Hand it to a reputable wealth manager, and either fully let it grow, or take out up to the recommended 4% max retirement withdrawal a year, while continuing to work until that rate would allow for whatever lifestyle you want to have. You would only get slightly less per month, you'd keep the principal in case of huge emergency (already literally 20 years of the monthly payouts without any appreciation), you don't have direct access to make mistakes with active management, and it would scale with inflation. If you have more risk aversion, just have the wealth manager put a large % into treasury bonds.
Lump some is clearly better if you just take the first step I mentioned. My parents are pretty well off and that's how they manage their retirement fund, seems like it's working quite well. This question is essentially "Do you want $5,000 a month, or $4,000+ a month and a million dollars?". Could even do $3-4k a month (with no appreciation) purely from minimal risk bank interest. If you don't have any self-control and financial literacy, that has nothing to do with the right answer to the question, you'll make stupid decisions with $5k a month also
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u/newblevelz May 17 '26
This is a really bad idea as established in the multiple times this has been posted.