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I think you guys actually convinced me to do something a bit "daring" for me with the emergency savings vs investing talk.
We keep 6 months of "bills" in emergency savings (doing nothing). We had LOTS of home maintenance repairs this year ($35k to be exact!) so we have worked on building back up to 6 months while contributing barely anything to my wife's ROTH IRA. But I realize I also cannot go back and contribute to this ROTH years later. If I don't max it this year, I can't make that up in the future. I think I'm willing to drop our emergency savings fund to roughly 4-5 months of expenses to max my wife's ROTH IRA.
1. I have a job where I would literally not be out of work if I got laid off. I could land a job the same day.
2. We are at a point in our lives where we are making the LEAST amount of money we will ever make. My wife works 10-15 hours a week at a minimum wage job while our 3.5 year old is in preschool. Once he's in school full-time, she will be getting a full-time job and our income stream will be much better, and we aren't that far away from this happening.
3. A ROTH can technically be used in an emergency as contributions can be withdrawn tax/penalty free at any time.
Thank you CP for showing me the light.
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