I’m 50 years old with $1 million in cash. What’s the ideal portfolio to retire by 60?

Quick Read

• The iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (TLT) offers a 4.29% annual yield and stands to benefit from ongoing interest rate cuts.

• A $1 million portfolio allocated 40% to TLT provides downside protection while allowing rebalancing into stocks during corrections.

• The proposed portfolio combines defensive holdings like TLT and consumer staples with 35% exposure to high-growth sectors including semiconductors and crypto.

• Some investors get rich while others struggle because they never learned there are two completely different strategies to building wealth. Don’t make the same mistake, learn about both here.

Retiring by your 60s looks harder by the day, considering the median net worth for a 50-year-old individual is ~$247,200. This was according to a 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances. Thus, if you have anywhere close to $1 million, you have a great head start that you can use wisely to retire by 50.

A Redditor found himself or herself in this exact situation. They asked for some portfolio ideas to achieve their goal of retiring by 60.

Now, if $1 million in cash is all they have, it can get a little problematic. However, it's much more likely that they already have a home and a source of income if they have this much saved up. We'll assume as such.

If you find yourself in the same or a similar boat, read on. We'll be looking into what can be done to meet that retirement goal in a smart way.

Cash is not king in the current environment

Don't let it sit idle

A million may look like a lot, but it is actually the minimum amount today. Retiring with anything below that will require you to cut corners and is quite risky. If you retire with, say, $700k and pull out 4%, that's $28k a year before Uncle Sam takes his slice.

After tax, you're looking at less than $2k a month. There's health insurance, car insurance, and you're unlikely to have enough for the nitty-gritty.

Now $1 million gets you $40k a year, but it's still not future-proof. Can that $40k survive an inflation wave like the one in 2022? In the next few decades, you're looking at multiple such inflation waves.

You need to invest and wait, preferably in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and stocks. Holding cash alone will erode your purchasing power.

Thankfully, the Redditor has one more decade on hand, and this gives them the leeway to a much more comfortable retirement.

The portfolio you need in the next decade

It must be able to survive a downturn, while taking advantage of an extended rally

History says a blended portfolio of low-cost ETFs plus a handful of proven companies beats every savings account, but the mix has to match the calendar. At 50, you should still care about growth, but you need to start putting more weight on safer stocks. A retirement portfolio needs shock absorbers. Otherwise, you face the sequence-of-returns risk phenomenon. That is, if a retiree's portfolio that faces a string of bad returns early on, it dents the chance that it will survive long-term.

If I were in the Redditor's shoes, I would position my portfolio defensively as of December 2025 due to how expensive stocks are today.

I'll have the most exposure to the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF (NASDAQ:TLT), allocating at least $400k here.

Why TLT?

TLT tracks the ICE U.S. Treasury 20+ Year Bond Index by holding a diversified portfolio of over 40 different U.S. government bond issues with remaining maturities of at least 20 years. You're essentially buying long-term U.S. government bonds, and you get a 4.29% annual dividend yield for it, distributed monthly.

The expense ratio is 0.15%, or $15 per $10,000.

TLT may look too passive, but you need to consider ongoing interest rate cuts and a near-term stock market correction that looks more likely by the day.

We're looking at another interest rate cut in December, and this will push up prices for high-yielding assets like TLT. This ETF is sitting at a discount today due to aggressive interest rate hikes over the past years, but with sustained rate cuts, you can easily get more upside from here alongside the yield. In short, TLT is a recession-proof safe haven with a yield that is ahead of inflation.

When the stocks do go through a correction, you can quickly reduce your exposure to TLT and buy them at a discount.

What I'll do with the rest

A good way to strike a balance between growth and safety is to lean into both

I would adopt a barbell strategy with the remaining money.

ETF

Allocated $

Purpose

Amplify CWP Enhanced Dividend Income ETF (NYSEARCA:DIVO)

$150k

Dividend yield plus stable long-term upside

SPDR Gold Trust (NYSEARCA:GLD)

$50k

Gold exposure with aggressive gains and defense

Vanguard Consumer Staples Index Fund ETF (NYSEARCA:VDC)

$50k

Exposure to the stable consumer staples sector

These three, plus the TLT stake, can weather very punishing recessions.

The DIVO ETF gets you a 4.55% yield, paid monthly. The 5-year total return is excellent at 81.33%. The GLD ETF gets you gold exposure, with the ETF rising 139.54% in just the past three years, and is an essential hedge today. The VDC ETF invests in consumer staples. It gets you a small 2.2% yield. The upside performance isn't great, but the downside protection is almost unparalleled.

With the "safety" portion of the portfolio covered, I would look into the following:

ETF

 Allocated $

Purpose

iShares Semiconductor ETF (NASDAQ:SOXX)

$100k

AI chips + quantum computing exposure

Roundhill Magnificent Seven ETF (BATS:MAGS)

$100k

AI software and cloud computing exposure

Global X Aging Population ETF (NASDAQ:AGNG)

$50k

Healthcare, biotech, and insurance exposure

Global X US Infrastructure Development ETF (BATS:PAVE)

$50k

"Satellite holding" with exposure to many manufacturing and infrastructure stocks

iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (NASDAQ:IBIT)

$50k

Crypto exposure

The above high-growth and speculative picks will constitute 35% of your portfolio. 25% is going to defensive ETFs with moderate growth, with 40% sitting in high-yield long-term bonds.

Should the stock market undergo a significant correction in the near term, I wouldn't hesitate to back up the truck and bring that TLT exposure down to a floor of 25%. But in the current environment, the above portfolio is great for a 50-year-old with $1 million in cash.

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