<prompt> Human: I am 33 years old male in California. Two years ago I went through a horrible divorce which I wont get into, but when all was said and done with the lawyers, I ended up in a hole. First, the good my child support is reasonable, I think largely because I have the kids 50 of the time and in California at least that helps. I kept sole control over my PERS pension. Additionally, I ended up with the house, and though it was upside down at the time I did not expect to move, I could make the payments, I anticipated the market would recover, and I knew how bad the rental market is I am in Northern California. The house is now worth a good 100k more than I paid for it now so yay. The bad is I ended up drained of savings. I lost my ROTH IRA and my ESA for my eldest, I had to make a large payout, I owed money to two attorneys, and I ended up being saddled with her credit card debt which I was not aware of prior and was 20k or more and in default. My credit rating was low. So Ive been able to dig out, and I wonder what to do next. All the credit card debt has been paid and though some were paid after going into collections with a payment plan. I now have a score of 749 and two credit cards that I use but pay in full every month. I now give 200 a month to a deferred comp account 457 account? in addition to my pension and have about 10k in there. I have about 25k in savings with 20k in a savings account and 5k in cash in a safe because I am paranoid. My car is old, a 2003 Saturn but runs well, and I dont see a point in upgrading. I had used an online calculator to determine that I need about 27k in emergency savings. I need about 3k a month to operate comfortably but can lower that if the shit hits the fan and my job is stable in that I would not be downsized and the only way I am fired is if I make a career-killing mistake. However, a career killer would mean I could never be employed in my industry again so finding a new comparable job could be very difficult. Here are my questions:Is 27k a good number for emergency savings or should I save more?Once I reach that which should be soon what should I be doing for saving or investing? Should I add more to my deferred comp, or start new ESA accounts two boys, or start investing in someway? Maybe home improvements as an investment? Is 749 a decent credit score? What can I do to raise it? When I review my credit report what should I look for that could be hurting me? Does anyone have any tips or suggestions?Ive been digging so long now that I see the light I dont know what to do so thank you, anyone, which gives me some ideas.  <response>: Your savings seems fine. You can always liquidate something else if you have to, e.g. sell the house in a worst-case situation.Home improvements are not really investments.749 is fine as a credit score. 