@nick220 I’m going to assume a few things here. You really don’t have THAT much money now, but assuming you play it right, you will in retirement. If you stay on track and avoid financial tragedies, you’ve already won and don’t need the headaches and burdens of risky investments. Crypto, options, and heavy investment into individual stocks should be out the window unless you want to sort of play around as a hobby with small sums of money. It sounds like property management should also be off your radar, and I agree. You’re still young, so some risk isn’t terrible. It’s pretty easy to find mutual funds with decent returns outside of an S&P500 index that can provide you with directed investment and managed risk.
I didn’t see you mention anywhere what you’re going to do after your retirement at age 41? If you aren’t planning to work, you really don’t have much money at all for 5 people for the rest of your lives, and your retirement accounts will take a huge hit if you need that money any time soon (I’ll assume you understand that). Stocks that produce high dividends could be a good option for you earlier in life than many others - someone already mentioned that with a pretty good reinvestment plan. Relatively low, but constant income to supplement your relatively low pension income could be necessary if you aren’t working.
Where are your IRAs? Go to that institution now, and start talking to an advisor and get a plan together to reduce your tax burden in retirement.
You said mostly Roth accounts which will benefit you greatly. Anything IRA-related not in Roth accounts can be converted to Roth, and doing so when your tax burden is low is best. Do this before your retirement accounts have millions in taxable money. Let’s say you want to buy a house in cash in retirement - if you want to withdraw $500k for a house from a traditional account, that’s a huge tax burden (just an example - maybe it’s a car for the kids or summer property). If all of your retirement accounts are Roth, this doesn’t really apply. Outside of the military, your taxable income may become too high for you to even contribute to Roth accounts, so keep this in mind.
I want to stress that with less than $200k/$1MM in taxable/retirement accounts, you really don’t need to pay someone to manage your money if your risk is relatively low. By retirement age, this may turn the other way. With 10 figures, it may be worth it to you to relieve yourself of the stress of money management and pay someone to do it. Very rich people do this all the time with advisors from major financial institutions. If you do this, shop around for a fiduciary who you trust and shares your values. The fees on managed accounts aren’t always too bad, and may be worth it to you.
The last morbid point I’ll make is that you need to plan on your death. You will have enough money that it will become pretty complex if you don’t have a plan. Make sure you have beneficiaries on your accounts and look into a will. $500 to a lawyer now could save your family a huge headache. If both you and your wife die tomorrow, have a plan ready to take care of financial issues until your children are old enough. Look into whether or not you need term life insurance - you and your wife may not deem it necessary, but it is pretty cheap while you’re young, and remember that your wife does not have a job and your children are not independent yet. Also remember that outsiders do very weird things when rich people die. If you don’t plan for your assets appropriately, estranged relatives and friends could show up in probate court with stories about how you promised them money or property. Even a simple will can put a quick stop to that sort of thing.
The biggest point I want to make is to stay away from stupid and/or high risk plays. You don’t need a get-rich-quick scheme to build generational wealth. Stay the course and protect what you have. Talk to a professional.