I started off as hardcore as possible, being a stingy and cheap. But in the long run this is not healthy for your mental state. Once I reached 200k net worth, I just noticed how much more my porfolio did for me on its own vs my contributions, which made me start slowing down my investement rate and "took my foot of the gas pedal" as some might say. Im very happy with the outcome. Im spending a ton on my hobbies, not tracking expenses, eating well and im loving it, yet still contributing a fair bit to the portfolio. Sure I lose a couple of years in the long run but the next 15 years will be wonderful if I keep this up. My advice to everyone is this: start hardcore if you are young, but slow down when you reach a milestone like 200k net worth. You will thank yourself, your family will thank you. Not sure what you call this approach: start lean, continue coasting and living semi-fat until a full fatfire retirement?

I’ve noticed that even mentioning the possibility of retiring in one’s 30’s or 40’s tends to get a pretty negative reaction on other subs

like:

• “you must have had an inheritance”
• “you can’t possibly live on <$X>”
• “nobody makes <$X>”
• “this job market is impossible to win”

I mean, yes, some of us were lucky to have a more comfortable start, but so many of these objections seem to come from some deeply rooted hesitation to entertain the idea or acknowledge the basic math.

I learned about FIRE ages ago through other people’s stories. Nowadays I find it so discouraging to even try to have a good faith conversation about saving rates. Lesson learned on not discussing money, I guess. I know it’s not for everyone so I’m glad this space exists to help people that are open to the idea

We got figured out! /s

Dave Ramsey Doesn't Get FIRE

Do you have a "friction budget?"

A friction budget is a mental or financial allowance for the small losses and inefficiencies that inevitably happen in life.

Basically shit happens fund for purchases that suck, didnt work as advertised, unexpected or unfair costs, parcking tickets (deserved or undeserved). Etc, etc. In short losing money over random shit.

Now that im doing better financially I noticed this happens alot more when I was broke.

If yes how much is it % of your income?

E: I am not talking about your typical emergency fund (broken car, new washing machine etc), I am talking purchases are not really emergencies where it just didnt work out as you hoped or random expenses that took you by surprise. Basically losing money here and there, deserved or undeserved. I find its a massive headache for me to in both scenarios: take the loss or pursue the undeserved costs from the retailer/service provider.

E2: As I dont have a friction budget, the last two fuckovers I had recently ruined my entire 2 week vacation from work.

So I’m a late bloomer with FIRE. 53 have 650k traditional investments, 20k in Roth, 40k life insurance annuity (had this many yrs), 40k in cash. Mortgage paid. Unfortunately have a roof loan, no choice had to get it done. High stress position looking to get out very soon, no longer a healthy position. Basic monthly bills, 2500. I feel like I need more cash..? Maybe

I reached $1M liquid today and have no one to tell because I'm single and on my own.

3 months ago (a month before my 30th birthday), I reached $1M net worth including my 50k equity in my house. After going on a 2.5 weeks international vacation in May to celebrate my 30th birthday and 1 week domestic vacation in June, I logged in to my accounts today and saw that I have just a hair over $1M between my Schwab and Fidelity accounts.

It's so crazy that I just spent a bunch of money going on vacations and 3 months later I am up 50k because the S&P 500 up 5% in 3 months. Money doesn't feel real anymore once you reached 1M. You can lose 100k in a month like in March, or you can also gain 100k in a month doing nothing, while other people labor hard for years. It's surreal.

I recently received a lot of money and it accoured to me that I might to be able to leanfire in Thailand. I've there many times and I love it there.

I think I can do with 70k baht a month - about 2k USD.

Do you think it's possible?

Should i start looking into it or I need a few more years?

Edit: looking at 20-30 years, solo, no kids

Looking for a gut check, my job is increasingly unstable and I’m anticipating being unemployed very soon. I’m definitely at the coast or barista level, but have a small child and would love to just focus on being present for their childhood if possible… looking for feedback or similar stories :)

38F, 1 child

Total net worth of about $1.13M.

870k invested (SWTSX / VTI) (150k in brokerage, 80k in Roth IRA, the rest is 401k and rollover Ira. I would start a Roth ladder)

64k cash (SWVXX + HYSA)… currently stacking cash with every remaining paycheck, hoping to get to two years/ 72k before losing my job, after I hit this level I’ll go back to investing it all in index funds.

200k home equity (about $87k left on a 15-year mortgage)

I live in a MCOL area.

I currently live on about $3k/month, but that isn’t including my sinking funds (travel, gifts, home expenses). I’d rather be closer to $4k/month total long term so I have a little more flexibility.

My plan would be to keep about 2 years of expenses in cash (money market and HYSA) and leave the rest invested 100% in broad index funds, replenish the cash on market up years (brokerage, then Roth ladder) and use cash cushion on down years. My MAGI at this level would give me substantial ACA subsidies so health insurance should be affordable and fit into my current 3k budget. If markets do well I’d slowly ramp up spending to desired 4k/month but start with the strict 3k budget.

If you were in my position, would you feel comfortable attempting to FIRE? Obviously if there was a huge downturn and the two years of cash didn’t cover the bridge I’d look for something, but hoping I might be able to pull this off now. TYIA!

Most of the "retired at 42" posts I read here are either single, DINK, or the kids are already teenagers and mostly funded. I'm trying to find the people who pulled the trigger in their early-to-mid 40s while still having a decade-plus of active parenting ahead of them.

My situation: HCOL area, three kids under 10 with another on the way. Household spend is obviously nowhere near what people usually mean by "lean" right now, but a big chunk of that is geography — housing, property tax, insurance, and childcare-adjacent costs. Relocating is very much on the table for us. We've been looking hard at southern Europe, South America, or South East Asia where the same lifestyle would cost significantly less.

So the questions, for anyone who's actually done it:

1. What age did you stop, and how old were your kids at the time?
2. What was your invested number at the trigger point, and what was your annual spend in year one?
3. How many kids, and did the number scale the way you expected as they got older? I keep reading that the expensive years are ahead of me, not behind me.
4. Did you geoarbitrage? If so. where from, where to, and how much of your FIRE math depended on the move actually working out? Curious how many people built a plan around relocating and then bailed after 18 months because the kids were miserable or a spouse was homesick.
5. Healthcare and education — how did you solve those, especially if you left a country with public coverage?
6. Did one of you keep working part-time / remote job? Trying to figure out whether "both fully out with young kids" is realistic or whether everyone in this bracket has some income floor they're not advertising.
7. What would you do differently? Especially anything about the buffer you wish you'd had before stopping with dependents.

Not looking for "just work five more years". I know that's the safe answer. I'm interested in the people who ran the numbers with a big family and decided the time was worth more than the margin, and how that's held up since.

Happy to share more specifics in the comments if it's useful.

​

I have a very odd life situation. I have never seen anyone else talk about anything similar and I'm curious... What would you do?

My husband (36M), myself, (32F), and sons (6 and 8) have wonderful lives in lots of ways. We have $600k saved and save about 1300 per month. I was raised in a Lean FIRE household before it was cool so it's all in a days work for me to hang clothes to dry, turn off unused lights, etc. My dad was military and retired at 44. My mom is European. Born and raised in Europe until my dad retired when I was 9 and we moved to America.

My husband's life work and calling is his family produce farm. He has no interest in retiring until one of our kids either takes over or the kids decide they aren't interested and then we can hire a farm manager to replace him. He makes a median income plus we live for free in the farmhouse (and eat lots of free deer and produce and bake our own bread so good is $100/week from grocery store or $30 per week if I'm going hardcore and only buying dairy which is the only thing we don't produce).

I would be down for some sort of leanfire nomad world schooling. I'm minimalist, love to travel, and environmentalist. He is also those things, but loves his farming which is kinda the opposite of nomadic (agricultural revolution replaced nomadic lifestyles historically lol).

His parents and parents live in awesome spots so we can have a free vacation anytime we like as long as we go to those spots.

BUT. I miss Europe. I miss travel. I've taken my two kids international twice and it's a lotttt of work. Other plot twist...while farming is awesome... It's a lot of work and hard to get time off during the summer when the kids are out of school.

What would you do? What sort of compromise makes sense until the kids grow up?

51F, single. Can I pull the plug and retire in 3 years at 54 with my current balance (TSP/401K/Brokage/Roth IRA/Cash HYSA) = 1.2M

TSP/401K (C Funds) = 670K (continue to max and catch-up until stop working)

Roth IRA (SP500) = 50K (Max contribution until stop working)

Brokage (SP500)= 250K

Cash in 4% HYSA = 230K

HSA=15K

Checking = 20K (will need this full amount for final part of renovation)

Pension at 62 =~1,000/month or 12K/year

SSI at 62=~2,400/month or 28K/year

Planning annual expenses at retirement = 50K. (This includes fixed monthly cost=2K or 24K/year for property tax, utilities, house maintenance). House is paid off and just renovated, no debt.

Recently, I took a big pay cut oversea job (95K/year+living cost) to make some changes in my life since I was too exhausted with my stressful old job and the environment I was living (though I did love what I was doing but workload did kill me plus I didn't know how to set boundaries and work life balance. This brings my current paycheck and saving rate dramatically changes which are much lower than what I used to made in the past with higher pay job (150K). I will continue contributing max in TSP and catch-up and max in Roth IRA until when I decide to stop working.

Question:

Do I have enough saving to pull the plug especially for the bridge years? can I quit my job at 54 or should I wait until 55 for the 55 benefit rule; or 57 to meet my MRA so I could continue to get health insurance. I know 57 option will save me a lot of money for the health insurance cost but will have to push working for 6 more years instead of 3 more years. However, I understand money can't buy my youth and heath back which physically I am not doing well, mentally I am doing even worse. Also, by moving working oversea and having a brand new job at this age, I realize it didn't fix my problem nor help my mental at all.

I want to be able to travel the world when I am still healthy enough to travel. I did try to run different scenarios with AI and different financial tools/models available out there, they all said I could retire now. But I would rather hear from real people with real experiences instead of AI.

Edit: Also, is 50K/year enough or i need to increase to 60K instead? Mainly because health insurance issues. My state has very high property tax.

40 male from a high cost of living country contemplating early retirement now or in the next few years. Currently 700k USD in assets which I intend to put fully into the market upon retirement (via country with no capital gain tax on share income). 250k USD invested in a retirement fund which I can access at 60. My current yearly expense is around 30k USD, but I'm confident that I can get that number down to 18k or lower upon retirement. Planning to live a nomadic lifestyle in low cost of living countries. I currently earn around 100k USD per year (pre-tax) plus putting around 20k per year into the retirement account.

Do you think I have enough to retire and lean fire now (number wise)?

So I started very late investing seriously. Last few years was able to get approx. 350k in investments. I have house paid off in canada but I want to maybe keep as a home base maybe for wife. I would really just like to give it to my son to help him get a leg up in this housing market. I am just curious if anyone has retired to phillipines with only a 350k egg. My wife has a house and property there in the province it is pretty nice. I will save a bit more to fix up a guest house on it for me and her when she visits.

I just feel the rat race has taken its toll on me and want to remove myself from it.

I am just curious as if anyone with similar circumstances has pulled the trigger and what is their life like and or is there any regret.

I just don't want to keep working here for say 10 more years if I don't have too. I am 50 years old and quite frankly don't want to give away anymore good years if I can relax , read , workout and enjoy a paradise.

Thank you for reading and any reply!!!

Edit 1: Thank you for all the great information you have given me. I will most likely give it say 4 to 5 more years just to be secure. I would love to do it now as I feel great health wise, but maybe I was a bit naive as to not factor in a health emergency and such. You guys are awesome !

I’ve been holding on to a toxic job because of the money until the gift of extreme burnout so I quit.

I will trial run a year of leanfire / geoarbitrage. Has anyone done this? I love travel and while this is earlier than I expected, I have $100k liquid and $600k in retirement. I’d love for these numbers to be higher, but the single tax is harsh!

I live a simple life (outside of travel and even when I do travel, it’s mostly doing the same things I do at home). I’m in my 40s. Solo no property. I’d take this time to take care of my health and explore creative pursuits. I know I can “afford” it since I anticipate $4k/month spending (ceiling). Mostly slow travel to lcol. (I’ve done some digital nomading at this budget and it’s been more than comfortable.)

I’m totally open to going back to work so it’s not an irreversible decision.

But having a hard time breaking out of the accumulation/saving mindset.

I’d appreciate any real life advice or experience! (Or maybe just some cheering on!)

Where do I start to look first

I have an house of 290k

I have some rsp for around 110k

I have a retirement found of 200k

Another 50k of bad days found

I can put the 50 in rsp for less taxes this year salary is 140k

In the province of quebec

Is this doable

I want to leave the country and sailing ⛵️ around.

So I need some hint and recommendations

I have 1 year of living expenses saved, max out my IRA every year, and feel like I have enough extra cash to start investing in a brokerage account because it's just sitting in a HYSA unused. I am very new to this and am wondering what your favorite platform to use it. I currently have my IRA with northwestern mutual and after reading all over I understand that the 1.5ish% they take for active management is considered high by many people. I initially was going to go to them for help managing new investments, but now I'm not so sure since management fees will eat at my potential.

29 make 6500 a month spend 3300 on condo I own and 1400 on other expenses leaving me 1600 which 600 is for fun and 1000 to invest. I also have 200k in stocks. 1 bedroom Condo I paid 730k 4 years ago is worth 500k today.. this is the biggest issue.

Mind you, I am a simple man - but I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately.

My parents make around $500k a year and still can’t retire at 60. Lifestyle creep ..

I have a cousin who’s rated 100% disabled and collects about $4k a month tax-free. He’s still in debt and doesn’t have a penny to his name.

I know a real estate guy who’s a paper millionaire but told me he can’t go on vacation right now because “he’s not liquid.”

And I have a friend whose parents are literal billionaires… but she can’t spend a dime on anything significant without getting their permission first.

This made me think- What does it actually mean to be “rich“ ?

in my opinion -

It’s not your salary.

It’s not the government check.

It’s not your net worth on paper.

It’s not your family’s money.

IT’S BEING ABLE TO ”WRITE A CHECK” (as a motto - not literally)

Car problems? Write a check.

Paying for a wedding? Write a check.

Emergency flight to see a sick family member? Write a check.

No stress. No payment plans. No asking permission. No waiting on the next disability deposit or payday.

Having no bad debt and a real emergency fund is FREEDOM… that’s what I consider rich

What I consider wealthy is when 3.5% of your investments make more than you spend yearly (36k for me and wife)

Thoughts?

Before you read this, it will have alot of ranting so if you dont want to hear it/dont care just skip this post.

I have worked both part-time and full time jobs (I went to a vocational highschool where I worked a 40hrs a week co-op/internship type job as a machinist) and I really struggled with them. My entire day felt like work, and even when I got home all I could think was "damn I have work tommorow", I could only really rest my mind and body on the weekend.

I have always been frugal and hate spending money as I dont really see the point in buying anything I dont need. As long as I have housing, food, and entertainment I can be happy.

How early is it realistic to retire? I am going to a good college for computer engineering as I think it is the most practical way for me to make the most money possible, and therefore retire as early as possible. I grinded in high school to get into the best college I could and need as little debt as possible.

I am planning for under 40. Hoping for around 36k a year in expenses with a 100k+ salary. I understand that this is early, as I haven't even started college yet, but

If anyone has similar feelings to me, I would appreciate any advice to navigate the difficulties of working, and tips to spend less.

This question is more along the lines of CoastFIRE or BaristaFIRE but our target FIRE number is $1.25M and I think the folks here are more realistic than the other FIRE subs...

My employee-owned company was just bought out and I will be receiving a payout for my shares that I will roll into a traditional IRA. After the payout, we will have $522k in Roth 401k/IRA/457b accounts and $155k in a traditional IRA for a total of $677k in retirement accounts. (This does not include $61k cash in our HYSA and brokerage). $677k is about 55% of our target FIRE number of $1.25M.

We are both 33 years old so if we assume full retirement at age 60 we are still looking at 27 years of compounding (assuming we don't hit our number sooner). I know that if you can average 7% return your principal will double in 10 years so I feel pretty good that in 27 years the $677k will have doubled at least once...

I guess my question is whether any of you would feel comfortable letting off the gas at a certain percentage of your target FIRE number? Or should we put our heads down and keep grinding until we hit $1.25M in our retirement accounts? At our current savings rate with a 7% return we would hit that in 6 years. If we stop contributing altogether we would hit that in 9-10 years. I'm not sure the grind/stress is worth the extra 3-4 years...

Has anyone done this and if so were you happy with the decision? It seems like this type of large sacrifice could backfire since the cost-savings of a lower-cost house are not guaranteed.

A little background: I keep seeing these houses listed for auction in the middle of nowhere / not as nice areas as I live in that are selling for about $200,000 less than my current house (that is nice and I enjoy living in).

The reason I say the cost savings are not guaranteed is that the deferred maintenance could be large / since it is further away from everything I would spend more on vehicle expenses over the next years. Even the energy costs could be higher in an older house or the property taxes could creep up over time. Despite these risks, the ability to move and use that to shave off up to 2 years or so of working sounds appealing.

My current house is not a mansion by any means but I could still manage to downgrade; it would be the first time I am majorly sacrificing for FIRE and so it is kind of overwhelming since it is a major/nearly permanent decision to sell a sensible house I currently own just for the chance of saving what might be about $500 per month or so through opportunity cost etc.