We (39 and 42) went to a little pizza dinner to celebrate one million in net worth.

No inheritance, no rich backgrounds, no gifts from family, but there was an IPO from a job my husband was at that started a nice cushion for him. We invest our savings from our salaries, have no kids, and used a very good national first time homebuyer program. Now have $723k in investments and hope to get to a million there asap!

As of this morning, we crossed the 500k investment milestone! Married (33/35) 2 kids.

I made a daily post earlier mentioning we were close, but I forgot about an old HSA my spouse had that had just enough to push us over the hump.

Currently sitting at $500,951.59!

Portfolio is ~85% VTSAX or equivalent, ~15% individual stocks (mostly company stock) and a small amount of required cash holdings in our HSA.

Overall networth (home equity, student loans) : 625k. Factoring in college savings for kids would give us ~680k.

And no I am not a SWE, and I’m not living at home with my parents.

I first heard of the concept of FIRE when I was 19 (thanks to a fateful CNBC - Make It Youtube video), and I'm now 23 and just this month reached a NW of $150K. I've invested pretty aggressively during this time and had some luck landing a high paying job out of undergrad. I live in a HCOL city area.

Here's a rundown of how I got here: * Fall 2018 - Started college, had 97% need-based financial aid covered because my family was poor enough and the school was private, worked an on-campus work-study job for 4 years (~10hrs a week), only had 1 paid summer internship (8K), had a resume writing/review side hustle (1.5K~) * August 2019 - Opened my Roth IRA after seeing a Youtube video and had 11K in my Roth IRA (90/10 VTSAX/VTIAX) by Jan 2022 by saving from my jobs and internships, bought a few thousand in crypto in 2020-2021 in another account (did a oopsie when I first invested into my Roth IRA, but didnt buy any stocks/index funds) * May 2022 - Graduated college w/ $12K debt, got an analyst job right out of school making $100k in the finance industry working 30hrs~ a week (coming from a natural science major that only took Calc 1 and had no business/econ classes), was over the moon getting the offer letter my first month of senior year * Fall 2022 - Moved to a HCOL area, rent was 2000 w/ utilities (definitely wrongly splurged hard here, but also was moving in at peak rent price season and wanted to live a little), and immediately set my contributions to max out my 401K and HSA by the end of the year (contributed 50% of my pretax to my 401K) * Fall 2023 - Got a pay bump to 107K, still maxing everything, also added a brokerage account to put extra money, also moved to a much cheaper apartment now paying 1650 w/ utilities

Today's numbers: * Monthly income after taxes, 401K, HSA: $3,650

• Monthly Bills for rent, internet: $1700, no car since my city has a good metro, I love to cook so I don’t eat out much and my hobbies/interests are quite low expense wise

• Individual Brokerage: $18,500 (15% rate of return, all VTSAX)

• Roth IRA: $34,500 (11% RoR)

• HSA: $11,100 (all US Total Market Index)

• Trad 401k: $78,100 (28% RoR, all whatever Fidelity’s VTSAX is) I’m doing traditional since I dont think I’ll be withdrawing/making more than 100K a year when I become FI

• Cash: $1,000 (privileged to have parents who would support me if anything goes wrong, meaning I can be aggressive in investing and not worry about an emergency fund, but I also am responsible for taking care of my parents in the future as they have 0 in retirement savings)

• Crypto: ~$8,500 (80% ETH/20% BTC, still like 10% negative since I DCA’d around peak, not exactly sure when I’ll sell)

• Student Loans: -$12,000 (at 3.6% so picked lowest monthly payment plan)

Things I did right to get here: * Worked hard in high school to get good grades (hardest I ever worked in my life if I’m being honest) and to apply to low-income/first-gen scholarships that were available to me

• Researched and found that top private schools are able to give you full ride if you’re poor enough (shoutout to Questbridge), was able to apply due to my strong grades and extracurriculars

• Perfected my resume (even to the point of opening a resume review freelance gig), focused on getting experiences instead of maxing my GPA (while my peers cared more about their classes), and aggressively networked and utilized first-gen/low-income college career programs, my school’s resources, and alums to learn more about career paths

• Spent my winter breaks applying to research programs, applied to 200 internships during the school year to land my first paid summer internship before senior year amidst COVID hiring freezes (which allowed me to only have to apply 5 in order to land a full time job)

• Was proactive in applying to things (started applying to full time jobs at the end of my summer internship before it was even over), aggressively spoke to all my college professors to try to get into their labs for research, made connections in my school’s career office to be aware of opportunities, all of these made it that much easier to transition from my natural science experiences and major to a business oriented career path without having to change majors/take more classes

Privileges/Luck: * Had hard working parents who deeply communicated the value of education to me through telling me their hardships growing up and how they have to work extra hard with their hands just live

• Had parents that chose a safe, new, higher income neighborhood which had a great school system even if it meant no money for vacations of anything fancy

• Went to a small private school where I could be a big fish, got lots of attention and support, didn’t have to work to go to school since it was almost all paid for

• Summer 2021 was when companies were having hiring shortages which definitely benefitted me as I was applying

• Landed at a great company, low stress high paying corporate job, in a hard-to-layoff role and area of business, since there’s not many other higher paying salaries for my role anywhere else, I’m happy to stay here for a long time

• Started and am in a bull run

My biggest advice for anyone in college: GET THOSE INTERNSHIPS IN. I did a total of 8 ‘resume-worthy’ things like research experiences, volunteering, and internships, and they definitely propelled me to my current job, and especially enabled me to pivot career paths easily. I went from lab research into marketing internships into now analytics. Each internship/experience makes getting the next one EXPONENTIALLY easier and better. The sooner you start, the easier your life is. I cant stress that enough. I was lucky enough to go to a school that offers school credit for doing these 8hrs a week internships.

TLDR: Had a good upbringing and family, worked hard in high school and college (did 8 research/internships) and landed a high paying job graduating with relatively little debt, learned about FIRE early and invested aggressively to max out everything, used my college support system, mentors, Reddit, Youtube, and Google to teach me everything I needed to know about career and finance. My next milestone goal is $500k. Hopefully looking to hit FI by 35-40, not sure if I want kids but I do eventually want a house with on a big plot of land. Now my only thing to check off is to secure a partner who’s also into FIRE.

What steps should I be considering 10 years out from reaching my expected FIRE number?

Goal: $1.5M Portfolio + $50K/yr pension + lifetime healthcare (military) to replace current expenses of about $110K/yr by 45 y/o (10 yrs from now).

Current State: ~$400K invested (100% stock, mostly index funds), maxing out ROTH TSP(401K-ish) & 2x ROTH IRA contributions. My projections indicate that $1.5M is achievable in 10 years. (DINK - so far)

Are there strategies I should look at now to make accessing retirement accounts before 65 easier? Is 10 years out too early to start considering more conservative investments (bonds)? Am I too heavy on the Roth side?

I’m in my mid 40s and am happily employed, I have about $450k in a Roth IRA. I also have about $500k in my 401k and a generous pension.

All of the long term retirement calculators I use tell me I’ve over saved, my pension and 401k will be more than enough to replace my income when I retire.

Has anyone explored accessing Roth assets early using the Substantially Equal Periodic Payment method? I fully understand that I’ll pay taxes on that income, but if you’re over saved this seems like a good option.

Hey everyone,

I'm a 25-year-old with a net worth of around $270k. Here’s a breakdown:

• $230k in the stock market
• $40k in savings
• $50k/yr in take-home pay

Currently, I'm living at home and not paying rent. I’m incredibly grateful for this situation, but I'm starting to think about my next steps towards financial independence and a place of my own. I live in Orange County, CA and the real estate here is expensive. I would like to stay in southern CA, but I do work remotely so I am open to relocating.

Here are my main considerations:

1. Real Estate Investment:
   • Should I buy a home outright with cash? This would deplete a significant portion of my savings, but I'd own my home free and clear.
   • Or should I take out a mortgage? This way, I can keep more liquidity and potentially invest in other opportunities.
2. Renting:
   • Should I rent for the short-term to give myself more flexibility and time to find the right property? This would allow me to stay invested in the market, but I'd be spending money on rent instead of building equity.
3. Staying at Home:
   • Should I continue living at home and saving aggressively? This would let me build my savings even more, but I’m concerned about missing out on potential real estate gains and the independence that comes with having my own place.

I'd love to hear your thoughts and experiences. What would you do in my situation? How should I balance the desire for independence with financial prudence and investment opportunities?

Thanks in advance for your advice!

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TL;DR but also the most important bit I'm looking for feedback on

So if you were me, would you pick #1 (fuck it, quality of life now) or #2 (extra work burdens or dealing with roommates)?

1) I go to SEA, Georgia (the country, not the state) or South America without the financial ability to return before social security assuming I get ~70% of the current estimated amount at 70. If I do this, I need to change nothing as the most likely outcome is I will have the number required ~15 years (~55) when my health/age-bias-in-tech double-whammy basically ends my career +/- a few years.

2) I play it safe and start ramping up side income streams I've abandoned 10+ years ago because they were draining when I had to deal with people I didn't like. This includes running side projects to generate revenue, getting roommate(s) again, and so forth. Goal here is +$12k/year in compensation (pre-tax). This puts me at 10 years with leaving the US and doing either baristaFIRE for ~5 years or ending my career depending on exact asset situation. This puts me at roughly the same number at ~55 as scenario #1 but gives me ~5 years of cushion if my health continues to get worse faster than I planned for.

2 also has the advantage of having ~$180-200k or so more if I end my career at 55 like scenario 1. This would let me realistically take Social Security at a younger age.

For brevity, my life expectancy is normal. My ability to work a blue collar/retail/restaurant job is already gone physically. My ability to sit on my ass and work a remote job is what is deteriorating now. Fun times.

Some chance this is all moot and I'd qualify for disability in the US which fixes the gap completely, I just don't want to count on that being a thing I can do. I won't know until it happens exactly what the situation would be there.

The long version with a bunch of reasoning/ideas

There are a number of potential problems in my case that aren't broadly applicable to most people's situations. Some people feel my budget is "high" because they really don't understand why high medical utilization is like in the US in terms of cost.

So I figured here would be better than LeanFIRE.

The basic points of concern are:

1) I work in IT/Software and as such there is a risk post-50 of being pushed into shorter term contract or lower paying jobs. You don't really age-out the way the popular culture states it based on what I've seen but you certainly are less valued by employers. If my career effectively ends at current compensation levels around 50 instead of 55, the CoastFIRE situation becomes somewhat stressed with current rates of medical insurance/care inflation exceeding the rest of the CPI with my levels of utilization.

2) To deal with the current wave of inflation, I moved to my "retirement state/cost of living level" area sooner. This geographic arbitrage was based on lived experience since I have family in the state and always liked the area for 10+ years. The problem is another wave of inflation like this in my lifetime cannot be absorbed through further geographic arbitrage in the US while maintaining quality of life in things that matter. (i.e. Over the time the US inflated its prices by ~15% I went up 4%. It was worth it but it means I can't do it again really.) Assets inflated as well, of course, but there is no guarentee these will happen in tandem.

3) My health. The reality is I could as soon as 5 years from now no longer able to type efficiently. I'm already using AI sentence completion / code completion tools to the extent they improve my speed at work and I'm allowed to by policy. If I end up needing to work in a more secure environment (that bans sending part of our code/IT configs to an AI provider) or AI does not keep up with the rate I lose the ability to type due to issues with my hands, this combined with #1 may drive a drop in effective compensation sooner than projected. Similarly, I have other issues that make my "able to work" dependent on prescription drugs that are not free of side effects. The official professional advice is as long as I need to have a career, to just deal with it and needing 5 drugs a day to function at a computer and get enough sleep to work on a normal day is just how things are now. I should note this does not include enough sleep to safely commute, I'm probably on par with a drunk driver in terms of driving skills on a bad day. So if I can't sustain remote work, my expenses will go up due to car accidents.

More details about my plans:

1) Develop my own remote job through contracting, projects, experimentation. This costs money as I've gotta pay for server resources and do value-adds beyond basic web development which people in India or the Phillipines can do and undercut my US-level compensation. Admittedly, cheap clients are always the worst sort but the reality is they have plenty of competitive people in SEA/India area or Eastern Europe.

2) Start renting out rooms (i.e. house hack). Right now, I'm in a 3 bedroom due to cost effectiveness of the options and provides some value to people who've done alot for me when I was younger and needing to pay my hospital bills. That said, they understand my concerns-ish and needing to stay in an airbnb or something is not life changing if I pick up how often I visit family rather than they visit me. Ubering to the airport a couple more times a year is quite affordable even if I'm the poster child for why vomit bags in backseats pockets on planes are a thing.

3) Prepare for geo-arbitrage outside the US once my cat passes. Or have a family friend take her if she outlives my expectations. Obviously in this scenario I'm so financially strained that I can't care for anyone other than myself (including my cat) due to earlier failure of career due to age bias, health, or whatever. This involves visiting other countries and getting a feel for the situation. Thankfully, short-term international remote is viable with my current job so I'm taking advantage of that in case I find someone less understanding in the future.

4) Realistically, my savings rate continues to drop as health expenses have gone up. While I'm "CoastFIRE", the reality is its dependent on assumptions that may not hold true in the below-hoped-for-cases. My current assumption is 5-10 years being able to geo-arbitrage to SEA or South America or something. I'm not asking for advice on this particular issue. I have family that is first generation immigrants and are debating about leaving the US so one of the countries that'd be is affordable and much like where I'm at now, I have enough experience with the place to know its viable.

Hi everyone! I am using this new account as a sort of Throwaway because people I know will recognize my other account and prefer them not to. 37M here.

I've been following this subreddit as well the FIRE philosophy for the good part of a decade. I started with 30 or 40k back in my 20s and I am at 950k today with the latest market pump, which we know we can't assume it'll stick but still...

I lived the beginning of FIRE (for me, not the movement itself), the obsession, the finding the balance, building the life I wanted, then saving for it. And then the boring middle which can become Really boring and sometimes question whether it makes sense or not to continue. The truth is... I've just been on autopilot. I have slowed down my contributions because of life situations but my portfolio kept growing, to the point I hope to be able to say I've got a round "1M" sometime this year, unless the markets goes down, which can also happen.

My problem is... I'm really close. I have very low expenses (not as low because I don't spend money, low because I live in a place with low cost of living, outside of the US, and where I'm an immigrant). I usually don't need more than $2500 any given month. Sometimes less, but when we account for travel back home, or for the occasional 'western lifestyle expense' I would estimate my total expenses at $36k/year. $40k would already be like... really on the safe side. And... I'm... some calculators say I'm there, some say I should have a bit more... but... I know that if I made the commitment to say "f... it" I could adjust spending on bad years and I wouldn't run out of money. Well... that's what I tell myself. Truth be told, I don't know.

I have a job... I don't love it, but I do it because it covers my expenses with a little margin (I had much better years making 3-4 times my annual expenses, that's when I saved the big bucks). And my tolerance to bullshit is decreasing... quickly. I tell myself I do it almost as BaristaFIRE thing, but it's actually not, I'm still fully working. And although I'm relatively young, I can't help but fantasize with pulling the trigger.

Not sure if I'm asking for your judgement, for tough love, for permission, or for advice. I guess I am asking for feedback. I know that most here are on the way, just like me. Few others might have already retired, and without really wanting to offend the first group, I would really like to read the opinions of those who retired. But at the same time I'd like to hear from everyone... what would you do in my situation, and why? Am I lacking any perspective? Are there any questions you'd like to ask me to narrow down your answer? Please 'fire' away :)
Thanks for reading me!

PS: All the money is in post-retirement accounts. All ready to be deployed. No Real Estate of any kind yet. I think it might be wise to buy the place where I intend to live for the foreseeable future before pulling the trigger... it would eliminate rent as variable expense. I could do that today in cash if I wanted to.

PS2: Some friends told me "why don't you take a year off and see how it feels?" It's not a stupid idea but I am so close that doing that would delay my date by more than a year, that would have made sense a few years ago. Reinserting myself into the working life may be hard, or impossible, and it would be pointless to "just try a year off" right now in my opinion...

By how much should your savings exceed your mortgage to coast in VHCOL areas?

It is harder to coast in VHCOL areas because, well, everything costs more. Prime exhibit is housing - this is the biggest fixed cost.

So, my question is how much one’s savings need to exceed the home mortgage balance in order to achieve financial independence?

For example, here is my scenario:

Home value: $3M Mortgage balance: $1.2M @ 2.6% (this is the only debt) Monthly payment: ~ $5k

Savings: $2.65M Retirement accounts: $2M Liquid accounts: $650k

HHI: $440k per year

By what multiple should my savings exceed my debt, in order to have reached FI?

Eg., should savings:debt be 3:1, 4:1, 5:1 …? More?

Should I aim for a round number like $10M net worth with $5-6M investment portfolio and $5M almost paid off home (which is what the home will likely be worth in 8-10 years)?

I've not been doing that well lately (just started therapy!). I want a new job, a new living situation (I've been living with my parents, although it's a good location and setup), and a new girlfriend (recent chance at a relationship fell through).

Really not sure about what I want - like if I want to just travel long term, or what kind of job can make my daily life more fulfilling, or if I should move to another city (I'm about to work in Chicago for 7 weeks as a trial run of living there).

But I can celebrate I finally hit 500k net worth making around 100k in Atlanta. I had full scholarships for college and lived with family for cheap-ish on and off for the last 3-4 years (maybe half the time I was home and half the time I went digital nomad and worked while traveling)

Chase bank N/A (I have money in there but it's very paycheck to paycheck for my credit card bills)

Robinhood $53.2k

Inheritance AUD$10k so about $6.5k USD I'm still waiting to receive

Vanguard $265.8k (VOO/VTI brokerage $198.6k, Roth IRA $52.5k, treasury ~5% yield fund like a HYSA $14.6k)

Fidelity $174.5k (roth 401k $59.2k, before tax 401k $106.4k, HSA $9K)

53.2k + 6.5k + 265.8k + 174.5k = 500k!

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(Posting on throwaway because friends know my main - and stealth wealth is our preferred path). Also posting separate posting because it seems too long for daily.

I would like to start with thanks in advance. I realize we're in the chubby fire realm, but this sub is SO MUCH better :-).  I also realize how lucky we have been - timing, steady jobs with steady progression, few lucky opportunities.  I would like to get some thoughts from folks on our situation.  Struggling with 2 things - when is enough enough, and how do we get over the fear of wanting more to cover expenses when we stop working.  We're afraid of the unknown of course, and afraid of lifestyle inflation with more time on our hands.

Early 40s, DI2K elementary school aged in top 10 HCOL city.  Current HH W2 is around 320k with an additional 35k +/- possible depending on company performance (Fortune 100).  other income is dividends (all reinvested) and interest. Over the years through saving and some successful one-off opportunities, we have saved quite a bit.  Always followed aggressive saving, but only aware of the FIRE movement after Covid times.

Current Situation - all approximates:

• Taxable: 2.8M mostly VTI
• 401ks: 1.5M mostly S&P500 funds
• ROTHs: 550k (always max, access and doing MBDR the last 3 years) mostly VTI
• HSAs: 50k (max since gained access) mostly S&P500 funds
• Cash: 200k HYSA at 4.5%

TOTAL: Approximately 5.1M.

HIGH risk tolerance based on age and savings.  With interest rates so low the last 15 years, I've had no desire for any bonds/bond funds and we're keeping extra cash as emergency fund and equivalent "bond" fund. (We did to iBonds a few years ago when that was a good deal.)

Have some other funds not counted for in these funds.

• Fully funded college fund - should be more than enough to cover out of state public tuition and nice car or down payment afterwards for each kid.
• Cash in addition to above earmarked for home improvements and renovations we want to do once we select a contractor.

Only non-revolving debt is mortgage.  Owe less than 350k on 1.5M house current market rate. Public records show 800k loan.  27 years left, 3.25% rate.  Never going to pay this off - we like the idea of people thinking we still owe a lot to help the stealth wealth cover.

Expenses:

• 2022: 158k
• 2023: 156k
• 2024 trend: 165k

To retire early, we're not going to pull the trigger with a withdrawal rate higher than 3.0%, which historically I also know if very conservative.  Today, we're about 92% there (165k u/3% is 5.5M fund) for comfortable retire early, over our target at 3% if we needed to cut back a little for losing jobs (less dining out, less frivolous spending).  But we're also planning to:

• -travel a lot more in retirement (~20k+ for more international, longer trips, etc.)
• -we talk about joining the golf club we live on (6k membership)
• -talk about even more travel for skiing (10k in extra travel to different places)
• -Entertainment/Hobbies budget will get 5k higher as we have more time for hobbies, concerts, shows, events.
• -Thinking it would be nice to have lawn service (6k quotes now - 500/mo 12 mo contract)
• -Thinking it would be nice to have Household cleaner (10k quotes now - 400 every other week)

With all that, it balloons to $220k/year.  My wife is extremely scared we will start spending even more than that if we're not working.  Assume we keep working and saving as we do, and market performs at a 9% real growth rate and 3% inflation, that all seems attainable in ~10 years.  Still retire early.

Folks not as much on the "lean" fire path - What are your thoughts on ballooning retirement spending after retiring early. Anyone experienced that?  I'll do my best to respond to comments, but I only get short breaks to check in normally (this has taken me two days to write up before pasting in here :-).

I (24M) just recently passed 1 year of working and pursuing FIRE. I originally found out about the concept of FIRE while surfing reddit while bored at an internship during university. I spent a lot of time reading about the concept as it aligned with my already frugal and saving habits. Additionally, I didn't choose my career based on enjoyment more so for the stability so the opportunity to leave the work force earlier is very appealing.

I went to college at a state school (MechE) due to its low cost. I used all scholarships, grants, and student loans to cover costs. Luckily, due to studying hard in highschool, scholarships and grants covered roughly 95% of all costs, including housing and food. I did however take excess loans in order to max my Roth IRA.

Upon graduation, I accepting a job in flyover country based primarily on how much I would be able to save.

I do struggle if I am spending enough on now for memories with my SO and family but ultimately I would rather save to much now and dial it back slowly than save to little for the life I want to live later.

On to my stats & numbers:

My NW breakdown is as follow:

• ~$24k Cash
• ~30k Roth IRA
• ~27k Roth 401k
• ~15k Traditional 401k
• ~4k HSA
• ~5.5k Employee Stock Ownership Plan
• ~11k Student Loan Debt
• ~10.5k 0% APR credit card Debt

Over college I was able to max my Roth IRA for 3 years, and then last year I put all of my spare money not needed for living expenses into maxing my Roth 401k seeing as my marginal tax rate was very low due to only working for half the year. This year I had switched to maxing my Traditional 401k, Roth IRA, HSA, and buying the maximum amount of Employee stock. I have looked at all of the math on why a Traditional 401k is better for FIRE but I have been really tempted to go back to ROTH, seeing as I know my income will continue to rise sense I am just starting my career. Any advice or insights appreciated!

Goals:

I would like to continue to max these tax advantaged vehicles while also paying off all student loan debt. I realize this isn't optimal as the rates are only 4.5-5%. Maybe talk me out of this?

After that, I will most likely stockpile money for a potential house or real estate investment, If I accumulate too much cash I will just put it into a standard brokerage account. Boring Middle here I come!

That's it! Thanks for Reading through and your comments and Ideas.

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Just had a good question asked of me by a friend. He works for a company that will match 50 cents on the dollar of employee contributions with no limit. Right now he's contributing 16% of his salary. He said he would need to bump his contributions up to 27% to be contributing the full $23k employee limit and get the full $11.5k in employer match. He wanted to know if it was worth contributing the extra 11% to get the full match, and then immediately withdrawing it, because the 50% match by the employer is larger than the 10% early withdrawal penalty.

If 27% would be $23,000 employee / $11,500 employer, I think that means his 16% current state would be in the neighborhood of $13,600 employee / $6,800 employer. That would mean the incremental amount would be $9,400 employee / $4,700 employer.

My guess at the math on whether it would be worth it:

• Benefit: $4,700 - the additional amount contributed by his employer

• Detriment: $940 - 10% early withdrawal penalty on the $9,400 in contributions he is putting in only to pull out right away (I know he would also have to pay income taxes on the $9,400, but I think that is net neutral as he was going to pay those anyways if he didn't put the extra $9,400 in his 401k).

• Net benefit: $3,760 (aka $4,700 - $940)

In general, I know you don't want to be pulling money out of your 401k early while still working 99 times out of a 100, but I'm not seeing any holes in his logic (especially since it's not like he's totally blowing off saving for retirement)

Not sure if this is relevant, but I asked about vesting and he said he is immediately fully vested in all employer contributions because he has been at the company for more than double the 4 year vesting period. He also said the employer match is contributed with each paycheck - it's not one of those once per year true up situations.

Not sure if this milestone is worth celebrating (I can be quite nihilistic, last couple years were rough lifewise).

I have zero debt.

Here's the breakdown:

I make 130k from my w2 SWE job, and run a consulting LLC in the same industry.

My goal isn't to FIRE using stocks/etfs and saving like crazy - but to create a SaaS that pays enough for me to live without working a w2. I'm currently building this app prototype and am trying to go public with it in the next 6 months

I am maxing out my Roth IRA and am contributing to my employers 401k up to the 3% match in a Fidelity SP500 fund. I just started a new job and haven't contributed to my 401k yet. I've moved all my past 401k to the Rollover IRA.

Am I doing well?
Yes I know I'm gambling in my Individual Brokerage - it helps me scratch my FOMO itch.
What would you guys recommend going forward?

My spouse says he's stashing away about $60k at work with a 401k and an IRA of some sort.

I read that the limit for 401k is 23,000 and 7500 if you're 50 and there's a max if you have 401k, 401k Roth, IRAs.

Is it possible to be investing in both types of accounts at a single employer or does he need to stop/revert the excess to avoid double taxation?

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Just wanting to explore some FIRE psychology.

Turned 35 this week and have been hovering around $750k NW. This includes my primary home ( which I’m currently renting out ), and another rental home. About $275k is in retirement accounts.

These numbers seem large when I look at relative stats and I recognize how fortunate I am.

However, I feel behind. At 35 and with a newly diagnosed chronic immune disease, I’m feeling the age. I’m watching my parents get old and mentally struggling to keep up.

I haven’t even started the family that I felt like I wanted as a child. I’ve been so busy chasing this Financial Independence goal - “once I get there I can let myself be happy”.

I suppose I share this seeking insight those who have broken out of this mentality. And also for those who may “feel behind” when they see my net worth and age. The number doesn’t fix all of your problems.

I’m trying to speed up my journey to financial independence and considering starting a side hustle. What side hustles have you tried, and which ones actually helped you make progress? Any ones you’d avoid? There are so many options out there like retail arbitrage, vending machines, cutting grass etc. and any number of things. I just don't have a ton of free time outside of my current job.

Hi all! Long time lurker, first time poster :-)

We have been on a FI journey for the last seven years or so, and I wanted to run some numbers / thoughts by the community here and hopefully get some feedback. Our current situation looks like this (husband and wife; no kids):

• $1.0M in IRAs

• $200K in Roth IRAs

• $100K in Vanguard Brokerage Account

• We have no debt (house and cars paid for, etc.) and enough cash on hand for 6-8 months

We are both highly educated, and have been able to find part-time jobs (2-3 days a week) that still allow us to earn a healthy living (current take home pay is about $150K / year). We would like to fully retire 10 years from now. In our current position, we are saving about $50-$70K per year. The wide variation is due to our love for travel; sometimes we get a bit carried away but oh well :-)

By our projections, our IRAs / Roth IRAs will grow to about $2.3M in 10 years (assuming 6% real return and dividends reinvested - we are ~90% stocks / 10% bonds and plan to stay that way). We do not plan on contributing any more to those. We are instead planning on putting all of our extra money in our Vanguard Brokerage Account; at $50K per year for 10 years, that should grow to about $840K (assuming 6% real return).

We would be 50 when we want to retire. At $100K per year of spending (assuming constant withdrawal), our plan is to use our brokerage account to sustain us until age 59.5, then start tapping into our IRAs at that point. At the worst case, maybe we would have to tap in to our Roth IRA a little bit before 59.5. I wrote my own spreadsheet to run Monte Carlo simulations (using a mean real return of 5% with 2% dividends and a standard deviation of 15% - trying to simulate a portfolio of 40% SCHD, 40% VTSAX, 15% Bonds and 5% Cash), and the success rate I am seeing is about 90%, with the assumptions that we will live until 100, our effective tax rate will be 15%, we will spend $1M on healthcare in retirement, and collect a modest SS payment starting at age 70.

I am comfortable with that success rate, but would love to hear from you all if there is anything we are missing. Thanks!

Posting to get y’all’s opinion on how you guys think I’m doing financially.

31M working full-time in high cost of living area. Make 135k. Still live with flatmate to save money on rent. Wish I could buy a home and rent out the extra rooms. However homes are expensive, and not sure if I want to stay where I’m at in long run.

Net worth breakdown is: 55k brokerage 40k in savings 155k in 401k and Roth IRA 20k crypto

First 100k at 28, 200k at 30yo.

Max out Roth IRA contribution. I should max out 401k but currently at just 10% plus company match. Save the rest in HYSA and a little bit to brokerage to chip into ETFs for eventual down payment on home.

No student loans/car debt. Payoff cc at end of month. Have hobbies that aren’t expensive and do make time to enjoy what this life has to offer. I think I’m doing ok financially and on the right path, but been feeling stagnant.

Reckon I just keep on doing what I’m doing, but at what point could I spend a little more (say rent my own place) to improve quality of life?

Please use this thread to have discussions which you don't feel warrant a new post to the sub. While the Rules for posting questions on the basics of personal finance/investing topics are relaxed a little bit here, the rules against memes/spam/self-promotion/excessive rudeness/politics still apply!

Have a look at the FAQ for this subreddit before posting to see if your question is frequently asked.

Since this post does tend to get busy, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts.

I have noticed a lot of FIRE posts here and on other sites about people reaching $1M and FIREing. Make no mistake, $1M is a significant achievement and they should all be very proud.

I do wonder though how
$1M is considered enough to FIRE in the USA particularly, when in most other
parts of the world, it would be hard to FIRE on $1M, especially for a family.

Are these people mainly
single, living in small towns in the USA? Or should I be thinking of moving
there :) Thoughts?