Before you do this (quit to start your own company), consider FIRE -- financial independence, retire early. With a 500K salary look at reducing your expenses t

Before you do this (quit to start your own company), consider FIRE -- financial independence, retire early. With a 500K salary look at reducing your expenses to bare minimum for the next 2 - 5 years, and see if you can build up your investment portfolio to a couple million -- that would give you 80K a year (using a safe withdrawal rate of 4%) to live off of. (Remember that income from long-term investments is taxed at a lower rate, and no FICA is taken out either). That is more than enough if you move to the middle of the US. Of course, many people do FIRE at much lower, all depends on what you are willing to accept.