10 ms·

Tech workers who are engineering a mid-30s retirement

103 points by kawera 9y ago

moonka 9y ago
>After projecting their monthly cost of living, the Rooses determined they’d need $300,000 in investments to be able to live off the dividends. What sort of dividends are they receiving? 10% would give you 30K a year, and seems pretty optimistic for planning.
- driverdan 9y ago
  Especially considering insurance in the US can easily cost over $1000/m for a family.
  - deleted 9y ago
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  - desas 9y ago
    Well they planned on location arbitrage, non-employer health insurance makes the US pretty expensive.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  Most people target 4% withdrawals if you want to live off the nest egg in perpituity, which in this case, would be $12k/year. Less safe investments would earn you a higher return at the risk of sacrificing principal. Edit: Something important to note is that you can live very well in other countries for what would be considered the poverty floor in the US. For $2k/month, I can pay for a very nice luxury apartment, day camp, and a nanny for my kids in parts of South America.
  - bryanlarsen 9y ago
    Is that 4% before or after inflation? A 4% real return (aka 7% if inflation is 3%) already requires quite risky investments.
    - desas 9y ago
      S&P500 90 year average is 9.8%. people FIREing typically have nearly all their money invested in low cost index funds.
      - bryanlarsen 9y ago
        And one of those years the return was -37%. Not a safe return.
        Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
        9.8% is not a safe return, no, which is why the safe return is about 7%. The worst-performing 30-year period averaged around 7%, which is what the 4% withdraw rate is calculated from (accounting for inflation). Obviously anything can happen, the world could end, whatever; there's no truly 'safe' option. But it's reasonable.
        bryanlarsen 9y ago
        It does assume the continuation of American exceptionalism. I believe that a better benchmark would be a basket of stock markets rather than just the S&P 500. That basket would be dominated by the S&P 500 so it wouldn't change things too drastically, but it would pull that number down somewhat.
      - badpun 9y ago
        You know what they say in the fine print - past performance is not a guarantee of future results...
    - otoburb 9y ago
      The 4% safe withdrawal rate usually refers to the net return. To your point, in today's interest rate environment that would mean aiming for >7%+ returns.
    - deleted 9y ago
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  - otoburb 9y ago
    Also, it seemed that the couple were willing to move to a lower cost of living location/country so their safe withdrawal rate would take them further. I don't think children were factored into the base equation, although it's entirely possible one or both of them could work part-time to augment income during child-rearing years.
  - LusoTycoon 9y ago
    That money gets you a good life anywhere, except for US and some big capitals/tech cities.
  - avip 9y ago
    Ah... no, you can't. You just think you can, because you've never tried. I've actually lived off that magical 2K number with my family in a (large city in a) 3rd world country. It was edgy, we hardly broke even every month, and any 1-time event (s.a medical) was covered from savings. Maybe if you go super rural you can pull that off. Keep us posted!
    - toomuchtodo 9y ago
      I know a family who has been doing it for 10+ years, and they publish their budget online. It can be done! With that said, our actual income will be ~7x our budget, so there’s plenty of cushion.
- bhaak 9y ago
  It is a pretty tight budget. Although they plan to "roam the world". There are a lot of cheap places all over the world. But the key word in "never have to work again" is "have". Removing the need to work and only do so when you want to must be a liberating experience.
- mayniac 9y ago
  Next sentence: >Within two years, they plan to hit this “magic number,” after which they’ll quit their jobs and roam the world. If you stick to cheap areas like SE Asia and Central Africa then you don't need half of that. Throw in couch surfing or buying a van to live in and you can spend a lot, lot less.
  - otoburb 9y ago
    FIRE couples need to ensure that they don't get lonely, and should spend more of their available time cultivating their network as they traipse around the world. For some, it's easy to form and maintain relationships wherever they land, but I find this dimension often missing from the analysis because it's so far into the future.
- conanbatt 9y ago
  Yeah I dont see that either, maybe you can retire in Costa rica or something but its still cutting it close.
navs 9y ago
How does one go from online marketing to an engineer at a big data company, earning $180,000 a year? Was he just that good at marketing himself?
- deleted 9y ago
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- chasd00 9y ago
  he probably doesn't know everything there is to know about engineering big data but, instead, knows everything there is to know about applying it to a business case. Create more than $180k of value each year and companies will fall over themselves to pay you $180k for your contribution.
- praneshp 9y ago
  What toomuchtodo said. I have some awesome colleagues that joined in a less technical role, then transitioned over to dev work.
- FLUX-YOU 9y ago
  This article is too light on details to speculate well, but it's entirely possible he already had good engineering skills and just happened to be doing something else for the article's starting point. It's also possible he just knew someone and writes zero code and the engineer title is bogus.
- ithinkinstereo 9y ago
  Data "scientist", i.e., knows R, basic SQL, and maybe some light JS, and has experience creating nice visualizations in Tableau, etc. These are skills any business analyst with a good working knowledge in Excel and statistics can learn in a couple of years. Coming from a marketing background, he probably also helps run A/B testing and funnel/conversion/UI optimizations.
ahelwer 9y ago
Everyone tosses around a 4% safe real withdrawal rate (SWR), but that number is just a starting point. The Trinity study was for a 30-year period where success was defined as ending with a non-negative account balance. If you're retiring at 30, you're probably looking at a 40-60 year time period and want to avoid sliding into the grave just as your account balance hits zero. Here is an in-depth analysis which seems to recommend a 3.25-3.5% SWR instead: https://earlyretirementnow.com/2016/12/07/the-ultimate-guide-to-safe-withdrawal-rates-part-1-intro/ https://earlyretirementnow.com/2016/12/07/the-ultimate-guide... Of course, many software engineers will continue to mess around with tech after retirement; if you follow your interest into extremely niche domains, the option of irregular highly-specialized consulting gigs becomes available. This income stream, while not consistent enough to live off by itself, proves formidable in conjunction with retirement-level investments and enables a much higher SWR.
- FLUX-YOU 9y ago
  Do consultants not get "You've not been working for the past X months/years, how should we trust you've been keeping pace in tech?"
  - learc83 9y ago
    When you're a consultant no one really expects you to provide a resume with a complete accounting of what you've been doing. It's more of, I worked for clients x,y, and z on projects a, b, and c. Here are the results I got for them.
    - busterarm 9y ago
      Turns out, positioning yourself this way pays huge dividends when looking for full-time employment as well!
  - ahelwer 9y ago
    When I say extremely niche, I mean extremely niche. Not the sort of thing you get by cold-calling some corporate entity. Maybe you become involved and well-known in an obscure technical field at the margins of economic feasibility. Eventually you run into someone who holds the purse strings at some organization who is interested in that field. You work together a bit, and eventually ask whether they'd want to pay you for a one-off trial project using the technology. Stuff like that.
ssalazars 9y ago
> "Daniel Imberman, a 26-year-old software engineer, drifts toward this pole, though he rejects the FIRE label (“sounds like classic tech-douche”). His target is $15 million." How long do you think it'll take him to reach his goal? He talks about starting a start-up, selling or profiting, but all of that take a lot of work. And even then there's no guarantee his plan will work. Saving 15M will probably take a developer anywhere from 10-20 years? Or am I very wrong?
- otoburb 9y ago
  >>Like many other aspiring early retirees, Daniel also made lucky investments in cryptocurrency. “The crypto lottery forwarded my timetable by five, ten years.” He also got very lucky. Assuming no cryptocurrency optionality, even if it took him up to 25 years to diligently save and invest, ceteris paribus he would still be able to retire around age 50. The only catch is that family formation can be quite expensive unless you get extremely lucky and find a life-long partner who shares the same frugal mentality. Finding said partner is much, much harder than it sounds.
- bradlys 9y ago
  I get that some developers at big companies make $600k+/yr but saving $15,000,000 over even 25 years requires putting away 15m/25 => $600k/yr. That's net income to be put away too. So, really you're probably making $1m/yr. I get you'll see return on investment over those 25 years but we're talking true 1% income regardless - which most software devs will never get near. (Even most in the bay area)
  - dgacmu 9y ago
    You're way undercounting the effects of growth. It's 342k/year saved at 8% growth: http://www.angio.net/finance/calc.html http://www.angio.net/finance/calc.html (See the one for regular contribution required for target). 8% before inflation is reasonable historically for 25 years. You still need a 400k+ salary to do it, but that's not out of reach in the Bay area, particularly for a couple.
    - 9y ago
rb808 9y ago
Am I just grumpy or is it fair that if you're lucky enough to be healthy and skilled you should still be spending your time working to contribute to the world and/or paying taxes, rather than just travelling around and having fun. Now maybe they plan to travel to work elsewhere to help people poorer than themselves but I doubt it. I'm presuming if they aren't American so if they get cancer or something they can return to Australia or wherever and sponge of the working taxpayers to pay for them.
- LUmBULtERA 9y ago
  Yes, you're just grumpy.
- kriffo 9y ago
  Yeah, you're definitely grumpy.
- RestlessMind 9y ago
  Don't worry, you are not grumpy. But you are worrying a little too much since this is just a very small (and hence negligible) problem. If too many young / healthy / smart / educated people were to start doing this, society will adjust and pass new laws and regulations, which will force such folks to work or at least ensure that they don't mooch off the system (esp. free healthcare).
- kpennell 9y ago
  I agree they should be contributing.
- DennisP 9y ago
  In most countries you pay taxes on your dividends and capital gains. Post-retirement plans mentioned by other people in the article: musician, angel investor, homeschool the kids, start a philanthropic enterprise.
- smokes 9y ago
  Hmm, no. Why are you putting this "forced charity work" condition on it? Someone who retires early has saved enough to live on their investments. That's no different from someone with a trust fund, but the difference is that they earned it. Think of it this way; if you won the lottery tomorrow, would it be a better contribution to your community to keep working in order to pay taxes, or retire so that someone who needs your job to live and support their family can do it instead?
mkendrick 9y ago
I have a similar opinion to the early retirement movement as DHH [0]: > One of the other underlying pillars of this dream was the concept of Never Having To Work Again. Like somehow an eternity of leisure was going to provide the existential bliss I had been longing for all along. I thought about that a lot. I did all the math: Hey, if I stuff all the money in a prudent mix of stock and bonds, I should be able to live a comfortable, if not extravagant, lifestyle until the end of my days without lifting another finger. > [...] What kept moving the needle, though, was programming Ruby, building Basecamp, writing for Signal v Noise, taking pictures, and enjoying all the same avenues of learning and entertainment my already privileged lifestyle had afforded me for years in advance. Or PG, even [1]: > If you work hard at being a bond trader for ten years, thinking that you'll quit and write novels when you have enough money, what happens when you quit and then discover that you don't actually like writing novels? Why would I live frugally and work at a job I dislike for a considerable chunk of my best years just so that I can then live frugally and have no idea what else to do? (if I didn't dislike it, I wouldn't want to stop doing it). [0] https://m.signalvnoise.com/the-day-i-became-a-millionaire-55d7dc4d8293 https://m.signalvnoise.com/the-day-i-became-a-millionaire-55... [1] http://www.paulgraham.com/love.html http://www.paulgraham.com/love.html
- yobrien 9y ago
  One of the tenants of FIRE that I hear is "create the life you want to live, then save for it". Nobody is saying to not try writing novels in spare time during career!
fhood 9y ago
Ok, let me make sure I understand. The goal is to live extremely frugally while you work so that you can retire very early and continue to live extremely frugally? Why? I don't hate working, and it allows me to fund my hobbies. If I wanted more free time I would just quit and do my own thing for a year. And many of my friends from college have done that. Maybe saving for retirement is the point. And the fun comes from attempting to accomplish that. I can understand, and thus respect that.
- DarkTree 9y ago
  > I don't hate working You answered your own question right away. Apparently, these people hate working more than they like being less frugal. I've had to be frugal to get by and it does become sort of like a game, where you are always trying to optimize your savings and tradeoffs. However, the stress involved with making these decisions and worrying about money made me appreciate working and making a good income, and I prefer this balance for now.
  - JacobAldridge 9y ago
    There's definitely a big difference between being frugal to get by (stressful) and doing it to hit a 60% savings rate (ie, it's arbitrary). When you have the choice, frugal is much easier - or put differenty, it's expensive to be poor. You're spot on about balance being key.
- wsinks 9y ago
  I believe in the rap game this magic number is called "Fuck You Money". It means freedom from a lot of things.
- 3pt14159 9y ago
  Because some people have skills that don't easily translate to happy job environments and they'd rather do things like tend a small veggie garden and teach their kids how to fish after they come home from school than clock another 65 hours balancing a spreadsheet for a hedge fund.
- ahelwer 9y ago
pm90 9y ago
> One software engineer wanted to hit $1 million so she could home-school her future children; another man, who hadn’t bought new sneakers in eight years thanks to Nike’s generous exchange policy, wanted to found a philanthropic enterprise. “I’m not sure,” another person said. Google, his employer, offered sweet perks. “It’s a great 9-to-5, but I want to see what I could do if I got those 45 waking hours per week back.” Yeah, no fucking way. Perhaps it makes sense if you don't like working very much. I tend to generally enjoy the work that I do, and love that I can use the money that I make to live in a nice house, to eat at nice restaurants, to travel wherever and save for retirement as well. At a time when most people in this country (US) are facing stagnant or decreasing wages, working in Tech seems to be an unbelievable luxury.
supercanuck 9y ago
>Like many other aspiring early retirees, Daniel also made lucky investments in cryptocurrency. “The crypto lottery forwarded my timetable by five, ten years.” ...makes complete sense now.
0wl3x 9y ago
How many people actually do this vs talk about doing it? I know Mr. Money Mustache is super popular and generally the tenets are a great idea, but I certainly don't know anyone my age (early 20s) who has become a proponent of these ideas. It seems a bit too extreme for my tastes. Why not just get a job you like, save enough that work is optional and enjoy your day to day?
- bhaak 9y ago
  That's the FI (financial independence) part of FIRE. The retire early part is optional for many that are pursuing this goal. There's an active community on Reddit at https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/ https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/ One point that often comes up is that people shut their mouth about FIRE because if they bring it up, the reaction is often negative. There might be several people you know working towards FIRE but they don't evangelize it.
- mark212 9y ago
  it's that middle bit that seems to cause all the consternation: "Save enough that work is optional". It also could be (and I don't mean to sound like an old grump or condescend so apologies in advance) that people in their early 20s haven't been soured on employment sufficiently yet. I was much more idealistic and had a greater tolerance for work-related BS when I was in my early 20s. I'm nearly 50 now and after being burned several times I made a vow to myself never to be dependent on anyone else again. Even if you work for an incredibly well-funded company, that doesn't mean some dweeb with an MBA in some office in another city / state / country won't wake up one day and decide to wipe our your entire division just because she needs to make a bigger bonus. I've seen pensions disappear overnight, industries collapse quicker than anyone ever thought, and vibrant cities crumble when big employers shut their doors. Painful and stressful in the extreme. I've also blown $10k on something stupid instead of buying another bunch of Apple stock, reasoning that I'd make it up later in life easily enough. That was 1997. The $10k would be well over $1 million now. The biggest thing to learn is that money doesn't equal happiness. That, for me, is the repeated lesson of MMM and related authors. Freedom to make decisions without reference to finances is a massive, amazing thing.
aresant 9y ago
I respect the fire movement - principally the frugality and minimalist component. But I am genuinely interested to see what happens the next time the market crashes - very easy to be pragmatic about pulling your 4.5% while skies are blue.
- whytaka 9y ago
  They'll probably get jobs again.
silveroriole 9y ago
Blimey, all very well if you live in the US and earn a six figure salary (and want to live ridiculously frugally). In the UK I don’t think I know a single person earning that much.
- JacobAldridge 9y ago
  Interesting. Just finished running a conference in Australia, and was having a beer at the end of the day with one of the UK guys talking about how many of his team and network were making early to mid six figures GBP. I only lived in London for a couple of years, but also knew a few. Most were 45+ years old and "financially independent", although they wouldn't have thought about it in FIRE terms because their idea of independence was pursuing interesting careers choices rather than retiring early. (Which is largely my plan as well.)
wintorez 9y ago
If you hate your job so much that you think about retiring at mid-30, maybe you should consider changing profession. If you love what you do, you don't have to work a single day in your life.
- deleted 9y ago
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satysin 9y ago
The following is my little story of how I "retired" young. I am 34 and "retired" 8 years ago. I still do some consultancy now and then to keep my brain active and up to date with how things are done in the "real world". Money isn't a big factor for me as I have enough for everything I want. I don't have any expensive interests, I don't care about owning a high-end car or a huge house, etc. I live in West London (technically Surrey) which is kind of expensive but I am comfortable. I was lucky more than anything being able to give up work in my mid-twenties though. I got some inheritance, I had a decent job that paid well, I sold my house a few months before the 2008 crash, etc. With some long term investments and a simple lifestyle I realised I didn't need to work not long after I separated from my wife. As I wasn't really enjoying life much after my divorce I ended up quitting my job and living with family for a year while I "found myself". I met my partner and we had a son who turned five a few months ago. My partner still works but doesn't earn a huge salary, we could live with her not working but she enjoys what she does and I suspect we would kill each other if we spent 24 hours a day together so it works out well imho. I have enjoyed almost every minute of being "retired" so far. I usually just say I am a stay at home dad as saying you retired in your twenties is a bit pompous sounding I feel. Now my son is at school I am toying with the idea of doing more consultancy but I also don't want to make a big commitment to a large project plus we are currently looking into moving to France to be closer to my partners family. Out initial calculations show living in France will be about 15% cheaper than where we currently live (mostly due to living in West London). Maybe France will bring some different consultancy options that will take my interest. Not entirely sure why I posted this comment if I am honest. I guess to see if there are other early retirees here who might want to chime in with their experiences to add to mine? Feel free to ask me any questions. I am happy to answer if I can. Also if anyone has any [technical/general] project management questions feel free to drop me a message (username @gmail.com forwards to my personal email).
- fhood 9y ago
  Did you set out with the goal of early retirement? Or were you just relatively frugal, and at some point realized it was possible? It seems like you owned a house at age 24 which is pretty unusual.
songzme 9y ago
After college, I paid $800/mo and lived modestly to save up money in SF. Two years later, I bought my first house in Berkeley and moved in. The tax savings from mortgage interest helps save alot of money. We rented out 2 remaining rooms that we are not using and it helped cover the mortgage. (Starting out, I made around 100k and saved around 50-60k/year) 2 years after that, my gf (at the time) and I pooled our money to buy a house in south SF. 2 years after that, my mom and I bought a 3 unit run-down place in Oakland and fixed it up. 6 years after college, I have rental income coming in around 13k / month and I quit my job. No need to move to a new/cheaper location, 13k / month is plenty for bay area. Now, I run a nonprofit to help people in the bay area community learn how to code (we focus on low income workers and we pay them to quit their jobs so they can learn how to code full time). Looking back, the best thing I did for myself is to refrain from living extravagantly. Its an easy trap once you start making 200k/year. With that much money, its easy to think that you deserve a nice car, impress girls, and get stuck in the mindset of always getting the best, which not only drains your financial resources quickly, but also creates an internal emptiness. Reuse old cars, cook at home, host modest dinner parties in your own place with friends/coworkers instead of going to bars. You will save alot of money. Also, (I could write a whole blog about this), time capping your time at every company to 1-2 years helps you cut through political bullshit (huge time sink) and focus on impact. Plus, sign-on bonuses every year boosts your income significantly.
- mistursinistur 9y ago
  > I bought my first house in Berkeley > rented out 2 remaining rooms > buy a house in south SF > my mom and I bought a 3 unit run-down place in Oakland and fixed it up > rental income coming in around 13k / month > Looking back, the best thing I did for myself is to refrain from living extravagantly Surprising! Sounds like the best thing that happened in this story was partnering with other wealthy people to engage in leveraged speculation on Bay Area real estate.
  - mark212 9y ago
    Maybe financially, but in the long run the best thing that he/she learned was that spending money doesn't lead to increased happiness. Stated differently, the same level of happiness can be reached at far lower financial cost. Even financially, that may be the more valuable learning.
decebalus1 9y ago
⌘+f 'health', ⌘+f 'insurance' - no hits. All this talk about retiring early when living frugally is a bunch of horseshit. It's 'Fuck you money' or bust. - Completely counterproductive to live frugally in order to retire early so that you can continue living frugally without working for 'the man' - if you really want independence from your employer, it needs to be complete independence. Not the independence that risks bankrupting you whenever you or your family have a serious health condition - 'Mr. Money Mustache' is so full of crap sometimes, I wonder if I'm reading /r/frugal_jerk and people often forget that 'Mr. Money Mustache' is a business in itself with different incentives than solely teaching you how to 'game the system' and 'escape the ratrace' - sometimes the frugal part takes up so much time and energy it's counterproductive to go that way when you're really well paid. Not to mention the decrease in quality of life After decades in this business, if you want a happy semi-independent life the following advice is what I can think of: - work on yourself, cultivate your craft, become a specialist so that you call the shots whenever you need to change jobs and afford to pick jobs allowing you to work on what you really want - work on side-projects and constantly learn new stuff. If you manage to get a passive income stream, good for you but don't necessarily make it a life goal - screw corporate loyalty. Change jobs every 3-4 years, you'll learn way more and your income will be miles ahead of your former colleagues - don't buy stupid shit you can't afford (including but not limited to: fancy cars, McMansions, travel for the sake of traveling, etc..) unless they are a central part of your existence - follow some basic money management rules (max out retirement funds, keep emergency cash while investing your savings, etc..) - keep good work life balance constantly so that you don't get burned out or daydream about your early retirement
- justherefortart 9y ago
  Put your assets in a trust, if you go bankrupt personally, it's irrelevant. Once my companies valuations + my net assets hit my magic number, I'll use my estate tax exemption and move 100% of it into a trust. I will agree though, working for yourself is fantastic if you can afford to do so.
  - billmalarky 9y ago
    >Put your assets in a trust, if you go bankrupt personally, it's irrelevant. Can you extrapolate on this? The more detail the better.
deleted 9y ago
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troubledworker 9y ago
I made a throwaway account. I wouldn't want to be found out be potential employers. I would want to do this, but I am in The Netherlands where health care is amazing, but the salaries are more modest in terms of absolute value. How would you go about a country like The Netherlands? I don't like working for someone else or when someone else says what I should do, in most cases. I want to do whatever I want, when I want it. I do think I'll be working on something, because watching movies and playing video games all the time seems like fun but I tried it -- it is depressing. Currently, I'm teaching a family member to code, because she really needs a distraction from her tough life. Also, she needs to see how smart she is -- even after being homeless for the past 20ish years (it is rare but does exist in The Netherlands). I enjoy that, but I won't get paid for that while it does add value to society I believe. I also would want to do a lot with music, but that seems risky financially. Or, I would want to learn a lot of new languages (e.g. Mandarin or Japanese) for fun. It would be cool to organize some events with friends or other people. Or I would like to help homeless people and refugees. Or, I try a stab at becoming a YouTube or pro-gamer (for fun, not for money). I'm all over the place and I'd like to be that, eventually honing in on the things I really like to do and own it. Another idea is to go for entrepreneurship. But without a financial cushion seems too risky. Maybe I should apply for a subsidy. Or, maybe I should just grow up. I honestly don't know. I feel the whole financial independence thing is something you can strive for if you're really crafty and clever but is at the very least just as hard as starting a startup and bring it to scale YC style. I feel my life is meh because of all this, because I'm being pushed into something I don't want to do but ought to do (work). Maybe Darwin will eventually select my type of genes out eventually, I hope so because this type of suffering is unnecessary.
- JacobAldridge 9y ago
  I hang out on reddit's financial independence sub, and there are a few Europeans and NL specifically; I believe there's even a specific FI NL sub (or maybe just FIeurope) for specific answers to your questions. Worth checking out if you are interested; more generally, it's the expenses not the income where most people struggle financially, and not having the US healthcare concerns makes a world of difference. You do need some kind of stable, middle class income to achieve FIRE - which is sometimes overlooked - but from there it's achievable if it's important (and it's OK for FIRE not to be important to you).
code4tee 9y ago
This isn’t retirement it’s just people deciding to live a minimalist life off minimal income. This could backfire big time when they realize they want “normal” stuff a few years down the line or have expenses (like health issues) that cost a ton if you don’t have employer coverage. Can you live off the income of $300k in savings from mid 30s onwards? Maybe. Is that a good idea? Probably not.
mud_dauber 9y ago
I'd never heard of FIRE, or MMM, until a couple of years ago. I'm 58 & unemployed but have discovered (honestly, to my surprise) that my wife & I are almost there already. > $1M in 401K money > three pensions lined up. go figure. > zero debt & a modest, paid-off house. with a view. > health insurance thanks to my wife's by-choice 2nd career > a preference for state parks, my dogs, and homemade avocado toast. :-) I know this is humblebragging. But all this financial uber-engineering seems a little over the top. Just staying out of San Francisco is one helluva head start.
- jakeway 9y ago
  You are almost 60 - you should be close to retirement. It would be way more impressive if you were 35.
  - mud_dauber 9y ago
    That's not the point. Simply going through life without making dumb financial decisions (and a little bit of luck) will get you to the same end point with the benefit of having a decent quality of life. I'm happy. And more importantly, my wife of 40 years is happy.
RickJWagner 9y ago
My mother is a wise woman. She's in her late 80s and is living comfortably. (She has since her mid 60s, when she retired. Dad died years before.) Her advice: Don't retire too soon. You'll get bored.
js8 9y ago
To try to solve social problems with self-reliance is about at the same level of foolishness as trying to solve them with technology. I am quite introverted and impractical person. But the effort that goes into avoiding banding together for more freedom (aka unionization) amazes me. I can sort of understand it, and I admit that sometimes it works. But is it really an efficient strategy?

103 points by kawera 9y ago

>After projecting their monthly cost of living, the Rooses determined they’d need $300,000 in investments to be able to live off the dividends. What sort of dividends are they receiving? 10% would give you 30K a year, and seems pretty optimistic for planning.

driverdan 9y ago
Especially considering insurance in the US can easily cost over $1000/m for a family.
- deleted 9y ago
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- desas 9y ago
  Well they planned on location arbitrage, non-employer health insurance makes the US pretty expensive.
toomuchtodo 9y ago
Most people target 4% withdrawals if you want to live off the nest egg in perpituity, which in this case, would be $12k/year. Less safe investments would earn you a higher return at the risk of sacrificing principal. Edit: Something important to note is that you can live very well in other countries for what would be considered the poverty floor in the US. For $2k/month, I can pay for a very nice luxury apartment, day camp, and a nanny for my kids in parts of South America.
- bryanlarsen 9y ago
  Is that 4% before or after inflation? A 4% real return (aka 7% if inflation is 3%) already requires quite risky investments.
  - desas 9y ago
    S&P500 90 year average is 9.8%. people FIREing typically have nearly all their money invested in low cost index funds.
    - bryanlarsen 9y ago
      And one of those years the return was -37%. Not a safe return.
      - Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
        9.8% is not a safe return, no, which is why the safe return is about 7%. The worst-performing 30-year period averaged around 7%, which is what the 4% withdraw rate is calculated from (accounting for inflation). Obviously anything can happen, the world could end, whatever; there's no truly 'safe' option. But it's reasonable.
        bryanlarsen 9y ago
        It does assume the continuation of American exceptionalism. I believe that a better benchmark would be a basket of stock markets rather than just the S&P 500. That basket would be dominated by the S&P 500 so it wouldn't change things too drastically, but it would pull that number down somewhat.
    - badpun 9y ago
      You know what they say in the fine print - past performance is not a guarantee of future results...
  - otoburb 9y ago
    The 4% safe withdrawal rate usually refers to the net return. To your point, in today's interest rate environment that would mean aiming for >7%+ returns.
  - deleted 9y ago
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- otoburb 9y ago
  Also, it seemed that the couple were willing to move to a lower cost of living location/country so their safe withdrawal rate would take them further. I don't think children were factored into the base equation, although it's entirely possible one or both of them could work part-time to augment income during child-rearing years.
- LusoTycoon 9y ago
  That money gets you a good life anywhere, except for US and some big capitals/tech cities.
- avip 9y ago
  Ah... no, you can't. You just think you can, because you've never tried. I've actually lived off that magical 2K number with my family in a (large city in a) 3rd world country. It was edgy, we hardly broke even every month, and any 1-time event (s.a medical) was covered from savings. Maybe if you go super rural you can pull that off. Keep us posted!
  - toomuchtodo 9y ago
    I know a family who has been doing it for 10+ years, and they publish their budget online. It can be done! With that said, our actual income will be ~7x our budget, so there’s plenty of cushion.
bhaak 9y ago
It is a pretty tight budget. Although they plan to "roam the world". There are a lot of cheap places all over the world. But the key word in "never have to work again" is "have". Removing the need to work and only do so when you want to must be a liberating experience.
mayniac 9y ago
Next sentence: >Within two years, they plan to hit this “magic number,” after which they’ll quit their jobs and roam the world. If you stick to cheap areas like SE Asia and Central Africa then you don't need half of that. Throw in couch surfing or buying a van to live in and you can spend a lot, lot less.
- otoburb 9y ago
  FIRE couples need to ensure that they don't get lonely, and should spend more of their available time cultivating their network as they traipse around the world. For some, it's easy to form and maintain relationships wherever they land, but I find this dimension often missing from the analysis because it's so far into the future.
conanbatt 9y ago
Yeah I dont see that either, maybe you can retire in Costa rica or something but its still cutting it close.

navs 9y ago

How does one go from online marketing to an engineer at a big data company, earning $180,000 a year? Was he just that good at marketing himself?

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chasd00 9y ago
he probably doesn't know everything there is to know about engineering big data but, instead, knows everything there is to know about applying it to a business case. Create more than $180k of value each year and companies will fall over themselves to pay you $180k for your contribution.
praneshp 9y ago
What toomuchtodo said. I have some awesome colleagues that joined in a less technical role, then transitioned over to dev work.
FLUX-YOU 9y ago
This article is too light on details to speculate well, but it's entirely possible he already had good engineering skills and just happened to be doing something else for the article's starting point. It's also possible he just knew someone and writes zero code and the engineer title is bogus.
ithinkinstereo 9y ago
Data "scientist", i.e., knows R, basic SQL, and maybe some light JS, and has experience creating nice visualizations in Tableau, etc. These are skills any business analyst with a good working knowledge in Excel and statistics can learn in a couple of years. Coming from a marketing background, he probably also helps run A/B testing and funnel/conversion/UI optimizations.

ahelwer 9y ago

Everyone tosses around a 4% safe real withdrawal rate (SWR), but that number is just a starting point. The Trinity study was for a 30-year period where success was defined as ending with a non-negative account balance. If you're retiring at 30, you're probably looking at a 40-60 year time period and want to avoid sliding into the grave just as your account balance hits zero. Here is an in-depth analysis which seems to recommend a 3.25-3.5% SWR instead: https://earlyretirementnow.com/2016/12/07/the-ultimate-guide-to-safe-withdrawal-rates-part-1-intro/ https://earlyretirementnow.com/2016/12/07/the-ultimate-guide... Of course, many software engineers will continue to mess around with tech after retirement; if you follow your interest into extremely niche domains, the option of irregular highly-specialized consulting gigs becomes available. This income stream, while not consistent enough to live off by itself, proves formidable in conjunction with retirement-level investments and enables a much higher SWR.

FLUX-YOU 9y ago
Do consultants not get "You've not been working for the past X months/years, how should we trust you've been keeping pace in tech?"
- learc83 9y ago
  When you're a consultant no one really expects you to provide a resume with a complete accounting of what you've been doing. It's more of, I worked for clients x,y, and z on projects a, b, and c. Here are the results I got for them.
  - busterarm 9y ago
    Turns out, positioning yourself this way pays huge dividends when looking for full-time employment as well!
- ahelwer 9y ago
  When I say extremely niche, I mean extremely niche. Not the sort of thing you get by cold-calling some corporate entity. Maybe you become involved and well-known in an obscure technical field at the margins of economic feasibility. Eventually you run into someone who holds the purse strings at some organization who is interested in that field. You work together a bit, and eventually ask whether they'd want to pay you for a one-off trial project using the technology. Stuff like that.

ssalazars 9y ago

> "Daniel Imberman, a 26-year-old software engineer, drifts toward this pole, though he rejects the FIRE label (“sounds like classic tech-douche”). His target is $15 million." How long do you think it'll take him to reach his goal? He talks about starting a start-up, selling or profiting, but all of that take a lot of work. And even then there's no guarantee his plan will work. Saving 15M will probably take a developer anywhere from 10-20 years? Or am I very wrong?

otoburb 9y ago
>>Like many other aspiring early retirees, Daniel also made lucky investments in cryptocurrency. “The crypto lottery forwarded my timetable by five, ten years.” He also got very lucky. Assuming no cryptocurrency optionality, even if it took him up to 25 years to diligently save and invest, ceteris paribus he would still be able to retire around age 50. The only catch is that family formation can be quite expensive unless you get extremely lucky and find a life-long partner who shares the same frugal mentality. Finding said partner is much, much harder than it sounds.
bradlys 9y ago
I get that some developers at big companies make $600k+/yr but saving $15,000,000 over even 25 years requires putting away 15m/25 => $600k/yr. That's net income to be put away too. So, really you're probably making $1m/yr. I get you'll see return on investment over those 25 years but we're talking true 1% income regardless - which most software devs will never get near. (Even most in the bay area)
- dgacmu 9y ago
  You're way undercounting the effects of growth. It's 342k/year saved at 8% growth: http://www.angio.net/finance/calc.html http://www.angio.net/finance/calc.html (See the one for regular contribution required for target). 8% before inflation is reasonable historically for 25 years. You still need a 400k+ salary to do it, but that's not out of reach in the Bay area, particularly for a couple.
  - 9y ago

rb808 9y ago

Am I just grumpy or is it fair that if you're lucky enough to be healthy and skilled you should still be spending your time working to contribute to the world and/or paying taxes, rather than just travelling around and having fun. Now maybe they plan to travel to work elsewhere to help people poorer than themselves but I doubt it. I'm presuming if they aren't American so if they get cancer or something they can return to Australia or wherever and sponge of the working taxpayers to pay for them.

LUmBULtERA 9y ago
Yes, you're just grumpy.
kriffo 9y ago
Yeah, you're definitely grumpy.
RestlessMind 9y ago
Don't worry, you are not grumpy. But you are worrying a little too much since this is just a very small (and hence negligible) problem. If too many young / healthy / smart / educated people were to start doing this, society will adjust and pass new laws and regulations, which will force such folks to work or at least ensure that they don't mooch off the system (esp. free healthcare).
kpennell 9y ago
I agree they should be contributing.
DennisP 9y ago
In most countries you pay taxes on your dividends and capital gains. Post-retirement plans mentioned by other people in the article: musician, angel investor, homeschool the kids, start a philanthropic enterprise.
smokes 9y ago
Hmm, no. Why are you putting this "forced charity work" condition on it? Someone who retires early has saved enough to live on their investments. That's no different from someone with a trust fund, but the difference is that they earned it. Think of it this way; if you won the lottery tomorrow, would it be a better contribution to your community to keep working in order to pay taxes, or retire so that someone who needs your job to live and support their family can do it instead?

mkendrick 9y ago

I have a similar opinion to the early retirement movement as DHH [0]: > One of the other underlying pillars of this dream was the concept of Never Having To Work Again. Like somehow an eternity of leisure was going to provide the existential bliss I had been longing for all along. I thought about that a lot. I did all the math: Hey, if I stuff all the money in a prudent mix of stock and bonds, I should be able to live a comfortable, if not extravagant, lifestyle until the end of my days without lifting another finger. > [...] What kept moving the needle, though, was programming Ruby, building Basecamp, writing for Signal v Noise, taking pictures, and enjoying all the same avenues of learning and entertainment my already privileged lifestyle had afforded me for years in advance. Or PG, even [1]: > If you work hard at being a bond trader for ten years, thinking that you'll quit and write novels when you have enough money, what happens when you quit and then discover that you don't actually like writing novels? Why would I live frugally and work at a job I dislike for a considerable chunk of my best years just so that I can then live frugally and have no idea what else to do? (if I didn't dislike it, I wouldn't want to stop doing it). [0] https://m.signalvnoise.com/the-day-i-became-a-millionaire-55d7dc4d8293 https://m.signalvnoise.com/the-day-i-became-a-millionaire-55... [1] http://www.paulgraham.com/love.html http://www.paulgraham.com/love.html

yobrien 9y ago
One of the tenants of FIRE that I hear is "create the life you want to live, then save for it". Nobody is saying to not try writing novels in spare time during career!

fhood 9y ago

Ok, let me make sure I understand. The goal is to live extremely frugally while you work so that you can retire very early and continue to live extremely frugally? Why? I don't hate working, and it allows me to fund my hobbies. If I wanted more free time I would just quit and do my own thing for a year. And many of my friends from college have done that. Maybe saving for retirement is the point. And the fun comes from attempting to accomplish that. I can understand, and thus respect that.

DarkTree 9y ago
> I don't hate working You answered your own question right away. Apparently, these people hate working more than they like being less frugal. I've had to be frugal to get by and it does become sort of like a game, where you are always trying to optimize your savings and tradeoffs. However, the stress involved with making these decisions and worrying about money made me appreciate working and making a good income, and I prefer this balance for now.
- JacobAldridge 9y ago
  There's definitely a big difference between being frugal to get by (stressful) and doing it to hit a 60% savings rate (ie, it's arbitrary). When you have the choice, frugal is much easier - or put differenty, it's expensive to be poor. You're spot on about balance being key.
wsinks 9y ago
I believe in the rap game this magic number is called "Fuck You Money". It means freedom from a lot of things.
3pt14159 9y ago
Because some people have skills that don't easily translate to happy job environments and they'd rather do things like tend a small veggie garden and teach their kids how to fish after they come home from school than clock another 65 hours balancing a spreadsheet for a hedge fund.
ahelwer 9y ago

pm90 9y ago

> One software engineer wanted to hit $1 million so she could home-school her future children; another man, who hadn’t bought new sneakers in eight years thanks to Nike’s generous exchange policy, wanted to found a philanthropic enterprise. “I’m not sure,” another person said. Google, his employer, offered sweet perks. “It’s a great 9-to-5, but I want to see what I could do if I got those 45 waking hours per week back.” Yeah, no fucking way. Perhaps it makes sense if you don't like working very much. I tend to generally enjoy the work that I do, and love that I can use the money that I make to live in a nice house, to eat at nice restaurants, to travel wherever and save for retirement as well. At a time when most people in this country (US) are facing stagnant or decreasing wages, working in Tech seems to be an unbelievable luxury.

supercanuck 9y ago

>Like many other aspiring early retirees, Daniel also made lucky investments in cryptocurrency. “The crypto lottery forwarded my timetable by five, ten years.” ...makes complete sense now.

0wl3x 9y ago

How many people actually do this vs talk about doing it? I know Mr. Money Mustache is super popular and generally the tenets are a great idea, but I certainly don't know anyone my age (early 20s) who has become a proponent of these ideas. It seems a bit too extreme for my tastes. Why not just get a job you like, save enough that work is optional and enjoy your day to day?

bhaak 9y ago
That's the FI (financial independence) part of FIRE. The retire early part is optional for many that are pursuing this goal. There's an active community on Reddit at https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/ https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/ One point that often comes up is that people shut their mouth about FIRE because if they bring it up, the reaction is often negative. There might be several people you know working towards FIRE but they don't evangelize it.
mark212 9y ago
it's that middle bit that seems to cause all the consternation: "Save enough that work is optional". It also could be (and I don't mean to sound like an old grump or condescend so apologies in advance) that people in their early 20s haven't been soured on employment sufficiently yet. I was much more idealistic and had a greater tolerance for work-related BS when I was in my early 20s. I'm nearly 50 now and after being burned several times I made a vow to myself never to be dependent on anyone else again. Even if you work for an incredibly well-funded company, that doesn't mean some dweeb with an MBA in some office in another city / state / country won't wake up one day and decide to wipe our your entire division just because she needs to make a bigger bonus. I've seen pensions disappear overnight, industries collapse quicker than anyone ever thought, and vibrant cities crumble when big employers shut their doors. Painful and stressful in the extreme. I've also blown $10k on something stupid instead of buying another bunch of Apple stock, reasoning that I'd make it up later in life easily enough. That was 1997. The $10k would be well over $1 million now. The biggest thing to learn is that money doesn't equal happiness. That, for me, is the repeated lesson of MMM and related authors. Freedom to make decisions without reference to finances is a massive, amazing thing.

aresant 9y ago

I respect the fire movement - principally the frugality and minimalist component. But I am genuinely interested to see what happens the next time the market crashes - very easy to be pragmatic about pulling your 4.5% while skies are blue.

whytaka 9y ago
They'll probably get jobs again.

silveroriole 9y ago

Blimey, all very well if you live in the US and earn a six figure salary (and want to live ridiculously frugally). In the UK I don’t think I know a single person earning that much.

JacobAldridge 9y ago
Interesting. Just finished running a conference in Australia, and was having a beer at the end of the day with one of the UK guys talking about how many of his team and network were making early to mid six figures GBP. I only lived in London for a couple of years, but also knew a few. Most were 45+ years old and "financially independent", although they wouldn't have thought about it in FIRE terms because their idea of independence was pursuing interesting careers choices rather than retiring early. (Which is largely my plan as well.)

wintorez 9y ago

If you hate your job so much that you think about retiring at mid-30, maybe you should consider changing profession. If you love what you do, you don't have to work a single day in your life.

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satysin 9y ago

The following is my little story of how I "retired" young. I am 34 and "retired" 8 years ago. I still do some consultancy now and then to keep my brain active and up to date with how things are done in the "real world". Money isn't a big factor for me as I have enough for everything I want. I don't have any expensive interests, I don't care about owning a high-end car or a huge house, etc. I live in West London (technically Surrey) which is kind of expensive but I am comfortable. I was lucky more than anything being able to give up work in my mid-twenties though. I got some inheritance, I had a decent job that paid well, I sold my house a few months before the 2008 crash, etc. With some long term investments and a simple lifestyle I realised I didn't need to work not long after I separated from my wife. As I wasn't really enjoying life much after my divorce I ended up quitting my job and living with family for a year while I "found myself". I met my partner and we had a son who turned five a few months ago. My partner still works but doesn't earn a huge salary, we could live with her not working but she enjoys what she does and I suspect we would kill each other if we spent 24 hours a day together so it works out well imho. I have enjoyed almost every minute of being "retired" so far. I usually just say I am a stay at home dad as saying you retired in your twenties is a bit pompous sounding I feel. Now my son is at school I am toying with the idea of doing more consultancy but I also don't want to make a big commitment to a large project plus we are currently looking into moving to France to be closer to my partners family. Out initial calculations show living in France will be about 15% cheaper than where we currently live (mostly due to living in West London). Maybe France will bring some different consultancy options that will take my interest. Not entirely sure why I posted this comment if I am honest. I guess to see if there are other early retirees here who might want to chime in with their experiences to add to mine? Feel free to ask me any questions. I am happy to answer if I can. Also if anyone has any [technical/general] project management questions feel free to drop me a message (username @gmail.com forwards to my personal email).

fhood 9y ago
Did you set out with the goal of early retirement? Or were you just relatively frugal, and at some point realized it was possible? It seems like you owned a house at age 24 which is pretty unusual.

songzme 9y ago

After college, I paid $800/mo and lived modestly to save up money in SF. Two years later, I bought my first house in Berkeley and moved in. The tax savings from mortgage interest helps save alot of money. We rented out 2 remaining rooms that we are not using and it helped cover the mortgage. (Starting out, I made around 100k and saved around 50-60k/year) 2 years after that, my gf (at the time) and I pooled our money to buy a house in south SF. 2 years after that, my mom and I bought a 3 unit run-down place in Oakland and fixed it up. 6 years after college, I have rental income coming in around 13k / month and I quit my job. No need to move to a new/cheaper location, 13k / month is plenty for bay area. Now, I run a nonprofit to help people in the bay area community learn how to code (we focus on low income workers and we pay them to quit their jobs so they can learn how to code full time). Looking back, the best thing I did for myself is to refrain from living extravagantly. Its an easy trap once you start making 200k/year. With that much money, its easy to think that you deserve a nice car, impress girls, and get stuck in the mindset of always getting the best, which not only drains your financial resources quickly, but also creates an internal emptiness. Reuse old cars, cook at home, host modest dinner parties in your own place with friends/coworkers instead of going to bars. You will save alot of money. Also, (I could write a whole blog about this), time capping your time at every company to 1-2 years helps you cut through political bullshit (huge time sink) and focus on impact. Plus, sign-on bonuses every year boosts your income significantly.

mistursinistur 9y ago
> I bought my first house in Berkeley > rented out 2 remaining rooms > buy a house in south SF > my mom and I bought a 3 unit run-down place in Oakland and fixed it up > rental income coming in around 13k / month > Looking back, the best thing I did for myself is to refrain from living extravagantly Surprising! Sounds like the best thing that happened in this story was partnering with other wealthy people to engage in leveraged speculation on Bay Area real estate.
- mark212 9y ago
  Maybe financially, but in the long run the best thing that he/she learned was that spending money doesn't lead to increased happiness. Stated differently, the same level of happiness can be reached at far lower financial cost. Even financially, that may be the more valuable learning.

decebalus1 9y ago

⌘+f 'health', ⌘+f 'insurance' - no hits. All this talk about retiring early when living frugally is a bunch of horseshit. It's 'Fuck you money' or bust. - Completely counterproductive to live frugally in order to retire early so that you can continue living frugally without working for 'the man' - if you really want independence from your employer, it needs to be complete independence. Not the independence that risks bankrupting you whenever you or your family have a serious health condition - 'Mr. Money Mustache' is so full of crap sometimes, I wonder if I'm reading /r/frugal_jerk and people often forget that 'Mr. Money Mustache' is a business in itself with different incentives than solely teaching you how to 'game the system' and 'escape the ratrace' - sometimes the frugal part takes up so much time and energy it's counterproductive to go that way when you're really well paid. Not to mention the decrease in quality of life After decades in this business, if you want a happy semi-independent life the following advice is what I can think of: - work on yourself, cultivate your craft, become a specialist so that you call the shots whenever you need to change jobs and afford to pick jobs allowing you to work on what you really want - work on side-projects and constantly learn new stuff. If you manage to get a passive income stream, good for you but don't necessarily make it a life goal - screw corporate loyalty. Change jobs every 3-4 years, you'll learn way more and your income will be miles ahead of your former colleagues - don't buy stupid shit you can't afford (including but not limited to: fancy cars, McMansions, travel for the sake of traveling, etc..) unless they are a central part of your existence - follow some basic money management rules (max out retirement funds, keep emergency cash while investing your savings, etc..) - keep good work life balance constantly so that you don't get burned out or daydream about your early retirement

justherefortart 9y ago
Put your assets in a trust, if you go bankrupt personally, it's irrelevant. Once my companies valuations + my net assets hit my magic number, I'll use my estate tax exemption and move 100% of it into a trust. I will agree though, working for yourself is fantastic if you can afford to do so.
- billmalarky 9y ago
  >Put your assets in a trust, if you go bankrupt personally, it's irrelevant. Can you extrapolate on this? The more detail the better.

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troubledworker 9y ago

I made a throwaway account. I wouldn't want to be found out be potential employers. I would want to do this, but I am in The Netherlands where health care is amazing, but the salaries are more modest in terms of absolute value. How would you go about a country like The Netherlands? I don't like working for someone else or when someone else says what I should do, in most cases. I want to do whatever I want, when I want it. I do think I'll be working on something, because watching movies and playing video games all the time seems like fun but I tried it -- it is depressing. Currently, I'm teaching a family member to code, because she really needs a distraction from her tough life. Also, she needs to see how smart she is -- even after being homeless for the past 20ish years (it is rare but does exist in The Netherlands). I enjoy that, but I won't get paid for that while it does add value to society I believe. I also would want to do a lot with music, but that seems risky financially. Or, I would want to learn a lot of new languages (e.g. Mandarin or Japanese) for fun. It would be cool to organize some events with friends or other people. Or I would like to help homeless people and refugees. Or, I try a stab at becoming a YouTube or pro-gamer (for fun, not for money). I'm all over the place and I'd like to be that, eventually honing in on the things I really like to do and own it. Another idea is to go for entrepreneurship. But without a financial cushion seems too risky. Maybe I should apply for a subsidy. Or, maybe I should just grow up. I honestly don't know. I feel the whole financial independence thing is something you can strive for if you're really crafty and clever but is at the very least just as hard as starting a startup and bring it to scale YC style. I feel my life is meh because of all this, because I'm being pushed into something I don't want to do but ought to do (work). Maybe Darwin will eventually select my type of genes out eventually, I hope so because this type of suffering is unnecessary.

JacobAldridge 9y ago
I hang out on reddit's financial independence sub, and there are a few Europeans and NL specifically; I believe there's even a specific FI NL sub (or maybe just FIeurope) for specific answers to your questions. Worth checking out if you are interested; more generally, it's the expenses not the income where most people struggle financially, and not having the US healthcare concerns makes a world of difference. You do need some kind of stable, middle class income to achieve FIRE - which is sometimes overlooked - but from there it's achievable if it's important (and it's OK for FIRE not to be important to you).

code4tee 9y ago

This isn’t retirement it’s just people deciding to live a minimalist life off minimal income. This could backfire big time when they realize they want “normal” stuff a few years down the line or have expenses (like health issues) that cost a ton if you don’t have employer coverage. Can you live off the income of $300k in savings from mid 30s onwards? Maybe. Is that a good idea? Probably not.

mud_dauber 9y ago

I'd never heard of FIRE, or MMM, until a couple of years ago. I'm 58 & unemployed but have discovered (honestly, to my surprise) that my wife & I are almost there already. > $1M in 401K money > three pensions lined up. go figure. > zero debt & a modest, paid-off house. with a view. > health insurance thanks to my wife's by-choice 2nd career > a preference for state parks, my dogs, and homemade avocado toast. :-) I know this is humblebragging. But all this financial uber-engineering seems a little over the top. Just staying out of San Francisco is one helluva head start.

jakeway 9y ago
You are almost 60 - you should be close to retirement. It would be way more impressive if you were 35.
- mud_dauber 9y ago
  That's not the point. Simply going through life without making dumb financial decisions (and a little bit of luck) will get you to the same end point with the benefit of having a decent quality of life. I'm happy. And more importantly, my wife of 40 years is happy.

RickJWagner 9y ago

My mother is a wise woman. She's in her late 80s and is living comfortably. (She has since her mid 60s, when she retired. Dad died years before.) Her advice: Don't retire too soon. You'll get bored.

js8 9y ago

To try to solve social problems with self-reliance is about at the same level of foolishness as trying to solve them with technology. I am quite introverted and impractical person. But the effort that goes into avoiding banding together for more freedom (aka unionization) amazes me. I can sort of understand it, and I admit that sometimes it works. But is it really an efficient strategy?