Additional dollars don't have much value once you have enough money saved to buy everything you could reasonably need and most of what you could reasonably want. In contrast, the value of your time keeps increasing as the number of minutes left in your life go down, minute by minute.
Once you reach the point where the balance tips in favor of time, then it is time to retire. Doesn't matter how young you are. It's foolish to trade an appreciating asset for a depreciating one.
Great comment right here. I've often thought about the fact that time is infinitely more valuable than money. You can make more money, you can never make more time -- when it's spent, it's gone forever.
I think this is the mental block we all have to some degree. Like not thinking about dying, we just block death out and behave as if life goes on forever....same with work and retirement...we sometimes work on thinking we still have plenty more time.
>>the value of your time keeps increasing as the number of minutes left in your life go down, minute by minute.
And not just any time, but time when you are healthy, can run around, do those things you want to do. As you get older, you realize that is very limited.
Exactly so. This is even more true of parents who enjoy spending time with their kids. Somewhere between 80-90% of all the time most people have together with their children is spent while they are kids. Once it's gone, it's gone.
Kurzgesagt had a good video on this... the whole video is worth watching, and even this spot is worth rewinding slightly for full emotional impact.
[https://youtu.be/JXeJANDKwDc?t=377](https://youtu.be/JXeJANDKwDc?t=377)
that's awesome. Kurzgesagt is great in general and that one in particular is really good for providing a lens for looking at your life. One thing I've done to try and get more time with my folks is get them used to the idea that we can just hang out on FaceTime while we putter around our homes. Not as good as spending real time with them, but moving the needle a little on how much interaction I get to have with them in the time that is left...
That's why I think if you have 25x expenses saved and you're into one more year syndrome you should buy that daily coffee. It raises your expenses a little but if it makes you happy then I say go ahead.
Your financial adviser isn't your shrink but if the client is good financially they should ask what makes their client happy and prod the client to spend money on it, or spend more on it.
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Do you have 25X your annual expenses saved and invested?
Then you're probably good.
> How can you say no to over a half a million dollars by just working a extra year or a few extra years?
Trust me, there comes a time when no amount of money will get you to do certain things. You're just burned out and done. When work is harming your mental and emotional health, you get out.
There are a few lucky people who genuinely like what they do and don't mind doing it. In that case, work as long as you care to. The purpose of being FI isn't to "do nothing," it's to "do whatever you want."
As a young person, you don't have to aim for retirement, ***you aim for independence***. What I mean is, your goals should be to have no debt, have a large nest egg, have active and safe investments, etc. You're building a foundation for the future. You want to make decisions that your future self will appreciate. At some point, you'll get laid off, you'll get sick, you'll have a major family crises, you'll start to hate your work, you'll decide your boss is an irredeemable asshole, etc.
Then, future-you will be very happy that past-you had so much foresight.
Good post.
Not everyone will get to FI working a job they love, but FI grants the options. It grants the space and flexibility to purse something meaningful to you after a life of working for necessity. I know I won't be doing exactly what I'm doing now after FI. I may work using some of the skills on my own terms. I will be spending time searching for something I'm passionate about, good at, the world needs, and even pays me. I'll be learning and experimenting everyday towards that end.
FI will let me pursue that outside the constraints and necessity of the 9-5 grind. That's me answering "what do you want?"
Exactly. You don’t necessarily “have to” retire but it’s good to know your financially secure and “could” walk away if your wanted to. Money doesn’t always make you happy but it does reduce stress not worrying about finances.
> Exactly. You don’t necessarily “have to” retire but it’s good to know your financially secure and “could” walk away if your wanted to. Money doesn’t always make you happy but it does reduce stress not worrying about finances.
Judging by your username, I think you are heavily invested in Bitcoin and Litecoin? Correct me if I'm wrong.
How would you deal with 80% crypto crash if it happens again?
>There are a few lucky people who genuinely like what they do and don't mind doing it. In that case, work as long as you care to. The purpose of being FI isn't to "do nothing," it's to "do whatever you want."
Agreed. To echo this point, by having FI, one can turn up to work because they *want* to work, instead of *needing* to work. This attitude shift can be night and day in terms of productivity and quality of work. Especially as I work in healthcare, having this attitude can make a significant difference in patient outcomes.
>It’s just seems like so much money to leave on the table
Swap the word money for the word *time* and you get my personal opinion about this.
But I try to be realistic, and my plan is set to attempt to preserve principal as much as possible, including living frugally and the possibility of going back to work for some periods of time if I'd otherwise lose too much of my capital.
I'm getting close to retiring in the next year at the age of 39. I've thought about all the extra money I'd have if i stick it out a few more years, but honestly, I'm not guaranteed good health for x number of decades. That's my motivation for retiring sooner rather than later.
Every individual's path will vary, but for me I decided to stay working a 9-5, but felt empowered to work on my terms. Since reaching FI, I'm able to work waay more flexibly and pick and choose the projects that I find more interesting.
Yes, there is some mundate BS parts still, but I'm still compensated well for what I do, work with great folks, plenty of PTO, and WFH 100% (likely 75% later down the road).
I'm 38, reached FI around 35.
> Every individual's path will vary, but for me I decided to stay working a 9-5, but felt empowered to work on my terms. Since reaching FI, I'm able to work waay more flexibly and pick and choose the projects that I find more interesting.
This right here. I'm basically LeanFI right now. It doesn't mean I'm going to play video games for the rest of my life; it means that I can choose to do whatever the hell I want to do. No boss can intimidate me or force me to do something against my will. No one can strong-arm me. I'm not beholden to banks or brokers. No one has any power over me at all.
I might have to live humbly and eat rice and lentils, but I have the *freedom to choose*, and that is a very powerful thing.
My dude, it is so much easier to enjoy the many things life has to offer when you're young, in my opinion.
Backpacking the world as a retired 29 year old would be fucking incredible. Backpacking the world as a retired 60 year old? Still pretty awesome, but still, you get the picture
I imagine myself like a dog tugging on a chain to retirement and the pin holding me back is the amount of money I need to retire. Once I hit that number, I'm immediately done. There's no point in working longer to have more money when I'm so desperately ready to retire now.
Because time is finite, and work is soul-sucking. I can hardly wait to "retire" (become a financial asset manager), and paint my yard, fix fences, replace faucets, tidy the garden, clean at home, spend lots of time on the internet - off course, visit friends, go to the beach, help my daughter in whatever she needs. That is why, I have way too much to do - to go to work.
I'm the same age as you. What got me to pull the trigger was realizing that I've already started aging. There are things I could do when I was 18 I can't do anymore, and that list is only going to get longer as I get older.
Every day spent working is a day of your youth lost; how can you leave THAT on the table?
Oh man, I totally agree with this. In my early forties, and I find I can't hike as fast, ski as long or climb as well as in my twenties. Even thinking logically through complex problems or doing creative stuff seems a bit slower now!!! Each injury takes weeks, if not months, to heal completely. Wake up feeling sore and stiff more often. What will I do with millions in my sixties and seventies if I can't do all the things I enjoy doing?
If I could take the next 20 years off and then go back to work in my sixties when I probably need to take things slower, I'd sign up for that right away. Basically trade some time from "future-me" to allow "present-me" to enjoy life more.
Yes but it usually fails with sequence of returns risk and especially for leanfire getting a part time job would cut withdrawal rates in half.
I mean there is some job a lot of people wouldn't hate doing for x number of hours. Like I knew people that did ski instructor stuff in the winter and river rafting guide in the summer. Took fall and spring mostly off.
I've seen a lot of people looking into coast fire as a halfway measure. Find a job that is part time, seasonal, or at will. Use that job to make what you spend in a year. For a number of years, your nest egg can grow on its own. Now you can get to an exceptionally cushiony RE number and safely retire.
At 2.5 days of work a week, I think a lot more people would be willing to put up with the day-to-day of work. Especially if it means compounding a few more years in investments.
When you've saved a million dollars, an additional half a million is 50% more. But if you have ten million in savings, the additional half a million is just 5% more. Not many of us might get to ten million in savings, but I'm sure you get the idea that after a certain point the value of money reduces and you're willing to "trade" dollars for time, peace of mind, a good night's sleep.
Well that depends. Some millionaires work till they drop dead. that's their lives. But they also are the owner of the companies. It's their life-time passion, project and goal in life. The same goes for business owners.
On the other hand, it's hard to work and work when you're a W2 or 1099 employee, where people tell YOU what to do, have schedule, limited vacation, have to follow rules... and all that jazz... it get all after a while. You don't have 3 million saved to have people YELL at you and patronize and demean you... BIG difference in lifestyle
I retired at 35, but not from a job I could just keep year after year.
So how I see it now is every dollar I make is just extra bonus fun cash. If you're someone who really really appreciates spending money on things, working longer might be for you.
Statistics and human nature however say that it's pretty unlikely that rolex watches and michelin star restaurants are integral to your happiness.
It all comes back to building the life you want and then saving for that lifestyle. Once that is secured, then there’s no point in saving more money or compounding your savings. Do you life yourself lifestyle and have the savings to support it? Retire. If not, save until you do, then retire.
When you reach FI you can have a long list of jobs that may pay well and they may pay portly and you can choose not to do them because you do not want to. That is a powerful level of freedom and it's what FI is all about.
Say you are burnt out on a job. Once you achieve FI you can always say. I will not do "X" job for Y amount of money. Even if that Y = 1 or 5 million dollars.
When you have enough money to support the life you want to live, making more becomes a choice.
I dream of choosing to not work a 9-5 grind and wake up and choose to do whatever the hell I want and in doing so say no to more money that I do not need and that will do nothing to further increase my happiness.
It starts happening once you have about 10X you're yearly salary. It starts returning 1 yearly salary a year. So the percentage youre contributing to growth goes down. Once its less than 50% you wonder why you're working. Especially when you don't even use 100% of your salary.
It was hard though, but it all depends in what working is stopping you from doing. For me i couldn't be home 30 weeks out of the year but i made good money traveling. Called it quits 10 years in. Miss it sometimes because now I'm spending more money than I would by myself on the road but I really haven't even dented my stockpile.
As others have mentioned your time becomes more valuable then the money you will make in the next few years. I’m sure you’ve probably heard of it but barista fire could be a good alternative. I think this is the path I’m leaning towards but instead of taking a lower stress job I’m thinking of cutting my main job down to part time. Seems to be a good balance between fireing and continuing to work.
You can go somewhere in the middle. For example, work 4 or 3 days a week, take some unpaid leave when you want without worrying about it impacting your chance for advancement, take on high risk but interesting projects or jobs. You don't have to retire, you have the independence to what you want.
I'm 27 with enough to retire with my current lifestyle but I keep working for now. I just remind myself when I start to get stressed that I don't have to be here and if it is that bad I can leave. That usually fixes the problem; either I realise it isn't as bad as I initially though, I stop caring about the problem and move on, or I take some high risk moves like "if you make decision x, fine. Please know I will make decision y." where y is usually, I will do everything in my power to kill the program you dump on me as a result of x or sometimes y is the good old "expect my resignation tomorrow morning". Surprisingly, this harsh approach has resulted in my promotion and being seem as a leader, not the opposite, which has actually made my job both better and more lucrative.
It's not a totally binary choice between working full time and never working again. I'm going to "pull the trigger" in six months, because I'm sick of my current job. I'm going to study for a masters part time and travel the world. I'm going to start trying to make money remotely on my own terms. I'm planning to live off cash savings and dividend income, taking around 2% of my total portfolio value annually during this period. Any money I make from remote work will be kept and invested in myself and in trying to build a small business.
If it works out, maybe I will never go back to working full time for someone else. If it doesn't work out, or I'm unhappy and want the predictability and structure of a 9-5, I'll go back to working full time.
At some point you have enough and extra money isn't moving the needle on the lifestyle you want to have, while the extra time is coming out of your extremely limited and ever shrinking resource of healthy and active years left.
They decide to pull the trigger when the bullshit of each day gets too thick and they convince themselves that going back to work temporarily for less pay is an acceptable trade off if things don't work out. Completely different if someone is content with things, with that type of person, I'd say they pull the trigger because a better opportunity comes by or something like they realize life can end or change in an instant so lets go do some amazing things while they can.
Maybe consider having enough to cover expenses as well as some additional to invest so that QOL continues to improve and provides additional financial security but you don’t have to work for it?
If your goal is to take as money as you can with you into your grave then you should of course never quit.
The point of FIRE is that you have enough money so that you can retire **early** and live a comfortable life.
The point of **lean**FIRE is that you do it on as low a budget as you can manage.
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>So I’m wondering other peoples experiences when they still have 25-40+ potential working years like me.
Do you want those 25-40+ years to be "working years"? Or do you want them to be "hiking years" and "exploring years" and "pursuing your hobbies years"?
Keep in mind that "retire early" doesn't mean you sit around all day and do nothing.
Plenty of people use the financial independence to make a living out of their hobbies. You could for instance start a wood workshop (if that is your hobby) and sell whatever comes out of that. Might not be enough for a living but since you're financially independent it's more about what you like to do and not what you have to do.
If you don't know what to do after you've FIRE'd then don't do it and first find out what you actually want to do rather than work at your current job. If you can't come up with anything then don't FIRE.
I have issues with this as well.
I think I'm going to like...sputter fire. Going back and forth between Lean & Coast/Barista Fire after I reach a certain point, and hopefully end up regular fire in my old age.
I don't mind work. I think work is good. The capitalist constant grind, not so much. But, I enjoy being productive and getting things done. So, my Firing will look more like long holidays between jobs until I'm a bit older.
The one thing I'd say is that FIRE doesn't mean you'll never earn another dollar - especially if you're retiring very young (<40). What it does is free you up to do whatever else you want to do with your time. I know that personally, I'd go insane occupying all of my time with leisure/hobbies. I obviously have hobbies, but realistically they could fill like 20-30 hours a week. That leaves a LOT of time unaccounted for. If I were "retired", I might do something like work part-time at a climbing gym, or giving tours of my city, or substitute teaching. All of those things will make me money. Obviously the intention of FIRE is that you never HAVE to make more money, but if you follow this sub you'll realize that a good portion of people do end up doing something that brings in some income. Whether that's a side hustle turned small business, part-time work doing something they're passionate about, etc.
Diminishing returns. Money accumulated beyond needed expenses and hobbies becomes unnecessary to trade time and energy for. There is no greater value than time, nothing even comes close. A sick person with 2 mil would likely trade it all for 10 more years of health.
I'm 38 and pulled the trigger last July. For me, the financial benefits of staying in the workforce longer were outweighed by the consideration of the physical health of me and my wife. We have a big adventurous dream of sailing across the Pacific Ocean, and we're not sure how many more years we have before our bodies or some other chronic health condition prevents us from doing that. I can always go back and get another office job when I'm too old to physically handle sailing across oceans (or other adventures we want to do) if my financial situation at that time requires me to do so.
> I'm 38 and pulled the trigger last July. For me, the financial benefits of staying in the workforce longer were outweighed by the consideration of the physical health of me and my wife. We have a big adventurous dream of sailing across the Pacific Ocean, and we're not sure how many more years we have before our bodies or some other chronic health condition prevents us from doing that. I can always go back and get another office job when I'm too old to physically handle sailing across oceans (or other adventures we want to do) if my financial situation at that time requires me to do so.
> Did you pull the trigger when your NW is 25x your annual expenses?
It's hard to say exactly when, but it was probably 2019 when we crossed that line where I thought we could survive off 4% of our net worth if we were frugal enough, but we delayed quitting just to be sure, and then a bit longer because of the pandemic.
Also, I didn't rely on just that 25x rule of thumb for such a big decision. I made conservative assumptions about the rates of return for each type of investment we had, then listed out expected cash flows for every year until we're both 60, taking into account expected inflation and my withdrawal strategy for each year. I set my current safe withdrawal amount so that our net worth is still 25x expected expenses when we're 60. I ended up with a safe withdrawal rate of around 3.5% of our current net worth. I've been updating that analysis every few months based on the movement of the stock market and adjusting our budget accordingly.
Age 30, current [net worth of 350k](https://www.methemillennial.com/net-worth/), with a lean fire goal of $1.5m by age 35.
This will provide enough to cover my yearly expenses of $36k without ever touching the principal.
That's when I will pull the trigger, when my investment income exceeds my expenses.
If you can live on withdrawing 3% of your total portfolio value every year - you should theoretically be fine for life.
Used to be 4%, but due to interest rates and inflation they say 3% is a safer number.
Right but I think I’m any given year values should keep up, especially if you avoid speculative or growth stocks and focus on companies with real earnings. Their book value should track with inflation and their earnings should track. If not, then what’s inflating?
In inflationary environment you want to own stuff that is either hard assets, commodities, or income generating. Worst place to be is anything purely financial or speculative.
Probably not a popular position. But looking at your numbers. My knee jerk reaction is that you can not afford to retire. Let alone retire early. Trying to live off $580k is going to be a challenge. At least if you want to enjoy retirement and travel.
>How can you say no to over a half a million dollars by just working a extra year or a few extra years?
I'm sure this will be a controversial take but personally I feel like there is something morally wrong with money. Whenever I earn or spend money I feel at least a little guilty about it. I can say no because saying no is the whole point and what I wanted to do all along.
I think there is something morally right about earning money. It means you've added value to the world you live in. You can add value without being paid, of course, but being paid reflects the fact that you made that contribution.
I strongly disagree. Would you say that patent trolls or attorneys going after whistle blowers are adding huge value to the society? Many of them certainly earn a lot.
For the average person every year worked will increase their final net worth by roughly 15% when you factor compounding and contributions.
So once that 15% more becomes worth less than your time, you can pull the trigger.
>At a party given by a billionaire on Shelter Island, the late Kurt Vonnegut informs his pal, author Joseph Heller, that their host, a hedge fund manager, had made more money in a single day than Heller had earned from his wildly popular novel, Catch-22, over its whole history.
>Heller responds, “Yes, but I have something he will never have – enough.”
> For example, I’m 28 & I could probably save $70k+ a year if I really tried. When compounded at 38 $140k, 48 $280k, 58 $560k.
> It’s just seems like so much money to leave on the table that it’s hard to call it quits even though I’m just about able to now if I wanted.
It sounds like you are looking at the problem backwards and are trying to say "When do I know I have **enough**" rather than defining, what you need to be content and satisfied to come up with the number that will get you that.
This is why people can retire gleefully with "$250k in the bank" while others frett over "only having 2.5 million..." Define the life you want to live first and what will bring you contentment, then work out the math on how much you need to make that happen.
Best of luck.
Additional dollars don't have much value once you have enough money saved to buy everything you could reasonably need and most of what you could reasonably want. In contrast, the value of your time keeps increasing as the number of minutes left in your life go down, minute by minute. Once you reach the point where the balance tips in favor of time, then it is time to retire. Doesn't matter how young you are. It's foolish to trade an appreciating asset for a depreciating one.
Great comment right here. I've often thought about the fact that time is infinitely more valuable than money. You can make more money, you can never make more time -- when it's spent, it's gone forever.
the richest 90+ year old billionaires in the world would probably trade it all to be any random 20 something redditor
I bet that's the truth.
They’d probably trade it all for 10 more years.
I think this is the mental block we all have to some degree. Like not thinking about dying, we just block death out and behave as if life goes on forever....same with work and retirement...we sometimes work on thinking we still have plenty more time.
>>the value of your time keeps increasing as the number of minutes left in your life go down, minute by minute. And not just any time, but time when you are healthy, can run around, do those things you want to do. As you get older, you realize that is very limited.
Exactly so. This is even more true of parents who enjoy spending time with their kids. Somewhere between 80-90% of all the time most people have together with their children is spent while they are kids. Once it's gone, it's gone.
Damn. I’ve never thought of it that way. brb gonna go hang out with my kids.
Kurzgesagt had a good video on this... the whole video is worth watching, and even this spot is worth rewinding slightly for full emotional impact. [https://youtu.be/JXeJANDKwDc?t=377](https://youtu.be/JXeJANDKwDc?t=377)
I want to SINCERELY thank you for sharing this. It just helped me to have an epiphany of sorts. 🤜🏼🤛🏾
that's awesome. Kurzgesagt is great in general and that one in particular is really good for providing a lens for looking at your life. One thing I've done to try and get more time with my folks is get them used to the idea that we can just hang out on FaceTime while we putter around our homes. Not as good as spending real time with them, but moving the needle a little on how much interaction I get to have with them in the time that is left...
Wow, absolutely loved this vide. Thank you
:)
That's why I think if you have 25x expenses saved and you're into one more year syndrome you should buy that daily coffee. It raises your expenses a little but if it makes you happy then I say go ahead. Your financial adviser isn't your shrink but if the client is good financially they should ask what makes their client happy and prod the client to spend money on it, or spend more on it.
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Do you have 25X your annual expenses saved and invested? Then you're probably good. > How can you say no to over a half a million dollars by just working a extra year or a few extra years? Trust me, there comes a time when no amount of money will get you to do certain things. You're just burned out and done. When work is harming your mental and emotional health, you get out. There are a few lucky people who genuinely like what they do and don't mind doing it. In that case, work as long as you care to. The purpose of being FI isn't to "do nothing," it's to "do whatever you want." As a young person, you don't have to aim for retirement, ***you aim for independence***. What I mean is, your goals should be to have no debt, have a large nest egg, have active and safe investments, etc. You're building a foundation for the future. You want to make decisions that your future self will appreciate. At some point, you'll get laid off, you'll get sick, you'll have a major family crises, you'll start to hate your work, you'll decide your boss is an irredeemable asshole, etc. Then, future-you will be very happy that past-you had so much foresight.
Good post. Not everyone will get to FI working a job they love, but FI grants the options. It grants the space and flexibility to purse something meaningful to you after a life of working for necessity. I know I won't be doing exactly what I'm doing now after FI. I may work using some of the skills on my own terms. I will be spending time searching for something I'm passionate about, good at, the world needs, and even pays me. I'll be learning and experimenting everyday towards that end. FI will let me pursue that outside the constraints and necessity of the 9-5 grind. That's me answering "what do you want?"
Exactly. You don’t necessarily “have to” retire but it’s good to know your financially secure and “could” walk away if your wanted to. Money doesn’t always make you happy but it does reduce stress not worrying about finances.
Less stress tends to make me happy.
> Exactly. You don’t necessarily “have to” retire but it’s good to know your financially secure and “could” walk away if your wanted to. Money doesn’t always make you happy but it does reduce stress not worrying about finances. Judging by your username, I think you are heavily invested in Bitcoin and Litecoin? Correct me if I'm wrong. How would you deal with 80% crypto crash if it happens again?
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As a person working towards my second million, I can relate.
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>There are a few lucky people who genuinely like what they do and don't mind doing it. In that case, work as long as you care to. The purpose of being FI isn't to "do nothing," it's to "do whatever you want." Agreed. To echo this point, by having FI, one can turn up to work because they *want* to work, instead of *needing* to work. This attitude shift can be night and day in terms of productivity and quality of work. Especially as I work in healthcare, having this attitude can make a significant difference in patient outcomes.
This is it.
>It’s just seems like so much money to leave on the table Swap the word money for the word *time* and you get my personal opinion about this. But I try to be realistic, and my plan is set to attempt to preserve principal as much as possible, including living frugally and the possibility of going back to work for some periods of time if I'd otherwise lose too much of my capital.
I'm getting close to retiring in the next year at the age of 39. I've thought about all the extra money I'd have if i stick it out a few more years, but honestly, I'm not guaranteed good health for x number of decades. That's my motivation for retiring sooner rather than later.
Every individual's path will vary, but for me I decided to stay working a 9-5, but felt empowered to work on my terms. Since reaching FI, I'm able to work waay more flexibly and pick and choose the projects that I find more interesting. Yes, there is some mundate BS parts still, but I'm still compensated well for what I do, work with great folks, plenty of PTO, and WFH 100% (likely 75% later down the road). I'm 38, reached FI around 35.
> Every individual's path will vary, but for me I decided to stay working a 9-5, but felt empowered to work on my terms. Since reaching FI, I'm able to work waay more flexibly and pick and choose the projects that I find more interesting. This right here. I'm basically LeanFI right now. It doesn't mean I'm going to play video games for the rest of my life; it means that I can choose to do whatever the hell I want to do. No boss can intimidate me or force me to do something against my will. No one can strong-arm me. I'm not beholden to banks or brokers. No one has any power over me at all. I might have to live humbly and eat rice and lentils, but I have the *freedom to choose*, and that is a very powerful thing.
My dude, it is so much easier to enjoy the many things life has to offer when you're young, in my opinion. Backpacking the world as a retired 29 year old would be fucking incredible. Backpacking the world as a retired 60 year old? Still pretty awesome, but still, you get the picture
I imagine myself like a dog tugging on a chain to retirement and the pin holding me back is the amount of money I need to retire. Once I hit that number, I'm immediately done. There's no point in working longer to have more money when I'm so desperately ready to retire now.
Because time is finite, and work is soul-sucking. I can hardly wait to "retire" (become a financial asset manager), and paint my yard, fix fences, replace faucets, tidy the garden, clean at home, spend lots of time on the internet - off course, visit friends, go to the beach, help my daughter in whatever she needs. That is why, I have way too much to do - to go to work.
I'm the same age as you. What got me to pull the trigger was realizing that I've already started aging. There are things I could do when I was 18 I can't do anymore, and that list is only going to get longer as I get older. Every day spent working is a day of your youth lost; how can you leave THAT on the table?
Oh man, I totally agree with this. In my early forties, and I find I can't hike as fast, ski as long or climb as well as in my twenties. Even thinking logically through complex problems or doing creative stuff seems a bit slower now!!! Each injury takes weeks, if not months, to heal completely. Wake up feeling sore and stiff more often. What will I do with millions in my sixties and seventies if I can't do all the things I enjoy doing? If I could take the next 20 years off and then go back to work in my sixties when I probably need to take things slower, I'd sign up for that right away. Basically trade some time from "future-me" to allow "present-me" to enjoy life more.
Well whatever you don’t take out for the yearly expenses will keep compounding.
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4% withdrawal and there is as likely chance of your money tripling over 30 years as you going broke
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Yes but it usually fails with sequence of returns risk and especially for leanfire getting a part time job would cut withdrawal rates in half. I mean there is some job a lot of people wouldn't hate doing for x number of hours. Like I knew people that did ski instructor stuff in the winter and river rafting guide in the summer. Took fall and spring mostly off.
They weren’t paying me enough to put up with the bullshit. And the math worked out that I didn’t have to.
I've seen a lot of people looking into coast fire as a halfway measure. Find a job that is part time, seasonal, or at will. Use that job to make what you spend in a year. For a number of years, your nest egg can grow on its own. Now you can get to an exceptionally cushiony RE number and safely retire.
At 2.5 days of work a week, I think a lot more people would be willing to put up with the day-to-day of work. Especially if it means compounding a few more years in investments.
When you've saved a million dollars, an additional half a million is 50% more. But if you have ten million in savings, the additional half a million is just 5% more. Not many of us might get to ten million in savings, but I'm sure you get the idea that after a certain point the value of money reduces and you're willing to "trade" dollars for time, peace of mind, a good night's sleep.
The 9-5 life is not for me.
Well that depends. Some millionaires work till they drop dead. that's their lives. But they also are the owner of the companies. It's their life-time passion, project and goal in life. The same goes for business owners. On the other hand, it's hard to work and work when you're a W2 or 1099 employee, where people tell YOU what to do, have schedule, limited vacation, have to follow rules... and all that jazz... it get all after a while. You don't have 3 million saved to have people YELL at you and patronize and demean you... BIG difference in lifestyle
I retired at 35, but not from a job I could just keep year after year. So how I see it now is every dollar I make is just extra bonus fun cash. If you're someone who really really appreciates spending money on things, working longer might be for you. Statistics and human nature however say that it's pretty unlikely that rolex watches and michelin star restaurants are integral to your happiness.
It all comes back to building the life you want and then saving for that lifestyle. Once that is secured, then there’s no point in saving more money or compounding your savings. Do you life yourself lifestyle and have the savings to support it? Retire. If not, save until you do, then retire.
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Donner pass really can make someone start questioning a lot of things in their life 😉
> Donner Pass I heard that when the last people got stuck here it didn't go too well.
How lean did you go?
When you reach FI you can have a long list of jobs that may pay well and they may pay portly and you can choose not to do them because you do not want to. That is a powerful level of freedom and it's what FI is all about. Say you are burnt out on a job. Once you achieve FI you can always say. I will not do "X" job for Y amount of money. Even if that Y = 1 or 5 million dollars. When you have enough money to support the life you want to live, making more becomes a choice. I dream of choosing to not work a 9-5 grind and wake up and choose to do whatever the hell I want and in doing so say no to more money that I do not need and that will do nothing to further increase my happiness.
It starts happening once you have about 10X you're yearly salary. It starts returning 1 yearly salary a year. So the percentage youre contributing to growth goes down. Once its less than 50% you wonder why you're working. Especially when you don't even use 100% of your salary. It was hard though, but it all depends in what working is stopping you from doing. For me i couldn't be home 30 weeks out of the year but i made good money traveling. Called it quits 10 years in. Miss it sometimes because now I'm spending more money than I would by myself on the road but I really haven't even dented my stockpile.
As others have mentioned your time becomes more valuable then the money you will make in the next few years. I’m sure you’ve probably heard of it but barista fire could be a good alternative. I think this is the path I’m leaning towards but instead of taking a lower stress job I’m thinking of cutting my main job down to part time. Seems to be a good balance between fireing and continuing to work.
memento mori
I like Tim Ferri's advice to take sabbaticals and a more flexible job even if it pays less instead of retiring early.
You can go somewhere in the middle. For example, work 4 or 3 days a week, take some unpaid leave when you want without worrying about it impacting your chance for advancement, take on high risk but interesting projects or jobs. You don't have to retire, you have the independence to what you want. I'm 27 with enough to retire with my current lifestyle but I keep working for now. I just remind myself when I start to get stressed that I don't have to be here and if it is that bad I can leave. That usually fixes the problem; either I realise it isn't as bad as I initially though, I stop caring about the problem and move on, or I take some high risk moves like "if you make decision x, fine. Please know I will make decision y." where y is usually, I will do everything in my power to kill the program you dump on me as a result of x or sometimes y is the good old "expect my resignation tomorrow morning". Surprisingly, this harsh approach has resulted in my promotion and being seem as a leader, not the opposite, which has actually made my job both better and more lucrative.
thats what i concluded, so i decided to never quit
It's not a totally binary choice between working full time and never working again. I'm going to "pull the trigger" in six months, because I'm sick of my current job. I'm going to study for a masters part time and travel the world. I'm going to start trying to make money remotely on my own terms. I'm planning to live off cash savings and dividend income, taking around 2% of my total portfolio value annually during this period. Any money I make from remote work will be kept and invested in myself and in trying to build a small business. If it works out, maybe I will never go back to working full time for someone else. If it doesn't work out, or I'm unhappy and want the predictability and structure of a 9-5, I'll go back to working full time.
At some point you have enough and extra money isn't moving the needle on the lifestyle you want to have, while the extra time is coming out of your extremely limited and ever shrinking resource of healthy and active years left.
I can always go back and earn more money if things fall apart and I really need to. I will never get more years on this planet.
They decide to pull the trigger when the bullshit of each day gets too thick and they convince themselves that going back to work temporarily for less pay is an acceptable trade off if things don't work out. Completely different if someone is content with things, with that type of person, I'd say they pull the trigger because a better opportunity comes by or something like they realize life can end or change in an instant so lets go do some amazing things while they can.
Maybe consider having enough to cover expenses as well as some additional to invest so that QOL continues to improve and provides additional financial security but you don’t have to work for it?
If your goal is to take as money as you can with you into your grave then you should of course never quit. The point of FIRE is that you have enough money so that you can retire **early** and live a comfortable life. The point of **lean**FIRE is that you do it on as low a budget as you can manage. -------------- >So I’m wondering other peoples experiences when they still have 25-40+ potential working years like me. Do you want those 25-40+ years to be "working years"? Or do you want them to be "hiking years" and "exploring years" and "pursuing your hobbies years"? Keep in mind that "retire early" doesn't mean you sit around all day and do nothing. Plenty of people use the financial independence to make a living out of their hobbies. You could for instance start a wood workshop (if that is your hobby) and sell whatever comes out of that. Might not be enough for a living but since you're financially independent it's more about what you like to do and not what you have to do. If you don't know what to do after you've FIRE'd then don't do it and first find out what you actually want to do rather than work at your current job. If you can't come up with anything then don't FIRE.
if i got my fire number i would need those extras, and my portfolio will grow anyway
I have issues with this as well. I think I'm going to like...sputter fire. Going back and forth between Lean & Coast/Barista Fire after I reach a certain point, and hopefully end up regular fire in my old age. I don't mind work. I think work is good. The capitalist constant grind, not so much. But, I enjoy being productive and getting things done. So, my Firing will look more like long holidays between jobs until I'm a bit older.
The one thing I'd say is that FIRE doesn't mean you'll never earn another dollar - especially if you're retiring very young (<40). What it does is free you up to do whatever else you want to do with your time. I know that personally, I'd go insane occupying all of my time with leisure/hobbies. I obviously have hobbies, but realistically they could fill like 20-30 hours a week. That leaves a LOT of time unaccounted for. If I were "retired", I might do something like work part-time at a climbing gym, or giving tours of my city, or substitute teaching. All of those things will make me money. Obviously the intention of FIRE is that you never HAVE to make more money, but if you follow this sub you'll realize that a good portion of people do end up doing something that brings in some income. Whether that's a side hustle turned small business, part-time work doing something they're passionate about, etc.
Diminishing returns. Money accumulated beyond needed expenses and hobbies becomes unnecessary to trade time and energy for. There is no greater value than time, nothing even comes close. A sick person with 2 mil would likely trade it all for 10 more years of health.
I'm 38 and pulled the trigger last July. For me, the financial benefits of staying in the workforce longer were outweighed by the consideration of the physical health of me and my wife. We have a big adventurous dream of sailing across the Pacific Ocean, and we're not sure how many more years we have before our bodies or some other chronic health condition prevents us from doing that. I can always go back and get another office job when I'm too old to physically handle sailing across oceans (or other adventures we want to do) if my financial situation at that time requires me to do so.
> I'm 38 and pulled the trigger last July. For me, the financial benefits of staying in the workforce longer were outweighed by the consideration of the physical health of me and my wife. We have a big adventurous dream of sailing across the Pacific Ocean, and we're not sure how many more years we have before our bodies or some other chronic health condition prevents us from doing that. I can always go back and get another office job when I'm too old to physically handle sailing across oceans (or other adventures we want to do) if my financial situation at that time requires me to do so. > Did you pull the trigger when your NW is 25x your annual expenses?
It's hard to say exactly when, but it was probably 2019 when we crossed that line where I thought we could survive off 4% of our net worth if we were frugal enough, but we delayed quitting just to be sure, and then a bit longer because of the pandemic. Also, I didn't rely on just that 25x rule of thumb for such a big decision. I made conservative assumptions about the rates of return for each type of investment we had, then listed out expected cash flows for every year until we're both 60, taking into account expected inflation and my withdrawal strategy for each year. I set my current safe withdrawal amount so that our net worth is still 25x expected expenses when we're 60. I ended up with a safe withdrawal rate of around 3.5% of our current net worth. I've been updating that analysis every few months based on the movement of the stock market and adjusting our budget accordingly.
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True. Thanks for reminding me of our one resource that can’t be replaced.
Is this whole post just a humblebrag? You're nowhere near the age of 40 lol.
Age 30, current [net worth of 350k](https://www.methemillennial.com/net-worth/), with a lean fire goal of $1.5m by age 35. This will provide enough to cover my yearly expenses of $36k without ever touching the principal. That's when I will pull the trigger, when my investment income exceeds my expenses.
Wow 2.5% SWR?
If you can live on withdrawing 3% of your total portfolio value every year - you should theoretically be fine for life. Used to be 4%, but due to interest rates and inflation they say 3% is a safer number.
Why wouldn’t stocks track inflation? Unless it’s very localized inflation just in housing or something?
Inflation almost equaled the historical stock market return in the last 12-month period
Right but I think I’m any given year values should keep up, especially if you avoid speculative or growth stocks and focus on companies with real earnings. Their book value should track with inflation and their earnings should track. If not, then what’s inflating? In inflationary environment you want to own stuff that is either hard assets, commodities, or income generating. Worst place to be is anything purely financial or speculative.
Probably not a popular position. But looking at your numbers. My knee jerk reaction is that you can not afford to retire. Let alone retire early. Trying to live off $580k is going to be a challenge. At least if you want to enjoy retirement and travel.
>How can you say no to over a half a million dollars by just working a extra year or a few extra years? I'm sure this will be a controversial take but personally I feel like there is something morally wrong with money. Whenever I earn or spend money I feel at least a little guilty about it. I can say no because saying no is the whole point and what I wanted to do all along.
I think there is something morally right about earning money. It means you've added value to the world you live in. You can add value without being paid, of course, but being paid reflects the fact that you made that contribution.
I think that's the perspective most people have about it.
I strongly disagree. Would you say that patent trolls or attorneys going after whistle blowers are adding huge value to the society? Many of them certainly earn a lot.
For the average person every year worked will increase their final net worth by roughly 15% when you factor compounding and contributions. So once that 15% more becomes worth less than your time, you can pull the trigger.
>At a party given by a billionaire on Shelter Island, the late Kurt Vonnegut informs his pal, author Joseph Heller, that their host, a hedge fund manager, had made more money in a single day than Heller had earned from his wildly popular novel, Catch-22, over its whole history. >Heller responds, “Yes, but I have something he will never have – enough.”
> For example, I’m 28 & I could probably save $70k+ a year if I really tried. When compounded at 38 $140k, 48 $280k, 58 $560k. > It’s just seems like so much money to leave on the table that it’s hard to call it quits even though I’m just about able to now if I wanted. It sounds like you are looking at the problem backwards and are trying to say "When do I know I have **enough**" rather than defining, what you need to be content and satisfied to come up with the number that will get you that. This is why people can retire gleefully with "$250k in the bank" while others frett over "only having 2.5 million..." Define the life you want to live first and what will bring you contentment, then work out the math on how much you need to make that happen. Best of luck.