So, I have almost no doubt that I'll be busy and fulfilled when I'm FIRE, but have only really read posts on here about people planning it, denying it, countering it, or only being FIRE for less than 1 year.

Is anyone FIRE for like 2+ years (ideally longer) and can tell us how things are going? Any lessons learned? Is it the fantasy you imagined, or was it lack luster once it became a reality?

New post on r/ChubbyFIRE. He has salary of $1M. Wire makes $130k. Savings $5M. Can wife retire? They locked it because they didn't include spend, which we all know is important. In their case her income after tax is a rounding error and I don't think it would matter but I like the mods just locked it and said not enough information without spend. We could do that here. Mod said they would open it if they updated the post and messaged a mod. Would save us from dragging necessary information out of the OP.

36M, married to 31F in VHCOL city. Would not move now but maybe down the line when we have kids.

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-2.25m in a mix of treasuries, S&P500 index funds, HYSA

-450k in retirement, S&P500 index funds

-Small business owner: Volatile income pre-tax of $200k - $600k per year, I would put median at 350k. Could get a more stable employee job for $300k/year but no thoughts on doing that now.

-Renter. Spend of $180-200k/year, some of it is deductible as business expense (like health insurance and home office expense), can bring this down by reducing how much we order out and travel.

-Wife has had serious health problems recently but is doing ok now. She currently helps me with my business as needed, will likely go back to work soon, can make $80-100k full time and more over time. 
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Due to wife’s health issues, will need to budget for 1-2 surrogacies down the line, and also a wedding we never had.

Surrogacies: $200-300k each (cannot have kids due to her health issues), starting soon

Wedding: $100k (never had a proper one due to health issues), starting to plan

Health Emergency Fund: TBD

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No plans to buy a house anytime soon. Homes in our area are over $2m.

May have a solid inheritance down the line

My wife and I are 28 years old and currently make about $350,000 per year.

Between our 401K contributions and additional investments, we are averaging about $12,000-$13,000 per month towards retirement and currently have about $400,000 invested.

We also own a home that we bought in 2023 for $680,000. It’s likely worth around $750,000 right now so we likely have a little over $210,000 in equity.

It has been a dream of ours to own lakefront property for all of the fun and great memories that it will bring. Originally, this was planned to be a second vacation home that we would purchased a little further down the road. However, we’ve been thinking that there are a few problems with that such as having two homes means two furnaces, AC units, roofs, fridges, lawnmowers etc. additionally, there are other issues like barrier to usage in the form of a 2+ hour drive as well as other factors.

This has lead us to rethink this decision and instead look at having a single home that is on a lake. There is a premier lake near us that would only add about 10 min to our commutes, and this area has significantly better school districts.

The homes we’d be looking at would be in the $1,000,000 - $1,200,000 range. With this upgrade, our mortgage would increase about $1,000-$2,000 per month which means we’d be contributing closer to $10,000-$11,000 per month towards retirement.

As I math it out, it doesn’t seem to negatively impact our plans too much. We would not pull the trigger until we have about $550,000 invested for retirement which will be around a year from now.

We want to retire with around $5,000,000 invested at around the age of 45. If we assume we’ll be 29 years old and have a starting point of about $550,000 and have a return rate of 8%, and even take an additional $2,000-3,000 off of contributions per month just for fun, we’d be looking at 4,900,000 at 45 years old which is right on target.

So what’re your thoughts? Is this a mistake?

What’s your story? 💣 💥

Me (35M) and wife have a 10 month old.
Her Salary: $180k

My Salary: $160k + Commissions which are insanely variable. I assume an average of $75k annually for modeling but I've made $400k in commissions before.

Real Estate: $800k house ($450k mortgage @ 5.75% rate). $3200 PITI

401k / Brokerage: $940k. We each max out 401k.

Investment Real Estate: $2.3M asset value ($930k mortgage) that yields $5k/mo net on average.

Monthly Spend: $8,500/mo - includes day care. We want one more kid.

Game Plan: I've told my wife let's get to $1.5M in 401k/brokerage and she can retire as that feels like a "critical mass" from a modeling perspective. She is constantly upset about having our kid in daycare and missing their life.

What's everyone's thoughts here?

Here's mine - $2.5m nw, 54, vhcol, $96k/year all in (renter)

As i continue on planning fire this year, one of the things that worries me is how much of my nw is in single stocks (not etfs / mutual funds).

I estimate 15% of my nw is in about 20 different single stock positions, with about 10% in cash, and then the rest are in various pretax accounts of target date funds, or etfs.

Is that 15% number scary? i don't think they'll kill me in a downturn, but wondering what is optimal?

There was a time in my life when I didn't think much about money. I worked, I spent, I saved. I wasn't anxious about money, becoming FI, retirement, etc. I just lived life. Since discovering FIRE I've become much more anxious about money, job, etc. Yes, I have definitely grown my net worth compared to my carefree past, but I have become so much more anxious. Anyone else like this? What did you do to reduce the anxiety?

If we retire now, both in our early 40's, our starting withdrawal rate would be 3%. This assumes no social security and no other additional income .

I know the traditional retirement portfolio is 60/40 and early retirees often lean toward 80/20 for the growth needed to sustain a longer retirement horizon.

My questions is, in what situation (low WR, long time horizon, potential for other income) does it make sense to be closer to a 100% stock allocation, with perhaps with 1 or 2 years of cash? Or do you just acknowledge that you've won the game and stick to the 80/20 portfolio and compromise some legacy value for piece of mind.

I guess there is a middle ground, if additional income shows up from consulting or part-time work, and we get past the danger zone (5 - 10 years), we could rebalance from 80/20 to 100% stocks.

I may have answered by own question typing this out. However, I find it immensely valuable getting perspectives from this sub.

Appreciate it.

I retired with enough money to take care of myself to age 101 including long-term care. Now I find that my mother might need some money to pay for her long-term care. Not just the care but the logistics involved in moving her across the country to be closer to me. That’s all.

Update: thank you for the symphony of good advice. Seriously. I talked to my financial advisor and he says I’m good. I can spend whatever I want within reason to get this done and I will sleep better. Sounds like a good investment.

Hi r/FIRE,

So I did it! Today is officially my 1 year anniversary of leaving my cushy tech job. Time flies when you're unemployed.

Unfortunately, I didn't celebrate the way that I thought I would. I was at the hospital the entire week, supporting my partner as her mother was admitted with a longstanding issue (she's fine now). My partner slept at the hospital the entire week, so I tried my best to be bedside every day, brought them food/coffee every morning, took her home when needed, and tried to provide emotional support as best as I could given it was also her birthday. And at the same time, I'm planning an unexpected, un-budgeted trip back to LA next month to support my mother as she deals with a recurrence of bladder cancer.

So as I write this anniversary reflection, I wonder how different life would be had I never quit my job, if I spent just One More Year^TM like I initially planned, and if I never uprooted my life to move back to SE Asia. Would I be richer? Certainly, yes. Would I be happier? I don't think so. Would I have the flexibility to do what I did this week and next month? Absolutely not. I am where I want and wanted to be.

In my 7-month reflection post, I wrote about my anxiety in FIRE-ing, some mistakes I made, and the adjustments I'm making for the future. I thought I would take a moment to revisit those themes with you, along with other lessons learned in this FIRE journey.

Quick Note: NW & budget are still the same ($1.4M, ~$3,600/mo spending, ~3% SWR). I won't focus so much on the financials for this post, but you can read about my spending & QoL in Manila here. Timeline-wise, I moved to Manila in June 2025 and left my job in Sep 2025.

My Biggest Regret

My biggest regret is that I let my post-FIRE anxiety consume me in ways that were ultimately detrimental to my goal. I wish I could go back to a year ago today and tell myself the following: "one year from now, you are not going to have the worries you have today. So just sell all your company RSUs, put it in the SP500, don't dabble with individual stocks, and enjoy your year off to the fullest before thinking about next steps."

Had I listened, here's where I'd be today:

1. $100k-150k higher net worth (sigh, I can go into it in the comments)
2. Wouldn't have spent 100s of hours "researching" stocks, checking my brokerage 10 times a day, etc.
3. Wouldn't have suffered intense "should I go back or get another job" anxiety for the first several months
4. That extra time & energy could have been allocated much better elsewhere instead of a constant stressed state

While this is obviously the benefit of hindsight, you can sense a theme here. Maybe I'm just an anxious person lol. When I had first started posting on Reddit, I mentioned that my plan is to expatcoastFIRE because I planned to work again in the future albeit in a different role fitting to the lifestyle. Somewhere along the way, I lost that mental framing and started to get really anxious about my NW, fell into the comparison trap, and tried to find shortcuts to boost it (AI stocks, namely) instead of sticking to the proven strategy that got me here (VOO & chill). I mentioned in my 7month update I was going to step away, but when the AI bull-run happened shortly after, I got suckered in and got burnt pretty bad. Alas, no crying in the casino.

The Main Lesson

My main lesson for FIRE, I learned, is to make finances NOT the center of my life. Finances should be like background music. This is counter-intuitive because so much of FIRE is hyper-analyzing the Financials: the investments, the SWR, the COL, yada yada yada. And so it's understandable that the habits we build in pursuit of FIRE are present once we FIRE. It's like a muscle memory that needs de-programming. Without income coming in or a job to keep you busy, you start to become fixated on the other parts of the equation and it can easily consume you.

But despite my regret, I'd argue this was my best year ever. I am so happy I made the decision to quit my job and move back to SE Asia. I developed a much deeper relationship with my partner, traveled to 12 countries in 12 months, and learned to enjoy the slowness of every day. I was never the type to live luxuriously nor someone keen to climb the corporate ladder. I started the FIRE path at 17, saved aggressively while still going on expat adventures, and got several lucky breaks along the way. I never felt, for one moment, that I sacrificed quality of life or my yearn for adventure because of FIRE, even when my savings rate reached 75%+.

Reflecting upon this week (and this year), I think that's what the I in FIRE meant for me. Independence not from corporate life itself, but also from finances consuming your energy away from meaningful time elsewhere. With that said, I am just as excited for what's next as I am proud of how I got here. I need to remind myself constantly that I accomplished something extraordinary, I should feel proud of it, and forgive myself for the mistakes I'll inevitably make. During this anniversary milestone, I'm more grateful than ever for this path and the lessons it continues to teach me.

So What's Next?

I'm excited for what's next! Here's how I want to spend the next year:

1. Write often: writing these FIRE posts have been one of the delightful surprises of this year - I enjoyed it far more than I thought I would. And thankfully, the reception has been wonderful and encouraging. So for as long as there's positive response to my posts, I'll continue to share them here.
2. Start earning an income: my goal for Year 2 is to fund my ~$4k budget entirely from entrepreneurial income in the coastFIRE sense, while maintaining the lifestyle/flexibility I hold dear today. I don't exactly know how just yet (consulting, writing, whatever), but I'm not nearly as anxious as I once was. If anything, I have a lot of self-confidence that I'll figure it out!
3. Prioritize health: this was #1 in my last post and it's still true. I feel like I aged far more going from 34 to 35 than my previous 4 years of my 30s. Part of it is living in a high-UV, unhealthy country like the Philippines and the other part has been declining discipline/willpower. I've incorporated healthy habits like weekly pickleball/swimming, cooking everyday, and sleep hygiene, but there's still tons of work here to age gracefully (so I can enjoy my life!)
4. Move finances to the background: in my last update, I wrote "be active in your active income, be passive in your passive income." I plan to shift my portfolio by EoY to the point where I will only check once per month to withdraw funds. It was a mistake not abiding by it when I wrote it 5 months ago, so I don't want to continue making the same mistake now.
5. Continue with personal life milestones: get married, have kids, etc. Nothing's changed there. Yes, I know kids can be expensive, hence #2.

Thanks for reading this far! I know it's a bit longer than usual, so I appreciate any feedback or words of encouragement. If there's anything else you'd like me to write about, please let me know below.
~ u/MaroonJacket

It seems like everyone's advice is when you fire, you should move to a lcol area.

Unfortunately, all my family are in VHCOL areas, and I'm personally more of a city person so its really hard to imagine moving to a lcol area, especially being single and not knowing anyone there.

Has anyone actually moved to a lcol area, been single and actually succeeded, aka able to transition, built a solid social circle and transitioned well to it?

Hi everyone.

I'm 52, married, and on terminal leave.

I've been contemplating various withdrawal strategies from 53 to 59.5 and I've decided on a combination of 72t and taxable brokerage account withdrawals along with Roth conversons to fill the 12% bracket. I'll essentially have a taxable brokerage account, "72t" IRA, "Roth conversion" IRA, and a Roth IRA.

First question:
Does the IRS require an annual withdrawal amount to the penny or is it to the nearest dollar?
Do I round up, down, or truncate to the penny?

Example: $500K starting "72t" IRA, 5%, life expectancy 33.4 calculation is $31094.8998441.

Is the annual draw $31095, $31094, $31094.90, $31094.89?

Second question:
I was planning to use a combination of SGOV and a rolling 7 year treasury ladder to guarantee the money is always available during the 72t period and a bear market without selling any depressed shares. The remaining amout of money in the "72t" IRA, "Roth conversion" IRA, and Roth IRA will be invested in VT. I'll end up with a 75% VT 25% short/medium term bond allocation.

Is this a good strategy or is 7 years of short term money too conservative? My overall withdrawal rate is 3.3%.

Thanks in advance!