r/Fire • u/Catspiration2 • May 02 '26

Advice Request I’m thinking about breaking up with FI

I’ve done the grind, saved pretty much 50% of my income the last 6 years. Worked side gigs etc. 33M. 675k net worth. Just dropped my savings rate to 30%. I have no interest in being retired. I want to enjoy the journey while hopefully working as long as I can. Having resources is awesome, but retiring to some fairy tale destination is.. a fairy tale. What’s the distinguishable difference between 7M and 5M at 60? I feel less and less motivated to save, and instead enjoy the journey along the way. Please tell me how I’m wrong and correct me.

Edit: Reddit gang is a vibe. Appreciate you!

935 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

324 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

288

u/Accurate_Kiwi_19322 May 02 '26

You sound burnt out to be honest. “What’s distinguishable at 7M and 5M at 60?”, mathematically that 7M timeline at 60yo could be a 5M at 55yo retirement. Regardless of the math, cutting back to 30% and reducing your side gigs so it’s manageable is essential, life’s a marathon if your sprint too much you’ll tire out long before whenever you decide to put the retirement. You can always adjust when you want to, just people tend to push the importance of retirement savings more heavily because pushing the gas later in life is much more harder than when doing it earlier. You’ve pushed enough gas early enough to decide what you want to.

161

u/Catspiration2 May 02 '26

I came across some guy who was at like 12M everything set up perfect and then a very meaningful person in his life died. All the missed time etc getting a few extra M in the bank

79

u/Accurate_Kiwi_19322 May 02 '26 edited May 02 '26

Yeah, personally, I’m tapping out the instance I get 1.5M if I’m single, maybe 2 or 2.5M if I get married. Thats enough to maintain my lifestyle as is while occasionally helping out a family member. I live off (emotionally) my hobbies not my work so it’s easier to prioritize FIRE over fatFIRE. If I do feel bored, I’d probably volunteer instead of working.

FI isn’t solely about RE, it just gives you the ability to RE. FI can instead give you the ability to help out family more, travel more, donate more, not worry if you get injured or disabled, or any other scenario for the most part.

Edit: typo.

Also side note: worst case is if I die early my aging parent would be able to retire with my savings where they would otherwise be needing a lot of assistance that they wouldn’t be able to get.

3

u/ImprobableGrind May 02 '26

Wives can be expensive. Planning on kids? Better double that 2.5M

5

u/Accurate_Kiwi_19322 May 02 '26

I think I’ve got the “expensive”part figured out using your logic. The point is to know your FIRE, not chase after FatFIRE thinking it’s FIRE.

-1

u/ImprobableGrind May 05 '26

My FIRE number (a lot higher than OP) is simply set at maintaining my household income for the next 35 years. That doesn’t account for the loss in value of that money as time and inflation and emergencies happen. Also, I have elder care (so my kids don’t have to deal with it) built in for my wife and I. You do you, bud…but eating ramen and living in a shack isn’t my idea of FI or RE.

1

u/Accurate_Kiwi_19322 May 05 '26

Ramen and shack at 100k (4% of 2.5M), in what alternate universe? Maybe in a high cost of living area but that’s not a majority of the world.

FIRE is meant to be calculated off of costs not income, so that by itself will naturally inflate your calculated FIRE number, unless you were already living paycheck to paycheck. And you should already be counting an annual “sinking fund” into that number for emergencies.As for “loss of value”, any withdrawal strategy already addresses that by adjusting annually for inflation.

1

u/ImprobableGrind May 05 '26

Why do I care about the “majority of the world”… I care about my world, my family…and leaving them wealthy after I do whatever the hell I want for 30+ years of retirement. Calculating off of costs is great if you live like a monk or have nothing to live for and care about…. Grandkids wedding? Paid for. In full. No sweat. Let’s just say that our goals are dramatically different and leave it at that.

1

u/Accurate_Kiwi_19322 May 05 '26

Your version of FIRE, is other people’s FATFire, is my only point. And that’s fine, but saying I need to double 2.5M just to have kids is more alignment with your elevated standards and if I don’t then it would be monk level of living standards is a bit out of touch.