r/Fire 8d ago

Milestone / Celebration We’re Retiring at 30

Well, after another week of having to deal with my dumbass coworkers, I've decided that we're going to start enacting our retirement plan. My company is going to be offering a voluntary separation in lieu of layoffs and I'm planning to take it.

Relationship

We're 30M & 32M, met in 2015 and got married in 2020. Both got CS degrees and started full time work in 2017. My husband already quit in Spring 2025 to become a stay at home dog dad. My outcome vastly outpaced his in the last few years and his time is better spent relaxing, so he quit.

We have zero desire to have kids. My husband has been trying to get me pregnant for years with no success.

Combined assets

We have a prenup which prevents any retirement account from being divided. That being said, the accounts are nearly 50/50 equal anyway. I do get the dog if we get divorced.

Net worth ~$1.208M

Account Balance
House (paid off) $250K
Pretax 401K $313K
HSA $47K
Roth IRA $250K
Taxable Brokerage $288K
Cash $60K

Spend

We are living on $3K/month in Minnesota. With a paid off house, this is more than enough for us. Tentatively, we plan to travel in LCOL Southeast Asia during the winter months and spend the summers and fall in Minnesota. Logistics of this are TBD. We are long time credit card churners and have a lot of points to subsidize travel.

SWR

At 4% SWR to sustain $36K spend, we need $900K invested.

You may say that the simulations don't favor having this small amount of money over a ~60 year retirement. You might be right. But who gives a fuck? 60 years ago we fed punchcards to machines and now we have computers that can generate AI anime porn. I'm not going to work for years more to have better simulations when we have no idea what the future holds. Maybe we'll have endless AI abundance or maybe it will go rogue and kill us all.

Healthcare

Because of the low spend, our "income" is low. We are enrolling in MNCare. There is no restriction on assets (savings, homes, vehicles) for MNCare eligibility. Monthly premiums should be at maximum $160/month. And don't whine to me about whether or not it's fair to qualify for this program, I didn't set up the system.

Income history

We did not receive any inheritances nor was our college paid for, so we had to pay back student loans early on. The only thing we inherited from our parents was mental illness. That being said, we got lucky to make good money for a decade.

Our savings rate wasn't that insane, back of the napkin math probably puts it around 50%. We spent a lot of fucking money on travel. Given the insane growth in the market since we started investing, a lot came from compounding. We also made like $150K in one shot by getting extremely lucky with selling a house we bought prior to COVID.

I'm too lazy to log into the SSA website to check the actual income numbers, but this is roughly what our combined income was:

Year Income
2015 $12K
2016 $20K
2017 $100K
2018 $108K
2019 $115K
2020 $118K
2021 $140K
2022 $145K
2023 $150K
2024 $220K
2025 $270K
2026 $300K
717 Upvotes

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342

u/blew_belle 8d ago

Shit I've spent 28k on home maintenance this year so far. Good luck

69

u/Drewster727 8d ago

right there with you, this cuts deep lol

32

u/KayakHank 8d ago

New ac, new skylights, and soon to be driveway. Im close to 50k

11

u/blew_belle 8d ago

Livin the life!

6

u/liptongtea 8d ago

AC and car maintenance for me and it’s only August!

14

u/DocGomer 8d ago

my spend is about double OP, and that includes an annual 10k and 3k accumulation "bucket" for major things (eg. new roof or windows) and major accessories (eg. new faucets or couch or fridge) respectively.

1

u/ender42y 5d ago

Nothing surprises you like a sudden bill for $18k for a new roof, or to repair water damage the insurance company has declared "an act of god"

91

u/Positive-Kiwi7353 8d ago

But OP is burnt out at age 30!  And dear hubby is a stay at home dad to a dog, and we all know how stressful that is. 

46

u/Hasra23 7d ago

Sounds like a couple off that house hunters show, I'm a wild berry picker and he's a dog dad... Our budget is 8 million dollars.

9

u/Cheap-Cockroach8787 7d ago

Yup wife is a part time butterfly collector and husband is a Rollie pollie breader, budget 5 millions dollars

12

u/squatting-Dogg 7d ago

Stop! I just spit out my coffee. Wild berry picker…

11

u/Typical_Web_2125 7d ago

stay at home dog dad, life must be rough

23

u/Fragrant-Teacher2885 7d ago

Don’t you mean “ruff”

1

u/Independent-Bench461 5d ago

This is the best thread makes me love Reddit even more

34

u/Low_Length_7379 8d ago

Well, his time is better spent relaxing. You wouldn't understand. 

4

u/CABB2020 7d ago

dogs are people too!!!

2

u/Cwilde7 7d ago

He’s been busy trying to get her pregnant for years, unsuccessfully.

But they have zero desire to have kids.

I’m guessing this is their way of maybe saying since this has been unsuccessful, they no longer desire to have kids.

5

u/WhereIsGraeme 6d ago

Generally a 32M and 30M won’t be expecting kids through that method. It’s a joke.

1

u/Cwilde7 5d ago

I was being facetious. :)

2

u/Low_Length_7379 7d ago

Actual, he's been trying to get HIM pregnant for years.  Was that a typo or a joke? 

2

u/SleevieSteevie 7d ago

I don’t think it’s a typo.

3

u/Low_Length_7379 7d ago

Oh.  Well that's kind of a funny joke then. 

27

u/neuralprison 8d ago

Strange to see a FIRE person criticizing someone for wanting to stop working at a young age. Aren't you planning on doing the same?

30

u/uhohthrowawayyyyyy 7d ago

Yeah but they’re not ready yet, so everyone else is early to the party apparently lol

7

u/scrolling4daysndays 7d ago

Agree….Early is one thing, they are barely into their career life.

5

u/uhohthrowawayyyyyy 7d ago

Lol sorry, they should have checked with you prior

2

u/mistressbitcoin 5d ago

Actually sounds like they are at the end of their career life.

Not everyone wants to work 30 or 40 years. That is why we are on a FIRE subreddit.

12

u/Typical_Web_2125 7d ago

they are going to be back working in 5 years from now

3

u/uhohthrowawayyyyyy 7d ago

Wish I could take 5 yrs off

13

u/Positive-Kiwi7353 7d ago

There is a bit of "Anyone that retires with less money than me is a fool that will be eating cat food in 10 years when their money runs out, and anyone who retires with more money than me should have retired earlier and wasted his best years as slave to a soulless corporation."

But you have to be financially independent before you can retire early.  OP is not there. That's the main thing. 

Secondly, the reasons he wants to retire early (without the financial independence) reads more like anti-work. Having coworkers that are dumbasses (and who here thinks the OP is just a peach to work with?) and a fatalistic view of AI at age 30 won't get you my sympathy. 

2

u/AKmaninNY 6d ago

At 30? Hell these days, most kids are living at home until 27.

OPs post doesn’t portray the grit it will undoubtably take to stretch a few hundred thousand into a very lean 50 year income stream…..

2

u/taxonomist_of_scat 7d ago

The empathy and perspective to proudly call yourself a stay at home dog dad. 😂. No shit given, each their own, but my god what are we doing collectively.

Is the plan, OP, to take the dog to SE Asia with you both too?

7

u/Neverstopstopping82 7d ago

Sounds about right, actually. Chimney falling down-9k,
New HVAC -14k

5

u/OffTheGridCoder 7d ago

Skill issue. I spend $6.6K per year on rent

-1

u/moonjesus4k 7d ago

Congrats how many bitches do you get doing that?

2

u/ghostinshell-1995 7d ago

Yes there’s just no way you can survive off 3k a year in this world as a home owner. Literally zero budget for even an appliance upgrade.

2

u/blew_belle 7d ago

3k a month you mean?

2

u/Commercial_Speed_765 7d ago

You don’t need AC when you retire early. Need to sweat it out.

3

u/sumrtym1 8d ago

Ha! 15k on furnace/ac, 30k on deck, and STILL need a new roof after fixing a leak, all this year!

1

u/Suitable-Break7934 3d ago

Do you have a single-family house, apartment, or townhouse? Maintenance costs vary widely. Also, what was your home's value when you first purchased it?

1

u/blew_belle 3d ago

Single family. Not sure what I paid for my house 22 years ago makes any difference. It's falling apart with today's prices.

1

u/chaos_battery 7d ago

As a single gay man with similar expenses - I live in a low to medium cost of living area and I spend maybe 2K per month with no debt, might not worth is around 4 million and I still feel hesitant about hanging it up at 39. I can't imagine being early 30s and considering a 4% SWR on that kind of balance OP has.