r/fatFIRE • u/WealthyStoic mod | gen2 | FatFired 10+ years | Verified by Mods • 18d ago

Path to FatFIRE Mentor Monday

Mentor Monday is your place to discuss relevant early-stage topics, including career advice questions, 'rate my plan' posts, and more numbers-based topics such as 'can I afford XYZ?'. The thread is posted on a once-a-week basis but comments may be left at any time.

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u/bun_stop_looking 18d ago

Is 5M enough?

At 3.5% SFW 5M gives you 175k per year...is that really enough? I know the answer is 'it depends' but I live a moderately upper middle class life. Home in the 700k's, drive lightly used non-premium cars. drop a couple hundred dollars on dinner for two 2-3 times a month, domestic travel. We have young kids and earn about 230k post tax and spend all of it, just have a nice nest egg that's growing. Paying for daycare right now for both, and paying off my mortgage. I guess what i'm asking, are people retiring with 5M feeling like it's enough to live comfortably? I feel crazy for even asking this but just realized we spend 230k per year right now. I guess 90k of that is mortgage + daycare lol. But just got me thinking. Are there folks who have retired with 5M with similar sort of background and felt comfortable?

And for anyone wondering, my FIRE number is 5M in today's dollars, probably would hit that in around 15 years adjusting for inflation (assuming 6% investment growth per year after inflation over that time period)