help get me to FIRE
So I’d like to prepare for Financial Independence. Here’s my broad plan, please let me know if you have any suggestions or questions for me.
Age: midlife
Timeframe: In five or six years, I’d like to be FI/REd. Ideally I’ll get there earlier. My goal is to take a year or two off and do some low budget traveling. After that I’d like to take on some sort of limited work, but only in areas that I enjoy.
Job: I currently work at a megacorp, in a job that isn’t that bad, but can be very stressful.
Health: pretty good, considering my age.
Housing: I own a too-large house which I share with my ex-spouse. But we’re both ready to move on in our personal lives, and the house will need to be sold. My plan is to rent a small apartment close to work when it’s sold.
Sadly it will probably cost more to rent the small place than to own the house. The house is about $15,000/yr (including taxes, utilities, and upkeep), with me doing the lion’s share of the grunt work. Meanwhile apartments at about half square footage are renting at $17,000/year, albeit leaving me more time to do things other than care for the lawn. Since I’ll have a kid almost half time, I can’t skimp on the apartment too much. I could cut costs by going with a one bedroom place instead of two bedroom, and outfitting the rest of the place like a studio, but that’s subject to my ex’s veto.
Dependents: I have a child who should be going off to college by the time I hope to be done.
Expenses: Still figuring these out, since they’ll change when we sell the house. I’m not Jacob, but I’m reasonably frugal.
Investments: I fully fund my traditional 401k and Roth IRA and rebalance into 20% bonds and 80% stocks yearly. Everything else goes into a 50/50 CDs/stocks in index funds. The stocks and bonds are in index funds. The stocks are split 75/25 domestic/foreign. Alas, right now the SWR for the amount I have would only just barely pay the child support.
I read _The Four Pillars of Investing_, _Common Sense on Mutual Funds_, _A Random Walk Down Wall Street_, and _Early Retirement Extreme_ a few years ago. This time I’m serious.
[not sure if this belongs in Young Dreamers; admins, please move if needed]
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