how much is too much?

[runchman]

SingleMom, I'm at around the same stage in life, 43, have an 11 year old and 9 year old.

Anyway a side effect of putting away too much could be, later in life, choosing to help out some organization you feel strongly about by giving them some money. I can imagine that would be satisfying after a lifetime of savings.

Anyway just a thought.

- John

[SteveR]

Maybe the question should be how much is the correct amount to save each week, month, quarter, year, decade in order to retire when you WANT to and still be able to live a decent life style without working again. That is the FI part of FIRE. My FIRE goal was sent long before I found this board or ever heard of SWR or any of the other buzz words on this and other similar forums. We had a goal to retire at age 55. We were tracking our expenses and our incomes and knew what it would take to create a cash flow to support our chosen ER budget. The hard part was staying the course despite the urge to spend like our neighbors and fall deeply into debt. I learned very early on that debt is the enemy and it will suck the life out of your FI plans if you let it.

Most of us have gotten to FIRE by using the three-legged stool....

Live on less than you make.

Invest in low cost balanced equity and bond funds.

Eliminate all debt.


The end result is a fast track to FIRE. It works!


We saved 40% of our salary for several years and still managed to have nice cars and a nice house. We took trips and bought toys but each one was bought at discount or not at all.

Hang in there. The first $Million is the hardest to make. After a few of them they start showing up sooner than you can imagine.

[chinaco]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SingleMomDreamer I am not a big spender and I just can't see accumulating to a point where I end up dying with a million bucks still left in the bank. I am wondering if I should keep plowing $$ into my retirement funds, or should I start to prioritize investing outside of my retirement, which I'd like to use to help support my ER.

It all depends on when you want to retire. You mention $2mm @ 65. Then you mention ER. The onlything you can do today is project your expenses in retirement. Target the desired age of retirement. Identify any income streams you will have in retirement. Then determine the size of portfolio needed to fill the income gap.

Personally I would over save a little in the early years to better ensure my plans are not interrupted. But... You are correct, once you are properly funding the target retirement plan... you may decide that you can spend more today. Let's face it... You work to earn money to support a particular lifestyle. If you are forgoing things you would like to acquire, you may be able to afford those things. That said, I would not spend frivolously.

Another way to look at it is if you want to ER and you have a lifestyle that requires less spending. Your aggressive savings may allow you to ER sooner than you expected.

[Mwsinron]

Better off saving early than later. Besides the compounding gig you never know when something bad might happen and work wont be possible

[TromboneAl]

Quote:

T-Al, So did you also contribute to non-taxable accounts after maxing out retirement contributions? It sounds like you did not opt for 72t. DH and I are 49 and would like to retire around 55 and are considering 72t option. Most of our savings is in tax-deferred accounts - going to start maxing out Roth IRAs, but we don't have much time to build a sizable cushion between now and then. Overall financial picture for us is solid - our challenge will be income between 55 and 59.5. Thanks for sharing.....

Sorry, I didn't notice this question until today.

Yes, we'd always saved some in non-tax-deferred investments after maxing out the deferred ones.