FIREd at Fifty

[njgolfer67]

Hi Folks,
I'm more of a lurker than a poster, so while I've been a member for years and benefitted from many of your words of wisdom, today is my first post.

I FIREd a little over a year ago, one month before my 50th birthday. I feel blessed, but the true credit goes to hard work and over 30 years of earning, saving and investing. Tremendous props go to my DW (44) who is the force behind our ability to save at a prodigious rate.

When I was a teenager, I set a goal to be a millionaire by 30 and able to retire by 50. As many of you have said so eloquently, most people don't even know what they mean when they express a desire to be a millionaire. For me, it was a goal to be FI after watching my parents (US Army retired) provide for our family with hard work and frugality. I missed my millionaire goal by 5 years, but the value of the goal was a mindset and behaviors that made it possible for me to live with financial confidence at 30. That knowledge and confidence showed me that being a millionaire in NJ was not what it used to be. I had to stay in NJ due to my kids from a first marriage, so I doubled down on reaching my second goal.

I had many trepidations about FIREing as early as I have, but my determination came from seeing friends and family lose their health in later years and never realizing their goal of smelling the roses. My DW and I will always be tinkering with private investments and projects, but we are smelling the roses.


We love travel and I am an avid golfer. We probably take 25 trips a year between 2-10 days and we're trying to line up some of the big ones over the next few years.

I hope to share more of my questions and comments in the future to give back what I have gotten from this community. For now, Thank You!


NJgolfer67

 

[Dtail]

Everything sounds excellent. Congrats on living the dream.

 

[omni550]

Welcome aboard! Congrats on a plan well-executed.

omni

 

[COZICAN]

"but the value of the goal was a mindset and behaviors that made it possible for me to live with financial confidence"

Well said!

 

[24601NoMore]

Congrats. Would love to hear more about those ~25 trips a year and what the heck that costs you guys. I have $10K/yr for travel budgeted and that's pretty much one big trip and a couple much smaller ones..even $10K barely seems enough for that..

 

[TheRunningMan]

"I'm more of a lurker than a poster"

I like to watch... -Chance the Gardener

Congrats on your freedom!

 

[Dtail]

Congrats. Would love to hear more about those ~25 trips a year and what the heck that costs you guys. I have $10K/yr for travel budgeted and that's pretty much one big trip and a couple much smaller ones..even $10K barely seems enough for that..

+1
Wondering the same.

 

[Franklin]

We love travel and I am an avid golfer. We probably take 25 trips a year between 2-10 days and we're trying to line up some of the big ones over the next few years.



Welcome and enjoy the ride. Like you DW and I have already logged in 6 short trips (long weekends and several weeks out of state) this year. We have several more planned. This is my first year of RE and have already blown the travel budget. But we want to do this while we can.


NJgolfer67[/QUOTE]

 

[njgolfer67]

In reply to how we do ~25 trips a year and on what budget...

Planning and executing is the most difficult part. DW loves to travel, but doesn't like to be away from home...a paradox that puts me in the instigator seat. The time will just fly by if you don't put a stake in the ground and make travel plans, so it's a hobby/sport for me to get the planning in motion.

Lots of the trips are long weekends where we drive and we have family in Coastal Carolina which is a nice, mostly free, place to visit.

I also parleyed a decent amount of business travel into lifetime status with Starwood/Marriott, so we can enjoy upgraded accommodations for bargain prices.

Sprinkle in a couple of points based timeshares that were paid for previously, plus my DW's frugality and we manage to make our money go a long way and to a variety of places.

This has been the first full year with this much travel, so I can't speak to a trend on the spending. And while I have projected budgets and financial forecasts, I'm not as good at tracking actuals. I've taken a more macro approach that says as long as the overall net worth keeps going up I'm not going to sweat the spending too much. Especially, because our style is to be frugal and we're not apt to do anything foolish.

I budgeted 12k for travel, but we're probably spending 15-20k and I'm fine with it. It feels a hell of a lot better to blow this piece of the budget than healthcare and taxes!

 

[braumeister]

DW loves to travel, but doesn't like to be away from home...a paradox that puts me in the instigator seat. The time will just fly by if you don't put a stake in the ground and make travel plans, so it's a hobby/sport for me to get the planning in motion.

I could have written that paragraph!

We had a unique set of circumstances this year where one thing was followed a week later by another, then another, and they were all things we really wanted to do. So I managed to convince her to take a trip of just over a month, covering three European countries. We had a great time, and we both really enjoyed it, but when we got home she said never again, and declared two weeks away from home to be the absolute max from now on.

But we'll see.

 

[hilltide]

Congrats on the retirement and having the courage to make the leap!

 

[Debinnov a]

I could have written that paragraph!

We had a unique set of circumstances this year where one thing was followed a week later by another, then another, and they were all things we really wanted to do. So I managed to convince her to take a trip of just over a month, covering three European countries. We had a great time, and we both really enjoyed it, but when we got home she said never again, and declared two weeks away from home to be the absolute max from now on.

But we'll see.

I could have written that paragraph as well. I'm the planner and DH likes to travel but loves being home. If I didn't instigate, we would never go anywhere.

We are in our fifth year of retirement. Travel is definitely one of our biggest expenses. We try to do one cruise a year, two or three to visit family and a half dozen shorter trips local to Florida. It adds up quickly!

 

[Dtail]

In reply to how we do ~25 trips a year and on what budget...

Planning and executing is the most difficult part. DW loves to travel, but doesn't like to be away from home...a paradox that puts me in the instigator seat. The time will just fly by if you don't put a stake in the ground and make travel plans, so it's a hobby/sport for me to get the planning in motion.

Lots of the trips are long weekends where we drive and we have family in Coastal Carolina which is a nice, mostly free, place to visit.

I also parleyed a decent amount of business travel into lifetime status with Starwood/Marriott, so we can enjoy upgraded accommodations for bargain prices.

Sprinkle in a couple of points based timeshares that were paid for previously, plus my DW's frugality and we manage to make our money go a long way and to a variety of places.

This has been the first full year with this much travel, so I can't speak to a trend on the spending. And while I have projected budgets and financial forecasts, I'm not as good at tracking actuals. I've taken a more macro approach that says as long as the overall net worth keeps going up I'm not going to sweat the spending too much. Especially, because our style is to be frugal and we're not apt to do anything foolish.

I budgeted 12k for travel, but we're probably spending 15-20k and I'm fine with it. It feels a hell of a lot better to blow this piece of the budget than healthcare and taxes!

Impressive and thank you. Our travel budget is ~15k, but can't squeeze 25 trips long or short out of it.