At what point did you think the $1 million milestone was possible?

[UnrealizedPotential]

I finally feel like I have a shot at the $1 million milestone. I am a bit over the 500K milestone now and it suddenly feels possible for me someday to reach the $1 million mark. I feel like compounding alone will get me there someday. I know it will still take years, but it seems doable now.

When I reached the 250K point I never had this feeling, I simply didn't think about it. So at what money milestone or at what point did you feel like, yeah I finally have a shot at 1 million?

 

[Car-Guy]

Probably when I was in my early to mid 40's when my salary was increasing by leaps and bounds... To the best of my memory I had my first million by the time I was 50, the next ones came much easier and quicker.


A short story about making a million:

When I was in elementary school (6th grade I think) I can remember a class discussion when the teacher told the class that "you" (the individuals in the class) wouldn't make (earn) a million "in total" during their lifetime. I went to school in a lower middle class neighborhood and that comment stuck with me for a long time. (I guess it's still in my mind today) Of course back then she was probably only making ~5k a year, so from her POV it was an impossible goal. Still seems short sighted for teacher to tell a class of 6th graders something like that, even way back then.

 

[Gumby]

For as long as I can remember, stretching back fairly early into my childhood, I never doubted that one day I would have a million dollars. In my early 20s, I could do the math and calculate just about when that would occur. I did take a detour to go to law school in my 30s, which set the schedule back just a little, but my recalculation right after I finished school was correct to within a month or two.

 

[2017ish]

Either in grad school, or within a year of graduation. Definitely before DW finished her residency. (But even then, knew that for our retirement dreams, that wouldn't be sufficient.)

 

[stepford]

I thought I'd hit a million someday ever since I started out in my 20s, but had some financial reversals early on: bought a house just before the crash of the early '90s and was laid off in the mid-90s. This slowed me down a bit, but the dot-com boom made up for it. I made my first million before 40... and then promptly lost it in the dot-com bust of 2001... and then made it over a million again by age 45... and then promptly lost it again in the crash of 2008... and then made it again (several times over) in the extended boom we've had since then.

So I have the distinction of making my first million in my 30s, 40s and 50s. Sure hope I don't have to do it again in my 60s.

 

[street]

That is a great question. I personally have no clue when I hit it and frankly I never even thought about it. I always was a saver but never knew what I had or tracked etc. till a few years before I retired. My wife finally said one day, you should retire. Till then I knew I would most likely could retire but never knew how much we had.

I shouldn't have said, I never tracked my money, because I did very early in my career. Then live got busy and ever really know what I had or when I hit milestones.

 

[audreyh1]

When I learned our company was finally going public.

 

[Perryinva]

Probably in my 40’s sometime. I remember thinking when I was younger right out of college, that the million mark was going to have to rise with inflation, and since I didn’t know any millionaires at the time inflation was high for what seemed like forever, I’d probably never reach it. Sometime in my late 50’s, IIRC, I hit it, and then realized, without other sources of income, it wasn’t enough. So kept at it until age 61.

 

[EA-Sports]

Is it $1MM in just retirement accounts or total net worth?

 

[Ronstar]

Probably around 30 years old. Married, no kids, both DW and working lots of OT. Low expenses. Starting keeping track of finances back in those days, making projections.

 

[Dtail]

Never thought about it until it passed, but very aware of it now.

 

[RobbieB]

I think I was about 50. House paid off too. Which increased investments which made more dough and yup, the first one's the hardest!

 

[rodi]

For me it wasn't until my early 40's.

 

[Aerides]

We never really thought about the 1M thing, and by the time we started to think about goal numbers we needed more than that to ER. But when we met with an FA about 10 years ago and he added everything up and said "ok well here you are" and we were slightly above. That was kinda cool.

The thing about "it takes money to make money" shows it's true because once you have a decent amount, it's not terribly hard to just plug away and get to an indecent amount.

 

[Offgrid Organic Farmer]

In the last few months right before I retired, I was doing a lot of math. Trying to calculate the value of my pension. When added to my portfolio, I was surprised to see that my Net Worth [if you consider Face Value of my pension] was over $1Million.

 

[Stormy Kromer]

I finished (got released) from high school in 1984 with $212 and a dead end job at our family farm.... "work here all your life for nothing. and at what's left when we die something might be yours"....til then.. get back to work and don't ask for anything!"


I took a job with a local small business at $5 per hour, a huge pay raise. I ended up buying the business and lived on a draw of $1,200 a month (big raise) got it paid for and gave it he!! for 30 years. When I stopped to look I had about $3M invested. I turned 50 and got out of there alive & some health left. By the way, I still was expected to work on the family farm..I did til dad died. I can't explain it, but I made it til the end.


I never kept score getting to $1M, I just worked til I hit my time frame and saw what was there. Looking back I went from $212 to $1M by age 40.


And it is true, the first is the hardest.

 

[aaronc879]

I finally feel like I have a shot at the $1 million milestone. I am a bit over the 500K milestone now and it suddenly feels possible for me someday to reach the $1 million mark. I feel like compounding alone will get me there someday. I know it will still take years, but it seems doable now.

When I reached the 250K point I never had this feeling, I simply didn't think about it. So at what money milestone or at what point did you feel like, yeah I finally have a shot at 1 million?

Never. Unless I win the lottery I will never reach $1M. Considering my average income at age 41 is under $28K/yr and falling, that is not unexpected. I will be able to FIRE by keeping my expenses low so I never need $1M net worth. If I ever reach $1M then that will mean I worked too long.

 

[MRG]

In the run up to y2k, at age 40, mostly in company stock and a proprietary fund. Then it crashed and lagged the market for years. Reclaimed the mark just in time for 08. Once I got out of Megacorp's stock things are much better.

 

[travelover]

Once I hit 100K, I felt like I was on my way to a million or should I say we were on our way. Hit that figure in mid 40's, got divorced and hit it again solo ten years later. Hitting that initial 100K really made a believer out of me, though.

 

[Blue531]

I first thought it was possible (to achieve one day) about 25 years ago after some exposure to personal finance, compound interest and investing. I figured that it would take me until my late 60s to get there. More recently, with the run of the last ten years or so, there is a chance I may achieve it sooner. I think it hit me a few years ago when I realized I was less than two "doubles" away from $1 Mil. For those not familiar, Patrick Bet-David discusses his "20 Rules of Money" in a you tube video and talks about how if you start out with $1,000, then you are only ten "doubles" away from $1 Mil. So, getting to $1 mil is a matter of how quickly you can keep doubling your money. Time will tell, of course, but what an amazing milestone that would be.

 

[Major Tom]

In my mid 30's, I started scribbling lots of sums on bits of paper, guesstimating how much I would have when older, at different savings and interest rates. I didn't know much about the markets, and had never heard of sequence of returns risk, so just used constant interest rates in my calculations. I came to the conclusion that a million was very doable, even on my modest salary. At that point, I didn't really know how much money I'd need to retire, as it seemed so far in the future. I just thought I'd save as much as I could, while still enjoying my life, and let the rest take care of itself.

So to answer the question, although it seemed like a lofty goal, I was in my mid 30's when I figured I had a decent shot at a million.

 

[_MEOW_]

Today, at age 30, a little later that I would've wish but it's still possible.

I ran the numbers 12k invested per year with an average rate of return @ 6% until age 60 you'll have $1,074,543
https://www.nerdwallet.com/banking/calculator/compound-interest-calculator

 

[Finance Dave]

At about age 26. That's when the 401k came out at my employer. I did the math and realized I could easily make it happen. What I didn't realize at that time is that near the end, your portfolio outearns your j*b! I couldn't make enough from 8-5 at Megacorp to beat my portfolio earnings...which is a good thing! That's when I started planning the FIRE date.

 

[Koolau]

When I had finally amassed $30,000, I knew it was possible to amass a million. After all, $30K is also 0.03 of a million. I'm serious, that was my thinking at the time though YMMV.

 

[pjigar]

I finally feel like I have a shot at the $1 million milestone. I am a bit over the 500K milestone now and it suddenly feels possible for me someday to reach the $1 million mark. I feel like compounding alone will get me there someday. I know it will still take years, but it seems doable now.

When I reached the 250K point I never had this feeling, I simply didn't think about it. So at what money milestone or at what point did you feel like, yeah I finally have a shot at 1 million?

I can't remember but I can tell you that first 500K was the hardest. 1M came soon after in less than half the time of $500K. And every milestone after 1M have been realized sooner than anticipated. I guess that's what is called compounding!