How big was your nest egg when you FIRE'd?

Add in SS and see if that exceeds any expenses.
That was my thoughts. Use SS as a inflation buffer.
I am just such a risk averse guy I sometime think I will sit here under these fluorescent lights at w**k forever waiting for enough so I feel safe. I'm the same guy that has felt the SP500 has been over-valued for 10 years waiting for the correction back down to a PE of 15. :)
 
That was my thoughts. Use SS as a inflation buffer.
I am just such a risk averse guy I sometime think I will sit here under these fluorescent lights at w**k forever waiting for enough so I feel safe. I'm the same guy that has felt the SP500 has been over-valued for 10 years waiting for the correction back down to a PE of 15. :)

Yeah I'm a belts and suspenders type myself. However you can't put a value on each year of freedom!
 
I think mine was about 48x my annual expenditures
48X:confused: So if you need $75k pre tax income, you saved $3.6M??

Oh no, see this is what I was worried about. Now I am getting back to w**k and will poke my head back out when I'm 60. :dead:

(And yes, I know there are many factors that go into nest egg size. I have 12 spreadsheets all over-analyzing all the data. I just sorta wanted to see what nest eggs were around.)
 
Before you panic: have you run FIREcalc? I strongly recommend it! Good for peace of mind.

Well, depending on the outcome anyway.... :D
 
48X:confused: So if you need $75k pre tax income, you saved $3.6M??

Oh no, see this is what I was worried about. Now I am getting back to w**k and will poke my head back out when I'm 60. :dead:

(And yes, I know there are many factors that go into nest egg size. I have 12 spreadsheets all over-analyzing all the data. I just sorta wanted to see what nest eggs were around.)

Well, I semi-retired in my mid 40s, and being the ultra-cautious type, I wanted to ensure that I had at least 35-40x expenses before turning my back permanently on a highly compensated job. And I ended up being helped tremendously by the huge bull market of recent years. Even if I had only had 35x expenses at the time, I still most likely would have pulled the plug.
 
This is why most of us chose to respond with a ratio of nest egg to expenses.
Yes, expenses are a huge factor, but with me there isn't much with paid off house, car, no debt, no kids, no wife. So....while I have $80k a year in "expenses", that could also be $40k. So the whole XExpenses thing is a bit lost on me.
 
Mine's bigger ;)

Was going to leave it at that, but it's not relevant as has been pointed out - I think what you're looking for is validation that you're not about to do something stupid.

When firecalc, Quicken Lifetime Planner, my FAs analysis and my own straight line math (portfolio x/y years) all boxed, I pulled the trigger.

Ensure your spending estimates are accurate and complete (health insurance was the biggest surprise for me) and you have some idea where you could adjust if things start moving our of your planning corridor.

I understand the idea of getting to freedom earlier, but doing so if one would be unnaturally anxious about how it will turn out wouldn't be worth it to me.
 
Yes, expenses are a huge factor, but with me there isn't much with paid off house, car, no debt, no kids, no wife. So....while I have $80k a year in "expenses", that could also be $40k. So the whole XExpenses thing is a bit lost on me.

Well you need to use some number for projected expenses. If you think you need $80K to be comfortable then so be it, and plan accordingly. If you really think you could be comfortable with 40, though, you might work a lot of extra years you don't really need to.

In practice I think most of us started with a target expense figure and then padded it a bit for a sense of security. For example I believed I needed about $45K to retire comfortably, but used $65K in my calculations (and looked for a 100% success rate) out of an abundance of caution. I thought this 40+% pad was plenty, but everyone has a different comfort zone. If you really want a 100% pad (using $80K when $40 is enough) then just be sure that extra security is worth the extra working years you'll pay for it.
 
I am super conservative and can keep working indefinitely if I wanted and saving more money. But, I balance that with wanting to enjoy my life and other passions. While everyones situation is different and nest egg is just one component, I was sorta curious if most people were more or less than this. Obviously pensions, location, lifestyle, make a big difference, I was just sorta wondering. Last thing I want to do is die at my desk still saving because it's never enough.

...

48X:confused: So if you need $75k pre tax income, you saved $3.6M??

Oh no, see this is what I was worried about. Now I am getting back to w**k and will poke my head back out when I'm 60. :dead:
...

The problem in comparing is there are so many variables. I answered upthread, but didn't get into variables that likely make my situation irrelevant to you. We have two pretty high paying jobs/professions and work a lot of hours. Thus, we play to spend on a whole bunch of discretionary experiences after we retire next month (a bit more than 50% of our anticipated spending, which gives us a lot of wiggle room). No pensions, no retiree healthcare, and in a state with nearly-non-functioning private health insurance market.

Plus, we didn't give notice until we had a big enough pile--and it was 2+ years notice to allow my wife's replacement to be on board. The market performance during the period of notice inflated the portfolio ....
 
How do you determine the value of your pension?

https://www.immediateannuities.com/

We retired with ~$200k in savings/investments, but a well-funded COLA'd pension that according to the link above has a current value of many, many millions. I don't know exactly because the max amount invested on that site is $5 million and the resulting annuity is considerably less than the pension.
 
https://www.immediateannuities.com/

We retired with ~$200k in savings/investments, but a well-funded COLA'd pension that according to the link above has a current value of many, many millions. I don't know exactly because the max amount invested on that site is $5 million and the resulting annuity is considerably less than the pension.

Just plugged in the numbers in the link.... HOLY COW :eek:
 
Wow, i just punched in my pension numbers into the immediate annuity calculator, it was 2,245,000 value. I dont know how the tax situation is with immediate annuities. As long as i stay in new york I only pay federal tax on my pension.
 
Yes, expenses are a huge factor, but with me there isn't much with paid off house, car, no debt, no kids, no wife. So....while I have $80k a year in "expenses", that could also be $40k. So the whole XExpenses thing is a bit lost on me.

RobbieB had a poll in 2016, "What's your Net Worth" and about 40% responded $1.0M to 2.5M. About 50% responded above $2.5M. So you are probably about average for a single person. Of course, there was the usual confusion as to whether the net worth was to include home value, etc.

I tracked my expenses for several years, am close to SS so it is unlikely to change significantly, and have access to very reasonable health insurance premiums but still padded my desired retirement income about 20%. If you are comfortable that you could live on $40-50K including insurance and taxes if necessary and have a good quality of life, you might go for it. But I would want some possible fall backs such as ability to get a part time job or option to relocate to a less expensive home or area if needed.
 
I must be doing something wrong on the annuities calculator but am not getting huge net present values for pensions. For example an immediate annuity costing $1M yields about $59K a year non-COLA or $46K a year with a 2% COLA. So I don't know how you guys are getting these multi-million NPVs unless your pensions are very large.
 
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I don't know how you guys are getting these multi-million NPVs unless your pensions are very large.

People here who've been unusually fortunate generally don't like to provide explicit details, but I think you hit the nail on the head right there.
 
I retired with ~42x my annual withdrawal, about 6 years ago. My withdrawal has increased a little, but so has my portfolio. The current portfolio is ~47x the annual withdrawal.

In addition, a modest SS income will come along in 8.5 years, if I take it early. I highly doubt that I will lower my withdrawal though - the SS income will be a welcome extra.
 
I was really worried about nest egg size at first but realized that before retiring, I was basically already doing the things outside of work that I enjoyed so had a pretty good idea of what my retirement cost looked like. Currently savings only is 30 x yrly spending. When/if SS kicks in both SS alone should be higher than current yrly spending. Also we live in a semi somewhat retirement town. Currently I'm able to take care of just about all maintenance of what we have. If/when that changes as we age, cost in a retirement town are considerable. I did not for see fleecing of elderly to such a degree!
 
That was my thoughts. Use SS as a inflation buffer.
I am just such a risk averse guy I sometime think I will sit here under these fluorescent lights at w**k forever waiting for enough so I feel safe. I'm the same guy that has felt the SP500 has been over-valued for 10 years waiting for the correction back down to a PE of 15. :)

+1 on SS to cover future inflation.

PE's are not a good indicator of the future course of the stock market. Play this from the point at 19 minutes 12 seconds. I do not do any trading based on this guy but he is interesting.

 
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>50 times projected annual expenses

We carried the mortgage on our house into retirement + have no pensions, annuities etc to fall draw on. Even so, it is much more than we need.

Portfolio growth has outpaced increased expenses + DW has gone back to a full time job, so the multiple is even higher now.
 
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