Just shaved a year or two off my FIRE date!

[SecondCor521]

Woohoo!

I just realized a few hours ago that I had a flaw in my retirement spreadsheet: I was including a line item for the NPV of my child support payments, and also including those same child support payments in my monthly spending, effectively double counting the single largest expense I have!

After adjusting for that error, my current projected FIRE date is 54 and change!

2Cor521

[Sam]

Great! Don't stop now, keep looking. ;-)

[SecondCor521]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sam Great! Don't stop now, keep looking. ;-)

I had to read that twice before I got it. I guess I am slow ;-).

Thanks. My FIRE-predicting spreadsheet is intentionally conservative in many ways, so I'm thinking I will be FIRE'd way before it predicts. But I look forward to the pleasant surprise.

I keep staring at it every day, hoping the numbers will go up faster if I just look at them. Occasionally I tell myself that this doesn't work and then I go try to do something that will help, like earn money or buy CFL's.

2Cor521

[bosco]

also consider "locking in" your spreadsheet gains--include the NPV of contraceptives

[kaudrey]

Thanks. My FIRE-predicting spreadsheet is intentionally conservative in many ways, so I'm thinking I will be FIRE'd way before it predicts. But I look forward to the pleasant surprise.

---

SecondCore - Mine is like this too! I'm shooting for 52, but my investments do better over the next 10 years than I predict (and they really should), I may go earlier...I'd rather be conservative than still working later...

[JohnDoe]

I found an error like that a few weeks ago. I increased my net worth by 100k in 2 seconds. I had my house value entered in excel as 175 and it should have been 275. It was like that for 7 months until I discovered it.

[Vincenzo Corleone]

Just re-checked my numbers and, what do you know! I was wrong about when we'll have the mortgage paid off. I had 2015 but it will actually be 2013. Our estimated time to FI (and maybe even RE) moved from 7.67 years to 5.83 years. Woohoo! I can actually see a light at the end of the tunnel.

[old woman]

I keep forgetting profit sharing. Last year was my first and not huge but 1,500 bonus and 3,400 to the 401K. Profits are huge this year my profit sharing should be even more than last year, I do the financial statements so know before anyone else how we are doing.
My investments are up 54K so far this year counting my contributions and the profits on investments. I only put in for it to go up 20K from contributions and about 16K from gains so I am up almost 2 years worth in 6 months.
I hope to retire in 2 years but plan on 3 for worse case. Best case might come much sooner.

[sendbaht]

VERYYYY Coolllll!

[Milton]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SecondCor521 I keep staring at it every day, hoping the numbers will go up faster if I just look at them.

Please let me know if that works!

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SecondCor521 I just realized a few hours ago that I had a flaw in my retirement spreadsheet: I was including a line item for the NPV of my child support payments, and also including those same child support payments in my monthly spending, effectively double counting the single largest expense I have! After adjusting for that error, my current projected FIRE date is 54 and change!

That's great news. Only problem I see is finding another error that sets you back a couople of years .

When I first go into seriously planning for retirement, I forgot that my income in retirement was taxable (almost all in an IRA and 403b's). Oops. I was ecstatic for about 15 minutes until I saw my error.

[CuppaJoe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rich_in_Tampa When I first go into seriously planning for retirement, I forgot that my income in retirement was taxable (almost all in an IRA and 403b's). Oops. I was ecstatic for about 15 minutes until I saw my error.

I kinda went the other way, over-estimating future taxes. Then I did a year-by-year guesstimate, it could be only half the amount (or percentage) I planned. Looking forward to taking out just enough deferred income to trigger little or no tax during the first few years, seems like a fun game to play with the IRS. They have given me so much joy over the years! I shall fear them not!

[megacorp-firee]

Quote:

Originally Posted by CuppaJoe I kinda went the other way, over-estimating future taxes. Then I did a year-by-year guesstimate, it could be only half the amount (or percentage) I planned. Looking forward to taking out just enough deferred income to trigger little or no tax during the first few years, seems like a fun game to play with the IRS. They have given me so much joy over the years! I shall fear them not!

Now that's a game I would relish playing. Nice going CuppaJoe, ... right side to err ...

[SecondCor521]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rich_in_Tampa That's great news. Only problem I see is finding another error that sets you back a couple of years . When I first go into seriously planning for retirement, I forgot that my income in retirement was taxable (almost all in an IRA and 403b's). Oops. I was ecstatic for about 15 minutes until I saw my error.

I had a moment like that once. As a young kid in college, I had all this extra money in my checking account, and had all my bills for the month paid...Ecstasy...until I realized I had forgotten one bill...the rent.

As I've said before, I leave some stuff out of my planning spreadsheet that will move my FIRE date even earlier, because to add them in would add more complexity to the spreadsheet, and I've already proven I can't even do simple spreadsheets right! So my theory is that I'll wait until I get "close" to FIRE and then do some more serious and complicated number crunching to find out what my real FIRE date is.

2Cor521