27 year old introduction to FIRE

[ozFIRE]

Hello All

I am Australian, currently living in London for the next couple of years, and have just started my journey to FIRE. I am just about to celebrate my 1 year wedding anniversary and my wife and are starting to plan our financial future.

The key for us is to plan to achieve FI so that we have the option to pursue other interests, or semi ER if needed. We both work in finance, so are luckily to have a reasonably understanding of markets/compounding/returns, etc. Although we didn't have any help or training from our parents!

We both come from modest backgrounds (I was often bullied in school for not wearing the right 'branded' clothes, didn't go on school trips that cost additional money, etc.), however have worked and studied hard over the last 10 years to start to earn a decent salary.

Our plan is to use the ISA system in the UK to accumulate £15k each per year to take advantage of the favourable tax position, and then invest the balance of our savings back in Aust. Plans are to continue saving around $8k per month (in total), and hopefully be in a good position to semi ER in around 15 years.

We also have a rental property in Aust that we plan to keep for a very long time.

Anyway, just wanted to introduce myself and hope to look back on this post favourably in a few years time!

Cheers

 

[travelover]

Welcome and good for you for starting early. More time for the compounding magic to work.

 

[Luckyvik]

Welcome!


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[ozFIRE]

Well I thought I would provide an update 10 years later.

Life is never what you expect it to be, and I had a few updates:
- Moved back from the UK to Australia, and then 6 years ago moved to the US
- Got divorced and remarried - luckily no children
- Went back to (what feels like) square 1 with investments. Divorces are brutal as everyone knows/has heard and it was no different for me

So what does it look like now? I’m on my way back to building FI, and shifted my timeline back 5-6 years - roughly 10-12 years from now.

My aspirations and ‘why’ are very much the same. Work is the same (new company, more senior, much much more pressure and stress) - I wish I was more passionate but it’s really just the fastest path with the best earning potential.

Continued best wishes to you all on your own journeys!

 

[MichaelB]

Thanks for the update, and also just for checking in!

 

[NgineER]

Great to see a ten-year update, I'm sorry to hear about your divorce and the resulting setback. Keep plugging away and you will get there. You are still a baby on this forum, being under 40.

Keep the updates coming and come around more often.

 

[NomDeER]

You probably already know this, but Australian taxation on American assets, especially Roth IRAs, can be brutal. So, if there's any chance that you are going to be going back to Australia, it's a good thing to plan ahead with Aussie tax rules in mind.

 

[Dash man]

You’ll do well. I was divorced back in 1993 with one son. Six years later I remarried to a great woman with the same financial mindset as me. Together we saved and invested, while still enjoying life along the way. We’re long retired and have been married 26 years now and my adult son chose to live near us rather than his mother. Life is good!