My first $100,000 seems impossible.

[jayc]

Strictly growing through contributions. QUOTE]

This is your answer. In the early years nothing is going to increase your net worth faster. Even in the later years I did not have any stock or mutual fund that even came close to increasing my NW like good ole saving/401K contribution. Net worth went up because principle was never lost. As long as I have my principle and time, I live to fight another day.

 

[jayc]

CK:

One thing I noticed. No one mentions rental real estate.

I agree. Every 5 years I bought a house to live in and rented out the previous house. 1031 tax exchanges are the greatest thing since sliced bread. Banks did not seem to care back then that you had converted it to rental as long as the mortgage was current.

 

[ESRwannabe]

I was at 100K (investments not net worth) at 30 years old. I did it via keough/sep/ira (all CD) on the tax defered side and CD's and DRIP on the taxable side. The AA for all was approx 85% CD and 15% DRIP. You have time and compounding on you side, therefore I NEVER lost 1 dollar of the principle in the tax deferred accounts. I have tracked my CD tax deferred stash against all my stocks and mutual funds and the CD's win hands down.

Add up all of contributions to date, compound them by say 4% per year and see if they are greater than what you have now. Let the number do the talking.

That is both depressing, and funny... My generation has been really screwed so far as investing in the S&P 500 goes.

My 401k is fixed income heavy. We get taxed on the 401k at the marginal tax rate. So, I figure I might as well fill most of it up with bonds.

 

[FreeAt30]

I finished school in 1997. From that date forward it seems that I have seen little if no gains in my portfolio. Strictly growing through contributions. As soon as I think I'm getting close, this past month in the market happens (again!) and crushes my energy for awhile. It's really disheartening.
What are others doing? I know I can't be the only person of this generation facing the same experience.
From those that are more experienced, how long did it take to get to $100k? Am I correct in understanding that the first $100k is the hardest?
Thanks for letting me vent!

/rant!

Cheers, TheDude!

I finished school around the same time. Yup there have been lots of ups and downs.

Although I've talked to lots of people about it, I can't really say what the deal is with seemingly "whole" or "round" numbers. 100K is no different from 97K or 102K. I've heard the same thing about the first 1MM.

My $.02 is to stop focusing on the $100K mark. It helped me a lot to focus on the process. Finding more ways to put money aside for FIRE, finding / having / educating a DF / DH that shares the FIRE goal, and scrutinizing what was working and what wasn't working in my portfolio then doing something about it helped earn my freedom. Doing those things leaves little time for being disheartened about some random round number.

 

[BigNick]

My first $100,000 seems impossible.

That's what Buffet and Gates once said also, I believe.

Don't know about Buffett, but I don't think Gates was ever going to have trouble meeting FIRE criteria. His private preparatory school tuition cost three times as much per term as Harvard.