Early Retirement Extreme Forums

<t>This line in the follow-up article made me do a spit-take: "It's a high-wire act, for sure."<br/> Learning to live far below your means, invest wisely, and develop life skills is risky? Versus relying on staying constantly employed and well-paid to support your inflated lifestyle? <br/> (As an as...

<r>It's my birthday, and I just crossed the 4% SWR line! It took me about 7 years--the last couple I've been shocked by how fast my investment accounts grew. Magic of compounding and a soaring market. I know the latter won't last, and I'm not quite ready to quit my job anyway, so my hope is that by ...

I went through NYC's public-school system K-12, then to a major university, from which I graduated Phi Beta Kappa. Snobbery makes me ill.

<t>95% of what I eat is vegan--the other 5% is sardines. Sticking to food costs, meat eating is more expensive unless you're eating really cheap meat, which all my meat-eating friends says is gross and bad for you and the environment. Of course, you can spend a lot on plant food, too, if you're goin...

Count another mass-murderer here as I've never joined FB. But I have thought of joining after retiring, as a way to keep from becoming a hermit.

<r>Wow, some experts here! I hoped as much <E>:-)</E> Thanks for your questions. We are supposed to get an email with the details that we were shown today. I will post that info as soon as we get it.<br/> I did check the electric bill and the fees this month are $4.63 while use is 453 (kWhs I assume...

<t>We're considering getting solar panels for our house. It looks like for ~$8k (after all rebates), we could wipe out our whole electric bill. We don't use a lot of electricity, less than $500 per year, but partly that's also because our state is mostly dirty coal energy, and prices have been going...

<t>We've been in our house 6 years and never spent 1% in a year. We've done little aesthetic work besides painting, which is cheap. We have hired people to: trap squirrels in attic; fix furnace ($450! Highway robbery); install gutter covers (3 stories up); remove broken in-sink garbage disposal. Eve...

<t>Update for the New Year: I ended 2012 above my original ERE target $, but I'm still working. However, I am making progress in changing my job situation. I convinced my Board to hire another minister, one that would essentially be my boss. I am basically demoting myself. My hope is that the new Se...

"When I actually retire I see myself having more time to worry about developing skills." --I agree with this. Part of my ER-fantasy life is taking community college courses on basic auto maintenance, home electrical systems, etc. Wonder if I'll actually do that, though. . . .

<t>You have 33x your annual living cost? I don't know about Britain, but in the US I'd feel very comfortable retiring on that, if I were fairly certain I could maintain my low spending rate. In fact I'm planning to retire with less than that. And doesn't Britain have a good Social Security-like publ...

<t>I wonder if other are like me: I have totally different routines in the warm months than in the cold. When it's warm and the sun comes up early, I naturally wake at dawn and get up and get all kinds of things done--I get up so early I often have a mid-morning nap if I can fit one in. When it's co...

<t>I don't have kids and don't plan on having them. (I'm a woman in my early 40s.) I've thought about this a lot. I am very concerned about over-population and global warming, so I think that people (especially first-world people) should only have children if they really want them (and then, only 2,...

<t>I bought (more Vanguard Total Market Fund) a few weeks ago on that dip, and now I'm out of cash. I have never in my life hit a low, but I figure if I buy when it's low-ish that's got to help so I've been trying not to feel too bad about pulling the trigger too early, maybe (maybe not; who the hel...

<t>This morning I read about John McAfee, who is in hiding in Belize after his neighbor was killed because he claims he is in fear of his life and he does not trust the Belize police or courts, or really any institutions in Belize. Why is he living in Belize? To avoid paying the "high" taxes require...

<t>I missed this thread first time around. Love it. If I were starting over knowing what I know now, I would become an auto mechanic and post-pone college until I was old enough to make real use of the experience. I would open a repair shop and employ all women mechanics (like me), and we would cate...

"But what about health insurance/health catastrophe?" "You're going to need a nursing home when you're old and medicaid ones are squalid."

<t>FI to me means earning $20k from investments, and I'm comfortable using a 4%SWR. So $500k is my goal. I'm actually spending more like $18k a year right now, and I'm not against working a little at stuff I'd like in FI, but I'm not confident that getting paid side jobs is as easy for me as it seem...

<t>My broker is convinced that bonds are going to take a big plunge in the next year or so, I think because they're such a bad deal compared to stocks that people are going to get tempted to try equities again. But what goes down eventually goes back up, so even if he's right I don't know that it wo...

<t>Thanks to everyone, particularly jennypenny who really clarified some things for me. I don't think I would bother going to therapy if I couldn't talk about ERE, as most of my stress is coming from deciding when and how to "pull the trigger"/quit my job. I've realized for me that this is more a ps...