Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

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dropoutretire
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Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by dropoutretire »

Thanks for having me, I personally retired at 39 and I dropped out of high school at 15. I actually started a new Facebook blog about it a few weeks ago. Im a huge fan of Mr. Money Mustache and now after finding this site I'm a huge fan of Early Retirement Extreme. If anyone is curious about my blog Facebook page feel free to ask. I do have an interesting twist on accelerated retirement through a much less formal public education.

Here is my blog about dropping out and retiring early. Feel free to LIKE SHARE JOIN and INVITE all of your friends to my new controversial page !!!! THANKS IN ADVANCE !!!!!  https://www.facebook.com/dropoutandretireearly/
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Last edited by dropoutretire on Wed Apr 26, 2017 12:31 am, edited 3 times in total.

wolf
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by wolf »

Hello dopoutretire!

Nice job. Retired with 39 yo. How have you done and achieved this? I would really like to hear about it. Have you already gained some insightfull experiences? How many years have you been retired so far?

dropoutretire
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by dropoutretire »

Thanks for asking and so nice to meet you, I am almost 46 now, so about 7 years ago I retired. 1st off I dropped out of school at 15 which was my 1st month of my sophomore year. my intent wasn't to retire early, but I really hated wasting time and losing money. So I left with all F's and 1 D grades. lol I always say that I mentally dropped out in the 7th grade and I really wished that I would have, maybe even earlier like 4th grade if I could have legally since thats about the amount of mathematical knowledge that I've ever used in life. I did have a boss at a gas station and he was the Millionaire next door type. He taught me all about compounding interest and investing in rental properties and more. He was extremely frugal always picking up pennies off of the ground. He was a far better teacher than broke teachers in my high school. He was far more successful also. I got marries when I was 18 and have been married to the same wife ever since which is another secret to early retirement. I never lost 50% in a divorce. lol. I started doing rental houses when I was 22 years young. I drive a 1992 Geo Metro and have happily driven it for the last 12 years roughly and I squeeze 68 MPG out of that hyper miling. You know it all boils down to income and outgo in the end. Waste not want not. Ive never been into stocks. 95% of the time I always do my own labor on cars and houses. The main thing that I attribute to getting ahead and retiring earlier than normal is seriously dropping out because it positioned me into much much lower real estate prices when I was buying up houses. If you want to know about my new Facebook page its called " dropout and retire early " feel free to like, share, and invite all of your friends to it, and anymore questions please feel free to ask and again it was so nice to meet you.

wolf
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by wolf »

That is some story. My plans are to retire in 2024, as my name says. I'll be 42 then. It is always good to hear about people who retired I early. It gives me motivation and ambition to do it also. So thank you for that.
May I ask you what are you doing the whole day? Is it boring sometimes? That are my concerns, that as soon that I quit and escape my full-time job, I will get bored. Have had some times like this or is it really interesting all the time?
There are so many different stories and pathes to ERE, it is fantasting.

dropoutretire
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by dropoutretire »

MDFIRE2024 wrote:That is some story. My plans are to retire in 2024, as my name says. I'll be 42 then. It is always good to hear about people who retired I early. It gives me motivation and ambition to do it also. So thank you for that.
May I ask you what are you doing the whole day? Is it boring sometimes? That are my concerns, that as soon that I quit and escape my full-time job, I will get bored. Have had some times like this or is it really interesting all the time?
There are so many different stories and pathes to ERE, it is fantasting.
Your so right there is a lot of different ways to retire early. I think that my dropout way is way easier because it required far less stressful thinking on a bunch of useless gobbily gook ! lol. But I am extremely busy because I do clean and sober rental houses, and I also helped my son start a carlot when I retired about 8 years ago. Sometimes I look back and think well geez when did I ever used to have the time to punch the ticking time trap called the time clock ! lol

dropoutretire
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by dropoutretire »

This is my new blog page on Facebook. Please feel free to LIKE, SHARE, and INVTE everyone that you know. Thanks Everyone !
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Fish
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by Fish »

@Forumites: Many of you have wondered or speculated what it would be like to begin life in a financially enlightened state, for example these threads:
I found it striking that a lot of these plans skip college and go straight to work. I have to admit it makes financial sense because 4 years to get a degree is a huge opportunity cost when you need to work fewer than 5 years to become financially independent. What would this be like? Suppose you're living the PERFECT ERE life, following dropout's remarkable life story. Starting at 15. Incredible work ethic. Great basic principles when it comes to money. Black belt in frugality, could have written the Tightwad Gazette. Very passionate and doesn't consider any element of his lifestyle as a sacrifice. A personal finance role model.

The years pass and you've achieved financial independence. You don't have or need Jacob's FIRE math equations or even the YMOYL wall chart to tell you when you hit the crossover point. You just know. Money is intuitive and it now feels like tap water. Now you start looking back at a life well lived, and you find it oddly amusing that so many struggle with money even with college educations and/or high professional salaries in some cases. Your personal example demonstrates that formal education is not required for early retirement, in fact it just gets in the way if you pay full sticker price and take student loan debt to get it. You want to tell others that there is another path, and show them how you did it. What would you have to say?

I don't know but I also find the concept of a perfect financial life interesting. It's impossible to know how we would have turned out given a chance at the perfect life but I'm finally coming around to Jacob's revised views on college education. Not just in terms of lenses but also with the concept of an education in the sense of what remains after you take away everything a person has learned in school. To make an analogy, college is to education as a personal trainer is to fitness. Both are expensive and there are no guarantees, but the results are generally much better than what an average person accomplishes on their own. I think many of us take the result of our formal educations for granted, and tend to speculate we could have done just as well without it, without considering how our development would have been affected. To what extent does an education result from personality and natural talent, and how much credit is given to environment and experiences? If you value your education and agree with Sclass when he characterizes it as path-dependent and irreversible (great post BTW), that would be a consideration in favor of attending college during one's formative years.

Anyway, we finally have an example of someone who did everything right from the beginning and we can get to know him through his writings here and the blog link in his post above. If you also find the "perfect ERE life" question interesting I'd recommend checking out his blog just to get an idea of the perspective you would have on things if you did everything right minus the 7-13 years of extra formal schooling that most people have here. I found it very enlightening. @dropout, thanks for sharing. Good luck with your blog and hopefully you get to reach out to people who would benefit from your advice!

dropoutretire
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by dropoutretire »

WOW !!!!! I really appreciate what you just said about me. Finally somebody gets it !!!! The people that argue with me constantly about needing a college education in life to make it in life have usually wasted a ton of time in college and their education was absolutely worthless and instead of learning from me and maybe teachings their kids about me and my ways they get all weirdly jealous and constantly chastise me about dropping out to retire early. I just had a blast reading about all the great things that you just said about me and I really appreciate it. feel free to message me anytime. I think that we would have a blast talking. :)

Fish
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by Fish »

We probably agree that college is a net negative for some people, after considering tuition and opportunity cost. Also that the fastest path to ER doesn't go through college (though college too can be somewhat fast if done right). I make these statements in a strict one-dimensional financial sense.

A big part of why you did well financially was recognizing really early on that additional schooling was not going to add much value to your life. If we consider college the standard plan, you gave yourself a 7 year head start in the financial game by dropping out, plus the gift of starting debt free without burdening your parents.

However, when I read your blog I am presented with a message that school is worthless. Maybe that's just your blogger persona talking but I hope you don't think that should hold for everyone. These anti-intellectual sentiments aren't the right way to convince others to skip college and follow your path. I don't think you have a problem with learning. It's rather the cost of learning with this college product that everyone is expected to buy nowadays. It's worth it for some people. But not for everyone.

That message gets lost and confused when you repost someone else's "school is stupid" meme, because it then becomes an anti-school blog. In other words, your readers only see "drop out" but not "retire early." It's the combination of the two that you're trying to promote, right?

What I think you're trying to say is: "College is expensive. If you go into it without a solid plan, it can be disastrous. Not only will you start working 4 years later, student loans will get in the way of building wealth. So if you're not sure, just start working instead. You can still continue your education with these free resources. And if you really want, you can always go back to college once you are rich and retired."

If you would post more along those lines it would more effectively communicate your message to your audience. Things like the post about seeing 3 pennies when you pick up 1 off the street, that's a great way to communicate the power of saving and paying off debt, and doesn't require much of a math education to appreciate. More of that please. Hope this feedback helps!

dropoutretire
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Re: Hello from Portland Oregon area * I dropped out of the public educational system at 15 and retired at 39

Post by dropoutretire »

Hey thanks so much for the input and reading by blog. I like a lot of what you said here and yes sometimes I need to calm down a hair. lol. My theories and beliefs are that college could be done away with 1OO% and all that should be left is medical and dental school. The rest could be taught by employers like an apprenticeship. If the employer teaches the employee to do a specific job, they can teach it far more efficiently and cost effectively for the employee. I always ask kids would you learn a job getting paid 1 penny an hour and of course they always say no. I say well 1 penny an hour is far better than paying a teacher 30 an hour plus all the other lost wages while sitting in class and all the other way over priced book fees and all the other BS that goes along with sitting in class. I like how you realized that a parent that pays for their kids college puts off their retirement also. I am just amazed at how people accept society as its been sold to them. But thanks again for the input and feel free to write on my blog. You know how people always say that you have to have a degree to compete ? My theory is that all students should BOYCOTT college and then when all of them apply for jobs employers are left with no other choice than to train people like they did many many years ago !!!! The employers have become masters at getting kids to go to college shoring them up with 1.4 TRILLION in student loan debts !!!! ITS GETTING UTTERLY STUPID !!!!! :)

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