Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Two year update:

1995: No savings, no debt.

2001: Laid-off from work; decided I was FI with 5% WR.

2012: 2% WR

2014: 1.5% WR

The relentless rise in stock prices reminds me of the late 1990's. Whoo-hoo!

While the numbers have lost significance, it's fun to check every now and then.

3.5% as of this weekend. I am officially declaring myself FI.

Thanks to the people here (and at MMM too) for the inspiration.

1.4% SWR as of Oct 30, 2014, twelve months into my early retirement. I'd just like to thank Ben Bernanke one more time for QE and all the goods times that followed.
1.75% as December 30, 2015.

2000- ooooo money!
2004- K this house is ridiculously large and expensive and do I really need multiple new vehicles and a gated community?
2008- Can I get a do over, in a way that makes just a bit more sense?
2010- OK time to get serious Seriously...
2014- Finally!, Better late than never geez...

100% of all anticipated ERE expenses covered. Since my life will not look like it does now when I ERE, that is the basis for my interpretation of SWR.

This is difficult for me to quantify due to the high degree of adaptation and flexibility with which I live. I am not leveraged in any way. As of today based on what I actually would need I estimate it could fluctuate between 2.5 and 5.5 depending on market performance and what I wanted to do for the year in question.

Note: This also assumes I will never make or recieve another dime. Kinda doom and gloomish but there you have it.

Finally crossed the 4 % line - my SWR is now 3.99 %

Congratulations, wizards! The last %s are the hardest, of course!

Thought I had posted this but was on my iPad so maybe that was the challenge.

In reconstructing this I'm pretty sure it goes like this:

2008 Bitter and sudden end of relationship: WR 12.5%
2010 Reset button on life now in place and going well: WR 10%
2012: WR 8%
2014: WR 4% - now able to call this a SWR!
1-Dec-2014: Handed in resignation
1-Jan-2015: Will be officially FI and able to devote more time to house projects, learning new skills, community service, friends and family.

Thanks to the community here - especially the dedication of Jacob in setting up this collaboration site - and also to the Mr. Money Mustache community. It has all be inspirational and educational.

@PDXgal -- that's fantastic. Congrats!

2011: 51% WR (graduated college, no income but very low spending living overseas)
2012: 43% WR (got a job, moved to high COL city)
2013: 29% WR
2014: 17% WR (surpassed 5 years of living expenses saved)
2015: 11% projected WR (new job, expecting to save of 75% net income)

I'm inspired by many posters' success stories and SWR's of well below 3%...

2011: infinite
2012: 76%
2013: 28%
2014: 12%

2015: 5% come hell or highwater!

New here, been reading for months. Here are my approximate #'s:

2013: ~31%
2014: ~18%
2015: predicting ~13%

While to go yet.

My 10 Year Plan - Year 3.

June 2012: Beginning of working career - net worth ~$0
Year End 2012: 74.5% WR - no true commitment to investment until year end
Year End 2013: 32.3% WR - began saving 50% of pre-tax income, living in metropolitan area with rent about 38% of all spending
Year End 2014: 18.2% WR - continued 50% savings rate plan with rent ~39% of spending

Projections*

Year End 2015: 13.16% WR
Year End 2016: 10.18% WR
Year End 2017: 7.92% WR
Year End 2018: 6.54% WR
Year End 2019: 5.54% WR
Year End 2020: 4.77% WR
Year End 2021: 4.17% WR
Year End 2022: 3.68% SWR

*Based on marginal pay increases of ~2% per year and a conservative return of 5% in investments while saving held constant at 50% of income and spending increases at 2% per year (~CPI). Technically more income could be saved if spending was held constant, but this approach should be conservative.

Moving to out of the metropolitan area would likely suit me better and also allow me to decrease my spending significantly, giving me an accelerated timeline to my target of < 4% SWR.

Note: Using total yearly expenses (actuals for 2012, 2013 and 2014) divided by investment value (not including 3 months spending emergency fund).

Here are the calcs I've gotten down and feel pretty comfortable with.

Looking for a withdrawal of 15K per year so

SWR Year Age

56.04% 2015 29
21.15% 2016 30
12.46% 2017 31
8.53% 2018 32
6.31% 2019 33
4.88% 2020 34
3.90% 2021 35 (FIRE!)



These calcs work for ROI of anywhere from 5%-10% over the next 5-6 years.

Beyond that, it starts decreasing toward 1% after a decade, eventually hitting .59% when I hit "retirement" age (hehe).

Extending work by just 5 years gives me this. Pretty nice!

SWR Year Age

56.04% 2015 29
21.15% 2016 30
12.46% 2017 31
8.53% 2018 32
6.31% 2019 33
4.88% 2020 34
3.90% 2021 35
3.19% 2022 36
2.65% 2023 37
2.23% 2024 38
1.89% 2025 39
1.62% 2026 40

2011: 85%
2012: 29%
2013: 22%
2014: 18%
projected 2015: <6%

Though I'm currently living in a van; awesome and sustainable except for bringing another human or two under the roof.

2014 - 11.5%
2015 - 7.5%
2016 - hopefully 4-5% & plan to switch to part-time work

2015 - 21.5%

Hopefully I remember to update this as we get close to 4%.

~23.5%

Not sure that really counts as an "SWR", mind, as I'm pretty sure only the extremely foolish would feel confident getting the ~25% returns required to sustain that one...!

2015 -- 1%

jacob wrote:2015 -- 1%

Impressive! I've yet to crack 4%, 4.3%-4.4% the last couple months. Probably a year and a half out before I hit 3% consistently.

When you give percentages for SWR, do you mean the chance that the portfolio with fail after a certain number of years, or the percentage of the portfolio that you spend in a given year? If it's the later, wouldn't it be more correct to call it just WR?