How I Saved $380K By Age 29 To Retire Early

[spohara]

I think the discussion here shows the wide variety of lifestyles out there. A lot of people assume their needs are the same as everyone's. You might not need a car everywhere. I used to live a block from the grocery store and I rode my bike there. My mortgage+taxes+insurance was $700/mo (taxes and insurance have shot up these days, so I'm not saying this is as easy to do now). I lived a pretty good life for around $15k a year in expenses. Now I live what I consider a luxurious life for about $48k a year. I think for most people it is unrealistic to try to live on $25k, or they'd need more than 700 sqft to be happy, but it is still an interesting idea and a good goal at least for a young person to obtain that kind of "skinny FI" at a young age. It is an incredible amount of savings for that age, and it really does open up a lot of opportunity when you have a good nest egg as a fallback. I'm not as sure about the "RE" part of FIRE sometimes. To me it is about owning your time and creating opportunity. I'm 37, and I guess I have technically probably hit or come close to my FI number, but there is too much left for me to do to actually RE.