My husband and I are 35, working remote tech jobs in a HCOL area. On paper, we could both retire comfortably around 45 with $8-10MM, but grinding at this pace for another decade feels impossible to me.

We have a toddler and hope to expand our family in the next year or so, but I don't see how I can handle my current job with two kids. I've been at this job for 4 years and have felt very burned out over the last year. I also don't see much room for career progression in my current role. Because it is fully remote and offers very good benefits, those are my main reasons for staying. Ultimately, I don't think this role is sustainable once we have two kids. I’m considering looking for a lower-paying role, finding part-time work, or taking a career break so I can regain my mental health and be present for my family.

Our situation:

• Both 35, working full-time in tech jobs, fully remote
• One toddler in full-time daycare, planning for a second child in a year or so
• HCOL area, close to both families

Our finances:

• Combined income: $600K/year, roughly evenly split
• Annual spending: $200K, including mortgage and full-time daycare. We expect daycare costs to go down in a few years for one child. We like to spend on organic produce, outsource some home maintenance, and take 2 nice vacations per year.
• 401(k)s and IRAs: $1.6M, invested in index funds
• Taxable brokerage: $1.75M, invested in index funds
• Emergency fund: $70K cash
• 529: $40K
• Home: Worth $1.1M, with a $690K mortgage at 6.125%
• Car: One paid-off car

What I'm trying to figure out:

1. If you were in my position, would you stay at this remote job while you can?
2. Can we afford one of us to earn significantly less without jeopardizing our long-term retirement goals?
3. Would you suggest any changes to our finances? For example, would you prioritize paying down our 6.125% mortgage, continue investing aggressively, or make any other changes?

I don't understand why people feel they need around $6.5M or more to retire.

Why stay in a high-cost-of-living area once you're retired? I associate those places with ambitious, career-focused people, and I'd wonder whether I'd feel out of place if I said I'd spent the day drinking coffee in a cafe.

I'd also question paying a premium while still worrying about neighborhood safety and homelessness.

For people planning to stay in a HCOL city after retiring, what makes it worth the extra cost?

My spouse and I are 40 and 42 respectively. We both work in Big Tech and live in a VHCOL area and make a HHI of about $1.5M split as $1.2M (me) and $300k (spouse). I am completely burnt out at the moment due to work, family and being a caregiver for a terminally ill family member, and want to take a break for a few years to spend time with my kids. We have two young kids who are 6 and 8. From a finances perspective we have $7.6M invested across brokerage and our retirement accounts which includes about $400k in cash equivalents. Half my liquid assets are in my employers stock hence I am worried about SOR risks. Our primary home is worth $2.7M is completely paid off. We have one car loan for $70k @2.99% and yearly spend of $180k. The fear is that I won't find a good job again and my spouse thinks we should make as much as we can while the bubble exists. Our FAT FIRE number is $11M. Should I grind away till the eventual layoff / reaching FAT FIRE or take a break now and worry about the rest later ?

I have a full-time remote job that's not particularly stressful and pays well. I am in my 30s. Combined NW with partner is mid 7 figures & partner also has a high-paying job. Keeping things somewhat generic to avoid doxxing myself.

I've been offered a senior leadership position at a very good company. My expected annual TC would increase 2-3x. It would be a major lifestyle shift - full-time in office and an extra couple hours worked per day.

My plan is to work another 5-10 years because I don't hate my job and would enjoy extra financial cushion/security... attempting to ride out the current bubble to better understand where things might land, etc. I've tried modeling out my HH spend (10-15k-ish per month) and potentially having a kid. It doesn't seem to impact my retirement picture that much... perhaps I could retire a year or so earlier, but working until I'm 45 produces an expected NW that seems similar-ish to what I'd have if I stayed at my current job. Are there risk/downside scenarios I should try modeling that might better illustrate why having this extra income might be useful? I'm really struggling to understand the intuition that none of this matters, and I'd probably bust my ass for no reason.

First post. Long time lurker. The math said we're ok to retire but with the recent stocks tumble, not really sure. Also I have a scarcity mindset because I grew up really really poor from a third world country. So I'm scared to take the plunge and don't want to leave money on the table so to speak.

I'm an IT manager and maybe a year ago, I was planning not to retire "early". I said I can work till 62 or 65. Fast forward, my job is getting a little too much for me and I have a health condition that surfaced early this year. If I'm younger and healthier maybe I can still continue to grind. Planning to go FMLA or STD (if approved) then see if I'm ok after that. If not maybe I can retire "early".

House is paid off.

Elder kid graduated college few years ago, married and financially independent. Younger daughter will graduate in June (remaining tuition/expenses are covered via 529). Both went to elite colleges full pay so I spent a lot on their college education.

Wife is willing to work for maybe till 60 so we are ok with medical insurance till she retires. and maybe cover about 90% of our estimated yearly expense.

Am I missing something? Any suggestion on how to allocate my money and withdraw in the future?

Current HH income - 377K

Estimated Annual expense with travel allowance - 140k

Current Portfolio

Cash/CDs/Certificates/HYSA/Money Market - 300K

Bonds - 200K

Brokerage - 883K

ROTH IRA - 240K

Non Deductible IRA - 89K

401k - 1.428M

403b - 490K

401a - 444K

Total Investable $4.074M

Primary Home Equity (paid off) - 1.4 M

HH NW - 5.474 M

Planning to collect SS when we are 65 (or earlier if needed).

feeling burnout, and mentally don’t think I can work in corporate much longer, been feeling extremely unmotivated especially with AI

NW 3.6m, all investments/retirement

VHCOL, early 30s, no plans for kids

I earn 200k, husband earns 600k. Unsure how long he would stay in current role but if he leaves, would likely end up in a role ~200k+/yr

Ultimate goal is 10M but think we would be fine with 5-7M, expenses ~120k/year

I have a side hustle consistently earning (~40k/year) but I’m quite confident I’d be able to increase it significantly if I have more dedicated time. though it is not guaranteed

Do I coast now? Quiet quit? Or grind it out some more…

Has anyone been in a similar situation?

Throwaway account. I follow this sub but not enough to really know what I'm doing. I'm exhausted right now and I'm considering retiring for mental health purposes, tired of the stress and grind in tech. My spouse is a homemaker. No kids.

Of the $4.4M:

$1.2M is in short term bonds

$1.8M is in employer stock which I did not diversify out of early enough (mag 7)

$900k is in various stocks & funds with a tilt towards AI power

$300k is in metals and gold funds

$125k is in bitcoin

Rest is in miscellaneous

Also:

$125k in cars which can be cut in half

$100k (maybe) in home equity with $1.1M mortgage

I bought at a horrible time and my mortgage in VHCOL is $7700/mo, with another $2.5k in HOA fees. Mortage can be lowered to $5500/mo if I pay down $350k, which at this point is a smart decision I think.

My expenses are way too high mostly to satisfy my family situation and short commute. Annual spends are roughly: personal $165k + mortgage $92k + HOA $30k.

A big portion of my annual spends (maybe half) are for health related reasons and can be cut back if I'm not working. I also have the option to sell my condo and move to a family property and live for free.

I probably need to shift my portfolio around somewhat. of the $4.4M:

$100k in HSA

$120k in Roth IRA

$820k in 401k

$3.38M in taxable

I don't know how much I can count on spending annually if I make this move or how best to find out. Thank you for help.

My income has been ramping up over 6 years (physician, production based) from 450 to about 1.4 this year. Will likely stay around 1.4 moving forward, unless I cut back. My question is - grind until at retirement number (4-5 years more) or cut back and work 6-7 more years. I enjoy what I do, but am very busy currently. Two young kids - so retiring to travel full time isn’t really an option with school and sports).

Details:
39 yo. 2 million invested.
Expenses 240k per year.
Goal 5-7 invested - then cut back to part time.

Main question - take about a 10% pay cut to take every other Monday off?

Hi all - in case helpful to read my first post: https://www.reddit.com/r/ChubbyFIRE/comments/1nrgjsm/enough_to_chubbyfire/

In short: married, both of us 43, no kids. MCOL. Spouse was laid off in November 2024 and still has not found paid work. The market run up has really increased our portfolio -- we're up about 20% in liquid networth, but I want to make sure I'm not missing anything before pulling the trigger!

Net worth: approx $5.5M with a lot in taxable accounts due to years abroad; liquid net worth of $4.7M

• ROTH / trad 401k + ROTH / trad IRAs = $1.1M
• taxable brokerage = $3.3M
• cash = $300k
• 2nd home = $880k zillow value in HCOL city; paid off - this is now breaking even with a new property manager ... as in the prior thread, my spouse absolutely loves this house, even if it makes zero financial sense

Monthly expenses: see username, we have really expensive hobbies :) I've really been sharpening my pencil on our expenses and how I think they'll will increase without paid work keeping us busy.

• Rent + utilities in our MCOL [needs]: $3000
• health insurance & OOP [needs]: $2000
• groceries/eating out/car repair [needs]: $2500
• 2nd home in our former HCOL city - now breaking even after changing Airbnb property managers, so no cost but also no return; we know this is a money pit
• travel/donations/celebrations [wants; increase of $2000 from current]: $4500
• hobbies [wants; was underestimated this time last year]: $6000
• taxes [could be quite variable, mostly LTCG]: $2000 / mo
• total = about $20k per month or $240k / year, though right now we are spending approx my take home base salary these days, which is not as much as shown above

My questions and where I would love your input:

1. Does anyone else have crazy expensive hobbies, like keeping competitive horses or a boat? How do you think about FIRE vs what you could spend on your hobby in retirement? I'm really struggling with this tradeoff, as I could spend even more than the amount I'm budgeting, but also I'm not getting as much time to pursue this (very expensive) hobby while working! :-D
2. How do I think about sinking funds? We've got about $150k in sinking funds related to hobbies, new cars, the 2nd home, splurge travel, etc. In mentally thinking about our SWR, I should actually remove the sinking funds from our asset base, right? I haven't done this yet.
3. We've been delayed buying the $400k house in our current MCOL city, but expect to pull the trigger soon. No increase in house price, thankfully. We're budgeting $500/mo in utilities and $15k / year for maintenance and repairs. In round numbers, I think buying means I can reduce our monthly spend by ~$1200 and I reduce our liquid assets available for FIRE by $400k, which is a wash at a 3.6% SWR. Is that the right way to think about it?

This thread is a spot for casual engagement with other community members. It has much more subject latitude than allowed in the main sub in general. Any topics tangentially related to ChubbyFIRE or upper middle class lifestyle are acceptable, as well as basic or early stage questions. Political discussion will be allowed if it is closely related to ChubbyFIRE or financial topics in general, and only if the conversation remains respectful.

It is not a free-for all. No spam or self-promotion. All comments must still follow Reddiquette and we will be responding to reported comments with follow-up action as needed. We'd really like to keep this channel open, so please don't abuse it!

Throwaway because I don't want friends and family knowing my situation.

I’m 33 with roughly $6M invested, and I’m starting to realize that the hardest part of early retirement may not be the math. I would like to work for about two more years until 35 then FIRE.

My basic numbers are:

- ~$6M portfolio

- Roughly 80/20 stocks and cash/cash alternatives

- House paid off

-MCOL area

- No significant debt

- Thinking about stopping work around 35

- Expected spending around $120k/year

- Initial withdrawal rate of roughly 2%

- Very long retirement horizon of potentially 50-60+ years

- Some low-cost-basis assets, so taxes would be a factor when selling

- Healthcare would also need to come out of the portfolio

On paper, I know that a 2% withdrawal rate is conservative. That’s what makes this frustrating.

For those of you who retired early with a similar sized portfolio:

Did you feel afraid that you could somehow lose it?

Did you ever reach a number where you genuinely felt “safe,” or did the anxiety follow you regardless of net worth?

How did you get comfortable with watching your portfolio fluctuate once you no longer had employment income coming in?

And how do you distinguish reasonable concern about sequence risk from simply being afraid to stop accumulating?

Would you personally retire at 35 with ~$6M and ~$120k in annual spending, or would the unusually long time horizon make you keep working?

Anyone applied for an apartment with no employer?

I'm unintentionally FIRE'd (at least for a while) after a layoff with 4M (2.5 taxable, 1.5 retirement, single & no real estate). I would like to move to a different city but don't plan on finding a job first.

I'm guessing applying with no job income would be dicey. Did you put your SWR as income?

M52, about to semi-retire January 2027 at 53. Wife will be 46 about same time. 5 kids all grown and self sustaining.

NW 9m including realestate. 4+m taxable brokerage and some IRA/roth but pretty small percentage.

Rentals produce about 175k gross annual and easily nets 60 to 75k income. 600+k cash in another brokerage for 3+ years of living expenses/ seq protection.

Avg spend is about 12k per month. Including primary residence in MCOL. No state taxes. 3.5% mortgages on about 20% total realestate port.

Have family medical through W2 for at least 2 years on remote contract. Basically covers medical insurance pretax and max 401k contributions for my age group.

Plan to harvest 3.5% or less in good markets and top off the smaller "life" account. No harvests till 2028 or later. Have a little money coming in beginning of year to cover some travel.

Going to slow travel in SE asia for 5 months or so and see the other side of the planet. See if i enjoy nomad lifestyle.

Can buckle down if markets get nasty and headwinds make for concerns.

Any suggestions from the pros out here? Ive always enjoyed reading the tips from you more experienced pyros out there.

Excited. (Little nervous)

Btw the answer here is probably yes, but looking for reassurance

NW is approx $5m excluding my illiquid assets (eg house). Wife works at a local govt job that’s stable and capable of paying the bills (approx 100k at a HCOL). Have a toddler in preschool, that I’m wanting to complete support for college when the time comes. Want another kid, but probably won’t happen.

My current household income is approx 600k (mine being 500k). Withdrawals are in the 80k range, which is well within the $4% withdrawal range.

While this all sounds good here’s my immediate problem:

While I’m not planning on FIREing immediately, I’m planning on switching jobs to a high risk one that will pay extremely well, with the idea that I can FatFire if it works out. If things don’t work out (I.e company goes under) I’m not sure I’m going to find another job (in the sense that it’ll be hard to match TC, and the corpo grind won’t be worth the squeeze)

So my problem: if I want to FIRE in 5 years should I risk the YOLO and stay put at current job? Despite the numbers I’m deeply skeptical about actually pulling off FIRE

I'm a software engineer at a big tech company, 10 years in. I just came back from a long leave and I'm seriously considering resigning.
Numbers:
Net worth ~$9M: $2M house (no mortgage) + ~$7M in stocks and cash
A significant chunk of the investments is in our employer's stock
My spouse still works with a high salary that fully covers our living expenses

Annual spending: 80k 120k

Why I want to leave: I don't enjoy the work anymore, especially since AI changed it, and it gives me little sense of accomplishment. I'd like to spend my time managing our family's investments and learning to trade (with a small portion only for fun and for risk control).

What's holding me back: The salary is good, and work keeps me busy. During my leave I also had some rough moments trading (missed a big move on a stock I'd watched for months), which made me doubt myself a bit.

This thread is a spot for casual engagement with other community members. It has much more subject latitude than allowed in the main sub in general. Any topics tangentially related to ChubbyFIRE or upper middle class lifestyle are acceptable, as well as basic or early stage questions. Political discussion will be allowed if it is closely related to ChubbyFIRE or financial topics in general, and only if the conversation remains respectful.

It is not a free-for all. No spam or self-promotion. All comments must still follow Reddiquette and we will be responding to reported comments with follow-up action as needed. We'd really like to keep this channel open, so please don't abuse it!

It’s happening. I’m putting in my notice in 2 weeks (done at end of Oct). I bought private health insurance this week. The numbers seem to check out. I have hobbies and things to keep me busy. Nothing should be bothering me but I am damn near having a panic attack.

Here’s the numbers:
- 48M / 46F.
- $24k to $40k income for the next few years (spouse likes her job, plans to conifer part time)
- $7.3m invested, $5.83m brokerage, $1.45m 401k and Ira; 91% equity (VTI & VXUS) 7.5% bond funds (VBILX & BND), and 1.5% cash
- $264k/yr all in spend, includes taxes, healthcare and a good amount of travel budget (3.62%); can flex this down to $200k/yr if necessary, maybe down to $160k of the world is unraveling.
- only debt is the mortgage $270k @ 3.2%, 17 yrs left (paid off when I turn 65)
- 3 kids; one adult still living at home and 2 in high school that will be in college in 3 & 4 years. No 529 but plan to set one up next year to cover in-state tuition.
- no other debt

Why am I panicking? Am I miscalculating?

We want to transition to single-earner now and retirement in 3 years. Unlike many here, our portfolio is not huge, but my pension hopefully bridges that.

I've done lots of math and burning of AI credits on this question, but looking for second opinions on whether we are low risk, med risk or high risk with this plan. We are self-insuring for health catastrophes, kids not launching, but what else might we be missing that needs to be included because it might alter our decision?

Context & Household Demographics:

• Married couple: Primary earner is 57, spouse 10 months behind
• One dependent child: reasonable private school until public high school at 63; college at 67).
• Location: HCOL
• Major Recent Change: spouse currently not working and we desire to keep it that way

Current Working Runway (Ages 57 to 60):

• Primary W-2: ~$200K base salary, Maxing Roth 403(b) @$32.5k/yr.
• Current Spending: $156K/yr, Normalized to ~$145,000/year all-in on a single income (not including rental income/costs)
• Cash Flow Posture: Net salary + rental income leaves a minor shortfall (~$1500/mo) that is easily absorbed by cash reserves to maintain $32.5k/year Roth contribution or we could cut contribution.

Retirement Income & Fixed Cash Flow (Age 60+):

• CalPERS Pension: Starting at age 60 at ~$110k/year gross base (~$9,100/mo gross; ~$7,500/mo net). Includes annual statutory COLA (up to 2%). Fully covers primary mortgage debt, property tax and insurance with about $10K left.
• Rental Real Estate: Generates ~$15k/year net cash flow today with enough cash already set aside for repairs and reasonable upgrades. Mortgage drops off in 25 years
• Social Security: Projected combined benefit at 67 ~$85k/yr.

Liquid Assets & Net Worth (~$3.35M Total Net Worth):

• Liquid Portfolio: ~ $2.1M total
  • Taxable Brokerage: ~$370k (broad equities).
  • Pre-Tax Traditional IRAs / 401(k) / 403(b): ~$1.40M.
  • Roth IRAs / 403(b)s: ~$300k.
  • Random Annuity: $25k
  • Cash: ~$90k.
• Real Estate Equity:
  • Primary Residence: current equity ~$900K (2.50% fixed; matures ~2051; P&I $4,400/mo; total carry $6,000/mo incl. tax/ins).
  • Rental Property: current equity ~$400k; (3.125% fixed, cash flow positive all-in with room to raise rent if needed)

Retirement Spending & Step-Down Schedule:

• Ages 57-60 Single income: Target Spend ~144k/yr, $12k/mo
• Ages 60–63 (Peak Outflow): Target spend ~$13,000/month ($156k/yr). Covers primary mortgage ($6,022/mo), full unsubsidized individual healthcare (e.g. Covered CA Bronze HMO for 3 people, private middle school tuition, and living overhead.
• Ages 63–65: Private school ends ($0 tuition; child transitions to public high school). Spending drops to ~$11,800/month ($141k/yr).
• Ages 65–67: Adults transition to Medicare (eliminating private exchange health insurance). Spending drops to ~$10,950/month ($131k/yr).
• Age 67+: Child hopefully launches to college. In-state university tuition-only costs are 100% absorbed in real time by dual Social Security, hopefully dropping portfolio withdrawal rate to 0%.

I’m working with online tools and my FA to build out a bond/TIPS ladder to provide an income floor during the first 10 years of early retirement. My spouse asked me the simple question, “What could go wrong with this plan?” My response was, well the US could continue to politically destabilize, Treasury/TIPS default, etc, but those events will impact all asset classes, and we’d be screwed anyways.

However, I’m wondering what the community is thinking about possibly incorporating non-USD sovereign debt into the ladder for further out years?

The infinite LLM oracle(ChatGPT 6) says that multi-sovereign, multi-currency is a good idea, but I think it’s just agreeing with me. “A sensible target is roughly 55% USD / 45% non-USD across the full ladder. I would not go much lower than 50% USD if the spending itself will primarily be in U.S. dollars.” I am not considering living somewhere overseas.

Has anyone taken this approach?

Answer:
No, it’s not worth it. The tax requirements can be a huge headache. There are not a lot of scenarios where if the US defaults that other sovereigns won’t as well. Gold is a better hedge that sovereign debt. Use ETFs for efficiency.

Im planning to try to harvest LTCG at 0% and do Roth conversion in alternating years.

For the years where I don’t do Roth conversions I am planning to sell enough stock in brokerage account the previous December to get ACA subsidy the next year. This should allow me to live off taxable accounts with zero tax on the first 130k every other year while getting ACA subsidies.

$3M in IRAs
$2.2M in taxable brokerages with 40% cost basis.

Around 250k spend per year.

Has anyone else done this?

We are planning to take the leap and retire in Jan 2027 but the anxiety has been building up. I know we have enough funds to trigger (Thank you everyone for your advice on that!!), but I have anxiety about whether I can correctly decumulate funds myself. My current cfp, which I don’t want to move forward with wants to manage my funds on AUM. But I don’t want to take on the cost, especially bc decumulation seems straightforward on paper.

Can folks who have already retired share what it’s been like to decumulate on their own? 🙏

My portfolio :
- Nw $5.2M
- $1.6M retirement / $3.6M taxable
- Expenses: $200K
- Cash shield: $400K (mix of VUSXX, cash and treasury 1,2,3 years)
- HELOC for $150k for nightmare scenarios

Decumulation
- Simulate monthly paycheck of $16,666 via automatic transfer from settlement fund to checking account. Use dividends and interests first.
- In bull market, quarterly sale of stocks to make up the difference (loss stocks first)
- In bear market, use the cash shield

Portfolio rebalancing : current mix is too heavy with cash and single stocks bc of RSUs. Cash is in DCA and will mostly get deployed by mid next year. I am planning to target 80 US broad market / 20 International broad market eventually via continuous liquidation of others for living expenses.
- Current mix : Cash & Short-Term Fixed Income 40% / US broad 23% / International Broad Market Equity ETFs 6% / US single stock 20% / US Tech & Growth Sector ETFs 4% / Real Estate REITs 4% / Dividend Funds 3%
- By mid next year: Cash & Short-Term Fixed Income 16% / US broad 44% / International Broad Market Equity ETFs 11% (rest is the same)

Tax
- Quarterly calculate MAGI. We plan to stay under $80K for subsidy
- End of year roth conversion: whatever we have left on MAGI that year.

Any feedback on my plan would be greatly appreciated. I have a weird fear that I might f*ck it all up and we would need to go back to work and can’t get a job. 😱 I am the only one managing the finances so this has been weighing on me. Thank you!

EDIT: we live in VHCOL. 43F 45M DINK. Expenses include $24K health insurance and medical related bills in case we can't stay under MAGI. Plus $15K any extra that might come up. Our minimum floor expense is $150K.

EDIT 2: A lot of people asked about the expenses. I tracked every transactions for the last 3 yrs and ensured we captured all categories. It didn't share it because it's too long and detailed for Reddit.

EDIT 3: Thank you for all your responses. I learned a lot! 🙏 I will do more research based on all of your suggestions. Also thank you for the votes of confidence. I am going to try DIY + flat fee advices from FA, CPA, estate attorney.

https://earlyretirementnow.com/2026/09/28/bengen-swr-series-part-65/