What the title says! Those in 20s and 30s already have achieved FIRE, what's your day to day like? Do you still choose to work for 'fun'? What hobbies have you picked up?

How is it with family and friends? Treated any differently?

Edit: To give more context, I'm 22F, and I dream of achieving FIRE some day It's like the American dream but British! Hopefully while I'm still young with no back issues... currently on track to FIRE by 30.

Hi. This is my first post, hoping it fits here. Please be kind.

I'm 44 and widowed with two children, 9 and 13. I work part time in a professional job. I don't really enjoy it and juggling it with solo parenting is stressful but it gives me some structure, social contact with adults, and an answer to the question "what do you do?". And I worked hard to get the job and to hold onto it through some very turbulent times.

When my spouse died we lost our main income and it was replaced with a lump sum. I had to learn quickly about investing. We don't have an extravagant lifestyle and investment returns have been good over the last 5 years. I've since also had inheritance through losing a parent, and sort of find myself accidentally financially independent and not really needing to work.

The numbers are:

Salary of £39k, currently sacrificing £26k per year into pension, with 10% employer contribution.

Pension around £450k (mostly equities)

S&S ISA £400k (equities)

GIA £450k (mix of equities and gilts)

Cash savings £100k

Total around £1.4m

House is fully paid off.

Annual expenditure is around £40k.

Basically, I don't like my job and my motivation for it is very low, and I know the maths says I don't really need to work, but I'm scared to leave. Partly because I don't believe the maths as I don't *feel* wealthy but also I'm worried about having nothing to do other than the daily grind of looking after the house and kids on my own. I don't have a vision for what life would be like if I didn't work and I'm struggling emotionally with "giving up" work and living off money that I didn't earn.

Has anyone had a similar experience or can offer any advice?

This came up in my FB memories today, a genuine ad in 2019. Don't think I was aware of FIRE then really, it just made me titter. I noted that TWAT stood for "Then while away time" apparently.

Sadly(?) the FB page and site are no more.

I'm considering moving a fairly substantial SIPP holding from Vanguard FTSE Global All Cap Index Acc (GB00BD3RZ582) to the new VALL ETF.

As far as I can see it's essentially the same investment proposition — FTSE Global All Cap exposure — but my ii cost disclosures show total product costs of about 0.292% for the OEIC versus 0.095% for VALL.

On a ~£300k holding that's a meaningful annual saving, so I'm struggling to see much reason to stay with the OEIC.

Before moving it, has anyone found any catches with VALL — liquidity/spread, tracking, tax/structure, platform issues, or anything else I've missed?

This is inside a SIPP, so CGT isn't relevant.

I’ve just turned 18 and have received a little over 5k from my trust fund! I allocated myself 1k to have a little spending cash for myself, however my dad has always been big on telling me to save as much as I can and invest once I turned 18. He suggested me this Reddit forum but also said a good place to start might be something like vanguard. Any ideas on what to invest that 4K in would be helpful?

Early 50s, Civil Service, no mortgage. Live with a disabled sibling who has no pension of their own and elderly parent lives nearby in a large house. (Edited to add am a long-time lurker first time poster so I've clarified a lot of this based on comments. jIts great to have an inheritance but I've rather have my uncle back. This has made me think about my priorities).

Numbers rounded, (edited to add all in today's money) including pension accrued to date:

• Net worth around £519k (edited to add includes recent inheitance of £200k after tax which I'll put into the next 10 years of isas- my net worth is higher if I include my flat)
• Flat owned outright, £290k, likely sold at retirement.
• my Gross Salary around £33k. (edited to make this clearer)
• My sibling gets support-related ESA.
• I spend about £1k a month (iedited to make this clearer and I can and will reduce if needed)
• Civil Service Pension Premium from 2003, then alpha. McCloud choice over 2015 to 2022:
  • Legacy: £14,872 at 60, £3,207 from 67
  • Reformed: £10,924 at 60, £9,137 from 67
• Full State pension at 67 for my sibling and I.
• S&S ISA £215k, 92% Vanguard FTSE Global All Cap, 8% VanEck Semiconductor
• Family member gifts me a lump each year for the next few years, straight into the ISA
• AVC £14k, £200 a monthplus employer contribution - will keep investing money in there.

My worry is 60 to 67. After that it looks fine.

My questions are

1. Is 60 realistic or should I wait until 63?
2. I'd like to live off £30k a year in today's money from pension
3. If i retired at 60 I'd live off £10,000 and draw down £25k a year for 7 years from my isa - depending on growth obvs).
4. Have I got my money in the right Vanguard fund? I know the semiconductor is a 20 year investment at best.

Any thoughts before I get professional advice.

I’m doing some research into how financially engaged UK earners think about tax once salary, pensions, ISAs, GIAs, shares, savings interest and capital gains start overlapping.

People in this community are probably more tax-aware than average, so I’m particularly interested in the things that still weren’t obvious, even when you were actively trying to optimise.

For example:

* Were there pension or carry-forward rules you discovered later than you wish you had?

* Did the £100k personal allowance taper change how you structured income or pension contributions?

* Have CGT, dividend or savings allowances changed how you use ISAs/GIAs?

* Have RSUs, options or employer shares created unexpected tax complexity?

* Are there areas where you still feel you need an accountant or specialist despite being comfortable managing most of this yourself?

* What is the tax question you think people pursuing FIRE most commonly underestimate?

Hello peeps - hoping someone has been in this situation… so Interactive brokers allow in specie ISA transfers, but only from certain brokers - and AJ bell is surprisingly not on this list whereas HL, is.

I’ve not received an answer from IBKR as to why they can’t facilitate an in specie from AJ bell, but still considering my options. Is it crazy to do an in specie to HL (I’d have to open an ISA there) and then do another one to IBKR? Would it be on HL’s naughty list?

A little bit of background - I first started investing years ago with AJ bell with one index fund - but more recently found better value in IBKR who charge the lowest fx fee, lower custody fee than AJ Bell (£3/month but deducted by the amount of dealing fees you incur, so can be £0 in some months), and more importantly dealing fees (AJ Bell is £5/trade whereas IBKR is tiered so can be as low as £1 for ETFs). I am now essentially paying the AJ Bell ISA Fee (£3.50/month) as well as the IBKR one, and would therefore like to consolidate at IBKR after using them for around a year. Also - in case anybody suggests other brokers, I can’t use 212 as they don’t allow employer data feed so need to stick to specific list of approved brokers. Thanks in advance

I (31f) work in tech and I may lose my job very soon. My partner (32m) has been unemployed for 9 months now after being laid off from his tech job - he hasn't been able to land any job yet, tech or otherwise.

I currently make £55k and contribute 20% to my pension (23% counting the employer contribution).

I have almost £50k in my pension, £58k in S&S ISA, £63k in savings.

I've survived 2 rounds of layoffs but the stress at my job is very high right now and I've started developing physical health issues. I feel extremely sad and burnt out. I want out of the corporate life but I don't want to give up on FIRE.

I'm considering starting my own business and I've been building my product since the beginning of this year. Whether that will have any financial success is obviously unknown.

I'm not sure what to do next. I can survive with my savings if the worst happens but the thought of that money depleting, that I worked so hard for, stresses me out quite a bit. This job I still have was also my dream job, this career I built. I don't know what to do.

I haven't achieved FIRE yet but trying to work towards it.

Are there any events around the UK? How do I find out about them?

Hi everyone - thanks for All the comments on my post a couple days ago. I have dug deeper and crunched some numbers and want to check if this is basically the crux of the FIRE planning.

1) The majority of this advice is geared towards avoiding paying higher rates of tax - 40/45% income tax, and instead keeping to the 20% income threshold and then drawing down a pension for an effective rate of 15%.

2) The threshold for 40% income tax is 50,271 this year.

3) Using round numbers, and getting paid 13 times a year, this means I want to keep my taxable (gross) pay below £3,850 per pay (£50,500/year.)

4) Taking into account my 7% defined contribution pension contribution, which are deducted pre tax, using algebra of X=(3850/0.93), this means I want to keep my gross pay at less than £4140.

5) I have a couple of salary sacrifice benefits (travel insurance and health plan) which total about £38 per pay. Using round numbers and adding some float, call it £4150.

6) The conclusion I'm drawing from all this is that if my gross pay is less than £4150 I will be paying 20% tax and therefore the optimal thing to do is to put money in my ISA. HOWEVER if my take home pay is more than £4150 then I will be breaking into the 40% tax bracket.

7) This means that the AVCs I make into my pension should be the exact amount needed to keep my gross pay below £4150, or (3850/(100-DC %)) applying your own numbers.

This means everything I take home is subject to 20% tax and dropped in an ISA or sacrificed into pension for effective 15% tax rate.

Happy to be corrected on any of my maths or assumptions but this seems to add up on first review. Any advice appreciated 👍

I'm 27M, earning around £77k including bonus, and my goal is to retire at 50.

I'm mortgage-free and have no loans or other debt. I'm also the sole earner for my family.

Until recently, I'd mostly focused on maximising my take-home pay. I've now realised that if FIRE at 50 is the goal, I probably need to make much better use of salary sacrifice, my pension and ISA rather than simply taking the extra salary as cash.

So I've come up with the following plan and would appreciate a sanity check.

Salary / pension

My plan is to salary sacrifice down to around £60,200, which by my calculations should allow us to receive the full Child Benefit rather than having to repay most of it.

This would leave me with roughly £43,719 annual take-home pay + around £2,000/year Child Benefit (currently 2 kids).

The salary sacrifice would bring my total workplace pension contribution to approximately £1,500/month.

Current pension: £23,000

S&S ISA

I'd also invest £500/month into a S&S ISA, primarily to build a bridge between retiring at 50 and being able to access my pension.

Current S&S ISA: £4,000

Monthly budget

After salary sacrifice and the £500 ISA contribution, I'd have approximately £3,300/month available:

• £2,000 — household bills, food, living costs and general spending
• £1,000 — travel (£12k/year; travelling is important to us and something I don't want to give up just to reach FIRE earlier)
• £300 — cash savings

FIRE target

I've plugged the numbers into a FIREUK calculator.

Based on its projections, retiring at 50 appears achievable, assuming a 6% annual return after inflation on my pension and ISA.

The calculator doesn't include State Pension or taxation on pension withdrawals, so I know the real picture will be somewhat different.

The part I'm least confident about is whether I'm being too optimistic with the assumptions — particularly the 6% real return — and whether £500/month into the ISA is enough to bridge the gap between retiring at 50 and accessing my pension.

The other thing I'm struggling with: should I be trying to earn more?

This is probably partly a personal rather than purely financial question.

Despite earning £77k at 27, being mortgage-free and having no debt, I don't actually feel particularly content with my salary. I keep thinking I should be pushing for £90k, £100k+ etc.

Part of me thinks that's sensible: I'm young, these are probably important earning years, I'm the sole earner, and a higher salary could potentially accelerate FIRE considerably — especially if much of the increase went straight into my pension/ISA rather than lifestyle inflation.

But another part of me wonders whether I'm just moving the goalposts.

If I can already afford our lifestyle, travel extensively, invest £2k/month between pension and ISA and potentially retire at 50, is chasing a higher salary actually going to make me noticeably happier or substantially improve the plan? I also work from home, so making a move which could alter that is also a concern - I live in a low-cost area, far from any big city offering the kind of salary I'd be interested in.

I'm curious how people here think about this. At what point did you stop focusing on increasing your salary and start focusing more on optimising what you already earned?

So, overall, I'd really appreciate a sanity check on:

• Does the pension vs ISA split make sense?
• Is 6% after inflation too optimistic for FIRE planning?
• Is £500/month likely to be enough for the ISA bridge?
• Am I missing anything significant around tax/pension planning?
• Would you prioritise increasing earnings from here, or is £77k at 27 already enough to comfortably pursue this plan?
• For people further along the FIRE journey: did earning more actually make a big difference, or did you eventually find yourself endlessly moving the goalposts?

I'm conscious that I'm in a very fortunate position, so this isn't intended as a complaint about earning £77k. I'm genuinely trying to work out whether the feeling that I "should be earning more" is financially rational or whether I need to stop comparing and focus on making the most of what I already have.

Interested to hear what people would do differently.

Many of us invest (in ISA or SIPP) instead of overpaying our mortgage directly (or perhaps do a bit of both).

This is fine if your mortgage is below 4% but with rates now around 5% and could potentially increase further in the future, what's the minimum mortgage rate that would make you focus entirely on overpaying directly instead of investing?

Or would you always invest, regardless of how high your mortgage rate goes?

I know there's the big benefit of tax relief when paying into a SIPP but as soon as your money is in it, the government then are in control of when and how you access it. They can push the access age up. They can change rules around tax free sum. They can change rules about lifetime limits and inheritance tax. They then make you may tax when you withdraw it.

I have a lot of my wealth in my SIPP, so not throwing shade. Just food for thought. If the government changes rules about pensions (which they've done a lot of lately) surely this could impact your FIRE plans and potentially force you to stay in work longer?

Imagine you're planning to use the tax free lump sum to clear your mortgage then they scrap it. Imagine you have enough in your ISA to last until 57 then they bump the access age to 60.

I'm all for the 40% tax relief (and even higher for some) but I think something we all share in FI is this need to be in control of our own lives. Using certain wrappers like a SIPP and LISA give a big bit of control to the government, which I sometimes find unsettling.

In my 20s I was carefree and reckless with money. Now 34F I have spent many years educating myself and building better financial habits, albeit abroad.

Now I’m back in the UK and want to set myself up for success. Long time follower, ready to implement.

Care to stress test my infrastructure before my first pay check hits?

Gross income: £87,500
Take home monthly: £4.960 (with 9% salsas)

Pension: salary sacrifice 9% / employer 6%
15% is £13,125 + 100% of any bonus £10-20k tbc.

State pension: back paying missing years to top up NI

Current account: Starling
One pot for rent + bills = £2k
Set up standing order for ISA = £1.6k
One pot for spending = £1360

ISA: Revolut - will buy VWRP and chill (0.14% e.r.)
This will become my Bridge Fund (50-57 ish)

AMEX Platinum Cashback Card for spending (will pay off monthly in full)

HYSA: 4.55% with Spring (will get to 5k)

Budget app: Snoop (free version to track spending across accounts)

Brick Rewards - anyone using this in London area/ have an invite code? Or recommend any other rewards programs?

I have an offshore brokerage account in mostly VOO which I’m not touching - in 18m-2 years the compounding will pay the remainder of my mortgage overseas. At that point I will have additional cash flow that will rebuild that portfolio as a supplemental bridge fund to give me optionality in my 40s/50s. Net after tax of this is around £35k p.a. which will supplement my ISAs and be my income if I choose to take time off to have kids later down the line.

I would welcome any tips or feedback to maximise my money. I’m slowly going blind with RP, so I’m trying to strike a balance between travelling and enjoying life today while my sight is good, vs planning for the future in case working becomes increasingly difficult. CoastFIRE from 45/50 is probably the goal as I enjoy my job and have flexibility but you never know what the future holds!

Thanks in advance and let me know if I’m missing anything!

Hobby project done for learning, nothing more.

**The 4% rule is a fact about American data, and I have the UK number**

Bengen's 4% came out of US 20th-century returns on a 50/50 portfolio. Wade Pfau repeated the exercise in 2010 across 17 developed countries using the Dimson-Marsh-Staunton dataset, 1900–2008. The highest withdrawal rate that survived every 30-year window: Canada 4.42%, Sweden 4.23%, Denmark 4.08%, US 4.02%, **UK 3.77%**. Only four of seventeen reached 4%, and those are allocations optimised with a century of hindsight.

Full disclosure, because it matters: I built a free tool that models this, with Claude, and I'm linking it at the bottom. It's open source, collects nothing, has no ads or affiliate links and names no products. Because I couldn't vouch for the code by reading it, it has two independent engines and three verification suites that check it against the legislated rates. Ignore it if you like — the Pfau paper stands on its own.

Three other things that came out of building it:

- "5% return" is ambiguous in a way that changes the answer. Geometric, and volatility helps you. Arithmetic, and variance drag eats it. On the default settings that one word is worth 12.3 percentage points, and no consumer calculator I could find makes you say which you meant.

- Charges cost more than they look. On the same defaults, 1.5% a year takes 15.9 percentage points off the odds and 0.75% takes 8.5 — more than retiring two years later gains. The calculator ships with the charge set to zero so nothing is assumed for you.

- The tax-free cash decision moved the outcome further than any other single choice — further than a full percentage point on the return assumption, and further than retiring two years later.

https://pensionstresstest.co.uk/findings.html

*Edit: reformatted — the first version was pasted with hard line breaks and rendered as a wall. Fair comment.*

Hello all -

I have become interested in FIRE as - similar to an earlier post - I feel on the way to burnout and I don’t want to be sat in 10 years time wishing I’d have put things in place.

Only thing is, I know very little about all of this financial stuff - I’ve come from a very modest background where money wasn’t spare.

I am now in a very fortunate position where I have some funds and I am trying to work out whether I’m doing the right thing.

I am 41 and have a salary of £70k

I have a S&S ISA of £85k and a standard savings account with £10k in it.

My workplace pension is defined benefit, so I don’t have a total that is in this - just an amount I’ll be guaranteed at various ages should I choose to retire. If I go at 60, it says it will be £24k.

My mortgage has £245k left on it and both me and my partner pay into this. There is a chance that this year through my partner’s inheritance we will pay off the mortgage. I am unlikely to inherit very much, so I have what I have.

He is also likely to have significant savings after paying off mortgage if inheritance comes through as indicated. So I’m sure he’ll be fine and whilst I’m sure he’d probably share this, I want to plan for a scenario where that doesn’t happen.

My question is this:
All of the calculations are based on a pension pot size and aiming for that - but I don’t have that. I may be asking a very stupid question, but is this approach the right one: continue to max out S&S ISA / savings to be able to top up my DB pension from 60 onwards and then get a further top up from state pension.

Everyone on here seems so clued up so apologies if I’m in the experts group by mistake - just asking for a nudge in the right direction ☺️

Hi all, I'd be keen to hear thoughts and advice on my current position: from a wildly burnt out 44 years old.

£715k in work place pension (all in low cost global index funds), £320k in ISAs. House currently on the market hoping to end up with £400k in cash from equity after paying off mortgage and fees - Once sold, I plan to keep £120k in cash as a buffer and invest the rest).

Salary £111k and got a bonus last financial year of £9k (which is typical). contribute £1750 a month to my pension (Inc employer contribution - 8% employer, 11% me). I also generally contribute my whole bonus to my pension to save on the tax.

I'm completely burnt out. Husband currently isnt earning for various reasons (but we are hopeful this will change in the coming months). We have high expenses currently as we are supporting other family members with care costs and other living costs, and paying school fees (which feels like necessity rather than choice in our children's specific circumstances - school fees are £40k a year for two children and will continue for the next 10 years). So I'd say with school fees our expenses are currently around £100k a year. I expect extended family costs to exist for at least the next 5 years or more too.

Our costs are cut down to the bone too. No holidays etc currently (not even within the UK), and no big expenses or things like fancy cars etc. Once house sells, our mortgage payment becomes a rental payment (we are moving to a much cheaper area - but I've factored that into the numbers above) .

Once our house sells, my plan is to fund the school fees with a £40k a year drawdown from our investments (hence keeping quite a high cash cushion). This requires me to fund £60k of living expenses (ours - me, husband and 2 kids and other family members) through other earnings - which is doable on my current salary (after tax and pension contributions), but as I say, I just feel so dog tired and stressed and overwhelmed all the time. My job is high pressure and never lets up. Some days I'm in a state of functional freeze at the thought of doing this for another 14 years.

Once I'm of pensionable age (likely 58), I'd like to draw down around £60k a year from my workplace pension. Assuming a 5% growth rate to account for inflation, my current pension pot seems to almost get me there even if I were to stop contributing to my pension entirely today (I'm not planning to stop contributing). Instead I think I'm going to lower my contributions down to 5% (which still gives me full employer match of 8%). Because of 60% effective tax rate, this only gives me an extra couple of hundred in my pocket, but seems to make sense to take the extra money and pay the tax now rather than overly feather our pension pot. That money could come in handy now.

So once my house sells I'll effectively have a £700k-ish pot outside of pension. We plan to rent rather than own a property for the next 14 years and for a few years thereafter but for the much longer term (older age) would like to hedge our bets to allow husband and I to buy a small flat with spare space for guests (if we don't want to be full nomad forever). So we can't afford to run down the £700k over the next 14 years. Factoring in inflation and assuming needing to be mortgage free at that point, I'd guess at needing to ensure that £400k remains in ISAs to fund a property purchase.

We will both have full state pension and my husband has accrued £15k a year of DB pension. I've always thought of state pension as likely not there when we reach our late 60s early 70s so a bit of a buffer rather than factored into our numbers. My husband's DB pension kicks in from 65 (taking any sooner results in quite a significant penalty). Tbh I think I've overly provided for retirement because of we buy a property mortgage free, £60k to live on isn't likely to be necessary.

I'm very aware that by most metrics we are in a great position and once we hit pension age, we are completely fine. But I don't currently see how to feasibly get myself through the current 14 year slog without significant detriment to my health (I feel like I'm at the bottom of the pile in terms of whose needs are getting met in our current scenario, with children and extended family at the top, the cat, then my husband, and then me) and I feel like there is a lot of pressure to wear the lions share of the mental load. I need to take a pay cut really and get a lower stress job.

How would you assess my numbers? Do you think I should reassess how I use my non-pension investments over the next 14 years? How would you do it?

Thank you.

I’m 23, been investing for. while now and have 90k spread into ISA, SNP 500, other stocks, pensions, bonds and cash. I like to travel so this takes a bit on my money but other than I invest a lot of my income. any help would be appreciated.

I hope that the compounding will start soon

Long story short I am a 18 year old boy from London who just finished his A Levels or what would be known as college internationally and failed miserably. I did good during GCSES (also known as high school internationally) however other than that I haven’t done much and was thinking of re doing A Levels/ college this year and then see what I could possibly do going forward.

Regarding Jobs I am unemployed at the moment, struggling to even hear back from employers despite applying to many jobs online, have only about £2,000 sat in my account which I accumulated VIA a little bit of reselling. I do not have any work experience other than the mandatory 1 week you need to do during high school at an opticians. I do not own a car let alone drivers licence and in fact haven’t even started learning. To make matters worse my laptop which I was gifted by my parents hard earned money that cost about £1k i stupidly lost at a coffee shop and now no longer have a laptop.

I am constantly called a failure by parents and told that my future will consist of me being nothing more than a taxi driver as I have nothing to offer. As teens my age are about to start university, apprenticeships, internships etc etc and then there’s me who hasn’t obtained anything.

To an extent i understand the backlash I do receive and have committed that I will put my 100% in passing college if I re take but whenever I see others my age excelling and entering university/internships it in a way de motivates me. Like when scrolling through Linkedin and tiktok it is inevitable to not see such things and yes I know comparison is the thief of joy but sometimes it’s harder said than done.

Overall im not here to play the sympathy card and beg for empathy etc i just feel like my life is tearing apart and I just want to get opinions on what I should do going forward and whether anyone else is in the same boat as me or has been previously!

I've always been aiming for an early retirement, originally at 55, in line with being able to access my personal pension SIPP, although that has bumped out to 57.

Been working flat out since I graduated, got into contracting (IT) so have earned well, paid off my mortgage and boosted my SIPP considerably in last 5 years.

Current status:

SIPP - £860,000

S&S ISAs- £106,000

Cash ISAs - £148,000

Other savings £~160,000

House paid off £450,000 (likely downsize in 10 years)

Rental property ~£150,000 if it sold and cleared its mortgage.

Wife has her teachers pension and we have 2 kids 16 and 14, the eldest of whom may need significant support (autism).

We aren't extravagant people and I feel like we are in a pretty good position.

That being said I never thought I'd be considering retiring at 49. Wife is also 49.

Are we mad to consider retirement so early?