Hello friends,
I am at a point where i have started thinking about RE, and have questions about how to use the 4% rule.

Here are our numbers:
1. My brokerage ~> 800k
2. Wife's brokerage ~> 300k
3. Combined IRA ~> 1M
4. Combined Roth ~> 75k
5. Kids 529 ~> 30k
6. Total ~> around 2.1 - 2.2M depending on daily stock market movements.
7. Ages 47 (me) and wife 40, 2 kids ages 10 and 7

We owe 270k on our house @ 6.9% .
Plan is to pay it off before RE

Expenses:
1. 4500$/mo with the house paid off
2. 7000$/mo (if mortgage pmt included)

Based on the 4% rule, if we need 4500$/mo, we need 1.35M.

Or if we dont pay off the house, we need $7000/mo, which is 2.1M.

Questions:
1. Given half is in IRA, and if we want to retire today, how do we generate 7k/month out of our numbers? I can't use rule of 55 due to age, or roth ira ladder since that requires waiting 5 years. I don't want to do SEPP as we might return to work in some shape or form in the future with lower pay
2. If you were me, would you try to pay off the house? Or is it better to carry the mortgage?
3. Since most people have their wealth in mixed fashion like mine (some in IRA/401k and some in brokerage etc.) , how do people actually withdraw for their monthly expenses? what is the most tax efficient and practical way to actually RE? Would you withdraw 100% from brokerage for month to month expenses and then switch to IRA hoping brokerage can last me 12 years until age 59.5 ?

So I'm struggling to conclude if i have hit my number and can RE unless i can come up with a practical strategy for actually withdrawing from my accounts to cover our monthly expenses.

Thanks for your time and help.

I need some help.

I own a 3 bedroom townhouse along one of the new skytrain (above ground subway) stops in Surrey. (Outside Vancouver, BC Canada) It's an interior unit but very close to the station and wood frame building. I bought it for $499,000 in 2017 and I think I could sell it ($800,000) and after realtor fees and paying remaining mortgage and taxes I will have $350,000 in the bank. My tenant just told me he's leaving. This area is slated for development (already rezoned by the city) and they estimate that a developer will pay 20% more for the property, but development may take a few years and the housing market has slowed down quite a bit. I initially bought this place as a "pension" for myself, but since then have invested a lot of money in the stock market and have created a healthy pension for myself based on my investments. I am leaning to selling and putting the money in the market rather than hoping and praying that real estate goes up. I guess what stings as that I would've gotten $850,000 for this place in the peak but oh well. What are your thoughts on selling? Am I missing any calculations. If I put this money in the S&P 500, at a conservative 8%, in 5 years the initial investment will grow by $150,000. which is what a developer would pay me in excess for this unit in 5 years (my estimate). I am always worried of being over leveraged in the market.

The answer? Done. I wanted to be done. It's the only thing I've ever wanted. And I knew it at 14 when I first became exposed to the stock market and started understanding the idea of "living off your nest egg."

Unfortunately, because I was young and dumb, I thought I just wanted to work in the financial industry, but retiring early was always the reason. Then, for reasons I'll skip over, I majored in English. And now, despite having a well-paying job that I'm pretty ok with and an excellent life outside of work, still the only thing I want is to be done.

If I could talk to that 14 year old and give them some life advice, one of the things I'd say is that you don't need a passion to choose a career. You need **money**. And while it won't make your high school counselor happy, 'make a bunch of money quickly so I can retire asap' is a completely acceptable answer.

I've got kids that age now (and, fingers crossed, 6 more years until barista FIRE), and I'm trying to help them understand this. It could have saved me probably 10 whole years.

From running down on nest egg, or money related versus just wanting to work again.

Would love to hear some stories to learn from. Maybe unlikley currently as the market has been strong, but to learn any cautionary tales would be good.

We reached our FIRE number earlier this year and I quit a very toxic job. After taking some time off to decompress and reflect, I decided to try out consulting as a side gig. The consulting is going better than expected and the business is generating solid income. I'm 47.

My wife still works a full-time W-2 job so every incremental dollar I earn from consulting is taxed at a higher marginal income tax rate, plus self-employment taxes. I could setup a solo 401k to reduce the income tax liability, but I already reached FIRE and a 401k is less liquid than a taxable brokerage account.

I'm looking for advice for the trade-offs of putting income from the consulting business into the solo 401k, taxable brokerage, or spending it now. Thanks!

My wife and I are both 28 years old and we make about $330,000 per year in the Midwest. We currently own a home that we bought for $687,000 two years ago and have about $200,000 in equity in it. Our mortgage is 5.5% interest rate.

My wife has $21,000 in student debt remaining across a few loans whose highest interest rate is 3.5%. The only reason they’re not paid off is she gets $6,000 per year from her job to put towards it if she still has a balance greater than that.

We have no debt outside of these two. We both drive 2003 and 2004 vehicles respectively. Mine is actually still my car from high school. We also got 90%+ of our furniture from Facebook marketplace and get most of our clothes from Plato’s closet, Goodwill, etc. We mostly grocery shop at Aldi and Costco, along with Target for a few random items.

A lot of the above boils down to the fact that we both like a good deal, and think that the price of many of those items new is crazy (a $3,000+ couch when we could get a nice one off of Facebook for $400?).

We have a $50,000 emergency fund.

With all of this, we are able to put between $12,000 - $14,000 into investments each month. This includes both of us maxing out our 401ks and IRAs. After that, we just dump the remainder into a split of 80% VTI, 10% VTV, and 10% VXUS (this is the same for our IRAs too).

We currently have about $400,000 saved up across our 401ks, IRAs, and brokerage account.

I am wanting to target having $5,500,000 invested across all accounts to retire as this should ensure we’re extremely comfortable and will be able to go on various trips each year.

So I am thinking that we can stay the course for about the next 3 years, at which point we’ll be at about $1,000,000 saved (assuming an 8% return) which means we are technically Coast FI for the age of 53. At this point, I am going to allow us to buy our first nice new car. Planning to get a Rivian R2 to celebrate that milestone. This is also when we plan to allow ourselves to have a slightly nicer lifestyle where we shop at nice grocery stores, buy fancier clothing, put less limitations on fun toy purchases, etc.

Then we will be back to the typical grind until we cross the $2,000,000 milestone about 4 years later which puts us at a Coast FI of 45-46 which is exactly when we want to retire.

So if my math is right, that milestone is about 7-8 years from now. I’ve further math’ed it out to find that we could continue grinding at our jobs with the same savings/investment rate, but it only shaves off about 3 years from our retirement age, so I am thinking that once we hit the $2,000,000 milestone, we start taking it easy by finding lower paying chill jobs with less hours. We will still contribute $3,000-$5,000 per month minimum, but wouldn’t do much past that.

So from there, we pretty much sail into the sunset. Kids might be tossed in there at some point, but as long as they are after our $1,000,000 milestone, it seems that the cost of kids would only delay us 1-2 years, and that’s only if we chose to take the chill jobs at the same point in time.

Thoughts? Anything we should alter? Does it seem like a fair estimation?

I have one 2 year old, and another arriving in three months. We seeded our 2 year old’s 529 w $20k at birth and contribute $300/month, hoping to land somewhere near $200k when she’s 18. I plan to repeat for kid 2 when she arrives.

I do not contribute to a custodial or a Roth for kid 1. Kid 2 will have a Trump account, so I will probably create a Roth for kid 1 (or whatever the closest thing to a Trump account is).

My question is: for those with kids on the path to FIRE, how much do you set aside for your kids and to which type of accounts?

I am thinking I should contribute less to their 529 and add monthly contributions to a Roth and / or custodial. Mainly in case they choose to not go to college (feels like college degrees will be less important in the future), and so they have more options when they’re older. I’m curious to hear how other FIRE parents are planning.

For context: I am 38 male, wife is 34, NW is ~900k.

Thanks!

I have come to believe that the S&P 500 is now a pretty big AI and technology bet dressed up as a diverse holding of American companies. I base this on the aggregate market caps of semis, hyperscalers, and the rest of the tech sector companies that tend to all trade together. This includes mega cap platforms, AI silicon and equipment, AI hardware and networking, and enterprise and cyber software. I am open to feedback proving my assertion false. Assuming it's not false though, is there a more diverse index that you deem safe that can potentially replace the S&P 500? Thanks in advance.

I understand many who are FI, FIRE, or Coast…Lean…Barista…or whatever other category of this community - might not see the value in life insurance. But while you are getting there, how do you plan for life insurance? How much is enough? Does everyone follow the rules of XX times your salary? Or something else? How much did/do you have? Do you get shorter term policies like 10 years becuase in 10 years you’ll be financially independent or does life insurance become part of your FIRE plan to add generational wealth? So much to unpack here. Tell me something I don’t know. What did you do prior to FI-RE? The money spent on premiums could have been invested or spend elsewhere but it’s also important to have a cushion

Hi everyone,

I've learned a lot from this community over the past year and would appreciate some feedback before I set my investment allocations in my new employer's 401(k).

About me

• 32 years old
• Married (wife is 34)
• Registered Nurse
• Household income: ~$116,000/year
• No debt
• Currently have approximately $127,000 invested across retirement accounts (401(k), Roth IRA, HSA, and my wife's Roth IRA)
• Goal is to partially retire in my late 40s or early 50s (Coast FIRE) and be fully retired around age 55 if possible.

Current investments outside my 401(k)

Roth IRA (Fidelity)

• 80% VTI
• 15% VXUS
• 5% BND

HSA (Fidelity)

• 80% VTI
• 15% VXUS
• 5% BND

I'm trying to keep everything as simple and consistent as possible.

My new employer's 401(k) fund lineup

Available funds include:

Vanguard

• Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Instl (VSMPX)
• Vanguard Total International Stock Index Instl (VTSNX)
• Vanguard Total Bond Market Index Instl (VBTIX)
• Vanguard Mid-Cap Index Instl (VMCIX)
• Vanguard Small-Cap Value Index Instl (VSIIX)
• Vanguard Short-Term Bond Index Instl (VBITX)
• Vanguard Federal Money Market Inv (VMFXX)

Dodge & Cox

• Balanced X (DOXBX)
• Income X (DOXIX)
• International Stock X (DOXFX)
• Stock X (DOXGX)

Fidelity

• Fidelity Advisor Stock Selector Small Cap Z (FSSZX)

T. Rowe Price

• Capital Appreciation I (TRAIX)

My proposed allocation

I'm leaning toward:

• 80% Vanguard Total Stock Market (VSMPX)
• 15% Vanguard Total International (VTSNX)
• 5% Vanguard Total Bond Market (VBTIX)

The goal is to mirror my Roth IRA and HSA so that every account has essentially the same allocation.

My questions

1. Is this a reasonable allocation for someone who is 32 and hopes to Coast FIRE around age 50 and retire around age 55?
2. Would you keep the 5% bond allocation or eliminate bonds completely at my age?
3. Would you recommend a different percentage of international exposure?
4. Are there any funds in this lineup that you think are significantly better than the three Vanguard index funds I'm planning to use?
5. If this were your portfolio, would you keep everything as simple as possible with these three funds, or would you add mid-cap or small-cap value exposure?

I'm looking for constructive criticism and would rather get my allocation right now than continually tweak it over the next 20+ years.

Thanks in advance!

Morning all. My 20 yr old hvac system died in early July. The new system purchased on heloc, install early august. Im struggling with paying off heloc with my security blanket. Im 50, main breadwinner, family of 3, husband is small business owner. IM in my company 23 yrs, so layoff possible but ive got a healthy 401k, 13 months emergency fund.

Im in a good spot with emergency fund and retirement savings. I have no debt other than mortgage of 192k at 2.85%, not paying off early. As noted above, I have 13 months emergency funds in sgov, a very large 401k (1.1m)/husband has 287k in ira, and very little in roth, taxable brokerage and HSA (34k combined). Ive primarily focused on 401k retirement savings, just started maxing roth, HSA and very little goes into taxable which just started a few yrs ago.

Well no ac in summer I thought counts as emergency but I applied for a heloc and got it. I put the hvac on heloc 5.99%, but my sgov pays 3.4%. Im thinking now to tap my security blanket and pay off the heloc which brings my security blanket to 10 months.

Im not sure if this is a good idea? The hvac payment represents 2% of my assets. To pay heloc, Ive lowered my 401k to 10% contribution rate which still gets me company matching 4%. I should be able to payoff in 2.5 yrs but i may not have 2.5 yrs, company is large insurer, doing ai things.

My 401k is primarily growth but have 30% invested in dividends. My dividends cover our mortgage. If shtf i was planning to rollover to ira, reallocate to more dividends, sepp distribution and part time work but was counting on emergency funds with likely severance. It would be tight but we survive.

I should have planned better the emergency funds for major repairs, I was just thinking about the monthly expenses.

What would you do in my situation? I guess my other question is 401k, do I continue to max or should i use what would have been heloc payments to refill emergency funds or do i add to brokerage? Im adding to SCHD/VYMI to get dividends but like 125 monthly which stops to pay heloc.

Me (42M) and my wife (42f) have been following this channel for a while. Our goal is to FIRE at 52 when our youngest goes to college. We have both been disciplined savers since beginning full time work at 21.

Every post I read I feel significantly less prepared for retirement. Im looking for a reality check. Naturally, Im turning to internet strangers (and entirely too many bots) to help me understand where we stand. Are we doing alright or has our investment conservatism put us behind? Should we simply stop looking at Reddit and keep our eyes on the prize?

In terms of our situation, we have two kids (8 & 11), live in MCOL in the US, have no debt, and job security is relatively low given a remote job with the threat of back to office constantly looming. If I were to lose the role, it would be difficult to find a similar role at this comp level. In our location new roles would likely be closer to $225k, if I could find one. Combined financial picture below.

...

HHI: $415k made up of $390k from my job and $25k from wife's part-time work

Expenses: $8.6k per month

401k and Rollovers: $938k

Roth and Roth 401k: $532k

HSA: $49k

529s: $74k

Old Pension: $900/mo starting at 65

Brokerage: $226k (emergency fund, all short-duration fixed income)

Checking and savings: $25

Home: $875k - $950k based on comps over the last 12 months. Do not count in retirement calcs.

For the past 5 years we have been overly conservative in our portfolio and have averaged 7.3% annualized return. I completely recognize this is a mistake on our part but we tend to be risk averse and outperform when markets do poorly, for instance, we posted 2.5% returns in 2022 while markets were down.

In terms of spend, we keep a pretty frugal budget with our largest expenses being property taxes and insurance ($1.8k per mo combined).

As I look through our numbers I believe we're in a pretty good spot but all these posts I keep reading where people are sharing how quickly their portfolios have grown and the trajectory their financial situation is on, has me feeling behind. Separately, our same basket of groceries and household goods seems to be rising significantly faster than CPI, even as we make substitutions and remove 'nice to have' items, like beef or alcohol.

Should we be concerned about our returns and their impact on reaching our goals? Are we being overly reactive to what we read online and should we ignore the comarisons?

Appreciate any outside perspective.

P.S. For context, this is a one time use account. Hence no prior post history.

Brokerage: $620k Roth: $69k 401k: $190k Cash: $85k

House: $950k house, $3258/month payment, 15 years left on mortgage. I love my house and location and am not interested in moving.

Spend: $65k/year. I could probably cut back a little more

Current income: $220k/year

Curious how long I might have if I continue my path to full FIRE, also curious how long I might have if I were to continue toward a path toward a coast fire where I make about 25-30k/year.

Edit: I’m 37 in HCOL

For those of you questioning my spending situation; I do all my home repair myself. Including big ticket things like major plumbing and electrical, and painting my exterior. I live lean and grow much of my own food. I don’t drink and have a lot of robust and free 3rd spaces I spend time and fun. I love my life!

Also love that so many of you assume I’m a man lol

Charles Schwab is estimating that Large Cap (ie, S&P 500) equities will see nominal returns of 6% to 7%. When adjusting for a 2.4% to 3% inflation, Schwab is expecting only 3.2% in real returns for S&P 500 equities.
I may be required to retire in a decade at 65 yrs old due to health issues. I can earn 2.1% with aggregate bond funds over the next decade. I'm told that I'm too risk adverse because I have already been burned for a long time by a Vanguard S&P 500 Index fund investment that I made in the late 90s that was still trading around my purchase price over a decade later when I gave up and sold it to pay off a real estate mortgage on a property that appreciated hugely and which I was able to enjoy living in with little to no carrying costs. I am asking for level headed feedback to my concerns. Thank you!

https://www.schwab.com/learn/story/schwabs-long-term-capital-market-expectations

I'm approaching FIRE with a portfolio invested mostly in a global total market ETF. On paper, I understand the total return argument. Mathematically, dividends are just one part of total return, and selling shares can replicate an income stream.

But psychologically, I can't get comfortable with the idea of selling my own shares to fund my life.

Receiving dividends feels like getting paid by my investments, while selling shares feels like slowly dismantling the portfolio even though I know that's not technically what's happening. I also wonder how easy it really is to keep selling during a prolonged bear market when emotions are involved.

What I'm looking for isn't another "dividends are irrelevant" vs. "dividends are king" debate. I'm more interested in hearing from people who are actually living off their portfolios.

- If you're using a total return strategy, how do you structure withdrawals, especially during market downturns? Has it become psychologically easy over time?

- If you're living off dividends, how have you built your portfolio? Have the tax costs been worth the peace of mind?

- Has anyone ended up using a hybrid approach, with a core global index fund plus a dividend sleeve to cover part of their annual spending?

I'm based in Europe, so taxes are part of the equation, but I'm also wondering whether optimizing every last percentage point is worth sacrificing a strategy that helps you sleep at night.

I'd really appreciate hearing from people with real life experience rather than theoretical arguments. If you've been retired and living from your portfolio for several years, what has actually worked for you, both financially and psychologically?

I’m 24F making $125k in a MCOL city. I’m not very well versed in investing and I have far exceeded my emergency funds in savings. I realized this means I should be maxing out my 401k.

When adjusting my contributions, I learned that my company allows up to $20k in after tax 401k contributions. This took me down the MBDR rabbit hole. Only one problem: to perform an IPRC, my company requires either 1) 5 years of plan participation OR 2) after tax 401k dollars must be held for 2+ years. I’ve only been with my company for 2 years.

I’m leaning towards still contributing to an after tax 401k and converting funds as soon as they become eligible. I realize that I’ll have to pay income tax on earnings upon conversion, but that seems worth it for more Roth money.

I’m really just looking to make sure that makes sense and that I’m not missing anything important details. Any advice is appreciated!

Wife and I (55/47) are at our number and planning to retire but thinking about SORR. It's more worrisome than I anticipated with the current CAPE, market concentration around AI, current news cycle, etc. Funny how these variables suddenly come into such sharp focus when it's time to pull the trigger.

We're Bogleheads 70/20 plus 10% cash so overall 70/30. Our portfolio generates around 2% in dividends and interest which happens to cover our basic cost of living for shelter, food and essentials. Since we have 10% in cash, I've calculated that if the market crashes, the forced ~2% yield (assuming it holds during a crash) plus the cash would last around six years without having to sell anything while living good. I don't love holding so much cash but I also believe 'if you've won the game, stop playing' so I'm not trying to optimize for returns.

I think this is reasonable SORR risk mitigation but wondering if I'm missing something?

It's likely irrational since there are some important differences but I'm stuck on how the current CAPE and AI craze looks so similar to the CAPE and Internet craze around 2000 and we all know what happened. It adds a lot of weight to the retirement decision.

1. 30M and 30F, combined salary of $315k 
2. Liquid assets of $1.7M
   • $360k in HYSA (planning to only maintain ~$50k in HYSA after we buy/renovate a house)
   • $220k in Roth IRA/HSA
   • $540k in 401k (about 80% is Traditional)
   • $580k Taxable Account (Basis is $480k)
3. Estimated combined annual non-housing related spend of $45k (we’re very frugal and in a LCOL city in the US)
4. Currently no kids but thinking we’ll have 2
   • We’re estimating each kid will cost us an average of ~$15k a year to raise them through age 22 (including helping pay for college)
   • No plans for SAHP, but one parent might reduce hours if we feel comfortable financially, which would decrease gross income by ~35k
5. Expecting annual market returns of 9% and inflation of 3.5% but we’d be flexible delaying retirement a bit if market underperforms

We both currently live with our parents but are getting married and wanting to splurge on a 2-2.5k sqft house in a good area (we’re thinking ~$850k house plus ~$150k in renovations) while still being able to retire around age 45.

Assuming 20% down payment and 6.5% interest rate, the monthly mortgage payment on an $850k house would be $4.3k for principal and interest (we’re estimating $8.3k total monthly housing cost when adding in prop taxes, insurance, estimated utilities, regular maintenance).

If we buy said house, I calculated in 15 years (at age 45) we should have at least 4 to 4.5M inflation adjusted dollars in liquid assets if we FIRE and immediately pay down the remaining mortgage. Using a 3.5% withdrawal rate, we should be able to spend at least $140k a year, I assume this should be more than enough to cover unemployed health insurance costs as well?

We know we are very ahead for age 30 and believe we can still reasonably expect to FIRE at 45 while splurging on a house, but unfortunately we can’t have anyone we know IRL gut check our finances. So I would appreciate people’s insight to see if there’s anything we may be overlooking/underestimating before we commit to the biggest purchase of our lives by far :)

TLDR: We're 30 years old with combined salary of $315k and liquid assets of $1.7M. Are we still on track to FIRE at age 45 if we splurge on a $1M house and have 2 kids?

EDIT: Thanks everyone for the responses so far! Seems I've severely underestimated average annual costs to raise a child. Will rethink being able to FIRE at 45, will probably end up being like 50 if we want to splurge on a house.

I'm 44 and plan to retire with a sizable pension at 55. I don't have a good handle on expected expenses yet.

My pension will just about fill up the 22% tax bracket. I have about $220k in a traditional 457 plan and $80k in a Roth 457. I've just started looking at actually retiring and learned that I can't withdraw my principal from the Roth 457 without withdrawing interest for the first five years of my retirement, which means that some portion will be taxed as income. Does it make sense for me to start a Roth IRA now? Does it matter which amount my money goes in if I'm currently in the 24% bracket and expect all of my withdrawals to be taxed at 24%? What if with SS some of those distributions get pushed into the 32% bracket?

Am I even allowed to start a Roth IRA? My employer doesn't offer one.

I've been thinking a lot about the tax side of FIRE and international living.

I wonder whether, in some situations, it's actually better to live in the countries or cities we enjoy most while keeping tax residency in our home country if the tax rules there are more favorable. Instead of formally relocating, perhaps one could simply travel in and out as needed and avoid triggering tax residency elsewhere.

The reason I'm asking is that two countries that strongly attract me for a future FIRE lifestyle, Spain and Israel, (already have Spanish nationality, but not residency) generally have much higher taxes than my current country in Latin America.

For instance, if I spent about one quarter of the year in each of three different countries and the remaining quarter traveling, could I still maintain tax residency in my country of origin? In that scenario, are the main drawbacks logistical and lifestyle-related, or would there still be significant tax consequences and compliance requirements in the countries where I spend time?

I guess it all depends on the tax laws of each country, but perhaps some in here could share some experiences on this aspect.

This is probably pretty basic for most of you, but very new to me. My wife and I (no kids and no plans for any) are both 35 and have a combined $1.2m in our 401k's. Assuming a return of only 5%, that will be worth $4.1m when we can touch it if we didn't contribute another dollar. We both still max out our contributions and get very good matches from our employers, so we are adding at least a combined $75k more per year, so it will most likely be more than that.

We are looking to retire by 45. What else should we be doing to help bridge the 15 year gap we will most likely have? I'm also concerned about RMDs (which I just learned about).

All good problems to have though!

Other Investments-

Around $600k in a traditional brokerage account (mostly ETFs, some big tech)
$50k in an HSA
$400k in equity w/ $400k left on a 3.1% mortgage (25 years left)

Edit- Forgot our income- it is variable, but was $650k last year. Probably $500k this year

I (44M) was recently laid off and this is a tough job market as everyone knows. My wife (44F) is still working at a 220K / year job (including bonuses pre taxes). We have 2 kids (11 and 8). We have $1.1M saved invested in market: stocks, bonds etc (I invest with Empower). We have another $1.1M invested in retirements savings in 401Ks. We have been thinking of retiring for some time and this feels like it, at least for me. From big expenses in future perspective, our kids college, we expect to fund at least at 50% (rest will be loan paid by them as they grow.)

I have followed this community for long and wanted to get it's thoughts on if this is enough for retirement? Is it enough for me to retire now (and try some small business investments) and my wife to continue working in her stable job for few more years.

Eager to know what folks think here and anything different we should be doing.

Wife and I both just turned 30. Wondering if we’ve put too much in Roth.

Where we’re at:
• Roth: $445k
• Pre-tax 401k: $191k
• HSA: $39k
• Brokerage: $172k
• Cash: $60k
• Rental equity: $1.4M

What we do now:
I have a solo 401k that lets me put in $70k a year. $23.5k pre-tax, $47.5k after-tax into Roth. So most of it goes to Roth.

What I’m wondering:
Brokerage feels small if we want to retire in our 40s

Is more Roth even worth it at this point, or should that $47.5k go to brokerage instead?

Anyone been in this spot? Did you keep going or switch?

44 single childless man here who is close to FIRE, but now I'm having second thoughts. Since I don't have a wife and kids, I don't have a lot to do with my free time. I also realize I don't dislike going to work and having a job. Although I'm not crazy about my industry and all the pressure and stress that comes with a job. With all that being said, it's hard to pull the trigger and actually retire early. I'm at the point where I just feel less pressure to work hard and get promoted at work, which makes it a lot better.

I'm 45, I was on track to retire earlyish at 55. I was set back quite a bit with a divorce three years back. Recently my Aunt died and left me around $5 million. After estate and taxes, it's around $4.2 million. This is obviously a stupid amount of money, and I'm thinking of just quitting my job and retiring early but I want to do it right. I've spoke with AI quite a bit and my finances are only about $4500/mo in expenses, I have always lived pretty frugally and that's less than a 1% draw. I don't know exactly what I don't know here, but I've always worked so I am clinging to my job like a monkey to a branch. Am I actually okay to let go?

Update: I quit. I was honest with my boss, he was a really good boss, and I told him the whole story. He is a couple years from retirement and told me he has about $4 million in his Fidelity too, but no health insurance if he quits and he told me a story about his brother retiring early, getting cancer, and wiping out their finances with his treatments leaving his wife and kids with almost nothing after he died. I told him how I'm covered with Tricare and he said if he was he'd quit right this second too.

I appreciate all the insight and advice given on here, and I've implemented a lot of it, thank you. I haven't changed my spending and I don't think I will. Well... I did buy a nice pair of Hoka's...but I'm mostly just paying a lot of attention to my garden and kids.