Quote:
Originally Posted by ASU2003
Have you ever thought about retiring early, or trying to reach a set number (and then being happy and quitting) instead of "getting rich"? Did you get your job because that is what people are supposed to do? Is your life going in the right direction, or do you not have any direction? Would you be ok if your partner quit by the time they were 45 because your lifestyle together doesn't cost very much?
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I did retire early, at the age of 42. At that age, I'm not so sure it's retiring as simply quitting your job.
Not all success is financial, but unfortunately you need some measure of financial success to make other things in your life work.
We never saw the point in getting rich. You can only spend so much money, you can't take it with you and if my son wants money, he can work for it, not inherit it.
We did have specific financial goals, the biggest being to pay off the house. Which we did. And we have always lived way under our means. Even with two incomes, our budget only allowed for the lowest income to cover everything, insurances, mortgage, utilities, etc. That way if one of us lost our job, we were never going to suffer.
That never happened but it was planned for anyway. All that extra money went to pay off, pre pay and do whatever we could to secure the future. That did not include Roth IRA's, 401(k) or anything else that had set rules on when, how much and at what age we could withdraw. I prefer to be in control.
I'm almost 43, my husband is 49. Our son is 17, will leave for college in about a year and a half and pretty much has his own life. My husband has cut back on his hours at work and takes days off here and there.
We take a lot of 3 day weekend trips, spend days on the beach, spend time reading or ordering up whole seasons of tv shows we missed from blockbuster online, some days are spent drinking, whilst the following day is spent napping and recovering. Two weeks ago we spent the day driving around trying pie and coffee at every diner we could find. Sorry, Dunkin Donuts still has the best coffee.
We are young, healthy, happy, enjoying our life, watching the sun rise and the sun set. We are not a slave to "look at what I bought".
For us, we are enormously successful.