if you were able to retire early (55-62) how did you do it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in my early 50s and in a job I like overall, but it's a very draining role, the commute isn't great, I'm getting bored with the work and the options for moving up the chain and seeing more significant raises are limited. I could stick it out for another five years, ideally more like 8-10, but it's getting to be a lot. Over the past year, a few of my older colleagues resigned before hitting 60. One retired early out of nowhere and management didn't throw him a retirement party, so I didn't have a chance to ask him what's next. Another left early after being with the org for about 15 years and was vested in the pension but still left earlier than most in the plan.

So, for those who've done it, how do you get to the point of making it happen? Did you assess your finances and accept a lower-paying or part time job for peace of mind and being ok with giving up the good salary? Or did you methodically plan for retiring early and sock away a lot of money since your first job?

Lived within our means (mostly). Incurred only "good debt" (mortgage; and didn't buy in the range we were approved for). Saved like crazy, invested, aggressively funded 529. We still had a lot of luxury (mostly vacations) but did not do fancy cars, fancy clothes (basic stuff no Prada, Gucci, Chanel, etc.), don't buy a lot of jewelry. Those just aren't important to us.

We also had some luck, honestly, buying our home in 2002 before prices skyrocketed. Also our starter home became our forever home and we remodeled. So we paid it off in about 20 years.

Having said that, I have money insecurities having grown up poor. So I'm still working, it's just for myself whenever I want. I'm 53.

How did you buy a house in DMV at 29??

I bought a house at the same time when I was 28.

The house was $300,000. I saved 60,000 to put down on the house because I didn’t go to fancy dinners or Europe.

I cooked at home and packed my lunch.

My house is now worth 750,000.

I live in Darnestown, Maryland. I’ve never commuted more than 30 minutes to work.

You probably would never want to live here. But I’m retired @ 57.

OMFG. You bought your house in 1997. Thats why you made it.

$300k when younger GenX or Millennials were that age gets you MAYBE a crappy condo, and long term that is almost always a financial liability.

Fancy dinners? Europe? Too bad retirement didnt make you a kinder or reflective person.

Older Millenial. Bought my first house in 2009 during the Great Recession. I feel like I won the timing lottery.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm Gen-X and bought a home at 30 in DC. It was a special program for homeowners-- 5% down and around 6% mortgage rate.

I'm 55 and took VERA option. I have $2 million in TSP.

I haven't actually received the pension yet, so I guess some would say I'm not really retired, but OPM seems to have the wheels in motion to make that happen in 6 months or so.

I am currently very busy supporting my kids as they start college, start jobs after college, move across country, etc. So I'm not bored/not wanting to find a new job.

My personality is very much of the "Easily Amused" type, so I don't expect I'll be wanting to do expensive travel. Road tripping to visit friends and family in Canada and US sounds great to me.

But if you are the type of person that really loves to travel, you may need to wait and not do early retirement.

Hey PP, How many years of service to be at $2M at age 55? Do you have other 401K besides TSP?
OPM is doing a great job, no worries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in my early 50s and in a job I like overall, but it's a very draining role, the commute isn't great, I'm getting bored with the work and the options for moving up the chain and seeing more significant raises are limited. I could stick it out for another five years, ideally more like 8-10, but it's getting to be a lot. Over the past year, a few of my older colleagues resigned before hitting 60. One retired early out of nowhere and management didn't throw him a retirement party, so I didn't have a chance to ask him what's next. Another left early after being with the org for about 15 years and was vested in the pension but still left earlier than most in the plan.

So, for those who've done it, how do you get to the point of making it happen? Did you assess your finances and accept a lower-paying or part time job for peace of mind and being ok with giving up the good salary? Or did you methodically plan for retiring early and sock away a lot of money since your first job?

Lived within our means (mostly). Incurred only "good debt" (mortgage; and didn't buy in the range we were approved for). Saved like crazy, invested, aggressively funded 529. We still had a lot of luxury (mostly vacations) but did not do fancy cars, fancy clothes (basic stuff no Prada, Gucci, Chanel, etc.), don't buy a lot of jewelry. Those just aren't important to us.

We also had some luck, honestly, buying our home in 2002 before prices skyrocketed. Also our starter home became our forever home and we remodeled. So we paid it off in about 20 years.

Having said that, I have money insecurities having grown up poor. So I'm still working, it's just for myself whenever I want. I'm 53.

How did you buy a house in DMV at 29??

I bought a house at the same time when I was 28.

The house was $300,000. I saved 60,000 to put down on the house because I didn’t go to fancy dinners or Europe.

I cooked at home and packed my lunch.

My house is now worth 750,000.

I live in Darnestown, Maryland. I’ve never commuted more than 30 minutes to work.

You probably would never want to live here. But I’m retired @ 57.

OMFG. You bought your house in 1997. Thats why you made it.

$300k when younger GenX or Millennials were that age gets you MAYBE a crappy condo, and long term that is almost always a financial liability.

Fancy dinners? Europe? Too bad retirement didnt make you a kinder or reflective person.

My brothers were boomers and they couldn’t believe that I was spending 300 K. To them that was an insane amount of money.

My friends who were Gen Xers in 1997 who could not buy a house we’re going on fancy dinners and going to Europe. I wasn’t talking about you going to fancy dinners and going to Europe so relax.

The reality is houses are expensive, but if everybody moved home with their parents for three or four years. Made their own lunch. Never went to Starbucks. Didn’t pay for every streaming service. Didn’t travel you could afford a house because my salary in 1997 was… $25K.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in my early 50s and in a job I like overall, but it's a very draining role, the commute isn't great, I'm getting bored with the work and the options for moving up the chain and seeing more significant raises are limited. I could stick it out for another five years, ideally more like 8-10, but it's getting to be a lot. Over the past year, a few of my older colleagues resigned before hitting 60. One retired early out of nowhere and management didn't throw him a retirement party, so I didn't have a chance to ask him what's next. Another left early after being with the org for about 15 years and was vested in the pension but still left earlier than most in the plan.

So, for those who've done it, how do you get to the point of making it happen? Did you assess your finances and accept a lower-paying or part time job for peace of mind and being ok with giving up the good salary? Or did you methodically plan for retiring early and sock away a lot of money since your first job?

Lived within our means (mostly). Incurred only "good debt" (mortgage; and didn't buy in the range we were approved for). Saved like crazy, invested, aggressively funded 529. We still had a lot of luxury (mostly vacations) but did not do fancy cars, fancy clothes (basic stuff no Prada, Gucci, Chanel, etc.), don't buy a lot of jewelry. Those just aren't important to us.

We also had some luck, honestly, buying our home in 2002 before prices skyrocketed. Also our starter home became our forever home and we remodeled. So we paid it off in about 20 years.

Having said that, I have money insecurities having grown up poor. So I'm still working, it's just for myself whenever I want. I'm 53.

How did you buy a house in DMV at 29??

I bought a house at the same time when I was 28.

The house was $300,000. I saved 60,000 to put down on the house because I didn’t go to fancy dinners or Europe.

I cooked at home and packed my lunch.

My house is now worth 750,000.

I live in Darnestown, Maryland. I’ve never commuted more than 30 minutes to work.

You probably would never want to live here. But I’m retired @ 57.

OMFG. You bought your house in 1997. Thats why you made it.

$300k when younger GenX or Millennials were that age gets you MAYBE a crappy condo, and long term that is almost always a financial liability.

Fancy dinners? Europe? Too bad retirement didnt make you a kinder or reflective person.

Older Millenial. Bought my first house in 2009 during the Great Recession. I feel like I won the timing lottery.

Do you remember your salary, how much the house was and how much you put down?

How did you save the down payment?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm 56 and still working. DH is 62 and retired at 60 (technically laid off and chose to retire because we were able to do that financially). I plan to retire at 60.

House will be paid off then and last kid out of college - she's a junior, kid 1 graduated this year and is working full time and living on his own. We still live in the Arlington house DH bought in the late 90s although we did a significant renovation 12 years ago. DH saved a lot in the first 10 yrs of his career while i was later to saving. So, a lot of our good place with retirement $$ is because of that foundation.

No pensions or retiree healthcare. I'll have to figure out health insurance to bridge from 60-65. Possibly an ACA plan, although I want to investigate more the idea of taking a class per semester at GMU to get student health insurance.

So, basically, early savings, house that never had a payment that was a large % of our income, kids went to reasonably priced colleges (one in-state, one OOS with merit, both <$30k/yr), my parents paid for one year of college per kid. Buy modest cars and drive them for a long time. Generally live within our means.

The 90s house is really the master key to prosperity for you.

Yes, but also that we chose to stay in the mostly-unimproved 1940s house and gradually DIY stuff for a long time before finally investing in a good renovation. A lot of my friends said they couldn't believe I lived with that kitchen for so long. But, now we are in a better place for retirement than they are.

You are so out of touch. Renovating a kitchen is peanuts compared to how much houses escalated in price soon after you bought. DIY has NOTHING to do with it.

Sure, compared to people buying a decade+ later. But I'm talking about similarly aged friends who also bought their first homes in the mid-late 90s. And, stretched more on price because they weren't ok with a fixer upper and/or kept moving up in houses to get something nicer. Now they think we are "lucky". No, compared to them we just made different choices. I acknowledge that we are luckier than people who entered the housing market later.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in my early 50s and in a job I like overall, but it's a very draining role, the commute isn't great, I'm getting bored with the work and the options for moving up the chain and seeing more significant raises are limited. I could stick it out for another five years, ideally more like 8-10, but it's getting to be a lot. Over the past year, a few of my older colleagues resigned before hitting 60. One retired early out of nowhere and management didn't throw him a retirement party, so I didn't have a chance to ask him what's next. Another left early after being with the org for about 15 years and was vested in the pension but still left earlier than most in the plan.

So, for those who've done it, how do you get to the point of making it happen? Did you assess your finances and accept a lower-paying or part time job for peace of mind and being ok with giving up the good salary? Or did you methodically plan for retiring early and sock away a lot of money since your first job?

Lived within our means (mostly). Incurred only "good debt" (mortgage; and didn't buy in the range we were approved for). Saved like crazy, invested, aggressively funded 529. We still had a lot of luxury (mostly vacations) but did not do fancy cars, fancy clothes (basic stuff no Prada, Gucci, Chanel, etc.), don't buy a lot of jewelry. Those just aren't important to us.

We also had some luck, honestly, buying our home in 2002 before prices skyrocketed. Also our starter home became our forever home and we remodeled. So we paid it off in about 20 years.

Having said that, I have money insecurities having grown up poor. So I'm still working, it's just for myself whenever I want. I'm 53.

How did you buy a house in DMV at 29??

I bought a house at the same time when I was 28.

The house was $300,000. I saved 60,000 to put down on the house because I didn’t go to fancy dinners or Europe.

I cooked at home and packed my lunch.

My house is now worth 750,000.

I live in Darnestown, Maryland. I’ve never commuted more than 30 minutes to work.

You probably would never want to live here. But I’m retired @ 57.

OMFG. You bought your house in 1997. Thats why you made it.

$300k when younger GenX or Millennials were that age gets you MAYBE a crappy condo, and long term that is almost always a financial liability.

Fancy dinners? Europe? Too bad retirement didnt make you a kinder or reflective person.

Older Millenial. Bought my first house in 2009 during the Great Recession. I feel like I won the timing lottery.

Do you remember your salary, how much the house was and how much you put down?

How did you save the down payment?

I think my salary out of law school was ~$135k, with no student loan debt (thanks to my parents). I lived simply and saved aggressively for a little over a year for the down payment, and the mortgage was $500k with an interest rate in the 4% range. I wish I had just paid off that first house and retired at ~40 to spend more time with my kids, travel, and live a simple life instead of caving to my husband's pressure to trade up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm Gen-X and bought a home at 30 in DC. It was a special program for homeowners-- 5% down and around 6% mortgage rate.

I'm 55 and took VERA option. I have $2 million in TSP.

I haven't actually received the pension yet, so I guess some would say I'm not really retired, but OPM seems to have the wheels in motion to make that happen in 6 months or so.

I am currently very busy supporting my kids as they start college, start jobs after college, move across country, etc. So I'm not bored/not wanting to find a new job.

My personality is very much of the "Easily Amused" type, so I don't expect I'll be wanting to do expensive travel. Road tripping to visit friends and family in Canada and US sounds great to me.

But if you are the type of person that really loves to travel, you may need to wait and not do early retirement.

Hey PP, How many years of service to be at $2M at age 55? Do you have other 401K besides TSP?
OPM is doing a great job, no worries.

have to have at least 20 for VERA. my TSP is at $700k after 10 years, i should be at $2mil in another 10.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in my early 50s and in a job I like overall, but it's a very draining role, the commute isn't great, I'm getting bored with the work and the options for moving up the chain and seeing more significant raises are limited. I could stick it out for another five years, ideally more like 8-10, but it's getting to be a lot. Over the past year, a few of my older colleagues resigned before hitting 60. One retired early out of nowhere and management didn't throw him a retirement party, so I didn't have a chance to ask him what's next. Another left early after being with the org for about 15 years and was vested in the pension but still left earlier than most in the plan.

So, for those who've done it, how do you get to the point of making it happen? Did you assess your finances and accept a lower-paying or part time job for peace of mind and being ok with giving up the good salary? Or did you methodically plan for retiring early and sock away a lot of money since your first job?

Lived within our means (mostly). Incurred only "good debt" (mortgage; and didn't buy in the range we were approved for). Saved like crazy, invested, aggressively funded 529. We still had a lot of luxury (mostly vacations) but did not do fancy cars, fancy clothes (basic stuff no Prada, Gucci, Chanel, etc.), don't buy a lot of jewelry. Those just aren't important to us.

We also had some luck, honestly, buying our home in 2002 before prices skyrocketed. Also our starter home became our forever home and we remodeled. So we paid it off in about 20 years.

Having said that, I have money insecurities having grown up poor. So I'm still working, it's just for myself whenever I want. I'm 53.

How did you buy a house in DMV at 29??

I bought a house at the same time when I was 28.

The house was $300,000. I saved 60,000 to put down on the house because I didn’t go to fancy dinners or Europe.

I cooked at home and packed my lunch.

My house is now worth 750,000.

I live in Darnestown, Maryland. I’ve never commuted more than 30 minutes to work.

You probably would never want to live here. But I’m retired @ 57.

OMFG. You bought your house in 1997. Thats why you made it.

$300k when younger GenX or Millennials were that age gets you MAYBE a crappy condo, and long term that is almost always a financial liability.

Fancy dinners? Europe? Too bad retirement didnt make you a kinder or reflective person.

My brothers were boomers and they couldn’t believe that I was spending 300 K. To them that was an insane amount of money.

My friends who were Gen Xers in 1997 who could not buy a house we’re going on fancy dinners and going to Europe. I wasn’t talking about you going to fancy dinners and going to Europe so relax.

The reality is houses are expensive, but if everybody moved home with their parents for three or four years. Made their own lunch. Never went to Starbucks. Didn’t pay for every streaming service. Didn’t travel you could afford a house because my salary in 1997 was… $25K.

My parents lived in the sticks in the armpit of America — no jobs.

Don’t avocado toast us, its no the lunch or starbucks of fing Netflix that is holding people back.

Its student debt, medical costs, housing costs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm Gen-X and bought a home at 30 in DC. It was a special program for homeowners-- 5% down and around 6% mortgage rate.

I'm 55 and took VERA option. I have $2 million in TSP.

I haven't actually received the pension yet, so I guess some would say I'm not really retired, but OPM seems to have the wheels in motion to make that happen in 6 months or so.

I am currently very busy supporting my kids as they start college, start jobs after college, move across country, etc. So I'm not bored/not wanting to find a new job.

My personality is very much of the "Easily Amused" type, so I don't expect I'll be wanting to do expensive travel. Road tripping to visit friends and family in Canada and US sounds great to me.

But if you are the type of person that really loves to travel, you may need to wait and not do early retirement.

Hey PP, How many years of service to be at $2M at age 55? Do you have other 401K besides TSP?
OPM is doing a great job, no worries.

I had 25 years of service. My husband has a 401k with $3 million.

And to get back to the OP original questions-- I absolutely was not planning to do early retirement. I assumed I would work until 65. I have worked since I was 15 and the whole "work ethic"/"need to earn my keep" mentality is a big part of my identity.

However, my job was becoming impossible to do in this new administration so I suddenly needed to take a hard look at the VERA option.

[Anonymous]

retired at 58 after 30 years as a fed. had a job before then too. Wife still works full time.

[Anonymous]

Was able to retire at 57 after wearing a hat to work, and in the office, for 25+years. That hat lead to thrift, savings and a number of very interesting opportunities that seemed to bypass those who thought wearing a hat was stupid or made them unattractive. I also used to place my business car or a few of them in the band of the hat and if you think that didn't help you don't know much. lol

[Anonymous]

business card. ^

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm in my early 50s and in a job I like overall, but it's a very draining role, the commute isn't great, I'm getting bored with the work and the options for moving up the chain and seeing more significant raises are limited. I could stick it out for another five years, ideally more like 8-10, but it's getting to be a lot. Over the past year, a few of my older colleagues resigned before hitting 60. One retired early out of nowhere and management didn't throw him a retirement party, so I didn't have a chance to ask him what's next. Another left early after being with the org for about 15 years and was vested in the pension but still left earlier than most in the plan.

So, for those who've done it, how do you get to the point of making it happen? Did you assess your finances and accept a lower-paying or part time job for peace of mind and being ok with giving up the good salary? Or did you methodically plan for retiring early and sock away a lot of money since your first job?

Lived within our means (mostly). Incurred only "good debt" (mortgage; and didn't buy in the range we were approved for). Saved like crazy, invested, aggressively funded 529. We still had a lot of luxury (mostly vacations) but did not do fancy cars, fancy clothes (basic stuff no Prada, Gucci, Chanel, etc.), don't buy a lot of jewelry. Those just aren't important to us.

We also had some luck, honestly, buying our home in 2002 before prices skyrocketed. Also our starter home became our forever home and we remodeled. So we paid it off in about 20 years.

Having said that, I have money insecurities having grown up poor. So I'm still working, it's just for myself whenever I want. I'm 53.

How did you buy a house in DMV at 29??

I bought a house at the same time when I was 28.

The house was $300,000. I saved 60,000 to put down on the house because I didn’t go to fancy dinners or Europe.

I cooked at home and packed my lunch.

My house is now worth 750,000.

I live in Darnestown, Maryland. I’ve never commuted more than 30 minutes to work.

You probably would never want to live here. But I’m retired @ 57.

OMFG. You bought your house in 1997. Thats why you made it.

$300k when younger GenX or Millennials were that age gets you MAYBE a crappy condo, and long term that is almost always a financial liability.

Fancy dinners? Europe? Too bad retirement didnt make you a kinder or reflective person.

Older Millenial. Bought my first house in 2009 during the Great Recession. I feel like I won the timing lottery.

Do you remember your salary, how much the house was and how much you put down?

How did you save the down payment?

I think my salary out of law school was ~$135k, with no student loan debt (thanks to my parents). I lived simply and saved aggressively for a little over a year for the down payment, and the mortgage was $500k with an interest rate in the 4% range. I wish I had just paid off that first house and retired at ~40 to spend more time with my kids, travel, and live a simple life instead of caving to my husband's pressure to trade up.

Parents paid for law school. That explains it.

[Anonymous]

I am 55 and DH is 62, we could retire now and be fine, but are planning in 4-5 years. We will have health insurance through jobs, two modest pensions (I was in fed service 10 years, state will be 10 years, he will have 18 years), enough in our 401k and brokerages and college paid for. House wont be paid off but we could easily sell and downsize; no second homes but we should be comfortable. Its also nice to know if layoffs, etc, occur for one of us we would be okay.

Every once in a while, I do think about leaving earlier, but I am at an inflection point in my job, about to make a lot of hires and build something that I was hired to do, and it will take 3-4 years to do it and transition to new leadership. Dh doesnt mind working because he finds it interesting, its remote, and is really flexible so he has plenty of time to work out, etc. Plus our kids are still in high school so its not like we could be jetting away for months at a time anyway.

That being said, I really wish I had known much more about finances than I did growing up and as a young person. My parents never talked about it, and except for putting away 15% of my mostly pitiful salary in tsp I never really knew much (like I didn't know what a Roth was), nor did my spouse. So we kind of lost out on some early years of compounding, and could have done more to be able to retire at 45. Interestingly the FIRE movement is very popular now among younger people (30s, 40s).

[Anonymous]

Two teacher household here. Husband will retire at 58 and I will retire at 57. We can only do this due to our pensions. Of course we also have quite a bit saved through our IRAs and such, but it's really the pension.