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    Financial Independence Happiness > FI, and don't postpone your happiness indefinitely

    March 11, 2018

    Financial Independence Happiness > FI, and don't postpone your happiness indefinitely

    Happiness > FI, and don't postpone your happiness indefinitely

    Posted: 10 Mar 2018 07:58 PM PST

    Hi friends, thanks for reading.

    This topic sometimes gets brought up on here but I really want to bring it up again.

    Your happiness, your health, your sanity, are more important than your pursuit of FI.

    This morning, I learned the horrific news that a family friend took their own life. This person is very successful on paper: great education, degree, career, etc.

    If you are in a job that makes you unhappy or negatively affects your health and you are trying to stick around because you want to pursue FI, please take care of your health and happiness first.

    I know that it might seem appealing to just "look at the numbers" and grind away, but I promise you that it isn't worth it.

    Separately, if you aren't happy in your journey to FI and keep telling yourself that you will be happy once you reach FI, please adjust accordingly.

    The truth is, you can't wait until "one day" to be happy. None of us can.

    You can't postpone happiness indefinitely.

    Be happy now. Right now. Wherever you are on that journey. And use that happiness as fuel to get you moving toward your goals.

    If you are moving slower than expected, or you get off path (because life happens to all of us), try to breathe, focus on your happiness, and then move forward.

    I know that FI is important to a lot of us here, but please do not lose track of the bigger picture.

    We live in a big world with SO MUCH to do and see and explore. So many great people to meet and fun things to do.

    FI can be awesome, and that independence will allow us all to do what we want in this world.

    But it means nothing without health and happiness.

    If this message reaches one person, it's worth it!

    edit: Wow! THank you all for reading.

    As someone who struggled with happiness issues for a long time, I would love to share what it took for me to get to a much happier place, today (doesn't have to do with religion or a cult or me selling you anything. Just some general advice). Anything from certain songs that put me in a good mood, quotes I like, affirmations, etc.

    Let me say that I DO NOT know all of your personal situations. I don't know what you've been through, I don't know what your job is like, how bad your boss is, what your other job options look like. So I'm not pretending to be an expert on your life telling you what to do.

    ALSO, I was miserable in a job. It got so bad that I ended up quitting without another one lined up. Things eventually worked out, but I wouldn't have done the exact same thing if I were to go back and do things over again. There are better ways to leave. The thing is, I let my mental state get to such a bad place that I had no other option than to quit on the spot. I'm talking daily panic attacks at work.

    What I'm saying is that I'm not just telling your to quit your job and change your whole life, today. I'm saying that this is food for thought, and if you are not happy, I suggest putting effort into it. Not saying to rock your whole life.

    submitted by /u/thatwanderlust
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    Sabbatical update

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 01:48 PM PDT

    Hello wonderful r/FI community! Throwaway here, but longtime sub participant. I wanted to share how my "sabbatical" has been going as a datapoint/argument for "building the life you want". Happy to answer questions if there are any, but it's night on this side of the planet so I may not get to them until (my) tomorrow.

    After a year or two of planning and saving, my SO and I (both ~30) quit our jobs to travel the world ~6 months ago. I loved my job and my company, and made every attempt to leave on good terms with enough heads up to leave the door open for a possible reentry, whereas my SO was pretty burnt out of her occupation and we're still unsure if she'll want to return to it.

    Travelling has been everything you'd think it would be: mostly amazing, with a hefty dose of new and different problems coming with it. It's been great for our relationship. We've had a few big fights (spending literally every day together and with no one else will do that), but ultimately we're much closer together than we've ever been, and I actually plan on proposing next week (shhh!).

    Since I'm not pitching a book or blog I won't claim that the travel itself has been a fundamentally life-changing, epiphany-inducing experience, but it has been a TON of fun, and has left me a lot more ready to "settle down" into "adulthood". We've created a wealth of memories and stories that would've taken many years of "vacation travelling" to accumulate.

    But here's the crazy part: this may actually turn out to have been a financially positive (or at least way less negative than expected) move for me. First, I had around $500k invested when I left, and the bull market has more than made up for our spending during the trip. The real cost for me was always going to be lost salary from not working, as I live in an (V)HCOLA so travel expenses<=regular living expenses, and I'm fortunate enough to make around $175k. However, thanks to playing my cards right before I left and having fooled everyone into thinking I'm a top performer, I'm actually coming back to my same company, very similar role, at a 20% pay increase. The reason for this is that I've received several raises/promotions during my time (<5 years) at the company, but the pay raises for employees always tends to lag a bit behind what a new hire at each level would earn, and the company is aware of this. So my director, who has been a fan and champion of mine for years, saw this as an opportunity to "true up" my salary to market level. He asked what salary I had in mind, I gave him a stretch goal thinking he'd negotiate down a bit, but he actually ended up offering me a bit more than I'd asked for.

    I'll acknowledge there's a bit of humblebragging going on; I can't really tell most of my friends or coworkers about the raise, so I'm hoping this is a safe community to share with. But really what I want to do with this post is to urge anyone who's considering taking a similar leap to DO IT! Yes, it's weird and sorta scary to see the numbers in my savings account go down instead of up, but this experience has been so incredible and worked out so well for me that the idea of ever regretting it seems utterly impossible. If you're telling yourself you're putting off travel for 10 or 20 years until you've hit FI, I strongly, strongly urge you to do something like this, even a mini version of it, NOW. Lots of places are changing, both culturally and environmentally, and many fun and exciting travel opportunities are literally disappearing year by year. And of course, you could always get hit by a bus next week and you can't take your 401k with you.

    I also realize there is a TON(!!!) of privilege behind my ability to do any of this, and that not everyone is in the same position. But if you ARE in a similar position and are considering something like this, this random internet stranger votes HELL YES.

    tl;dr: Quit my job 6 months ago to travel with SO. It's been amazing, I'm coming back to a raise, and I cannot recommend it enough.

    submitted by /u/fisabbaticalfun
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    Daily FI discussion thread - March 11, 2018

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 04:08 AM PDT

    Please use this thread to have discussions which you don't feel warrant a new post to the sub. While the Rules for posting questions on the basics of personal finance/investing topics are relaxed a little bit here, the rules against memes/spam/self-promotion/excessive rudeness/politics still apply!

    Have a look at the FAQ for this subreddit before posting to see if your question is frequently asked.

    Since this post does tend to get busy, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts.

    submitted by /u/AutoModerator
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    Mega backdoor Roth worth the hassle?

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 04:53 PM PDT

    I was excited to see my job support the mega backdoor Roth in their 401k last year and immediately took advantage of it. Now I'm wondering if it's worth it.

    Pros:

    • My Roth IRA jumped significantly.

    Cons:

    • I have to call regularly to transfer money.
    • Budgeting is harder. Generally, I just save as much as possible, but because this comes out of my paycheck and isn't nearly as capped, I have to figure out exactly how much to save in advance, and I have to constantly watch my checking account to make sure I have enough to cover expenses.
    • The money is harder to access as part of a retirement account, compared to a taxable account. There are ways around this, but the complexity is there.
    • My 401k provider (actually, both, because it changed midyear) sent 1099-R forms without any taxable amount and refuse to change it. So now I have the option of assuming they know what they are doing and hoping the IRS doesn't object, or calculating how much was taxable myself and waiting for a letter from the IRS when they investigate the discrepancy.

    If I don't plan on being in a high tax bracket in retirement, it seems like a lot of hassle for a little gain.

    Does anyone else have experience with this, especially the annoying tax form issue? Does r/fi think it's worth it? Before I tried it, I was sure it was... Talk me down!

    submitted by /u/wasachrozine
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    Thoughts and analysis of InvestmentCalculator.io

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 12:05 PM PDT

    I was wondering if anyone has more insight as to how InvestmentCalculator.io is predicting its aggressive and conservative investment strategies. The projected returns for the aggressive approach seem to greatly eclipse the historical 7% returns, and the conservative approach beats out FireCalc's estimate by about 20% in my case.

    So what approach do you think this site is using, and how reliable are the numbers?

    submitted by /u/Needs_More_Llama
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    FI advice requested

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 01:13 PM PDT

    HI all,

    Throwaway account but long-time commenter/user of this sub. Frequent JL Collings, MMM, Mad Fientist very regularly and am very grateful for this community in particular. EDIT: formatting

    About me:

    • 31/M SINK, single
    • Salary of $75k in MCOL area. I rent a 1BR that's a 15 minute drive to work
    • Current debt is $14k left on car, which I pay $300/month on to pay off in just over four years
    • After putting in 20% into 401k, my take home is $3,300 and expenses are $2,666. I then put the balance in savings. I have $11,000 split b/w savings and checking.
    • I pay $35/month for full healthcare via my employer
    • Including 401k deductions, I'm at a 54.4% SR
    • I have a Vanguard Roth IRA with 100% VTSAX with ~$19k in it
    • Debating whether or not to attend grad school this Fall or Spring 2019 with employer paying for >66% of it.
    • During semi-retirement, I plan on consulting, maybe getting a CFP, blogging, and perhaps doing adjunct teaching at a CC (with masters degree of course). Slow-travel around the world is my plan until I find somewhere to stick around for a bit. A mountain home in the US would be ideal, but unsure how healthcare is going to pan out over the coming years. I eat healthy (most of the time at least) and am a fitness fanatic so that should help with costs.
    • While this might be taboo here, I expect an inheritance in a couple of years of maybe $100k which I'll allocate based on my portfolio preferences
    • Ideal SFR is ~$35,000 but depends on marital situation

    Questions:

    • For 401k, my employer puts in roughly $4,300 if I put in ~$6,500 or more (up to 4,300). I'm currently putting in 20% which is $1,160/month. Since I have a Vanguard Roth IRA (VTSAX), should I stop putting 20% and instead put $6,500 (to get max match) and then put the rest in my IRA? With the current setup, I'm expecting about $19,400/year of contributions. In my 401k I have about 80% in an S&P Total Index Fund (no Vanguard - bummer) and 20% in an Int'l Index Fund. Both have a very low expense ratio. Should I get some bonds or REITs? This week I was planning to allocate some funds to my IRA which I'm currently not funding.
    • I'd like to semi-retire at age 45/46, which at my current SR will put me at about 750k or so assuming ~8% gains and 3% inflation. How do you all factor in promotions related to salary? Most 401k calcs provide a field to input expected raises (which are about 3% on average), but I'm trying to remain mobile geographically which will open up more opportunities and thus salaries. Plus a grad degree will help.

    I'd appreciate any other advice on my allocations/plan. Thanks in advance!

    submitted by /u/FI_temp
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    Opinion question: would you rather take a job for 125k/yr only salary without benefits, OR a 100k job with full standard benefit package

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 04:01 PM PDT

    24 years old with two job offers on the table as a new grad PA

    Also, the 125k job is an hour and 20 minute drive away

    The 100k job is 5 minutes away

    Thanks!

    submitted by /u/idkman93
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    Paying off mortgage

    Posted: 10 Mar 2018 07:04 PM PST

    Just read the article someone posted about paying off mortgage early as key to retirement. I'm confused though — I have $1M in real estate debt and could pay off a decent portion of it. But I choose to invest that money instead.

    Mortgage is only at 3.85% and returns elsewhere exceed that, so seems logical not to pay it off and instead deploy the capital elsewhere.

    Is this the right strategy?

    submitted by /u/bergguy420
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    Company is Getting Bought Out - Should I Stay or Should I Go?

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 05:57 AM PDT

    Hey there fellow FIRE community members.

    I found out Thursday that my company is getting bought out. There is obviously a lot of uncertainty right now in the workplace, but what we do know is that the CEO of the buying business has already admitted there will be "$600 million in administrator synergies".

    That's cuts.

    Our company has already stated that if we stick around until the deal is completed (another 6-9 months) that we'll get a double bonus (that would be a total of about $24,000 for me) and there will be the typical severance package to "protect us from sudden layoffs". From what I've been told, typically severance is 1 months pay per year of service. That would be 7 months pay for me.

    No one truly knows what's in store for us. If there will be cuts in IT where I work, or if they'll slash salaries, or if we'll be safe. What I do know if what I've been able to dig up in Glassdoor.

    1) It sounds like their health insurance premiums are really high. My current premiums are middle of the road.

    2) the new company only matches 401k up to 4.5%. My current employer match's 6%

    3) Average salary for a "senior database administrator" at the new company is $93,000. I'm not even senior at my current company and I make $97,000. That tells me salary cuts will ensue.

    4) They offer a week less of PTO

    I had, just 3 weeks ago, turned down a job at another company because the offer was $4000 less than what my current employer was willing to bump me up too. That sucks. But their lead engineer just told me his week they're having trouble on boarding the new guy because of green card issues. They match on 401k 12.5%, have cheaper medical premiums than my current employer, and an extra week of PTO, but the base salary is lower than I would expect. That 401k match would be a huge plus for FIRE but the lower salary could offset it.

    Here's the question. Do I...

    1) stick it out with the current employer? The acquisition may not go through. Or it may, and I likely will take a pay cut, or could get laid off. But there is a guarantee decent bonus and potential severance if I wait to jump ship.

    2) talk to the company I turned down and let them know circumstances have changed and if they have other openings I would be interested in talking? Keep in mind my job is highly specialized as a mainframe database admin. My fear hear is that contacting them would look desperate.

    3) Skip the above 2 and slowly hunt for another job.

    Any advice would be greatly helpful. Looking for what would be best with FIRE in mind. I hoping to FatFIRE by 50 (29 currently).

    submitted by /u/sleepymoose88
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    Looking for others thoughts if we’re financially on track to hit a point of not HAVING to work around the standard retirement years.

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 10:00 AM PDT

    There's so much data out there suggesting different numbers at different ages for retirement. On track?

    34, married, two kids under 5. Household income between $140k-$150k Largest monthly bills are $2k daycare and $1700 mortgage. No car payments No student loans Use credit cards for everything and pay off monthly for cash back. $170k in retirement savings Contribute $20k a year between 401k, Roth, Traditional IRA's Each kid has $19k in 529's * will be able to contribute more when we free up the $2k a month in daycare Net worth $250k

    submitted by /u/HeGTOCe
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    When I read MMM I immediately want to start liquidating the excessive things I have

    Posted: 11 Mar 2018 06:17 AM PDT

    But if I were to sell the extra things I have, vehicles for example, I would just have less usable vehicles and more money just sitting there. Having too much extra money is not always a good thing it either. I'm a small business owner so having extra cash meant extra income and less deductible expenses. How do you guys deal with this?

    submitted by /u/orangewarner
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    I thought you guys would enjoy this simple, but effective advice on mortgages for those seeking early retirement

    Posted: 10 Mar 2018 05:14 PM PST
    Read more
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