What tips have you picked up from the forum?

[Paul der Krake]

Tax planning really

The single most important piece of information on this forum, IMO, is how to execute the Roth IRA pipeline for accessing your 401k funds before retirement age.  This is the little-known tidbit that makes retirement possible years and years earlier all by itself, by avoiding all taxes on that income.

Tax planning in general is the ultimate cheat code for early retirees. We are incredibly lucky to have all these tools and favorable tax treatments. The DYI approach to retirement might be a societal disaster, but it's a godsend to us here.

[muckety_muck]

SO much. so much. but here's what i can recall at the moment:

-Tax planning (Roth IRA conversion ladder in early retirement, lump sum transfer one time from TSP to IRA,
-Forecasting dividends and estimating 4% SWR needed to maintain nest egg
-Knowing how much of a nest egg we will feel comfortable with for our initial FIRE
-the love of Crockpots
-General encouragement from others in the same/similar boat on a mission to $1M net worth
-How to keep spouse interested in our progress
- YMOYL
-Vanguard for taxable investments
-Practical applications of what life is like after FIRE (ie. spouse thought we were just going to be sitting around twiddling our thumbs, but I was able to show that people volunteer, start small side projects/hustles, etc)
-Side hustles galore. Waiting for kids to get old enough to help with some of them... thus self-funding their college funds.

thank you MMM forum :)

[Dicey]

...I don't need frills.  I need apples.  And money.

This is wonderful!

P.S. Is that "Q" as in "Quimby"?

[RamonaQ]

...I don't need frills.  I need apples.  And money.

This is wonderful!

P.S. Is that "Q" as in "Quimby"?

Of course. :-)

[1WattLightbulb]

* Eat out less
* DIY blown-in insulation project in attic. pays off in summer & winter.
* Roth IRA - 401k conversion
* Oh, I can have a 457b AND a 401k? kewl.
* Pension stuff - calculating SWR when you have a pension; funding the gap between early retirement and when I can draw a pension check; plus learning more about obscure pension rules.
* cars are old enough to drop the comprehensive & collision coverage
* DIY carpet cleaning
* No, I don't need a hot tub/spa. (maybe I'll splurge years from now)
* Opened up that laptop and fixed that $10 thingy deep inside there.
* Showed daughter that walking from a free parking space is awesome (so much more cool stuff to see), and where possible, biking is even better.
* Zulily - cheap children's clothes/shoes, party supplies, etc.
* Do I really need to buy this (whatever)? What are the long-term costs?