Author Topic: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55  (Read 22341 times)

Jazzpolice

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #50 on: June 08, 2014, 09:50:45 PM »
Well I just retired at 52 and didn't have any savings in 1997 plus a $160k mortgage.

The house is now paid off and my net worth around $1.4M.

I rather enjoy the stunned disbelief when people ask me "what I do"...:)

Frank

Frank--that's fantastic and congratulations!  If you don't mind sharing…how much were you putting away a year to reach the 1.4M?

secondcor521

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #51 on: June 08, 2014, 11:11:36 PM »
I've had various responses.

Mom and Dad are worried that I haven't saved enough (without knowing how much I've saved).

My kids are supportive.

A work colleague who thinks about things rather than following the crowd said basically, "Wow, good for you."

The few others to whom I've made oblique comments are doubtful that it'll work.  That makes me double check / triple check / quadruple check my plan, which is beneficial to me so I appreciate their doubt.

Exflyboy

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #52 on: June 09, 2014, 03:05:09 AM »
Well I just retired at 52 and didn't have any savings in 1997 plus a $160k mortgage.

The house is now paid off and my net worth around $1.4M.

I rather enjoy the stunned disbelief when people ask me "what I do"...:)

Frank

Frank--that's fantastic and congratulations!  If you don't mind sharing…how much were you putting away a year to reach the 1.4M?


If you read my story here t will give you a good feel for what I was doing

http://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/share-your-badassity/i-retired-today!-%29/

I bet we were spending $35k including the airplane during those years.

I have now sold the airplane and sunk the money into ETF's.

Most of my gains came from continuing to buy during the great recession.

Frank

NewStachian

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #53 on: June 09, 2014, 05:13:53 AM »
My plan is to retire at 40.  When I told my new financial advisor (we just moved) he said "Ha, ya, good luck with that" So I fired him.  The best part was he just finished a long brag about how he was a super retirement planner.  What an idiot.  Now I understand why most Mustachians manage their own money.

My financial planner wrote down the name of the MMM website and said she was excited to take a look at it. She also didn't blink when I told her I wanted to retire by 35 or 40 - she just got right into analyzing the numbers.

I think people can't comprehend early retirement because 1) they have no idea where there money is going every month and 2) it's hard for us to intuitively form exponential regression lines in our head. We can interpolate linearly just fine, but you need to write some numbers down and do some math to understand the power of compounding.

libertarian4321

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #54 on: June 29, 2014, 02:17:26 AM »
Corporate drones who live the typical "make good money, spend all of it, and then some" American lifestyle will never understand.

When I was around 39, I started a new job.  At the end of the year, I had the tradition BS "evaluation" where I had to start with a "self assessment."  One of the questions asked "where do you see yourself in 5-years?"  I thought about filling in the traditional buzzword filled, insincere, corporate bull crap (something like "I want to achieve synergies using XYZ corporation paradigms to better serve our clients and lead XYZ corp to global domination), but instead I decided to be honest and wrote "I'll be retired and laying on a beach in Cancun sipping a Margarita." 

Needless to say, I was excoriated for "not taking the process seriously."  At XYZ corp, evaluations took on almost a religious level of seriousness, and since I, in their opinion, dared to mock the process, I was clearly a poor employee with a bad attitude. I tried to tell them that I was serious, I would be retired in 5 years.  Then they really got pissed about my "bad attitude" and told me to write a real goal.  So I copied and pasted some BS out of the corporate manual.

This is why I would never mention any early retirement plans in my office. It would seriously hurt my annual review, which I need to get renewed each year. I really love my job and I'm not ready to give it up quite yet. That doesn't mean I won't be there in another five ten years.

Good point.

It's never a good idea to tell them if you aren't ready to quite.

But I was at the point of no longer giving a damn.  I knew I could retire any time I damned well pleased.

But if you aren't there yet, it's probably best to just keep "playing the game" and pretending to give a sh#t about your job :)

Malaysia41

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #55 on: June 29, 2014, 02:25:16 AM »

"Whatever the hell I want to, sucka.  By the way, how are you enjoying those staff meetings and conference calls?"
+1

Malaysia41

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #56 on: June 29, 2014, 02:55:34 AM »
Retire.  Ugh.  I want a new word.  For me it isn't other people's reactions that are the problem - It is my relationship with that word!  I feel awkward saying "I'm retiring."   To colleagues at work who discover I'm leaving the company, I say, "yeah - my last day is July 31st."  When they ask where I'm going.  I say, "I'm going to work on my own projects," or something like that.  But I never say "I'm retiring."

The word 'retire' conjures an image of a grandpa kicking back on a barca lounger, tinkling ice in his tumbler full of gin and tonic, with polyester pants hiked up and revealing white tube socks under his black shoes*.  I'm not that guy.  I'm a 41 year old hot(ish) chick.  I drink Sangiovese.  And I'm not that old!

What a tool.  I should just get over myself. 

Subtext - I'm also embarrassed it has taken me this long.  If I'd have avoided some whopper mistakes and if I'd dialed in my spending early on, I would've been able to retire right alongside MMM (I started in a high paying Silicon Valley engineering job 1 year after MMM.)

*(actually, that grandpa sounds rad).

Gray Matter

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #57 on: June 29, 2014, 05:51:23 AM »

The word 'retire' conjures an image of a grandpa kicking back on a barca lounger, tinkling ice in his tumbler full of gin and tonic, with polyester pants hiked up and revealing white tube socks under his black shoes.


Evidence that I'm feeling burned out...that actually sounds like a fabulous lifestyle to me right now. 

Fatmouse

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #58 on: June 29, 2014, 06:41:18 AM »
Interesting thread!  I think it is so funny that so many people respond to ER with disbelief, but generally people do not have that reaction to stories of massive debt repayment.  There are occasionally stories even in mass media about paying down credit cards or student loans in a blink, I think it's viewed as impressive but not abnormal.

Shouldn't it follow that if one just keeps doing this after a big debt is gone, they'll have enough for ER before 20, 30 or 40 years pass?

I guess the difference is the assumption that spending less is "deprivation."  One can be "deprived" for a short time to deal with a debt emergency.  But for life?  Un-American.  ;)

Frugal Father

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #59 on: June 30, 2014, 09:10:46 AM »
Interesting thread!  I think it is so funny that so many people respond to ER with disbelief, but generally people do not have that reaction to stories of massive debt repayment.  There are occasionally stories even in mass media about paying down credit cards or student loans in a blink, I think it's viewed as impressive but not abnormal.

Shouldn't it follow that if one just keeps doing this after a big debt is gone, they'll have enough for ER before 20, 30 or 40 years pass?

I guess the difference is the assumption that spending less is "deprivation."  One can be "deprived" for a short time to deal with a debt emergency.  But for life?  Un-American.  ;)
I think you've probably nailed it. Consumerism is often seen as patriotic/American and helping the economy to grow. To them, the thought of saving more than 10% or 20% just means you're being greedy and hurting the economy.

galaxie

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #60 on: June 30, 2014, 01:38:55 PM »
My plan is to retire at 40.  When I told my new financial advisor (we just moved) he said "Ha, ya, good luck with that" So I fired him.  The best part was he just finished a long brag about how he was a super retirement planner.  What an idiot.  Now I understand why most Mustachians manage their own money.

2) it's hard for us to intuitively form exponential regression lines in our head. We can interpolate linearly just fine, but you need to write some numbers down and do some math to understand the power of compounding.

Since I'm an engineer, I immediately thought "I wonder if it would be easier to look at it in dB."

sobezen

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #61 on: June 30, 2014, 02:00:56 PM »
Just ignore them, keep on flexing your Mustachian badass muscles and prove them wrong! 

 ‘Your actions speak so loudly, I can not hear what you are saying'  - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Cinder

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #62 on: July 01, 2014, 02:29:30 PM »
I hadn't started talking to my wife about it until recently.  She's already on board with frugality, so there was never an issue with getting our finances lined up, but I realized there's still a mental barrier to leaving a career behind that she will need to overcome.  If I started showing spreadsheets with numbers it would make her eyes glaze over though.  Her initial reaction was "What will I do with all that time?" which I thought was funny because she is a school teacher with 10 weeks off every summer.  I think early retirement is so uncommon, and virtually never portrayed in the mass media, that people have a hard time envisioning it.  Part of bringing the spouses around is painting a picture for them of what life will be like.  At least that's what I feel like I need to start doing.

This is exactly the situation that I am in right now.  I feel like my wife also gets lots of pressure from her parents.   They also don't understand the difference between frugality and cheapness.  Not everything is about spending the least amount of money, it's about value for your time/money spent.

sobezen

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #63 on: July 01, 2014, 03:57:46 PM »
I hadn't started talking to my wife about it until recently.  She's already on board with frugality, so there was never an issue with getting our finances lined up, but I realized there's still a mental barrier to leaving a career behind that she will need to overcome.  If I started showing spreadsheets with numbers it would make her eyes glaze over though.  Her initial reaction was "What will I do with all that time?" which I thought was funny because she is a school teacher with 10 weeks off every summer.  I think early retirement is so uncommon, and virtually never portrayed in the mass media, that people have a hard time envisioning it.  Part of bringing the spouses around is painting a picture for them of what life will be like.  At least that's what I feel like I need to start doing.

This is exactly the situation that I am in right now.  I feel like my wife also gets lots of pressure from her parents.   They also don't understand the difference between frugality and cheapness.  Not everything is about spending the least amount of money, it's about value for your time/money spent.

I experience a similar level of disdain from loved ones, close friends and even the occasional "date".  It is very taxing to even attempt to explain that frugality does not equal cheapness.  This is especially challenging when you are dating.  Anyways at this point in life, I just let them be.
« Last Edit: July 01, 2014, 04:01:03 PM by sobezen »

Cassie

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Re: Annoyed by People Keep Telling Me I Won't be Able to Retire at 55
« Reply #64 on: July 02, 2014, 02:31:28 PM »
I would only talk about it with people that are like minded-even if it means just mostly people on the internet.  Just keep working steadily towards your goal and it will happen.  So many people confuse being frugal with deprivation and not having what you want.  I think it is the difference between knowing what you want & can afford and trying to satisfy every little impulse which will not make you happy in the long run.  It is all about setting priorities, figuring out what you really want out of life. It is so different for everyone.  Being mindful instead of blindly just upgrading everything so you never save $.  It would be great if you could find more like minded folks but until then keep saving!