This is a total braggadocios post, patting myself on the back and sharing my experience.
Age 34, wife 32. Surprisingly, alarmingly actually, my wife and I combined are a millionaire. Before marriage, but already seriously dating, we bought a house at the depth of the recession (2013) with an apartment over the garage. I am a real estate appraiser (Certified General Appraiser, nearly an MAI) by trade. I am well aware that luck is involved in our situation, but I am tuned in and leapt on a good opportunity at the best possible time. We lived in the apartment, rented out the front, nearly broke even for $0 mortgage/rent. This enabled us to save us money quickly. I used some of it to buy a rock attached to precious metals and she let me put it on her finger (modest diamond ring on white gold, we got married). She's even more frugal than me and has been a positive influence on my spending and savings.
We saved up for another down payment and bought a 2nd house across town, this one with a lockoff downstairs. Gross cash flow from the 3 total units now matches my work salary. Net is much much lower with massive mortgages, but in 30 years or however it goes, we'll be set up really well. We live in an expensive area, near Vail, CO, so home prices are not affordable unless there is renting capabilities, in my opinion. But rents are very high and home values have climbed big time since purchase.
I've got high interest checking account and savings with CityWide Bank. 401 and 457 through work (diversified Vanguard index funds w low expense ratios). Just started a Roth IRA (Vanguard) in December when the market was crashing so it already looks really good and I was able to max out $5500 2018 contributions last week, and plan to max out 2019 $6000 too (hopefully). When I started my job, they offered an HSA and I maxed it out when available. Its now w Lake Michigan Credit Union and just this week I put it into HSA Investment account (w LMCU), entirely in Vanguard Admiral shares. Before our wedding, we started a joint Betterment account (post-tax post-tax) to save for the big day. At the time of the wedding, it was not worth what we put in and my wife said, we'll pay for our frugal day (about $15k) out of savings and let the stock market ride. I've continued funding it and it is now worth more than we've invested. Wife has checking, savings, retirement.
Between the 2 properties, I estimate current value of $1.3M. Outstanding mortgages total $680k. Equity $600k+. We do not plan to sell either in the near future.
I put down all my stuff in a spreadsheet in early January, which was nice to get an organized visual of everything going on. Wife finally did it last night. Since January (mostly stock market effect on retirement/betterment), personally I'm up $45k. In 2 months. That's more than I made for many years and jaw dropping for me personally. Adding both of our stuff together, plus the RE equity, this month we crested 7 digits. Unbelievable! Keep saving, buy assets not liabilities, don't have kids! Also, my wife is due with first child in July.
