I discovered MMM last autumn at the age of 43. We live in one of the most expensive countries in the world, so FIRE is not as easy here as in the USA. Luckily we were already quite a few Norwegian million crowns in the plus, which can be divided roughly by 10 to convert to into USD. We have always been small spenders with cheap hobbies, like spending vacations in a tent, brewing beer at home, cooking own food, doing work ourselves, etc. We paid down the mortgage of our first, cheap house in 5 and a half years and kept living there for 15 years in total, saving a lot of money each. I read years ago about investing in low cost index funds, so I've been doing that for some years before discovering MMM. I made good profit with that.
Some years ago my DH mentioned becoming pensioners at the age of 50. As we were already saving about 1 yearly spending level per year, he said that every year working would let us stop working one year earlier. I never took that very seriously, as I had no idea how much money would be enough to survive. At least MMM showed that it was possible and how much $$ is needed, like 25x yearly spending level. From the age of 67 we are pretty much settled with pensions that we saved/government saved for us.
Our current situation is that we, just before discovering MMM, bought a big and expensive house. We bought it with our own means with no mortgage, but this meant selling all our stock and our old house. We had to start from scratch again building up stash to invest into funds. In retrospect we should not have done this. I really enjoy the magnificent view from the house, but I find it very big. Cleaning internally is a lot of work, window cleaning an even more so, each window having an inside, outside and 2 more sides within them. And being a mustachian kind of person, I don't hire people to do this for me. I just realize now that this move was really not smart. The money should better have stayed in these index funds which generate money all the time. It is time to consider taking up a mortgage on a part of the house to invest into funds. As the rent is very low at this moment.
My DH is of the opinion that he would like to keep living in this house during FIRE. I made an excel sheet where I showed him my detailed FIRE plan and that plan shows him how much stash we need at a certain date to start FIRE. We will never get this stash without selling the house and downsizing. He is starting to see this. But he still thinks we can keep the money in the house until we need that particular stash. I still think we'll need to invest it into stock to let money make more money. Houses usually do not generate cash above the inflation level. Our house is not in a HCOL area.
I am now almost 44. The big plan is still to start FIRE when I reach 50, in 2023 and my DH 53. And earlier if we somehow manage to save a lot more than expected. Last year, with 10 months of not being MMM, we managed to save 60% of our net income. Next year, being in full saving modus, I hope to get a higher saving percentage.
We were already doing a lot of things right, obviously. What my improvements are, since discovering MMM:
- Using a cashback credit card for grocery shopping
- Using customer program for grocery shopping
- Shopping groceries at a cheaper shop
- Choosing more groceries that are on sale and buying bulk on sale
- Checking prices on insurances and electricity more often - once every few years is not often enough.
- Buying more items used instead of new
- Selling stuff I don't use any more
- Becoming more of a minimalist, so that our next house can be smaller and to make cleaning in our current house easier
- Lowering the central heating a few degrees, so that we are more motivated to use the wood stove with free wood from our garden
- Bringing my own lunch to work
- Thinking loosely about finding a side-gig, but I haven't found the answer yet
