28yo FIRE article on CNN

[Abe Froman]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

From the article....

Among the proponents of FIRE, who support each other on various spaces on-line, Livingston's accomplishment is called "Fat FIRE," which is like FIRE, but with much bigger monthly budgets, and therefore much larger nest eggs.

I think this one's whole work life was in one long bull run.
Wonder how she will fare when Schiller's PE comes home to roost.

[retireatbirth]

Bit of an outlier. Graduated from Harvard and went into six-figure finance jobs with exponential salary growth. Good for her, though.

[TheAnonOne]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

From the article....

Among the proponents of FIRE, who support each other on various spaces on-line, Livingston's accomplishment is called "Fat FIRE," which is like FIRE, but with much bigger monthly budgets, and therefore much larger nest eggs.

I think this one's whole work life was in one long bull run.
Wonder how she will fare when Schiller's PE comes home to roost.

2.25M spending only $67,000

She will be fine, better than most here I imagine. (She is under 4%)

[prognastat]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

From the article....

Among the proponents of FIRE, who support each other on various spaces on-line, Livingston's accomplishment is called "Fat FIRE," which is like FIRE, but with much bigger monthly budgets, and therefore much larger nest eggs.

I think this one's whole work life was in one long bull run.
Wonder how she will fare when Schiller's PE comes home to roost.

2.25M spending only $67,000

She will be fine, better than most here I imagine. (She is under 4%)

And her husband still works.

From the sounds of it her assets generate enough growth to pay for their bills. But it sounds like they aren't really drawing it down by the full 67k.

Since they don't really talk about withdrawing funds at all it wouldn't surprise me if her husband's income is enough to pay for most if not all of their expenses at this time allowing their stash to simply grow.

[2lazy2retire]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

From the article....

Among the proponents of FIRE, who support each other on various spaces on-line, Livingston's accomplishment is called "Fat FIRE," which is like FIRE, but with much bigger monthly budgets, and therefore much larger nest eggs.

I think this one's whole work life was in one long bull run.
Wonder how she will fare when Schiller's PE comes home to roost.

Starting to sound like yahoo finance comments around here :). But I do think these articles do little to further the FIRE message - just an opener for the knockers - harvard, mid 6 figures etc - the linked artical about savings rates and FIRE in 10/20 years etc is much more useful stuff for the average CNN reader

[prognastat]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

From the article....

Among the proponents of FIRE, who support each other on various spaces on-line, Livingston's accomplishment is called "Fat FIRE," which is like FIRE, but with much bigger monthly budgets, and therefore much larger nest eggs.

I think this one's whole work life was in one long bull run.
Wonder how she will fare when Schiller's PE comes home to roost.

Starting to sound like yahoo finance comments around here :). But I do think these articles do little to further the FIRE message - just an opener for the knockers - harvard, mid 6 figures etc - the linked artical about savings rates and FIRE in 10/20 years etc is much more useful stuff for the average CNN reader

It is an unfortunate mental heuristic where people will look for anything they can use to discredit what someone has achieved instead of trying to take the useful information and see how it could apply to their life, but chances are due to this person's education and very high income most people reading it are likely to simply write it off as something they couldn't achieve in any form simply because they don't have that education/income.

[jtraggie99]

This is not to knock her accomplishments at all, but graduating from Harvard with no debt is no easy task.  She mentions growing up poor but had family savings to help her pay for school?  She must have had some pretty substantial scholarships. 

[CheapScholar]

This is not to knock her accomplishments at all, but graduating from Harvard with no debt is no easy task.  She mentions growing up poor but had family savings to help her pay for school?  She must have had some pretty substantial scholarships.

I work in higher ed at an elite school.  We, like Harvard, have need blind admissions.  Honestly, graduating from Harvard debt free probably isn't all that rare, even for the poor.  People see the sticker price of tuition, but keep in mind Harvard has a 36B endowment.  Heck, even at my school with a 10B endowment I see poor kids come and pay no tuition, no room and board and receive money for laptops and study abroad.

From Harvard's website:

20% of our parents have total incomes less than $65,000 and are not expected to contribute.
Families with incomes between $65,000 and $150,000 will contribute from 0-10% of their income, and those with incomes above $150,000 will be asked to pay proportionately more than 10%, based on their individual circumstances. Families at all income levels who have significant assets will continue to pay more than those in less fortunate circumstances.

Home equity and retirement assets are not considered in our assessment of financial need.

[thenextguy]

Bit of an outlier. Graduated from Harvard and went into six-figure finance jobs with exponential salary growth. Good for her, though.

Better than that article a while back about how this one gal paid off her student loans by getting a job from her Mom.

[VolcanicArts]

I read the article, quite an accomplishment. Not to downplay her success, but it did involve some luck and she was able to graduate a good school debt free, which reduces at minimum 3 years from the equation. Most likely she was contributing massive amounts at the right time. I've always been geared towards RE, but hitting rough patches can really screw your progress, what got me for a bit was the massive decline in oil that never really rebounded. I think anyone of us making a decent income right after 2008 and saving at least 50% would be sitting very good right now vs. a different time period.

[simmias]

This is not to knock her accomplishments at all, but graduating from Harvard with no debt is no easy task.  She mentions growing up poor but had family savings to help her pay for school?  She must have had some pretty substantial scholarships.

I did a double take at that part of the article as well.  I think what she was saying is that her parents grew up poor and tried to instill what they learned from that in her, but that she didn't actually grow up poor herself.

[meatface]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

From the article....

Among the proponents of FIRE, who support each other on various spaces on-line, Livingston's accomplishment is called "Fat FIRE," which is like FIRE, but with much bigger monthly budgets, and therefore much larger nest eggs.

She's amazing!!! We are all very proud! Good job, lady.

[Dicey]

I read it and wondered if there wasn't an earlier article that featured her tiny NYC apartment somewhere?

I'm also going to remind the naysayers that she started out with a 60k base salary and kept her living costs low in a super HCOLA. She had advantages, to be sure, but she put them to good use, which is the mustachian way.

[Kl285528]

I read it and wondered if there wasn't an earlier article that featured her tiny NYC apartment somewhere?

I wondered the same thing!

[renata ricotta]

Sort of OT, but in this CNN window there is a sidebar with an ad with a retirement calculator.  I put in my annual income (~$300k), what I've saved so far ($300k - the high earning thing is new this year), what I save monthly (~$6k), and when I want to retire (at age 35, in 7 years).  The calculator 1) said my retirement year was too young ON AN ARTICLE ABOUT A 28 YEAR OLD RETIRING and automatically adjusted it to 36, and 2) said that I needed to save $24 MILLION in retirement which "can provide $1,073,925 in retirement income each year."  What about my numbers made this weird calculator think that I needed to draw more than a million dollars a year in retirement?  Not surprisingly, it told me I wasn't saving enough to meet my goal.  :)

[MrsPete]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

The article starts off with a falsehood.  It says that Millennials are the first generation to reject traditional retirement /be interested in saving and retiring early.  First, this implies that young people are doing this on a wide scale, which isn't true -- only a small percentage of any generation is interested in doing this.  Second, I know two older people who've done this -- one from the Greatest Generation and one Boomer.  Poor start to an interesting article. 

This is not to knock her accomplishments at all, but graduating from Harvard with no debt is no easy task.  She mentions growing up poor but had family savings to help her pay for school?  She must have had some pretty substantial scholarships.

For one thing, she graduated in only three years -- not the easiest of tasks.  I'd bet she planned ahead and accumulated some college credits in high school.  But finishing in three years automatically cut 25% off her college education.  Smart. 

As for "growing up poor", that can mean different things to different people.  It could mean they were working poor and had enough but had to ration carefully.  It could mean she was the child of divorced parents and one parent had money and the other didn't ... I'm thinking of a student of mine who lived with her mother, who worked only part time, yet her doctor father actually paid all her expenses ... she got LOADS of financial aid because it looked like she was supported only by her mother.  It could mean that she had wealthy grandparents who didn't help with daily life but had put aside money for her education.  Or it could mean she was out-and-out homeless.  "Growing up poor" is a vague phrase. 

I read it and wondered if there wasn't an earlier article that featured her tiny NYC apartment somewhere?

I didn't see an earlier article, but clearly she was wise enough to prioritize saving over lifestyle.  The article says she had a NY apartment with just a mattress on the floor, and she paid only $1100.  Unheard of for NY.

[sirdoug007]

Sort of OT, but in this CNN window there is a sidebar with an ad with a retirement calculator.  I put in my annual income (~$300k), what I've saved so far ($300k - the high earning thing is new this year), what I save monthly (~$6k), and when I want to retire (at age 35, in 7 years).  The calculator 1) said my retirement year was too young ON AN ARTICLE ABOUT A 28 YEAR OLD RETIRING and automatically adjusted it to 36, and 2) said that I needed to save $24 MILLION in retirement which "can provide $1,073,925 in retirement income each year."  What about my numbers made this weird calculator think that I needed to draw more than a million dollars a year in retirement?  Not surprisingly, it told me I wasn't saving enough to meet my goal.  :)

Here is the full calculator.  Actually not a bad one once you put more info in, specifically your retirement spending.  At least it let's you retire before 50 unlike a lot of other internet calculators!

https://smartasset.com/retirement/retirement-calculator?utm_source=captivate&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=cap__retirementcalculatorc_moreinfo

The short version makes an assumption that you are spending what you aren't saving ($300k-$6k*12 = $228k) and you will need that amount for the next 60 years because they assume you live to 95.  Oh and only a 2% real rate of return.  So suddenly you need $24 million.  Yikes!  But that's what you get when you add on a bunch of bad assumptions.

[Psychstache]

See it here....http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/02/pf/early-retirement/index.html

From the article....

Among the proponents of FIRE, who support each other on various spaces on-line, Livingston's accomplishment is called "Fat FIRE," which is like FIRE, but with much bigger monthly budgets, and therefore much larger nest eggs.

I think this one's whole work life was in one long bull run.
Wonder how she will fare when Schiller's PE comes home to roost.

Starting to sound like yahoo finance comments around here :). But I do think these articles do little to further the FIRE message - just an opener for the knockers - harvard, mid 6 figures etc - the linked artical about savings rates and FIRE in 10/20 years etc is much more useful stuff for the average CNN reader

Who do you think you are questioning the Sausage King of Chicago?!?!?

;)

[renata ricotta]

Sort of OT, but in this CNN window there is a sidebar with an ad with a retirement calculator.  I put in my annual income (~$300k), what I've saved so far ($300k - the high earning thing is new this year), what I save monthly (~$6k), and when I want to retire (at age 35, in 7 years).  The calculator 1) said my retirement year was too young ON AN ARTICLE ABOUT A 28 YEAR OLD RETIRING and automatically adjusted it to 36, and 2) said that I needed to save $24 MILLION in retirement which "can provide $1,073,925 in retirement income each year."  What about my numbers made this weird calculator think that I needed to draw more than a million dollars a year in retirement?  Not surprisingly, it told me I wasn't saving enough to meet my goal.  :)

Here is the full calculator.  Actually not a bad one once you put more info in, specifically your retirement spending.  At least it let's you retire before 50 unlike a lot of other internet calculators!

https://smartasset.com/retirement/retirement-calculator?utm_source=captivate&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=cap__retirementcalculatorc_moreinfo

The short version makes an assumption that you are spending what you aren't saving ($300k-$6k*12 = $228k) and you will need that amount for the next 60 years because they assume you live to 95.  Oh and only a 2% real rate of return.  So suddenly you need $24 million.  Yikes!  But that's what you get when you add on a bunch of bad assumptions.

I'd love to be spending everything I don't save! Unfortunately, a pretty big chunk of that $228k gets send straight to the government. (Also, lest anyone here worry I'm a spendypants with a burn rate that is still north of $130k - I forgot to consider that the last $65k of my annual earnings is in a year-end bonus, and I save all of that, in addition to the $6k/mo).

[surfhb]

Very impressive!    But what would be super impressive  is see how she does when she lives through 3 or 4 extended bear markets during her retirement. :) 

[neonlight]

Very impressive!    But what would be super impressive  is see how she does when she lives through 3 or 4 extended bear markets during her retirement. :)

Read somewhere that MMM says it's best to retire during bear market. It's really a bull market now and wonder I should go for it next year.

[Lan Mandragoran]

This article left with me with mixed feelings tbh.

First take:

Yay more people are into FIRE, yay its more approachable and maybe more people think they can do it!

Actually finished article take:

 ..... oh. She started planning this at 20~, went to harvard, has a like minded husband, waited to have kids, makes mid 6 figures, and comes across to others as extreme most likely (moving to NYC to make more money then possibly going to move to LCOL area later).

Feels like this will leave people with the impression that this is the only possible way to do this.... in reality its just an extreme version, she has a ton of money, and is also 28... in order to do that yes you do have to do the above. In order to just FIRE though, at a less extreme but still extreme age of 35-55, you have to just be very intentional and dedicated.

[renata ricotta]

This article left with me with mixed feelings tbh.

First take:

Yay more people are into FIRE, yay its more approachable and maybe more people think they can do it!

Actually finished article take:

 ..... oh. She started planning this at 20~, went to harvard, has a like minded husband, waited to have kids, makes mid 6 figures, and comes across to others as extreme most likely (moving to NYC to make more money then possibly going to move to LCOL area later).

Feels like this will leave people with the impression that this is the only possible way to do this.... in reality its just an extreme version, she has a ton of money, and is also 28... in order to do that yes you do have to do the above. In order to just FIRE though, at a less extreme but still extreme age of 35-55, you have to just be very intentional and dedicated.

Agreed; good for her, but I'm not sure other people will feel as inspired by it.  My friends and family who are all around median American income and don't live in big cities often feel like mid 6-figures is SO much money and living in NYC is SO fancy they can't really relate.  (My first full-time salary was $45k and I would have thought the same thing then).

[neonlight]

It's CNN Money, what were you guys expecting, bland saving habits like what's preached here ;)

*Sarcasm*

[EricL]

I'll admit it.  I'm jealous as hell.  I wish I'd got the notion to get my shit together as early.

[Dicey]

Actually finished article take:[/b]

 ..... oh. She started planning this at 20~, went to harvard, has a like minded husband, waited to have kids, makes mid 6 figures, and comes across to others as extreme most likely (moving to NYC to make more money then possibly going to move to LCOL area later).

Feels like this will leave people with the impression that this is the only possible way to do this.... in reality its just an extreme version, she has a ton of money, and is also 28... in order to do that yes you do have to do the above. In order to just FIRE though, at a less extreme but still extreme age of 35-55, you have to just be very intentional and dedicated.

Funny, it didn't seem particularly extreme to me at all. From a mustachian POV, it just seems like she made a series of good choices, with a constant goal in mind. What the hell is extreme about that? If you want to see extreme, please go read some Jacob Lund Fisker. Then keep following along here until you recognize a badass when you see one.

http://earlyretirementextreme.com

[GenXbiker]

There was a follow-up on this for reader reaction.

http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/04/retirement/early-retirement-reader-reaction

[MM_MG]

Didn't read the whole article or all the comments above, but thought it was funny that the savings rate of the retirement calculator on the page was capped at 40% of income.

It did let me work longer than I needed to reach my goal.   

#useless

[Lan Mandragoran]

Actually finished article take:[/b]

 ..... oh. She started planning this at 20~, went to harvard, has a like minded husband, waited to have kids, makes mid 6 figures, and comes across to others as extreme most likely (moving to NYC to make more money then possibly going to move to LCOL area later).

Feels like this will leave people with the impression that this is the only possible way to do this.... in reality its just an extreme version, she has a ton of money, and is also 28... in order to do that yes you do have to do the above. In order to just FIRE though, at a less extreme but still extreme age of 35-55, you have to just be very intentional and dedicated.

Funny, it didn't seem particularly extreme to me at all. From a mustachian POV, it just seems like she made a series of good choices, with a constant goal in mind. What the hell is extreme about that? If you want to see extreme, please go read some Jacob Lund Fisker. Then keep following along here until you recognize a badass when you see one.

http://earlyretirementextreme.com

lol... ok. Ummm anyway, I think you misunderstood my post. I was just pointing out that most people would view her as... extreme. As tbh she is, not many people retire at 28 with 2.5 million dollars or w/e, thats impressive and took... extreme actions :P, and therefore discouraging to people not as awesome. Doesn't mean its not logical and awesome though!

Also I have read ERE. And most of the other popular/reputable blogs out there on the topic of early retirement.

I am what most of America would call "extreme" as well, I can give examples if necessary :P. Maybe not as much so as Jacob, but I like having a wife and family that still like me =].

[gerardc]

Since they don't really talk about withdrawing funds at all it wouldn't surprise me if her husband's income is enough to pay for most if not all of their expenses at this time allowing their stash to simply grow.

My thoughts exactly.

Funny how in the article each time they mention her husband is still working, they are very careful to avoid the "stay at home spouse" label, reiterating that here investments are sufficient to pay for her expenses :D

[MonkeyJenga]

Good for her. She had a lot of advantages, but that's true of many of us. Not every detail of a story needs to be applicable to every possible situation.

Maybe someone will see this and bump up their own savings rate.

I read it and wondered if there wasn't an earlier article that featured her tiny NYC apartment somewhere?

I didn't see an earlier article, but clearly she was wise enough to prioritize saving over lifestyle.  The article says she had a NY apartment with just a mattress on the floor, and she paid only $1100.  Unheard of for NY.

It's easy to pay $1,100 or less in NYC with a roommate. Harder to find a studio, but still doable in the less trendy neighborhoods.

[Accidental Fire]

From the follow-up article - "With a nest egg of $2.25 million to live on for the next 60 years, she could take out $88,800 annually or about $7,400 a month from age 29 to 89, assuming a 4% growth rate. Not living large, but certainly better off than many people, especially considering she isn't even working."

So..... $7400 a month is not living large?  This is why sites like CNN Money derail people.  That's around 3.2X MMM's family expenses annually, and I would argue that he's living large.  But, he doesn't have a BMW M3 so there's that....

[prognastat]

From the follow-up article - "With a nest egg of $2.25 million to live on for the next 60 years, she could take out $88,800 annually or about $7,400 a month from age 29 to 89, assuming a 4% growth rate. Not living large, but certainly better off than many people, especially considering she isn't even working."

So..... $7400 a month is not living large?  This is why sites like CNN Money derail people.  That's around 3.2X MMM's family expenses annually, and I would argue that he's living large.  But, he doesn't have a BMW M3 so there's that....

True however COL is a little higher in NYC and they don't have a paid off home and are instead renting. If you imputed MMMs mortgage savings by having a paid off house his yearly spending would be closer to 40k-50k. Not quite 3x MMM spending. I'd say they still aren't quite as frugal, but the gap still isn't quite what you mention either.

[Dicey]

Since they don't really talk about withdrawing funds at all it wouldn't surprise me if her husband's income is enough to pay for most if not all of their expenses at this time allowing their stash to simply grow.

My thoughts exactly.

Funny how in the article each time they mention her husband is still working, they are very careful to avoid the "stay at home spouse" label, reiterating that here investments are sufficient to pay for her expenses :D

This is exactly our situation, though we're twice their age. We're FI but only I am RE. We live on part of DH's salary while our stache coasts.

Sometimes retirement doesn't look at all like what you've planned for. DH's mom has ALZ and lives with us. DH would go nuts if he was trapped at home every day, so he continues to work. He's most of the way to a full pension, so he might as well continue to do a job he enjoys. When his mom no longer lives with us, he'll retire and then we will both be FIRE and we can live an even more luxurious lifestyle, have more to lavish on our favorite charities, or both.

I do not remotely consider myself a "SAH Spouse", though some might consider the term apt. Nearly five years into ER, I'm still thrilled to know I'll never again have to take any job for any reason other than personal satisfaction.

The difference is the money, particularly in amounts requiring two commas.

[Accidental Fire]

From the follow-up article - "With a nest egg of $2.25 million to live on for the next 60 years, she could take out $88,800 annually or about $7,400 a month from age 29 to 89, assuming a 4% growth rate. Not living large, but certainly better off than many people, especially considering she isn't even working."

So..... $7400 a month is not living large?  This is why sites like CNN Money derail people.  That's around 3.2X MMM's family expenses annually, and I would argue that he's living large.  But, he doesn't have a BMW M3 so there's that....

True however COL is a little higher in NYC and they don't have a paid off home and are instead renting. If you imputed MMMs mortgage savings by having a paid off house his yearly spending would be closer to 40k-50k. Not quite 3x MMM spending. I'd say they still aren't quite as frugal, but the gap still isn't quite what you mention either.

True and you make a good ppoint, but the CNN article didn't say "Not living large in New York", it said not living large.  Having read their articles for years to mainly stay tuned to what the average American is reading, CNN's general notion of what it takes to live definitely falls heavily on the consumer-sucka lifestyle.

[LessIsLess]

It's an inspirational story for sure.  (I haven't read the article.)

There are many different ways to get to the promise land.  Each of us will find our own way according to our circumstances and abilities.  Just keep a positive attitude and keep moving in the right direction.  You will get to your destination, sometimes faster than expected.

[Dicey]

It's an inspirational story for sure.  (I haven't read the article.)

There are many different ways to get to the promise land.  Each of us will find our own way according to our circumstances and abilities.  Just keep a positive attitude and keep moving in the right direction.  You will get to your destination, sometimes faster than expected.

^Amen.^ Even if it's slower than expected,  it's still 1) sooner than most people will get there and 2) damn good.

[dude]

Anyone who doesn't think what she did is badass is either just jealous or insecure.  What she did is totally badass, and not at all unlike what MMM (and his wife) did. It's amazing how hard it is for some people to see beyond their own prejudices (she went to Harvard! she earned six-figures right out of college! she had no student loan debt! etc, etc, etc.). This is textbook MMM complainypants whining.

[Accidental Fire]

Anyone who doesn't think what she did is badass is either just jealous or insecure.  What she did is totally badass, and not at all unlike what MMM (and his wife) did. It's amazing how hard it is for some people to see beyond their own prejudices (she went to Harvard! she earned six-figures right out of college! she had no student loan debt! etc, etc, etc.). This is textbook MMM complainypants whining.

Totally agree. Making that kind of salary at a young age, she resisted the very strong societal peer-pressure to have the 60K luxury car and all the blingy things. Human nature is to fall victim to that peer-pressure and she resisted it and chose her freedom