I did get lucky this year with GME but it turns out that trading is not for me so I lost most of it. Now even crypto is too mature so there's not that much potential left (relatively speaking). Do I just need to continue grinding boring work for the next 10+ years to get back to previous highs or more, to finally stop doing "useless" work?
* Build your personal brand, blog, code open source, write a book, etc. Be known for something specific and valuable
* Get a great job at larger tech co, probably American based given salary differences, especially if its in your area of expertise, then you can negotiate more salary and stock
* Cut down a lot on your personal expenses
In short be prepared to invest a lot of your personal time and have a lot less fun in the near term.
TBH most of the people who have 'retired early' got lucky in the sense that they either joined a startup and had a great exit or joined a FAANG in the mid 2000s and worked there for 10-15 years and watched their stock grow and grow...
OTOH, you can just choose to work your hours, have a sustainable and fun life, disconnect and work on preventing burnout, and just roll with the tech lifestyle
If you want a general rule of thumb look to invest in the broader market mainly and then have smaller portions of your portfolio invested in riskier assets.
What I'd do first is max my tax-free savings account (a stocks & shares ISA in the UK). That's 20k a year. Assume that grows at the rate of the S&P 500 and you'll have just under 300k in 10 years, or 25k a year interest which covers your living expenses but doesn't take into account inflation (and assumes the market performs).
Now you have 15k left per year. Make sure that you're living life and not just saving away - spend some of this on hobbies and enjoy your time. Maybe you have 5k left after that, maybe 10k, who knows. Either way, depending on your risk appetite you can either invest the remaining amount into an ETF, save it as cash for a rainy day, buy individual shares, or go into crypto.
I have worked in crypto for several years now and I don't pretend I understand the market, it may as well be gambling, but if I was to give blanket advice I'd suggest following dollar-cost-averaging across as many coins as you can to get the best chance of success there.
All-in-all though, think about what you want to do when you retire. Is it to start a hobby? Spend time at the beach? Play video games? Work out why you want to retire early and see how you can improve your situation to allow yourself to do that now. It could be that freelancing half a year for 50-60k and spending half a year on your hobbies is better than living cash-strapped till 2031 so you can retire.
This is where the real wealth is created.
Sure, if you’re a school teacher. Slow and steady savings is the way.
Not when you are a software developer with skills to create wealth…
And you can join a more established startup, to improve your odds.
Maybe I could eventually find one but the odds don't seem great. Ideally I might work for something like Neuralink but I don't think I can get there. The chasm to making that a reality seems too deep. Though this may be a self-fulfilling prophecy in a way.
As for other startups, I don't think e.g. any of the local ones pay well and, like many would say, I value equity options at zero until they're liquid. I just feel like I've been burned too many times to grasp for more lottery tickets.
Felt that IT career is making me miserable so was not sure how long I can keep at it even though it pays really well.
Started with my own real estate so there is no rent payment and equity is built up instead. Then got lucky with TSLA (not with GME).
Just retired with somewhere between few years to a decade or runway (depends on stock market) Now I am interested in markets. Have been following markets for about 3 years and plan to test my cleverness and do more active trading/calculated gambling to get to Financial independence. Or return to work when my runway ends.
This channel has been a great learning source and he has a lot to say about building wealth and trading. https://www.youtube.com/c/MeetKevin I think I have done it as soon as possible for me. Took a decade if not counting the financial crisis years. Good luck!
Perhaps also something on alternative income streams. I managed to work 24/7 on a startup once, but after it crashed and burned with nothing to show for it, I don't think I can do it again. I tried many times but I couldn't make it work.
AI would be more lucrative to work on but even though I have a degree labelled such, I find the chasm to a job making more money from that somehow impassable. But maybe it's not entirely.
I've had good luck with just throwing a set amount of each paycheck into the top crypto (mostly bitcoin and ethereum, lately more solana) with an auto-buy and not worrying whether it goes up or down. If it goes down, I just end up getting more coin for my purchase. Rode the last crypto bear market down like that, and a few years later (now) it ended up paying off big time.
Was super easy, didn't even have to think about it. Been trying to pay more attention this time around and it might not have been worth all the extra time and mindspace, honestly, except if I had started watching InvestAnswers six months earlier I would have put a big bet on Solana when it was ~$8 and been semi-retired by now, probably.
If you save 35k per year and have living expenses of 25k per year (60k - 35k = 25k), then you have a 58.3% savings rate (net of taxes). My math has you FI in 14 years assuming a 5% return net of inflation, or 13 years with a 7% return net of inflation.
If you can augment that 35k per year savings by working part time it can be even faster. Assuming the same implied hourly rate at 120k per year ($60/hr), and an extra 20 hr/wk of work, AND a 50% tax rate, that yields an extra 30k per year of savings.
That would bump the savings rate to 72.2%, which would drop the estimated time to retire to 9 at a 5% return net of inflation or 8 years at a 7% return net of inflation instead of 14 or 13 years. Thus saving 5 years.
At a 20% rate of return net of inflation, just for example, the 8 or 9 year time would drop to 6 years, so the yield on your investments probably isn't going to be a primary driver of the time until retirement. Savings rate is a much bigger driver.
If you are single, ok cutting your expenses and live very frugally, then you need very little money to make a living. If you are not single, check with your partner :). Kids add a lot more expense. If you can afford it, take a sabbatical and see if that works.
I am almost there (I am at 24 vacation days) and I just am 3 years into my career.
I am from western europe.
1) Make a lot of money.
2) Minimize your expenses.
People often forget just how powerful #2 can be. Don't neglect that side of the coin.
It won't be the "cool" kind of retired where you're on beaches, with a nice garden and all. If you've minimised expenses, you'll be that guy with a lot of money in the bank, who's wearing tattered clothes, living in a cramped apartment, eating rice and beans every day.
It answers the question perfectly, though.
You can minimize expenses by having a reasonable home and paying it off early. You can then still sell and upgrade to nicer homes as real estate markets grow. You also should buy items that will last a lifetime. Make sure your home is energy-efficient. Learn to DIY repairs.
You buy good clothes because they last longer. You buy top-of-the-line computers and phones because they'll give you more years before needing to upgrade again. You buy good food to stay healthy and reduce health care costs. You spend your nest eggs when inflation rises because those energy-saving improvements to my home will cost thousands today, but save even more thousands over the next 20 years.
Reducing expenses doesn't mean not spending money. It means looking deeply at the value your spending brings to your life, and doing whatever will actually reduce long-term lifetime spending.
No it isn't. Who told you that? It's only just been adopted in a couple countries. We've got a long way to go. Don't let FOMO get you.
Get yourself a Bitcoin wallet, buy, and hold. Then see where we're at in 10 years. An no, don't mess with the rest.
If I could do it all again (no wife, kids, or fear) that’s what I would do.
