Work hard now to pay off your mortgage by 30, and retire by 40

[Ieattoomuchsugar]

And to buy a house at 19/20 whatever age

Maybe exaggerating with the ages a bit but these are examples I've seen.

People who've gone without holidays, new clothes etc, lived with the bare minimum and worked endless overtime for years in order to achieve the above.

Has anybody actually done this or in the process of doing it?

I do see the appeal but I personally wouldn't want/wouldn't have wanted to spend my 20s and 30s living that way. I do think life is to be enjoyed, I of course want to save but I am not prepared to go without things I enjoy for such a long time. I think it's better to strike a balance, and I'd rather enjoy life now just as much as when I am 50/60.

@Whatayear81 from a guy who retired at 30:

www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/10/06/the-true-cost-of-commuting/

But people want a back yard. For their kids, or their dogs.”

Are you JOKING?? When you live in a high-end district, ignoring the fact that luxury apartment buildings typically have amazing landscaped common areas, you have literally a multi-billion dollar back yard. The Toronto lakeshore is an endless expanse of beaches, bike paths, fountains, gardens, play structures, volleyball courts, patio restaurants, and of course one of the largest expanses of sparkling blue freshwater in the world. In Ottawa you have a stunning riverfront, forests and parks and bike paths that lead everywhere, and rapid transit that would eliminate any need to ever own a car.

Would you really waste an extra $3,000 per month just so your kids could play on your personal fenced-in postage stamp overlooked by vinyl-clad suburban houses in every direction while you are out stuck in traffic? No.

But what about the dogs?

$3,000 per month, plus the $400 it costs to feed and treat and house and transport and occasionally kennel the a dog, compounds to roughly $588,200 every decade if you invest the money instead. That’s every decade, and they live longer than that. Are you really rich enough to spend a million dollars, and clean up warm squishing chunks of excrement daily with only your bare hand and a plastic bag, just so you can have this extra bit of companionship during your sparse time outside of work? No

I mean obviously the Toronto property market/housing stock is very different from the London one. His calculation was that even living in a luxury apartment in the city was cheaper than the suburban house. But in my case, buying a 1930s 2 bed flat in London z3 is significantly cheaper than living in a commuter town in a house with garden... But of course like in the UK, a lot of Canadians and Americans disagree, hence the popularity of the suburbs in those countries. And like Toronto, London has lovely parks and many flats here have beautiful shared gardens. And in London, unlike the Americas, apartments are individually owned and it costs the same to own as to rent plus it is a hedge against inflation.

@Feduprenter most people wouldn't FIRE though... It's just not what they want and that's fair enough. I am interested in a lot of the advice as i do believe it's good to save money, particularly on things which are lifestyle bloat rather than things that spark joy! But I am not FIRE in the slightest.

If even a significant amount do though you see the issue surely

That's very exaggerated and reality most doing that will be buying very cheap property in poorer areas as a 19 year old tends not to have a) a degree b) a high salary or c) a large deposit

However I do see the point in trying to pay your mortgage off. Because of the interest compounding the longer you take to pay it off the more interest you pay, its pissing money away. DH and I should have cleared ours by age 40 (but we are very high earners) and as a result will have saved hundreds of thousands of pounds in interest.

@Feduprenter well based on this thread, most probably wouldn't :) also MMM doesn't even live in a city, after all I think the whole point of FIRE was that you achieve financial freedom and can move wherever they want which for most people would be house with garden. Admittedly if you didn't work and could guarantee for the rest of your life that you would never need to go into an office again (not even hybrid working ), living in the sticks is cheaper. But if you have a 9-5 and an employer who doesn't guarantee WFH (DH works for an investment bank and they are completely against WFH and my employer says min 1-2 days in the office which can be increased at will), that is a different story. And if people have to work till retirement age, I don't see how they can guarantee eternal WFH (would they never change jobs for the next 20 years or guarantee being able to find WFH jobs even during recession), I think rising inflation, increasing gas bills etc do make living in the sticks and commuting a more expensive choice in the long run.

FIRE appears to be a concept that only applies to those on a reasonably good income.

Many people buy their groceries from Lidl, don't get the latest phones and live in a property with no garden because they can't afford to do anything else, never mind pay off a mortgage early.

Doing FIRE is fine if that's how you want to live, but don't forget having that option as a choice rather than a default is privilege.

If your dream is to retire at 40, you need to think carefully about what your purpose will be after then, we all need a reason to get out of bed in the morning!

@onlychildhamster

Just like you- that author doesn’t have any children.

I want financial security.... but I don't want to retire that early. People who retire that early often stop using their brain. The ones I know who have done this have aged faster & lost touch with technology trends etc. I also think the vast majority of early retirers significantly underestimate the extent to which they need a lot of money to keep pace with inflation.

Someone without children telling me that the decision to prioritise a home with a garden is due to society pressures

Is someone i am not going to take seriously!

Retiring at 30?

I’d honestly feel so embarrassed. Really!

@Whatayear81

* Society believes you need a house with garden for a child *

Your words

In the UK maybe. In other countries it seems to be more acceptable to live in a flat and have communal space. But then the build quality is probably much better, and they have stricter rules on noise.

@DeepaBeesKit

I want financial security.... but I don't want to retire that early. People who retire that early often stop using their brain. The ones I know who have done this have aged faster & lost touch with technology trends etc. I also think the vast majority of early retirers significantly underestimate the extent to which they need a lot of money to keep pace with inflation.

I actually think the opposite. I work with a lot of people and some of those older than me see the figures posted online to have a 'good retirement' and think that is what they need to achieve and keep working and working afraid of running out of money.

I have paid for professional advice and pension planning and used my own bills and lifestyle and we can easily afford to retire early without taking any capital out of our pensions. We probably will as we plan to skew our retirement holiday years early on whilst we can afford the travel insurance with medical conditions but still not enough to be a concern. And if we want to do more we can get a temporary seasonal job or downsize which are all options that we have considered as an emergency route.

@Whatayear81 a 3 bed house with garden in my area costs approximately £300k more than a flat with 3 bedrooms. A mortgage at 2% interest rate roughly works out to over a thousand pounds. Moving to a commuter town is £400 per month for a season ticket, double that by 2. So £800 and not even counting the cost of the car..

Having a garden is a £1279 per month decision. I have yet to take any £12k holidays lol. The gap is less in cheaper or gentrifying areas but there is always a cost to buying anything with desirable features. I guess we have to work out what is truly important to us.

@backinthebox thank you for that example. We are in pretty much that position with £100k left on the mortgage at 0.74% (my only really good financial decision ever). I have been debating whether to start to pay extra off the mortgage or whether to put money into savings. Your example really crystalizes what I have been thinking which is that investments would be the better idea.

@Whatayear81 he has a son! www.mrmoneymustache.com/2015/07/27/rent-vs-buy/

@Whatayear81 www.mrmoneymustache.com/2015/05/20/what-im-teaching-my-son-about-money/

Nobody should be overpaying a mortgage right now, even a stocks and shares isa is a better investment

@Whatayear81 I think having a garden for dc in the UK is a societal expectation. We really don't seem to enjoy sharing anything. Look at the handwringing that is done on threads about shared driveways alone.
In my city most new social housing has become flats, rather than houses. There was an uproar about how children would suffer from lack of a garden, despite most of the developments backing onto large parks or woodland. Even in lockdown I saw lots of people on instagram who have London gardens (so fairly small) complaining about garden inequalities and how this was going to impact their dc negatively.

My stocks & shares ISA (multi fund pooled) plummeted in value in last 2 yrs. I guess now might be very cheap or you could lose your shirt.

@JuergenSchwarzwald

In the UK maybe. In other countries it seems to be more acceptable to live in a flat and have communal space. But then the build quality is probably much better, and they have stricter rules on noise.

Unrelated to this thread but the Victorian terraces in my area are a million pounds. I have lived in one before, and there is far less sound proofing than my 1930s flat.

I think it is because of the lack of larger flats. They do exist but they are much less common than 2 bed flats. I mean, Lulu Lytle (who was the designer behind Carrie Symonds' infamous revamp of 10 Downing Street) lives in a very large £4 million top floor flat (2 apartments knocked down to create one long apartment) and she has 3 children so some people are clearly not averse to it. May seem weird to bring her up in a thread about FIRE, but it may be that people living in desirable neighbourhoods are able to see the financial benefits of such a decision more easily due to the huge cost of buying a house in that area ( I am sure buying 2 flats and knocking through is cheaper than buying 1 large house, i have done the calculations for my area and its certainly true for me; and have thought of that as an option).

www.standard.co.uk/homesandproperty/interiors/at-home-with-soane-britain-founder-lulu-lytle-a-global-treasure-trove-of-textiles-paintings-maps-and-artefacts-a100921.html

@PurpleRainlnTheSky speak for yourself. Of course people pay a mortgage off in their early 30s. I have. Mortgage on first house around £120k 5 years ago.

Rough figures but if a couple save £2.5K each month over 5 years.
£2.5K x 12 x5 = £150k
It helps being in professional jobs with no children yet.

Just because you can’t imagine it, doesn’t mean it isn’t possible!

And let me guess @seekinglondonlife

You don’t have any children either?

@Toadsinholes

Those of you who have nearly or paid it off before 40, can I ask how?! Is your house very cheap or do you earn loads, or have inherited some? We have a very average house (200k mortgage) & earn average salaries (60k combined) - there is no way we could ever pay that off early! Surely it’s out of reach for ‘normal’ people?

@Toadsinholes

There are various reasons why people are able to pay it off early.
I looked at the mortgage calculator on my banking app and it calculates what your mortgage will reduce to when you overpay each month.

I checked various calculations and worked out what I could afford. Even overpaying £50-100 per month makes a big difference. And I like how it means paying less interest.
I'm in a position now where I can overpay but haven't always been so I'm doing it now while I can.

I'm not cutting back on anything. Still doing what I'd normally do, going to meals etc.
It's definitely worth having a look at. I've knocked 10 years off my mortgage by making overpayments.

There is some terrible ageism on this thread. I retired at 57 and I can't see my brain or body rotting any time soon. I am fitter than I have been for years and have rediscovered my passion for neuroscience, which I studied at university. I also spent the early part of the pandemic volunteering at the vaccination centre. Not everyone who retires goes downhill.