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.

We're late 30s. We've been mortgage free since early 30s unfortunately due to dh's dad passing away. No way would we retire at 40. We're making AVCs to our pensions with the intention of retiring at 60.

We debated upgrading to a nicer area locally. We have no interest in a bigger house, but longer commutes. We decided against it as we'd rather have more money to enjoy life day to day, save for the kids' futures via S&S ISAs and go on lots of holidays. Life is short.

@ufucoffee

Wouldn't want to retire by 40.

Me neither. All your friends will be working, retirees are 60+ - is that who you want to hang out with during the endless days? A balance is good.

I think this isn't a possibility for a lot of people. I mean houses aren't just a little bit too expensive, they're not just save a bit or even a lot for a few years expensive. They're 'live-at-your-parents-for-a-decade-and-spend-nothing-to-even-get-a-deposit' for a lot of people, and obviously people don't want to to do that. With student debt and the cost of rent there is no way a lot of people can ever buy unless the system changes.

Similar story to some others, my MIL died very suddenly and unexpectedly in her late 40's. Her and my FIL had made so many plans for retirement and subsequently so many sacrifices to make those plans a real toy and they never made it there, so I couldn't do this as tomorrow isn't promised. I'm certain there is a middle.ground though which is what we try to do, slightly overpay the mortgage and go on some reasonably priced holidays and days out within our means

I lived very modestly with my children (solo parent) and paid off my mortgage mid 40s, retired late 50s.

Retirement is fantastic and if I could have afforded it earlier I’d have done it. It was great having (relatively) more money when my children were teenagers and starting out in life. Lots more freedom now, as they are adults and my time is my own. I continue to live quite modestly but with more holidays and leisure activities.

Top tip: go for the shortest mortgage term you can afford. Much cheaper in the long run.

I only afforded my mortgage at 30 Ivf cost me 25k you don’t know how things like Ivf or redundancy will come and smack you in the mouth

*reality

@ShadowsInTheDarkness

Gosh that sounds quite a miserable existence especially as most people have DCs during the years that you'd need to be saving like mad so would mean less money spent on them too.

We have an opposite outlook (necessitated by me having small DCs when I met DH and going back to uni at that point). We rent now and will do until our 40s, and have lived in some lovely places. The DCs get a much bigger bedroom and outside space than we would be able to afford if buying and we rent some land where we keep livestock just up the road. When we are in our 40s or older we will be in a position to buy something possibly outright or at least with a much shorter mortgage than would have been possible if we bought sooner. We will be able to look at small holdings or houses with land attached for our animals.

It's completely upside down compared to how everyone else does it but it's working well for us and has meant that we don't have to do the scrimping and saving thing with small children. I did that when I was a single parent and it was incredibly tough so we made a choice that we would prioritise the DCs childhood now and renting frees up the money to do that.

This is such a lovely approach to living life and enjoying and enriching childhoods.

In other countries with they rent whilst working and accumulate savings to buy something outright mortgage free on retirement. But it depends where you live as to the ratio of wages to rents to property prices (and rate of increase as in SE UK many people couldn’t save as fast as rise in property prices)

If interest rates were where they should be, people with mortgages wouldn't have much disposable income so wouldn't be living that lifestyle in any case.

Anyone with a mortgage who's living that lifestyle now should be bracing themselves for rate rises.

I lived with my parents to save for a deposit for 8 years. That was the worst part, but I couldn’t afford to rent!

Everyone I know who has retired early has ended up taking on freelance work as they are so bored. My dad practically has a whole new second career in freelance IT consulting.

I think it’s actually a good idea, as long as you don’t restrict your life too much. The key is really getting additional income streams probably more so than restricting outgoings - investments, BTL, freelance online work etc.

Pp keep saying they know people who died or had ill health in middle age so it’s not worth it, but you’re much more likely to experience that post state retirement age so you’re much more likely to be able to enjoy retirement if you retire early. Read some FIRE blogs like Mr Money Mustache - he is using his early retirement to be able to spend more time with his DS while he’s young, which I’m sure we’d all like to be able to do.

It is possibly a lifestyle best suited to more minimalist people though. A pp mentioned not being able to buy a 5 bed detached house with this approach. Well no, but not everyone wants a big house. I wouldn’t want more than 3-4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms/loos because I can’t be bothered cleaning and maintaining more than that and all the crap stuff that would accumulate within it.

@Pedalpushers

Everyone I know who has retired early has ended up taking on freelance work as they are so bored. My dad practically has a whole new second career in freelance IT consulting.

The major difference will be though everything he does is because he wants to do it and he enjoys doing it and he’ll actually be a far better IT consultant as a result of that. But the pressure is off you say if he wakes up in the morning and he actually doesn’t want £600 a day contract he doesn’t have to do it does he

My DD owns her own home at 23. We are in Liverpool and she works in the NHS, so it's doable. Before Covid she started going on holidays with her friend and used to panic about the amount of money she was spending. I keep having to remind her that life is for living. She's going to Greece in September and I'm helping her set a budget that she feels comfortable with, but is still doing quads, boat trips, water sports etc. You can get too caught up with saving.
It's a bit like those who say keep out of the sun so you have good skin at 50/60. My outlook changed when I was Widowed in my 30's, we had a list of holidays that we were going to do when he dropped his working hours.

We paid cash for a house $350k AUD. We saved this in about 10 years by both working full time and living off one wage and saving the other. We are not skilled workers (office admin and car sales)
The first 20k was the the hardest and then we were getting about 8% interest from the bank (2008 ish).
Originally we intended to save 20% deposit but we just kept going. After a while we decided we would relocate in the future so didn’t want to buy and continued renting and saving.
We rented a cheap place (studio unit) and had one fairly crappy car between us (both worked in the same location). We still went on holidays though. Although we have never had a mortgage we still work (one part time and one full time) and are no where near being able to retire (ages 45 & 50).

I bought my first home less than a month after turning 18. It was possible because:
I live in the North where house prices are very cheap.
I was willing and able to move to a cheaper, run down area and live there for a few years.
I had a partner who had similar savings, work ethic and desires.
I was willing to put my education on hold to work full time in order to be accepted for a mortgage.

I’m now 24. I consider my decisions a success- I’m now married to the partner, we have 3 children together and have been able to move back to a bigger and nicer house in the area we actually want to live in. I run my own successful business.

BUT I still haven’t been able to return to my education. I now have a 200k mortgage that won’t be paid off ANY time soon. My husband has also delayed his education and is now doing a degree whilst working full time and raising 3 children. Neither of us will be retiring anywhere near 40.

I’m pleased with my choices, but I can very much understand why the sacrifices we have made might not be for everyone. And I certainly haven’t been able to travel and enjoy my 20s like a lot of my child and mortgage free friends have.

@ESGdance don't mind me asking what you retrained in?

I'm technically retired, but do childcare, school pickup three times a week. My time is filled. I don't know anyone whose 80% enjoyed retirement, if they don't have family/hobbies/voluntary work to fill their time. I know women who've done minimum wage jobs, but with a good group of workmates who really miss the social interaction.

@Pedalpushers

Everyone I know who has retired early has ended up taking on freelance work as they are so bored. My dad practically has a whole new second career in freelance IT consulting.

It depends how you view retirement. I see it as an opportunity to do something different and am not bored, although lockdown was pretty tedious. Dh and I have different projects eg I am a councillor and do a lot of voluntary work and he studies for wine exams and mentors three people from his former profession. We do some things together: gym , sport, day trips etc, but we don’t want to spend all day, every day together.

Buying a house young is still possible even in the SE & London. I bought my house when I was 24, now just shy of 27. Most of my friends have bought as well. I had no family help but a few of my friends did to be fair, although it is mostly enabled by them being high earners (not me!).

And to buy a house at 19/20 whatever age.

Pie in the sky for people that age round here, where even a 1-bedroom flat is a quarter of a million.

Oh Gosh, it reminds of my cousin. She is always saving money. Constantly adding things to her goal list. Mortgage first, then bigger house and now working two jobs to finish off bigger mortgage. She says her next goal is to upgrade to Tesla car. she is missing out on family meetings in pubs because she always joins with her children after the Sunday lunch. Occasional holidays and is always complaining about no money. I think it sucks that joy out of the life.

I was mortgage free by 45 with a 6 bedroom house and it’s totally worth it. We are not ones for a consumerist lifestyle and never signed up for the monthly income drainers like Netflix, Spotify etc. It’s amazing how much those small monthly payments add up.

My car is 11 years old and DPs “new” one is 4 years old.

Well I'm 40 and can't save up to get a passport let alone a deposit for a house so I'm not quite on target for this little daydream.