tl;dr self taught web developer with a BA in social science and foreign language who worked their way up to senior engineer at BigCorp, kept expenses under $40k/yr and went all in on index funds.
Hey all. I discovered this sub in 2013 when I was 22 and broke with no career plan. Today I'm 29, turning 30 in a few weeks, and my net worth just passed $1mil - all in investments and cash. I've consistently spent roughly $32k-38k a year for the past 4-5 years, so this means I just hit FI for my current expenses!
My RE number is different from my FI number, so I'm not retiring yet. More about that at the end of the post.
Its all from working, saving and index fund returns. No combined couples finances, no inheritance, no house appreciation, no crypto windfalls, no parental support after turning 18, etc.
This post is not an attempt to take credit for the results of the record bull market or my own privilege as a middle-class American with access to good education and opportunities. My situation arose out of a mix of both luck and hard work, neither of which would have been enough without the other.
This post is also not advice. It is a case study to provide data to people who find this kind of data interesting. Reading these kinds of stories at 22 directly inspired me to do what I did, so I'm contributing one back.
The Numbers
Current NW Breakdown
| Asset | Value |
|---|---|
| Emergency Fund + House Downpayment | $57k |
| Taxable Brokerage | $663k |
| 401k | $180k |
| Roth IRA | $24k |
| HSA | $11k |
| Vested & Held RSUs | $68k |
| Bitcoin | $1k |
No debt. I got several scholarships for undergrad, graduated early to save on tuition, and paid off my remaining loans while making US pay in a developing country (see career section below for details).
I messed up early on and was afraid of taxed-advantaged accounts, and in later years my earnings exceeded a lot of limits so I had to dump the remainder in taxable. That's why my taxable is so high.
Rough estimate of yearly pretax income over time
Not exact figures but pretty close. I finished undergrad a semester early at the end of December 2013.
| Year | Job | Total Pretax Compensation |
|---|---|---|
| 2014 | Freelance Web Developer | $40k |
| 2015 | Media Company Software Developer | $90k |
| 2016 | Junior BigCorp Developer | $155k |
| 2017 | BigCorp Developer | $145k |
| 2018 | BigCorp Developer | $180k |
| 2019 | BigCorp Developer | $225k |
| 2020 | BigCorp Developer | $295k |
| 2021 | Senior BigCorp Developer | $295k |
tl;dr self taught programmer with a BA in social science who started freelance making WordPress websites and climbed to senior engineer at BigCorp.
My budget in 2021
| Category | Budgeted Per Month |
|---|---|
| Rent, utilities and insurance | $1780 |
| Electricity | $35 |
| Groceries | $175 |
| Internet | $55 |
| Household supplies | $25 |
| Cell service | $0 (comped by company) |
| Car | $0 (carless my whole life) |
| Public Transit | $0 (comped by company) |
| Medical | $100 (its almost never actually this high - more of an emergency earmark) |
| Web Hosting | $15 |
| Outdoor adventure travel (rental cars, lift tickets, etc.) | $300 |
| Gifts | $50 |
| Coffee | $20 |
| Discretionary | ~$400-500 |
I keep a line-item budget using Firefly III and my expenses have been $34k-$38k total per year for the past 3 years
Prior to the past couple years, I was much more frugal and kept my expenses around $30-34k per year. I was living somewhere cheaper, was living with my now-ex who was helping with rent and I was not spending on anything fun at all.
Lifestyle
I live a very frugal lifestyle. My annual spending has stayed within $26k-$38k my entire adult life despite living solely in (V)HCOL cities. About 75% of my frugality is by preference, and the remaining 25% is delayed lifestyle inflation so I could hit FI sooner.
I walk and take the bus everywhere - I have never owned a car. I buy everything used. Yes, I eat lentils r/fijerk (I'm a vegetarian). The only thing in my life I spend big on is housing. I rent a small but very nice apartment in an expensive, walkable central neighborhood in a desirable city. During the week, I spend almost all my time at home either working or engrossed in my hobbies. I love to read, write, mess with computers, make videos, play video games and TTRPGs, watch TV and movies, sew, cook and bake. I don't often do things like eat out or go to ticketed events - did a lot of that in my early 20s but not into it anymore.
What I really live for is backpacking and skiing on weekends and vacations. That's what makes me happy and what I center my life around. All in all they're not very expensive hobbies - I live less than an hour drive from the mountains and costs are basically just rental cars and gas once or twice a month, permits, clif bars, the occasional big gear purchase. I even handmake some of my own camping gear.
Frankly I do not think my lifestyle would work for most people. But it makes sense for me.
Career
While I have become "the typical high paid software developer", I did not begin that way.
I finished undergrad in winter 2013 with a BA in social science and a foreign language minor. I had no savings (but thankfully only a small amount of debt) and absolutely no idea what to do. I was living paycheck to paycheck in NYC in a shared Craigslist apartment, working an abusive retail job and doing exploitative odd gigs to survive.
I read about tech careers on reddit, and computers had always been a hobby, so with no other career prospects I started working freelance building websites. Mind you I never expected to make 6 figures in my life, but I thought it'd be a good income source until I could figure out a "real career". I leapt into working 50-60 hour weeks with an extra 10+ hours on nights and weekends working on software side projects, building an online presence to market myself with, and studying CS fundamentals and interview questions. I was very passionate about the subject material. I had no personal life during this time - all I did was work and sleep.
After 9 months of grinding like this, I unexpectedly received a full-ride scholarship for a one year post-grad program in Asia. I moved there and lived rent free in the university dorms for 14 months. I continued to work remotely around 20-30 hours per week for an NYC-based web development agency while attending college full time in a foreign language. I lived for free off of the scholarship and arbitraged my American freelance pay to eradicate the rest of my debt and start saving and investing.
When my visa expired I moved back to NYC and got my first big time corporate job working on a household name media company website. After 14 months I job hopped again to a big tech company and left NYC forever in favor of a slightly less expensive west coast city (not Bay Area).
I've been living frugally and grinding the corporate ladder for 5 years since then. I was promoted 10 months after joining BigCorp and got promoted again this year to senior engineer. I've gotten top tier performance reviews almost all years. As a result my pretax compensation has grown from the sub-$30k I was making when I first started out as a 21 year old freelancer to just under $300k now.
This career has taken a huge toll on me in terms of health, stress and missed experiences, but it was a financial rocketship just like those reddit posts promised. I went down this path with my eyes open to the tradeoffs I was making, and for the most part I don't regret them. With that said, this isn't sustainable long term.
Investment Strategy
I'm not a clever investor and I did a lot of things wrong over the years. I put money into taxable instead of tax-advantaged thinking "what if I need it sooner". I bought a bunch of bonds early on thinking they were safer. I sold Bitcoin at $10 per coin in 2012, and sold my company RSUs on vest instead of holding - the stock price has since jumped 4x. I never bought property despite watching prices soar around me.
The one thing I did right was regularly buy and hold index funds. I have since corrected my earlier mistakes around asset allocation and tax advantaged investment, but my knowledge of investing has very little to do with my success.
Long Term Goals
While building this career has been exciting, its also not something I can continue doing long term. I'm burned out and no longer have any passion for consumer software. While I don't work as many hours these days as I used to, my job still takes a huge toll on me in terms of stress and sacrifices in my personal life. Crunch times, disruptive oncall rotations and toxic corporate politics are all regularities. I've gained 20lbs in the past 5 years, have developed unhealthy stress coping mechanisms and have almost no energy outside work.
Conversely, the happiest times in my life have been my experiences living abroad and spending extended time in the wilderness. I want to get to a point where I have a stable home base that I can always come home to, so that I can go on fun multi month dirtbag adventures but never have to worry about finances or what I'm going to do when the trip ends. I don't see myself marrying or having children.
Ideally I'd spend April - October each year hiking long trails (Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail, etc.) or doing low cost travel abroad, and the rest of the time back home in my HCOL location skiing, doing shorter local backcountry trips and pursuing my numerous hobbies. I cannot fathom the idea of being bored without work.
Next Steps
I really don't know what to do next. On the one hand I still feel miles away from permanent RE. Can't imagine stopping work for good until I have not only this nest egg but also:
- Ownership of a 2BR condo or home
- Budget for an AWD high clearance car (my primary planned source of entertainment in RE)
- US healthcare solution
I like the west coast too much to leave, so I'm roughly looking at $400-$600k for the type of property I'd like to own (a modest 2BR condo/townhome or <1000sqft cottage in a nice neighborhood). This likely means another 2-5 years of working at my current income level before I can pay off the property in full or amass enough investments to pay the mortgage. I have a downpayment saved and am planning to buy in the next few months.
On the other hand, I don't know how much longer I can do my job. It is wrecking me physically and mentally.
So I'm currently stuck between these two choices. I can grind a few more years and then pull the cord for good. Or I can flame out now, pull the plug early and go hiking with $1mil in investments, and then have to get a job again later on in my 30s to get a house. If I do stick to the grind, I will begin spending more next year now that I'm at $1mil. I would love to hear peoples' opinions and thoughts on what I should do.
40s and on? Anyone who thinks they know what they'll want in over 10 years is kidding themselves. We'll cross that bridge when we get there.
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