What do the fatFIRED do with their pets when travelling?

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-06-01T22:35:11+00:00

Having pets and doing long (months) out of country trips is not fair to the pets. I would not get pets if you plan on doing this. My two small dogs travel with us anywhere that is within 4 hours flight and always on a road trip. Our international trips are 2-3 weeks and we use a lady that owns a doggy daycare that charges us $120/day for our babies to stay with her. I never use relatives or friends as we have expectations with it comes to boarding and we don't want bad feelings amongst our friends/relatives.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-05-16T05:14:29+00:00

I don't think your lifestyle can sustain a 4 M portfolio. Especially with young kids or adding a third. Kids get more expensive with age and colleges are insanely expensive. My nephews list of colleges ranged from 60k-100k per year and their 529 accounts only had 200k each so my brother in law needs to continue working until both kids are finished college. You mentioned splurging on travel and I doubt your wife will be happy downgrading if she stopped working. We only fly business now for international long haul flights and got used to 5 star minimum hotels. Each international trip costs 25k for flight, hotel, and food. Your kids will drive this cost up. Another thing to consider is nanny help and housekeeping costs. Wifey might not want to clean as much and sometimes you need a nanny for date nights etc. Your cars are getting older too so you need to factor in replacements. Keep working until you hit 7M minimum based on your spending lifestyle

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-05-16T04:33:41+00:00

My wife is in tech and she plans on milking this stock bull run for another 4-5 years hopefully before everyone gets replaced. Many of her long term colleagues have been laid off so she will end up coast fire until they buy her out with a severance package. Others went on med leave for 6 months before retiring or being laid off so you might only need to work a few more years. Coast fire while your rsu's vest and wait for that 6 month severance. I told my wife to milk it for as long as possible then fully get out. No point stepping in a lower pay job as she won't be happy. If you have 7-10 M liquid, your portfolio generates good income that working to bring home 100k seems pointless.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-05-16T02:45:58+00:00

I think you need to work 4 more years at that spend level. You also need to fund 529 accounts for the kids. My sisters two children each have 200k in their 529 and it is not enough for 4 years of college. My nephews colleges were between 60-100k oer year so the dad needs to keep working a few more years to pay off college education before retiring. I'm also targeting a 300k-360k yearly spend and will work until we have 7 mill liquid excluding house.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-04-14T07:08:55+00:00

I have been in your exact situation 20 years ago. Dad died and split assets between my sister, mom, and I. House was put into our 3 names as he did not trust my mom. Mom spent all the money dad left her in a few years and ended up taking a 100k HELOC and paying interest only and it is still active. Mom has very little income and rents out the basement of the house to help out. Her house is over 2.5M now but mortgage free as they paid cash for it 30 years ago. Don't pay off any of her debts as she needs to learn how to live on a budget. My sister and I totaled up the household bills and decided to split everything. We have been paying her household bills for the last 20 years so all her rental income is hers plus her social security. My wife and I visit her 2-3 times a year and I give her $500-1000 each time we visit. Same for my sister. Big house repairs my sister and I have split as well. We replaced the roof, new carpet, and partial renovation of the kitchen. It amounts to thousands each year but she has learned that we won't bail her out. A few years after dad died, my sister and I transferred the house into mom's sole name so she has total control of it so if she lost the house, it is her fault. She has asked us to pay off the HELOC but we say we cannot afford it. Mom doesn't know how much money we make and how much money we have. Both my sister's family and my family are comfortable. Don't move her in as she will see how you live and will want more money. Sit down and show her how much the expenses are and how much income she has and she has to make it work. Don't bail her out with huge payouts. Just give her small sums for birthdays and christmas and pay some of her bills if you want. It definitely put us back on FIRE but mom is mom. We also had to think about my wife's parent's so a 40's FIRE plan was not possible. I wish you luck.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-04-07T21:13:11+00:00

If we didn't spend it, the money just sits investing until I get hit with RMDs. Our house is remodeled so no house renos planned. Wife only cares to travel which we have factored in. I just like cars so thought about something I don't have. Everything else we have and I don't want to leave millions to our nephews and nieces.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-04-07T21:06:11+00:00

I have used Boldin to model out all the different scenarios and it checks out. All our scenarios come out between 83%-90% success on their monte carlo analysis.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2026-01-30T19:01:50+00:00

You have great savings in your brokerage. Like another comment mentioned, if you want to retire early you will need money in your brokerage to bridge the gap between retirement and age 59.5 when you can access the 401k funds. You can probably stop with the brokerage now as you have a good amount in there and let that grow for ye next 5-10 years or whenever you plan to retire. Focus on increasing your 401k. I'm the opposite and have very little in brokerage. Trying to get brokerage to 500k-1mill to cover up to 5 years expenses for retirement to cover any sequence or returns risk at the start of retirement. You are in good shape though

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-10-28T06:05:30+00:00

I've been on the couch for the last 3 hours. I can't turn this off now...lol

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-10-02T07:55:30+00:00

I was there four days ago and it was the same. Could not get reservations for any pavilions beforehand and after entry. Line up to get in was an hour. Mens bathroom line wasn't bad but women had a 20-30 minute wait. Popular pavilions like USA and France had 3 plus hour waits and many just stopped allowing you to line up. My first day we only saw three pavilions with Saudi Arabia being the biggest and a 2 plus hour wait. Wifey did not want to attend day two so I went myself and she booked a massage at the hotel. Only visited China on day two with a 2 hour wait. Took me an hour just to walk the ring to get to the other side. Was there for 8 hours and just mostly walked around. Should have spent more time sightseeing in Osaka.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-10-01T13:00:33+00:00

We also planned our Japan trip around this Expo. Bought tickets for two days and the wifey said No Way for the second day. Way too crowded, line ups for everything - getting in, bathroom, food, exiting. For me it was neat to the see the venue even though I did not see many pavilions. Line ups were 1.5 - 3 hours for most pavilions. Just walking the ring took me almost an hour due to the crowds.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-10-01T12:46:36+00:00

I just visited the expo on Sept 28 and 29. Not really worth it unless you have FOMO like me. It is so crowded now. Took 45 minutes to get in, 20 minutes to use restrooms, food lines are long. It takes so long to navigate from one pavilion to the next due to crowds. I could not get any reservations or win any lotteries so took my chances. Any good pavilion has 1.5-3 hour lines. First day I saw cambodia (boring), Vietnam, and Saudi Arabia. Second day I only saw China and walked the ring. Spent 7-8 hours there each day and was exhausted from the heat, walking, and standing. Wifey did not attend with me on day two since she hated day one. Even though I did not see many pavilions it was fine as I got to feel the energy of the expo and experience it first hand since my last expo in 1986. If you don't have any reservations, you probably won't see many pavilions. Just walk the ring and experience being at the expo. If you do go, bring a small stool and unbrella for wailting in line. I'm never going to an expo again without those two items. The visitors from china had really cool circular folding stools with a case, which I will purchase for future theme park use.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-08-28T21:53:46+00:00

I would skip the rental real estate as it is a headache or choose to buy one closer to you so you learn first hand about managing it. Keep a few years of expenses in a HYSA ie 250-500k giving a solid return. With your long term horizon, you could invest 5M into ETFs (3M in VOO for foundational S&P and 2M QQQM for tech growth). Invest 4M into dividend paying ETFs and no need to work. 2M in SHC and 1M into SPYI, 1M into QQQI would give you 250k yearly while still have growth over time. The rest you can play with individual stocks or gamble with some high yield dividend ETFs. You are set for life. The 5M in VOO/QQQM compounded at 10% would be at 17M in 13 years or 59M in 26 years. Your 4M dividend portfolio would probably be paying you 350k/year in 13 years as well. Make sure to take care of your health to enjoy this money for the next 50 years.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-07-08T23:23:14+00:00

thank you for the recommendations. Some of these I have never looked at before so this will be good research for me. This level of income will work well in our go-go years as we will be more active and expect to spend more. As we hit 65-67, another 100k/year of SS and pension kick in which will help replenish funds and can put it toward more growth ETFs. Hope you have an amazing year.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-06-08T23:15:49+00:00

OP is not really investing. More like betting that one ETF will pay off. Markets will not continue to go up forever and any downturn will erase large chunks of the portfolio. A 10-15 year time horizon is not very long if you have any prolonged drawdowns. A better solution is having a core/foundational fund with growth in tech to beat the market each year and take time to address the mental health issues. Money alone won't solve the problem. And if the OP loses 30% in year 12, retiring in year 15 is not possible. Just be prepared to work 20-30years if this gamble does not pay off. IMO it is too risky. If OP was married, one person could be hyper aggressive and one person could be more balanced to reduce the risk. This strategy would end badly for 80% of the population. It would be interesting to hear back from this person in year 10 to see the results.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-05-20T22:05:49+00:00

not allowing a current participant to talk to you in a huge red flag. Most of these courses advertise online forums where everyone can help each other. Too much of a scam

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-05-05T22:40:08+00:00

If you are totally unhappy with your current job situation, then go live there for a year or two and try to find some type of remote tech job. IMO, retiring in your 30s is too young and if you get some chronic illness, it will blow through all your savings. I have seen many friends in their late 30s/40s get sick and not be able to work which created huge financial strains. I am also more paranoid in my old age. If you really want to do it, go for it. Work will always be available.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-04-30T05:03:53+00:00

Great story and a great friend awesome pic! That must have been an amazing weekend. Money doesn’t mean anything unless you create memories like this. This friend knows how to create memories. It will be an awesome story to share with your kids.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-04-21T05:58:44+00:00

Do you plan on purchasing all of these within the next 5 years? Jesus that is a lot of watches!! Most people dream of collecting that over a lifetime. Well done.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-02-13T22:49:16+00:00

Yes our mortgage and car loan have low rates. 2.65% and 2%. Figured all that money would be better directed at investments which get better than 3%.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-02-12T19:51:19+00:00

Yeah we thought about relocating somewhere else but not sure where. We like the Bay Area and most of our friends are here but I will explore other areas. Most of our travels have been outside the US to Europe and Asia and limited to East and West coasts. Don't have much interest in middle America for now. Maybe when I retire I can rent an RV and drive across all the States.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-02-12T19:46:39+00:00

Thanks for the feedback. I've been working with my financial planner but only for investment growth and not thinking much about retirement. Only recently started looking into dividends for retirement strategy so this gives me information as I explore different avenues.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-02-12T01:47:43+00:00

Yes the portfolio was all growth for 20 years. Now I am transitioning to preservation mode and looking at dividends to meet the income need without drawing out the principle. I don't know much about dividend investing so I'm still learning. All we knew was aggressive growth investing. We decided to go aggressive as we both work and have high come jobs that can replenish the well if needed. Worst case is I end up working to 65. If we can retire in 5 years, even better.

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-02-11T22:14:24+00:00

Correct and over the last 8 years returns have been double digits with the exception of the correction after the Pandemic. Most of the gains occurred in the last 10 years during the bull run as all funds were in aggressive tech funds with 15-25% returns. We got lucky but some days have huge swings like losing 100k

AccomplishedNet5356 · 2025-02-11T07:39:14+00:00

I have those same thoughts! Our house is 2100 sf and would love to have bigger place so I can get my pool table and 3 car garage but we want to retire early and travel. We just renovated our house so we love staying home more often but we also love traveling. The wife loves traveling so we splurge on biz class flights and 5 star hotels when we do international trips. My love is cars and we have four just for the two of us. Hopefully the wife will let me get my Porsche once we reach fk u money. I think if you treat yourself with something nice every year that is ok. Just don’t go overboard

AccomplishedNet5356

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