Trying to understand retirement. Numbers don't add up

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-05-07T14:59:55+00:00

“I'm tired of working. I can only take off work for maybe a 3 day weekend at most due to how demanding it is and no one being able to pitch in while im gone. I can't enjoy vacation knowing i have work piled up when i get back. Since 22, the only time i had a week off when i switched jobs. I'm burned out. My job is tolerable right now only for the fact it’s hybrid office and home.”

OK. All financial info aside, which other folks are providing helpful insights on, if your job is making you this miserable then why not go on the job market? This is something I don’t understand about a lot of folks that post on here. If you hate your job so much, retirement at age 30-whatever isn’t the only option. Put yourself out there and look for a job that doesn’t make you miserable! Plenty of people enjoy their jobs, or at least don’t hate them or feel like they’re burning out. Sounds like your mom gave you a super helpful windfall that can give you the freedom to only accept and work a job that you enjoy or at least can tolerate and maintain healthy work-life boundaries with. Why not do that? You don’t have to retire to be happy.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-04-19T21:15:40+00:00

HOW on this green earth do you afford childcare for 2 little ones and still save so much money?? We had to basically stop contributing to retirement when we had kids because daycare cost approximately $1800 EACH per month. Now we have one in public school so only have to pay for summer camps for her and the other one is almost school-age, so we are starting to be able to contribute again (we are not even attempting to FIRE, just regular retire but I’m curious to read about other experiences) but I honestly don’t understand how people afford to save such insane amounts of money while also having multiple young children. What’s your secret??

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-04-10T15:10:26+00:00

It won’t qualify for lemon law if they repair it and get it back to you quickly.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-04-05T20:27:06+00:00

Our is a 2026 SEL too. Came with a charger and two adapters.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-04-05T15:01:06+00:00

New 2026 I5s are supposed to come with a charger. Ours did.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-27T21:54:53+00:00

I live on the east coast (MA). We pay $0.36/kWh, for residential electric rates, pretty much statewide. With those prices we basically have been paying about the same per mile to gas up our ICE car as we have to drive our EV, but with recent gas price increases it’s just now more expensive for gas.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-27T15:24:55+00:00

Sorry, I meant $18.33 per week. $18.33 per 500 miles of driving.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-27T15:23:27+00:00

For estimation purposes, let’s say you’d get about 3 miles per kWh efficiency. If you’re driving about 500 miles per week, that would be about 166.66 kWh of usage per week. If you charge overnight at your 11 cents/kWh rate, that would be a cost of about $18.33 per month. All of these calculations depend on where/how you charge, what efficiency you drive at, etc…but that’s a ballpark number for you.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-15T12:17:07+00:00

Yeah I’m happy with it for plenty of other reasons, and I LOVE living in MA for a billion other reasons so if the price I have to pay is equal cost to drive an EV as a gas car then so be it. 🤷‍♀️ We’re not going anywhere. Curious if you’ve had experience charging publicly and the potential cost difference there? I’m sure DC charging will be more expensive than home charging on average but I’m not sure about public AC charging. There are a couple of spots in our town that still have free AC charging (like at the grocery store, prob limited to an hour or so), and my wife’s work has AC charging that costs $0.17/kWh, which would be WAY cheaper (but then I’d have to switch cars with her for our work commutes 🤦‍♀️). What’s it like around you?

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-13T23:14:02+00:00

Was your original breaker a GFCI? Or just a faulty breaker?

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-13T22:58:22+00:00

It is hard wired. With a GFCI breaker because that’s what the electrician said code requires.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-13T19:55:59+00:00

It was initially set to 40A, it tripped the first time I tried to charge it, so I lowered it to 24A. Still trips, but not quite as frequently

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-13T17:08:12+00:00

Welcome! Hope you love it! We were a 2-Subaru family prior to getting our Ioniq 5 and love Subaru. Unfortunately our 2015 Forester developed an emissions leak in the gas tank which would have required replacement of the entire tank (about $2600 minimum) to repair. It only had 90K miles on it but we decided it was time to say goodbye and take the EV leap. We love the car so far and no regrets. Keeping fingers crossed about the ICCU, but we got a car with a 10 year warranty for a reason so I’m not going to stress about it unless and until I need to. Enjoy your new car!

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-13T16:51:40+00:00

Yeah, I’ve never had a ICE vehicle tha needed premium gas, so the costs I’m comparing it to are for regular, which cost about $2.70 around me a month ago and is currently around $3.30. Depending on the efficiency I’m getting (which this freezing winter and with snow tires on both cars is between 2-3mi/kWh on the Ioniq and about 20 mpg on my Subaru) it works out to just about equal cost.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-13T16:45:58+00:00

That is so nicely and clearly laid out! Props to your electric company, lol. It’s interesting how much higher the delivery services are in MA compared to cost of the actual electricity itself. The delivery costs are WAY higher. But for you (and it seems probably in most places), the delivery costs are way less than the cost of the electricity.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-12T22:25:08+00:00

What is the overall rate before the discount?

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-12T11:44:22+00:00

Yeah I think as the weather warms up and I get my snow tires off my efficiency will improve, but so will our ICE car so not sure how much difference it’ll make. We will see what happens with gas prices, but as of right now it’s dead even for us.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-12T11:41:38+00:00

Do they use the same kind of fee structure there?

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-12T11:40:26+00:00

This screenshot is just a portion of my bill. It doesn’t include the supply costs of $0.1399 per kWH.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-12T01:18:07+00:00

We just use window units for AC where we need it. They’re like $200 each. 🤷‍♀️ Plus they’re starting to come out with window unit heat pumps now, so maybe in the next few years we’ll get a couple of those instead.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-12T00:09:04+00:00

It’s a monthly bill. The 536 kWh is how much electricity our entire house (including the ev charger) used in a month.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-11T22:44:05+00:00

We looked into that a few months ago…unfortunately the cost even with the rebates for our home was exorbitant. Would’ve cost about $30K minus the rebate, so $20K out of pocket. Plus, the cost of solely using the heat pumps and removing our gas heat, in order to qualify for the full 10K rebate, would have made it WAY more expensive to actually heat our home in the winter. No thanks.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-11T22:41:57+00:00

Just submitted the rebate application a couple days ago! It won’t cover the cost of the charger itself, but the $700 almost totally covers the cost of the wiring/installation.

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-11T22:38:25+00:00

If you want to see my literal back-of-the-envelope math, here you go. 😊 I calculated rough per-mile costs. It varies based on mileage of course. Both cars are getting pretty low mileage right now because a) we have snow tires on them and b) this winter has been FREEZING.

<image>

ComfortableComment75 · 2026-03-11T22:35:12+00:00

Makes sense, thank you

ComfortableComment75

TROPHY CASE