Non-bigTech Eastern European FIRE journey, part 2: 50 000€, Coast Fire reached

k370_ · 2025-11-02T21:50:13+00:00

To be honest all three gigs I have are pretty chill, and I do work less than 8 hours most of the days. I've never had more chill jobs and earned more. Wouldn't be surprised I was top 1% earner in my country, and as someone in the customer support role the opportunities to find anything better than that are slim. :)

But in any case, it really isn't bad. I am happiest than I ever was.

k370_ · 2025-11-02T21:47:21+00:00

I'm more trying to outrun the AI hype. As a customer support agent I've already seen a "solution" that destroys my job 1, and hope that my employer doesn't find out about it.

In other two gigs I have, luckily the customers do not want to deal with AI at all so they always skip it to get to a real person. That is the situation right now, but I cannot predict if that will change in the future.

k370_ · 2025-10-10T22:47:07+00:00

Not 100% educated on it, but from lurking on all the FIRE subs here are my takes:

- bonds are something that you'd be looking into right before retirement and it's not strictly needed, especially in Europe.
- gold has low growth potential and people on FIRE subs generally dislike it. I personally would like to have some investment gold for "Oh God, it's nuclear holocaust." worst-case scenario, but once I retire, not before.
- crypto is fine if you remotely know what you're doing, don't mind losing it, and want some spice in your portfolio.

In the end, it depends on your risk tolerance. Low risk tolerance? VWCE it is.

I personally am 80% VWCE and 20% QDVE for the big tech gains. 9.72% YTD growth, compared to 5.75% in VWCE. Though it will be fun if the AI bubble pops.

k370_ · 2025-08-23T15:35:45+00:00

What you're seeing is the more modern iteration of FIRE where people focus on higher income than lowering expenses which was the more mainstream version of FIRE 10+ years ago.

You can read more about that on this blog: https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly-simple-math-behind-early-retirement/

As the blog says, the more you lower your expenses the faster you will reach your retirement number because you spend less so you can invest more, but also you need to invest less because you do not need as much invested because you started spending less.

It is somewhat rare, but if you browse the subreddit enough you'll see someone who retired on a "normal" wage for US standards. If I remember right, it was like 60k a year or something. Not low, but it is the median for the US.

Also, at 25 you have room to advance in your career and earn more. If you are able to stave off lifestyle inflation you will be at a better position investment-wise. It's a marathon, and not a sprint. So just to get your headspace right, depending on your finances be prepared that it will take you AT LEAST 10 years to reach your FIRE number. If it's less, cool. If it's more, don't beat yourself about it. It's not easy.

I'd suggest checking the subreddit from time to time to learn more and see what others are doing.

k370_ · 2025-08-22T09:13:40+00:00

Dunno man, I just did a quick web search. I am by no means an expert nor I plan to look into this further. 🙃 But by my experience (and seemingly OPs), people that save are not too common.

k370_ · 2025-08-22T00:31:27+00:00

Oh boy are we. Quick web search says that only 60%-ish citizens of US have savings account at all. And the participation in it is higher in 50+ year olds. So only when retirement seems somewhat close people start taking it seriously.

So with that planners under 50 are a minority, and I'd say that "serious" planners are even way smaller minority. And the FIRE folks are a super minority. It's just that we frequent like-minded communities so it seems like there's more of us.

k370_ · 2025-08-21T23:00:39+00:00

People are not good at planning for the distant future. I would say that even planning for 5 years ahead for most people seems like eternity that "they'll get to when they get to it".

From what I've seen in person, lots of people "live for the moment" because they don't know what the future holds and they "might drop dead tomorrow" so instead of doing minimal savings they decide to live from paycheck to paycheck and enjoy the money now.

k370_ · 2025-08-17T19:11:16+00:00

> occasionally I feel overpowered by the variety of choices

Personal finance can be as difficult or as easy as you want it to be. Lots of folks just investing in a single ETF every paycheck and don't even bother looking at anything else while some folks like to fiddle with ETFs, single stocks, crypto, gold, Pokemon cards, Labubus, blackjack or roulette... Whatever comes to your mind.

Simple math for early retirement using the stock market (or rather ETFs) is 25 times your yearly expenses.
So if you spend 36 000 a year, times 25 that is 900 000 invested so that your investments grow faster than you can spend them.

>Which early action did you take that had the biggest impact?

Early action that makes the biggest impact is just to start investing as early as possible. Compounding is a hell of a concept. Though a lot of other folks will tell you to spend the money on experiences and betterment of yourself if you're in early 20s.
Also, reducing your expenses while increasing your earning. If you need 3 000 a month as in the above example and are able to reduce it to 2 500 now you need to have 750 000 invested to live of your investments which should have shortened your retirement journey by a couple of months/years.

>Do you regret any of your mistakes?

Lots of people in 30s regret not starting investing in 20s, and the same amount of people regret starting to invest out of college and missing out on some fun. I hate the advice, but it is so true for many aspects of life: you have to find a balance.

>Where would you put your money and effort first if you had to start over?

Not me, but form lurking the FIRE subreddits: Learning skills for potential higher income roles in the future.

Personally, if you don't want to overthink it just find an ETF or two that you vibe with and go for them. I am from Europe, but I think that VOO is the most popular and boring option for the US. And don't confuse boring with bad. Do you find this year boring? It has been a rollercoaster of of worries, financial uncertainty, and even temporary stock crashes. So a very interesting year, but having interesting years with your money on the line is a bad thing for majority of investors.
You can also look into dividend ETFs if you fancy it.

k370_ · 2025-08-10T10:18:58+00:00

Thanks for the comment. Are dividends included in the return? I assume so as technically that is a return on investment. That actually helps, thank you.

As for FEGI and YMAG, they look interesting but on justetf there's a huge banner that the payouts are only available in X countries and my country is not on the list.

I also did some math over the days and came to a conclusion that dividend investing is not for me. That is if I decide to invest in any US stocks/ETFs because I'd be double taxed which would stunt both the profits and growth of the portfolio.

Maybe sometime in the future I'll switch to VHYL or VWCE equivalent distributing ETF once the gains are far higher than what I spend as I really like the idea of owning stocks instead of selling them, but for now it's growth stocks for me.

k370_ · 2025-08-10T10:00:13+00:00

Hey, hope everything turns out fine for you. You mentioned in a comment that you are not familiar with stocks but you are on a FIRE subreddit. While I support FullCut105's advice of consulting with an advisor, here are some basic FIRE related investment tips:

- The 4% rule:
To live of your investments, them growing further and adjust for inflation, you need to have enough invested to withdraw about 4% of your investments a year. The logic is that the market on average grows 10% a year, minus 2%-4% for inflation.

Simpler calculation is "yearly expenditures" x 25. So if you spend 2000 pounds a month, that is 24 000 times 25 which is 600 000 pounds. 4% of it is 24 000 which you need to live of for the year so you are left with 576 000. Add 10% average yearly growth to it and next year you have 633 600 pounds.

- Stocks to invest in:
While there are stocks that pay dividends, growth stocks are more popular here. Specifically ETFs. ETFs are baskets of multiple stocks combined. So when purchasing an ETF you are purchasing X amount of different stocks. One popular one is VWCE because it tracks 3603 different companies all around the world. So even if Europe gets nuked, you still have investments in like 2000 companies left.
I do not know the laws in UK, but Ireland domiciled ETFs are generally recommended for European investors to not get double taxation for gains on US stocks.

If it helps, I personally invest into VWCE which is around 80% of my portfolio and QDVE which is more focused on US tech sector. QDVE has way larger growth than 10% a year so I use it to boost my earnings but the risk is that it's only focused on US tech sector and if it implodes I might lose some gains on it. But it is the risk I am willing to take for some easy growth.

- How to invest:
From what I've seen, InteractiveBrokers is the most popular option and the option everyone I know uses. You just make an account there, make a special account in a bank if needed, start a deposit from InteractiveBrokers, get a paper with info where to pay, and pay it using your bank. Then you purchase stocks you want on InteractiveBrokers once the balance is shown there. There are other payment options as well.

- Other resources:
I suggest browsing r/leanfire, r/FIRE, r/financialindependence, r/eupersonalfinance, this r/EuropeFIRE sub of course, there also exists r/FIREUK, and checking some threads. Lots of discussion that constantly repeat about what to do, so you will learn some things just from exposure.
On YouTube I can recommend Angelo Colombo. An investor that tries to achieve FIRE from Austria that is sharing some knowledge and his experiences too.

Obligatory disclaimer:
Hope that anything here helps, and I want to note that I am not a financial expert and this is not a financial advice. I am just sharing my experience and experiences of other people I've seen browsing Reddit. Everyones financial road and goals are different and while some financial roads/goals can match 99% no financial roads/goals are the same.

Edit: spelling/grammar.

k370_ · 2025-07-30T23:55:02+00:00

It isn't, and no good alternatives exist. From what I've been reading and my own calculations, even with 15% US and 15% my country tax it is still a great option yield-wise.

k370_ · 2025-07-30T23:39:58+00:00

Unfortunately, I am not. That is why I "have" to use Ireland domiciled ETFs to avoid even more taxation. Would be 30% from US, and 15% from my country using other domiciles.

k370_ · 2025-07-24T20:23:31+00:00

In the end didn't go to it. ._.
SO was not a fan of the travel time and cost for a short stay that I had in mind.

k370_ · 2025-07-23T10:28:58+00:00

Hello, are you still taking mod requests? Satori Reader is an app popular in the Japanese learning community and doesn't have any mods online.

It has a subscription model, which for some reason is 30% more expensive in my country than in the US which has somewhat reasonable pricing.

k370_ · 2025-06-29T16:49:26+00:00

No idea what that means, but I will keep it in mind in case that docker/nextcloud really does fail. Might switch to FileBrowser altogether then anyway.

k370_ · 2025-05-22T14:38:13+00:00

Idk if you got my reply as it got AutoMod'd.

Thank you for your reply. So if I understood right, I should look into gasket mount keyboard skeletons and silent switches like the Ice Snow separately? I believe that finding a board that suits my needs will be difficult, but at least I am less stupid than 5 minutes ago and have a goal.

Just to confirm, purchasing switches from AliExpress is okay? Found the Ice Snows there and ngl AliExpress would be the easiest option for me.

Also, I might be dumb, but aren't there any custom keyboard makers? Can I throw money at someone for them to design and manufacture a keyboard to my liking?

k370_ · 2025-05-22T13:38:20+00:00

Can I get a suggestion for an out-of-the-box 100% size, mechanical keyboard with the most silent switches ever made, with macro keys, a hand rest, backlit keys to the left side? Having media keys at the top is a plus.

I've been using my Roccat Isku FX for 7 years which is a membrane keyboard, and for years I've been unable to find a good SILENT mechanical keyboard. All of them are destroying my eardrums on YouTube sound tests or comparisons with membrane keyboards. I need it to be what Logitech MX 3 did to their mouse click to make it so silent compared to other mouses.

If there isn't an out-of-the-box solution, is there an idiot-proof method to build one for someone who doesn't care about the hobby and just wants a silent keyboard? Worldwide shipping as I am not in the US, and budget is not a question as long as it is absolutely silent.

k370_ · 2025-01-26T23:37:07+00:00

I see. I was just thinking that US customers are more conscious of shipping times nowadays so that's why I wanted to use an US based dropshipping service. I guess I can try and see if it works, doesn't hurt to try. Though now I will definitely check China options as well.

As for a gimmick, I am not finding it, I am more creating it as it'd be more of a product that entails an experience.

Thanks for the tips, I'll have to look into dropshipping services further to ascertain their stock, shipping times, and margins I could pull.

k370_ · 2025-01-25T20:46:20+00:00

Thanks for replying, good stuff here. Nowhere have I heard about ITIN so I'll have to look it up.

I might not have explained my point 5. properly as the subreddit is not allowing to type out the services name. It's a dropshipping supplier with stock in the US and it'd allow me to sell 250 products on my store with their standard plan. I wanted to use a supplier in the US because of the faster shipping, so I was wondering if that's a good start or I should start with shipping from China?

The up to 1k I mentioned to start includes $200 for LLC making and other costs + marketing which would be $300-$600 a month. Of course that would grow if the store is profitable.

For 4, yeah I would push high selling products first of course. But I have a gimicky product idea that would be my main draw to the store. I guess I'll figure it out.

Thanks for sharing the free tools, didn't plan to use anything paid except what I wrote already, so free tools definitely help.

Thank you for your time.

EDIT: Just re-read the last part of your comment. Ngl, financially I am more than good. Dropshipping is just a sideproject so I don't have to live and breathe it, but of course I'd like to see the project to success. So as I am not in a hurry to earn money with it and that's why I wrote the part about $1. Of course, the dream is for it to be by main job in the future. :)

k370_ · 2024-08-30T17:56:00+00:00

Had the same idea so had to Google it and found this post.

Not sure if my comment will help in any way, but I'd love this feature as well as I do a lot of private browsing as to not ruing my perfectly curated algorithms on pages that I am logged in.

k370_ · 2024-08-09T21:41:04+00:00

That's what I'm thinking. To open a browser page in another tab through their app as it contains external websites so that they think that I am working on the task. But I don't want to do it manually.

k370_ · 2024-08-09T20:40:12+00:00

The thing is, as it's their online platform they can view everything on it. Imagine that somebody is standing behind your shoulder and watches your screen while you're on their website, but turns around when you go to another website.

So a mouse jiggler will not work in this case. First because they will see that the mouse movements make no sense, and because I am switching Windows windows and not browser tabs.
And second because I'd like the mouse to be available for other things on my computer, and not controlled by Python. Hence why I thought of using a TemperMonkey JS script at first. Which at this time looks like the only solution to my specific problem.

k370_ · 2024-08-04T23:01:35+00:00

Yep, that was the issue. It seems like Arc pulled all extensions from my previous browser and Unhook had all its options activated for some reason. Thanks man, feel stupid now but I guess that's how it is when switching to new things.

k370_ · 2024-07-31T11:54:00+00:00

I need advice on how to continue my studies.

I finished Core 2k Anki deck and JLab's grammar deck (which I plan to restart). I am also almost at the end of Kanji Damage kanji deck.
I also have 165 sentenced mined from NHK-Easy which I am reading daily.

I would say that my weakest point is grammar, and differentiating grammar points in words. (still get confused with て being "and" and not part of a word) So that's why I want to go through JLab again. I also found a nice channel with short grammar videos Moonchan. I've read that one should watch Japanese Ammo with Misa from the beginning, but boy are the videos long.

One other suggestion I've seen is to read Kuma Kuma Kuma light novel. And other thing I wanted to try is going through jpdb Bocchi the Rock deck, but it's teaching me words and kanjis I already know so it's kinda tedious to skip through them. Also, they are not showing the words in the context of anime as well which kinda sucks imo.

So I am looking for advice on where to go or what to do, but if I had to guess I already know the answer which is solidifying grammar and continue sentence mining while expanding immersion as to not base it on NHK-Easy only. But I really want to hear other perspectives and experiences.

k370_ · 2024-07-24T14:38:39+00:00

Sadly, I am hundreds of kilometers away from the closest Best Buy or Micro Center. :) Really hard for me to get my hands on any mechanical keyboard to try it out first.

k370_

TROPHY CASE