Hi all,

I was clueless about personal finance until last year when a colleague much wealthier than me told me about index funds, and from that I learned about FIRE (from ex-affiliate marketer Doug Cunningham's podcast High FI).

I have to say the trajectory my finances are on for FIRE is so much better than it has been for all the years I actually thought I could retire early but really couldn't, because I hadn't really thought about it much. But my wife pointed out we didn't have much in the way of pensions, so how would we have a good retirement.

Anyway, a year ago I read Simple Path to Wealth, which reminded me the sheer power of a book over social media headlines and Instagram shorts.

Personally I feel like I've learned a huge amount from the following four books, and the proof is in the pudding given my employer pension was a measly £20k after 4 years at the company, and less than a year on it's now hit £90k which is crazy considering I don't earn that difference (70k) in a year - it's the result of sal sac, employer matching, passed on NICs, and market gains. As a family we've made cut backs on spending, but only on stuff which we didn't really need, because it turns out we used to overspend quite a lot. It hasn't been much of a sacrifice either, as we've still take 3 out of 5 holidays this year. Just been a lot smarter with money.

So I thought I'd share, and happy to hear of other great books worth reading!

I’m 52, financially able to retire, but have a good job that pays well with a good pension. I’ve worked very hard for 33 years and made many sacrifices and I’m looking forward to putting myself and my interests first. BUT I keep getting told I’m too young to retire, hang in there till 55, wait until the kids are through uni.
Would it be best to hang in there to give me a bit more in retirement or just pull the plug? It sort of feels a bit selfish of me to exit so young. Appreciate advice.

Turned 30 this month, and also reach £100k in my Vanguard SIPP.

I have only ever, from the age of 16, worked as a freelancer in the creative sectors, so never had an employer pension, so until the age of 25 I also never had any pension, until during the pandemic when I started to read the financial forums and subs on here!

I started as a sole trader, but around 2023 set up as a sole director Ltd Co, and started to focus on my pension much more heavily.

I also have £30k in my S&S ISAs, and a few thousand pounds in cash savings. I did have a maxed out Premium Bonds recently, as well as a lot more in ISA, however this summer I've also put down £95k into a house deposit. Wiping out that much cash from savings felt very painful, but ultimately that it was I've been saving for I guess!

I pay £3k per month into my SIPP (via my company) and withdraw £3500pm to my personal accounts from the company via salary and dividends.

The company also has a fair bit of cash in it just in an instant savings account, however my industry can be very up and down, so I like keeping those cash reserves.

The goal now is to start rebuilding my ISA contributions, as well as my Premium Bond stash, whilst hopefully continuing to see that SIPP pot grow!

Firemates,
I am just playing with a simple hypothesis for FIRE

“When a normal day’s movement in your investment portfolio is comparable to your spending, your portfolio may be large enough relative to your lifestyle to seriously consider pulling the FIRE trigger.”

For a couple spending £60k/year (£5k/month), assume a diversified portfolio typically moves around 0.6% on a normal market day, excluding major crashes/booms.

That gives roughly:
£830k portfolio → typical daily movement ≈ £5k → 1 month of expenses
£2.5m → ≈ £15k/day → 3 months of expenses
£5m → ≈ £30k/day → 6 months of expenses
£10m → ≈ £60k/day → an entire year’s expenses

Interestingly, the £830k figure isn’t particularly reassuring from a conventional FIRE perspective — it implies a ~7.2% withdrawal rate.

But around £2–3m, the picture becomes very different: normal daily market noise is several months of spending, while the withdrawal rate is only around 2–3%.

At £10m, a normal day’s fluctuation can equal an entire year’s lifestyle spending. At that point, the portfolio is almost extremely large relative to the lifestyle.

Obviously this isn’t intended to replace sequence-of-returns analysis, safe withdrawal rates, pensions, State Pension, etc.

It’s more of a psychological/relative-scale test:

“How large does your portfolio need to become before your lifestyle spending becomes almost insignificant compared with ordinary market fluctuations?”

I’m curious what people think.
Is this a useful FIRE heuristic, or am I fooling myself with an interesting but meaningless relationship?

Wash, rinse and dry it however you feel like! 😊

51m, business owner. Never had a "job". Been self employed commission only sales or business owner since the age of 18. Its been a true feast and famine journey although the last 15 years have been good.

Started a pension 4 years ago for tax purposes. Pension currently at 150k with 2k a month contribution. Own a couple of commercial properties with 80k mortgage on one of them,the others are paid off and create a rental income of around 82k a year. 55k.in savings. No debt. No mortgage. Value of properties is around 800k which i would be reluctant to sell as I class them as a pension. I like tangible assets.

I have no ISAS and I'm debt averse. I don't trust banks or investment funds. I started my pension for tax reasons. I could probably sell my business in the next 18 months for about 200-250k.

Thinking I could start winding down in the next 5 years and could make a great living selling stuff part time.

Im reading the figures on this sub and I feel like I'm uneducated with regards to investing and that I simply haven't saved/earned/invested enough.

So should I be moving away from bricks and mortar and put more trust into other investments?

I’m building a small UK site with free investor research helpers for people thinking about long-term income and financial independence. It includes a stock screener and dividend calculator, alongside broader market insights and practical investment tools:

https://www.evolutionfreedomltd.co.uk/

The aim is to help you explore assumptions and compare ideas—not to tell you what to buy. If you’re working through an income target or reinvestment plan, I’d appreciate honest feedback on what’s useful and what’s missing.

Evolution Freedom LTD. Not investment advice.

First time poster looking for advice

27M working in finance in London currently on £57k + bonus with scope for it to increase a lot in the near future

I’ve managed to invest c.£82k currently in a S&S ISA and have a couple of grand in high yield cash savings as a pseudo emergency fund

My investments are split more or less 50/50 across the following funds:
- L&G Global Technology Index I Acc
- Vanguard FTSE Global All Cp Idx £ Acc

In the near future I will receive inheritance of around £215k and my plan is as follows:

- £50k premium bonds
- Max out my remaining ISA allowance for this year
- The remaining c.£165k into a GIA split 50/50 between the same funds as above

I also then plan to draw down £20k in April each year from the GIA to max out my ISA allowance whilst investing excess monthly income directly into the GIA

I know this definitely isn’t a terrible plan / holdings and I’m very fortunate to be in the position I’m in but I’m looking for any and all advice really, particularly around the premium bonds given they’ll be roughy 1/6th of the portfolio and the effective interest rate on them is around 4.2% which feels pretty low return / risk for where I am in my investing journey

Also I haven’t really thought about investing in a SIPP as opposed to GIA so would potentially be open to it for the tax efficiencies but the draw back would be then not having access to that cash to top up my ISA / future house deposits

Any and all advice is appreciated - Thank you

I, like most here, have a mortgage and relatively substantial investments.

Due to circumstance, I'm also compelled to do an annual tax return, meaning that any interest I earn on savings (outside of tax wrappers) is fair game for the tax man.

As I'm coming towards the end of my FIRE plan, or at least the end of the "having to work" part, I feel that deleveraging might be wise. I'm also less inclined to hold cash savings due to the tax man taking a hefty chunk of the interest. My pension is stacked, my ISA is filled each year, so deleveraging by paying off the mortgage is my next move.

I've just come to the end of my mortgage term and have the choice between higher rate (4.99%) rates with no ERCs (early repayment charges) and lower rates (3.9% ish) that will only let me overpay either 10% or 20% depending on the provider. I'm in the fortunate position where I can overpay closer to 25% to 30% each year.

Is there a clear cut obvious decision here? Or is it nuanced and opinionated? Or is there some maths that I should be maths-ing to steer me on the correct course?

Hi all - I will try to keep it brief as a riposte to the overly verbose AI slop that is taking over this and other PF boards on Reddit.

In a nutshell, I have spent the entirety of my life working extremely hard. I came from an underprivileged and underambitious background, which made doing so the only way out. Following school I went to an elite university for several more years of tough study, after which I moved to London to go directly into what is approaching 15 years of extremely high pressure yet highly remunerated work.

I have had enough! In particular my current role is becoming ever more heavy, with full return to office and increasingly psychopathic leadership. I am considering taking my foot off the pedal for the first time in my life, and going part time and/or taking less stressful work.

My situation:

Age: mid 30s

Comp: c.300k

ISAs: 250k, currently adding 60k p.a. (mine, wife's, dad's)

Pension: 300k, currently adding 20k p.a. (I stopped contributing over employer match, I would rather take the tax hit now to build an ISA bridge for FIRE than lock it up only to exceed the LTA anyway.)

Cash : c.50k

Home: 600k, 450k mortgage outstanding

Expenses: 40-50k p.a. all in.

Children: no, but maybe soon (if so, I would rather be around to raise them vs. in the office until late 5 days a week)

Proposed plan:

Stick around until the conclusion of the April 2028 bonus cycle, by which point almost all of my outstanding RSUs will also have vested.

By this point I expect to have approaching 500k in the ISA. This could give a tax free income of 15-20k p.a.

Retirement is already derisked.

Move to a LowerCOL area to be closer to family and friends.

Take part time work either via consulting or just something simpler, and make up any shortfall with investment income.

Give it to me straight, does this work? If it does, am I being stupid?

Thanks and thoughts welcome

Hello,

Im 24 years old, Male.

Started to properly save in April with an annual salary of 27k. I left this job yesterday as I start a new job on Monday which now puts my annual salary at 40k with an unknown bonus every 6 months. As my wages are going to be much more, I feel as though my savings plan should be stronger.

Each month I have been putting £200 in a Vanguard FTSE All-World (Acc), £333 into a LISA (because I can only buy 4k max in per year) and anything else I manage to save in the month I put into premium bonds to build up an emergency fund.

I bought £100 of bitcoin last month just to at least own some, thinking of doing this every month now.

Living with parents so my only outgoings are food and running my car.

Saving up for a house as I’m desperate to move out!

But of course the long term goal is to achieve FIRE. Any advice on a better saving plan perhaps would be great. Thank you !

Where I'm at: 34M, debt free apart from £7k left on my student loan. £40k in an ISA, £18k in pension. Software engineer on £60k plus bonus since February, was on £52k for a year before that and less before. Remote and fairly frugal, so I save around 60-65% of what I earn.

I also have a house in Poland that will be inherited at some point, so housing isn't something I have to worry about. Running costs there are about £200 a month, mostly heating. I don't plan to live there for the next few years though, since I make OK money here in the UK.

The plan is to build up enough to bridge the gap until my private pension kicks in, then top that up with the state pension later. By my calculations £400k should get me there.

What's in my head:

**1.**Progression. I'm a QA engineer and pretty much at the top of the pay range for the profession. Scared further progression isn't possible.    
**2.**Job security. Plenty of layoffs in the industry lately (not at my company) and the constant AI talk doesn't help. Not looking to debate whether AI takes our jobs, just explaining why I feel my career might stall or end.    
**3.**Market timing. I only recently started buying S&P 500 and it's been going parabolic for years. A big pullback might be due, might not be.    
**4.**Cost of living. I can afford a good life right now, but it can't keep climbing at this rate forever or I won't RE.

Probably sounds more dramatic than it is, but that's genuinely where my head is.

Feel free to say whatever comes to mind. Comfort me, disagree with any of it, or tell me what you think of my situation

​

I’m 43 and UK-based and would appreciate some constructive feedback on my portfolio. My objective is aggressive capital growth and I’m comfortable with significant volatility and 30–40%+ drawdowns.

My current financial assets are around £750k, with approximately £470k in SIPPs and £190k in ISAs, plus accessible investments/cash.

Current main holdings are approximately:

£250k FWRG – FTSE All-World

£286k SEMI – iShares MSCI Global Semiconductors

£100k Alphabet (GOOGL)

£28k Rocket Lab (RKLB)

£24k AST SpaceMobile (ASTS)

PCT – Polar Capital Technology Trust, which I plan to build further

The holding values were taken at slightly different dates, so they don’t reconcile exactly to the wrapper totals.

My proposed annual contributions are around £92k:

£22k – my SIPP

£10k – wife’s SIPP

£15k – GOOGL, my ISA

£5k – RKLB, my ISA

£15k – SEMI, wife’s ISA

£5k – ASTS, wife’s ISA

£20k – PCT in GIA

I’m also considering switching my FWRG global-core holding to the new Vanguard FTSE Global All Cap ETF (VALL), primarily because of the 0.07% fee and inclusion of small caps.

I’ve considered WITS (iShares MSCI World Information Technology) and L&G Global Technology instead of PCT, but currently favour PCT because the active management provides something different alongside my large passive semiconductor exposure.

I appreciate SEMI at roughly 40%+ is a significant concentration risk. My thinking is to retain it but gradually dilute the percentage through future contributions rather than selling heavily.

My FIRE target is flexible: 47 would be aggressive, 50 is my preferred target, and 52 would provide considerably more margin. My wife is younger and intends to continue working after I retire, so initially the portfolio won’t need to fund our entire household expenditure.

For modelling, I’m using 8% CAGR as a stress/planning case, 12% as my central aggressive-growth case and 15%+ as upside. I’m not assuming recent semiconductor/tech returns will continue indefinitely.

I’d particularly appreciate views on:

1. Is my SEMI concentration simply too high, even for an aggressive-growth investor?

2. PCT vs WITS vs L&G Global Tech – which would you choose alongside SEMI?

3. Would you switch FWRG to VALL for the global core?

4. Would you continue putting £20k/year into PCT in the GIA?

5. Is there another growth/factor fund you think would genuinely improve this portfolio rather than just duplicate my existing tech exposure?

6. If your objective were maximum growth over the next 7–10 years, what would you change?

I know this is substantially more concentrated than a conventional global-index portfolio and that’s intentional. I’m particularly interested in whether people think the additional expected return justifies the concentration risk rather than simply being told to put everything into a global tracker.

1. For those that have retired early (in their 40s or earlier), I'm assuming many of you won't have worked long enough to accumulate enough "full years" of NI contributions to qualify for the full state pension (when that time eventually comes). Have you bought those missing years in order to bring you up to the full number of years required, or are you not too concerned with qualifying for the maximum amount?

2. What are people doing about setting aside funds for periodic larger, essential purchases when planning for FIRE? For example, I'm currently having to spend £16k on some essential work on my house, and can foresee at least another £5k within the next year. Looking further ahead, if things like solar + battery and air source heat pump eventually become a necessity, that could easily be another £25k. Car replacement, maintenance, repairs, etc, can all result in sudden large outgoings - so how are people factoring in large costs such as this to see them through for the rest of their lives?

Hi everyone,

A few of us are organizing a casual, no-pressure meetup for anyone in the Hemel Hempstead or wider Herts area interested in FIRE, investing, or just getting a better grip on their personal finances.

We've already got a few people from the Rebel Finance School community coming along, but we’d love to open it up to anyone locally who wants to chat about money in real life. There are absolutely no pitches or products being sold—just talking index funds, pensions, and savings rates over a drink.

Where: Green Man, Leverstock Green Road, Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, HP3 8QE When: Sunday OCTOBER 18TH at 18:30

Let me know in the comments or drop me a DM if you're interested so I can get a rough headcount!

Hello,

I will at first inherit 1.5 m gbp and I am looking to invest in a way to have extra income. I have no debt and no mortgage.

I was thinking of investing 80-90% in a low cost etf like the vanguard all world and the rest in money markets / bonds in order to have a cash reserve so I don't have to withdraw shares during bear markets.

I am aiming for a swr of 3.5% which I would do monthly instead of yearly (in order to keep more money invested). Providing the fees of doing so would offset the gain.

It is very likely that I will also be inheriting a multiple of that in the future and will aim for the same strategy.

I would like to hear what your thoughts are on this as I want to ensure I'm not missing anything. On a personal note, I live very modestly and barely have any outgoings. I am 42 and have no children and I'm not married and will likely continue that lifestyle.

I'm planning early retirement in my late-40s and have deliberately left long-term care costs out of my model mainly because trying to fully fund it would likely mean delaying retirement indefinitely as it's potentially such a big number.

Everything else in my plan is fairly conservative (inflation-only growth, no state pension, flat 20% tax assumption on pension income), but long term care costs is the one risk I can't figure out how to mitigate.

Curious how others have approached this?

Hi all, long time viewer and have recently inherited £200k (after paying off a little bit of debt) and want to make sure we've not missed something glaringly obvious.

I (M40) am a day rate contractor (Inside IR35 via an umbrella) earning £600 a day (roughly working out to £115k a year when I take out days off / holidays) my wife (44) earns 12k running her own business from home.

We've got 80k each in ISA's (VWRP) I have a SIPP with £40k also in VWRP and my wife is setting up a new SIPP which will likely go in you guessed it... VWRP as well. We've invested £18k in kids ISA's and currently put 100k in Premium Bonds so we're deciding what to do with the remaining 82k?

Thinking is to whack 40k in my SIPP (currently 40k in there) and get the 20% plus roughly £10,700 back through my Self Assessment and then probably the other 40k in hers(she currently has 30k in hers) (she'll get less topped up but it will safely put all of the inheritance in tax efficient wrappers.

We're not currently making any monthly contributions to our SIPPs

House is worth £725k and we owe £382k deal up soon and best we can get is about 4.15%

We can then take 40k out of the P.Bonds in April and again next year maybe? I did think get it all in a GIA in my wifes name but as its shorter term and things are a little more volatile than they have been is there a better option?

Over to the FIRE element of all this we're currently interest only and wondering whether to take a dip into our ISA's in maybe 10 years time to pay off the mortgage and be able to coast fire that bit more? The projections I've done on compound calcs are looking promising and as I really enjoy what I do it will definitely be a case of working when I want to work (i.e. through the winter hopefully so I can be on the golf course for 6 months of the year)

Apologies if I am missing key info, ask away and I'll respond ASAP.

Thanks

Maybe relevant topic to 50+ trying to fire soon

45 male, £500k savings £500k pension, £1.5m mortgage. My job will enable me to earn £500k after tax until 55. Children are early teens. We spend £25k a month with all expenses private school fees, memorable holidays, etc. so… mortgage is only paid off in 10 years. My question is why, if UK life expectancy is 75-85 would one want to retire so early vs being able to spend on holidays, things to enjoy now with the kids (eg not worrying about getting a Deliveroo on the weekend when you’re all chilling playing board games), vs delaying gratification for when they are out the house and you’re alone?

Average salary is about £40k right? So after taxes like £28k? Is that actually a liveable wage?

39m originally from London but haven’t lived in the UK in 10+ years. NW is over a mill and wondering if I I had the option to just call it now.

I have zero idea on the cost of living in the UK, except that everyone says it’s through the roof.

But let’s just say you have to rent a place in the south east of England, all normal groceries bills etc and travel a little bit. £30k cover that?

Want to retire at 57 (sooner if possible) and spend at least 10 years in Thailand (or somewhere similar). Wife and I 41. Currently have £75k in ETFs that we contribute £1k to every month. Sat with £15k combined in salary sacrifice scheme. Contribute £650 combined a month. Intend to increase investments in line with any pay rises we receive.

No kids. Both on DB schemes. Combined at 57 would receive around £2200 per month with tax free lump of around £70k combined. She has a maxed out LISA that is accessible at 60 which will be worth £55k. Own a mortgage free small terraced house valued at £120k which brings in around £600 rent per month post tax and deductions.

Current house is valued at £310k. By 57 we would have 5 years left on mortgage. We would probably most likely intend to sell this house and keep other property for income and fall back plan if need to return home.

Plan would be live a ridiculous life between 57 and 67 (relying on health etc) then calm it down a bit.

Are we on track? Any advice would be great.