MMM is too smug and pushy for a good portion of the general public. His writing can awfully hostile, it could be toned down a bit and his message would get further - some of his advice is very sensible.

The problem with frugal blogs (in general) is they do one or more of the following; push penny pinching 24/7, "if you aren't eating lentils everyday and living in a cardboard box you're fucking up," they are too condescending, or they are only applicable to the already rich/privileged, like Mitt Romney's "just borrow 10s of thousands of dollars from your parents to start a business, easy!," and are out of touch with they "everyday man," or fail to recognize that people are different than them.

I think I could write a blog that is more accessible, I have experience being both very high income and very low income. It's such a saturated market though I doubt I'd get any readers. Maybe I'll do it just for myself some day to formulate some of the thoughts I have on the topic.

I think MMM knows his audience, it isn't for me but I can imagine many people do get something out of it.

Really the main problem is there just isn't much to say, spend less than you earn, invest the difference, develop some self-sufficiency.

I didn't know what "spend less than you earn, invest the difference, develop some self-sufficiency" meant 15-20 or so years ago though, they were just words. I didn't know what a 401(k) was, I didn't know what an IRA was, I didn't know what a brokerage account was, I didn't know what a mutual fund was, I didn't know what an ETF was, I didn't know what "equity" meant, I only had a vague idea of what investments were, I didn't even know what the stock market was other than "its something to do with money."

Plus that advise isn't applicable to everyone. A college student doesn't have the same finances as a dual income couple in their 30s with two kids. Someone with a $70k income has much different prorities than someone with a $30k income. I think finances is a journey, not a destination.

I think one of the first tenets of financial freedom/independence is figuring out life priorities, not everyone is going to have the same spending because everyone really enjoys different things. Oftentimes people don't even know what they really enjoy and where their spending brings them most life satisfaction so it requires a lot of self reflection and communication/negotiation with family members and maybe questioning cultural norms and expectations. I don't think that financial independence/frugality should about hording money so much as it should be about making your money work for you in the most optimal way possible.

There's also nuances to discussions about money like how it affects interpersonal relationships (and not just romantic ones) and the psychological aspects of money and spending.

You have a good point about him "know[ing] his audience" though, so thank you for pointing that out.

All those things you didn't know are irrelevant if you spend more than you earn, this is the situation most people are in. It applies whether you are a student or coming to the end of your career. Most people need to absorb that simple message.

I personally enjoy his style. MMM is clearly a character that he plays and is deliberately provocative. There are other more level headed financial independence blogs out there but I don't find any of them as entertaining as MMM.

> I have experience being both very high income and very low income.

See, I could do the same thing, but the blog would really boil down to a single post - "stop fucking around and just learn web dev." I really don't see a more accessible route to go low income to high income.

MMM does have this:

http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/07/25/50-jobs-over-50000...

Web dev is great for a lot of people, perhaps not for everyone.

As for MMM is general, I personally love his style. I remember back in grad school, I stumbled upon his blog, I think from an HN comment. I was hooked. I read through years of blog posts in a few months. I probably factored heavily into my decision of not going for the PhD (stopped at MASc).

Although I still think he makes a lot of good points, my take on frugality and my personal finance goals are a bit more, um, nuanced these days. For anyone who'd be interested in a quick intro to his core ideas, I highly recommend this 28 min talk, it's a really fun watch:

https://vimeo.com/183016901

My comfort zone with regard to frugality is much less extreme than MMM's. Probably nearer Dave Ramsey's part of the spectrum.

I like the MMM blog because it's a good source of concepts/tips to try, but you don't have to treat it like gospel. For example, the DIY home maintenance and investing tips resonate with me, but the "rewards credit card" not so much.

Also, doesn't take into account healthcare costs and things like hurricanes and floods and disasters that afflict a lot of people.

> Also, doesn't take into account healthcare costs

See http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/11/01/our-new-237-per-mo... and http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/10/17/its-all-about-the-...

"Third level of safety: optional part-time work."

Don't you find it hilarious that a blog on financial independence tries to talk about safety nets vs. risks and devolves to: Well, sh*t just get a job I guess, but call it optional because you are "retired"? I do.

It is how you end up with 80 year old wal-mart greeters.

> Don't you find it hilarious that a blog on financial independence tries to talk about safety nets vs. risks and devolves to: Well, sh*t just get a job I guess

Not at all. If you retire early, one of many backup and contingency plans, somewhere down the list, could very well be "I could always go back to work". Doesn't mean you aren't retired.

It's hard to effectively criticize consumer culture without sounding hostile to consumers. It would be worse for his persuasiveness to err on the side of appeasing the dominant cultural sentiment.

He has several rentals and lives off other families. We can't all do that. It's not a real, scalable solution. It's not genuine.

He does have rentals. But he doesn't live off that money. He's done income reports (see this one from 2016[0]) that show where the money comes from and where it goes.

[0]: http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2017/05/19/2016-spending/

Personally, I find rent-seeking landlords to be an unethical pursuit. I know that's not a mainstream thought, and is the underpinning of many people's income strategy ... but I can't support the idea of letting a family live in a property for decades, and then something happening, and they're on the street with nothing to show for the tens of thousands of dollars they have given in rent.

The reason to rent is for the ability to move on demand.

If a family is renting in the same place for decades, that is their problem. The moment you realize you are going to stay in one place for an extended period of time, there is no reason to continue renting. Sure, not everybody can purchase their dream home. But they can purchase something small, build equity, and upgrade in the future. The government also has programs to help first time buyers, especially those with less income.

Again, the primary reason to rent is so you can relocate. If you are not planning on relocating in the 5-10 years, you should own, or be working on owning.

Furthermore, the landlord is taking on risk (risk of the market moving against him, risk of the tenant not paying him or the place remaining unoccupied after a tenant leaves), is paying property taxes, insurance, is responsible for broken appliances, and is also often taking on a loan with higher interest rates.

Should all of this be provided for free?

"You should own," no, everyone is different.

Many people have no interest or ability to take care of a property. I watched my grandparents' house deteriorate and literally fall apart from neglect. [I used to think the roof leaking when it rained was a totally normal thing] They had literally every appliance in the house break over the years but they didn't have the wherewithal to replace anything so they just went without. They lived in total squalor for years, it was depressing (as well as very dangerous) visiting. If code enforcement stopped by they'd be homeless.

For sure, there is many, many benefits to owning, I love being a homeowner (most of the time - though I did get a little sticker shocked at my first 4 figure repair bill), but don't believe for a second "everyone should own."

I don't disagree with your broader point. But I would point out that owning doesn't need to mean owning a standalone house. In addition, in general, renting starts to become problematic at some point in life where being forced to move because the landlord sold the property becomes a really unpleasant situation.

Condos are another can of worms.

I just very briefly touched on one issue with owning and why it may make sense for someone to rent for years (even if it might not be financially optimal[1]).

Books could be written about the topic.

The main takeaway is "everyone is different." And "one size does not fit all." Remember, many businesses still choose to rent over buying.

[1] plus you only truly know in hindsight what was truly financially optimal

>don't believe for a second "everyone should own."

You really should own if you're going to stay in the same place. If you can't take care of your place, and you rely on a landlord to do it, you're going to be in for a bad time when you have a landlord that doesn't give a shit. Which a lot of them are.

It's common for people to get stuck below or near the poverty line. It's difficult to save for a house down payment (much less build up the credit to get a loan for the rest) when you're struggling to pay for rent, bills, and food. Ignoring this cycle is missing the reality for many, many people.

Absolutely. Some people definitely do have it a bit harder than other people. But, outside of medical/mental issues, or just a stream of bad luck, people generally make it harder on themselves due to certain choices in their life.

My parents came to America without a dollar in their pockets. My dad's income was running a convenience store which barely made enough to pay his bills. So both parents worked, effectively minimum wage jobs, and saved for years so they could build their dream home and send their children to college.

We never went out to eat, rarely went on vacation, and parents don't drink. So, they were able to fulfill their dreams.

When people say they want to own a house, but are unwilling to find a cheaper location, stop drinking, stop eating out, drive older beat-up cars, well, then they've made their choice. The system has its issues, but no one deserves anything, and the system is not the problem here.

How much was land back then? Far less. He'd be in that cycle if he came over now.

You say "outside of ...", as if those things aren't common. So what, a stream of bad luck, or a sickness should relegate you to lifelong poverty?

I invite everyone on this thread to read "The Wealthy Renter" by Alex Avery. Also, no, the primary reason is not so you can relocate. Buying a home could be a very bad financial decision for most people, who don't realize it and just do it because everyone around them tells them to.

Renters are also borrowing the credit score and down payment of the landlord.

Yes, but it should be temporary (to be ethical) ... if a single entity is a long-term tenant, that should be proof that they are a responsible, and should begin to accrue equity in the asset they are paying tons of money into.

What exactly should be the relationship between the person who owns a home and the person that lives in it then? One of charity? Or do you think private home ownership is in and of itself wrong?

There is a position in between "all rental arrangements are okay" and "no rental arrangements are okay".

I think the parent and others that dislike rent-seeking would have no ethical objection if the landlord charged an amount corresponding to costs of maintaining and renting the house (taxes, upkeep, risk, management, etc). The objection is when a landlord is able to work a few hours a month managing their properties and realize a sizable income.

Rent-to-own arrangements might also be considered ethically acceptable.

I'm not trying to propose a practical policy here, just suggesting some potentially ethical arrangements.

"I think the parent and others that dislike rent-seeking"

Jesus fuck I just wish people would stop throwing that word around trying to sound like economists when they obviously have no idea what it even means. Renting out real estate is not rent seeking.

> Renting out real estate is not rent seeking.

While to a certain extent real estate has been transformed into something that, in some cases, approximates a commodity, it is historically the canonical non-subsitutable monopolized good where each item lacks perfect substitutes, which is why “rent-seeking” is literally named after what landlords do. Renting out real estate is the “trope naming” instance of rent-seeking.

ok, then perhaps I should say, "seeking rent for long periods of time on a necessity, with no exchange of value in the long term for the person paying"

exactly this ... there needs to be a discussion about what the right balance to strike is. Rent-to-own would be a fantastic thing to be more popular (especially if you can take your equity with you when you leave ... even if only a portion of it, so that renting/risk still has rewards (yes I realize this arrangement probably isn't common (if at all), but it should be)).

I'm sure you have some properties where families can live for free, or at least only have to pay half of the rent? Or you give away interest free montages so they can buy their own place?

If not, what the fuck are you talking about then? Landlords offer a service for money. Since when is that unethical?

People price gouging during disasters is "offering a good or service for money", and it is unethical (and illegal). I propose that long-term gains from a single tenant, without an exchange of value (equity) is unethical. If you own a house, and one person/family has been living there for decades and then have to leave for some reason, they should not be leaving with a zero balance ... they've paid tens of thousands of dollars, and for a landlord to simply take it, and just rent it out to the next schmuck in a few weeks is unethical.

What you propose is not in fact unethical in any way. They offered a good or service for money without gouging and not during a disaster. you aren't getting nothing out of the deal, you got a place to live for decades out of the deal. That was in fact the deal you signed up for, and what was delivered. They offered you a house for X dollars a month, you paid X dollars a month and got to live in said house for the month. When the month is over, you either pay them again or go find a new house to live in. pretty simple really.

"I can't support the idea of letting a family buy food for decades, then something happening, and they're starving with nothing to show for the tens of thousands of dollars they have spent on food."

Housing is not a perishable resource (to an extent, yes I realize maintenance is a thing). It's not comparable

> maintenance is a thing Yeah, I used to think "home ownership" meant I owned the home, not the other way around.

Speaking as a homeowner, with a garden, fruit trees, and formerly chickens and goats, they're very comparable.

Renting meets the daily housing need, without ownership in the assets that provide for that need in the future.

Buying food meets the daily food need, without ownership in the assets that provide for that need in the future.

Alternatively, people could buy land and equipment/building and develop skills to use/maintain them, allowing them to meet their future food/housing needs.

The key element is that people can choose how they want to spend their resources (money, time, and attention). Sometimes buying is better, sometimes renting is. And yes, people do often make decisions that turn out not to have been in their best long-term interest.

Do you spend as much on rent as you do on food? My mortgage is bigger than food and utilities combined.

I'm with you and need someone smarter to make a better argument against renting than I can formulate on my own. All

What I was taught: Renting is often times optimal, totally fine, the right choice for a lot of people!

What my experience has taught me: Renting is for suckers or the incredibly wealthy that want to be able to move to a new city on a whim. I was a sucker for many years, and paid a very rich man 100k+ for the luxury of paying down his mortage. Never again.

The point is, you've got to think it through and see if it's a good deal for you or not. Right now I own a house worth about 400k. If I rented and put that 400k in stocks history says I'd probably make on average almost 20k per year above inflation. Plus the landlord would pay the 4k property taxes and the new roof ill be doing next year. In my area I could easily rent a similar house for 20k per year. So in my case with the market the way it is right now I might be better off renting.

There are plenty of families who have no interest in buying even if they can afford it easily. One doesn't have to prey on the impoverished to have rental income.

It is interesting also to see financially independent people who are happy to rent, keeping their assets in more lucrative and flexible investments than the real estate they live in.

There are lots of reasons to rent. It is generally a mutually beneficial relationship, like pretty much every other business transaction.

A lot of people don't understand the benefits or recognition of money velocity, but are also not privileged enough to care.

That's the deal. I like renting because if I want real estate exposure I could buy a diversified REIT.

I would assume that an important part of trying to retire early is to choose a career path that doesn't max out at $50k per year.

From what I've seen he suggests two things are necessary to retire early: 1. Save lots of money (which requires making money that you can save). 2. Don't spend lots of money. He seems to be pretty transparent in how he does both. If you want to save lots of money, but choose a career that leads to a $50k a year job, it is necessarily going to take you longer to retire than someone who chooses a career that leads to a $150,000 per year job. I'm not sure that makes it a pipe dream--just that if your time horizon is going to be different based on the decisions you make.

$50k earner and $150k could have the same retirement schedule if they have different lifestyles. If both can live comfortably on the same proportion of their income, then they can retire at the same time. If both had expenses that were 50% of their income, for example.

If both want to live a lifestyle where they spend $75k, then the lower earner will never retire.

>good luck trying to retire as a welder or car mechanic making $50k.

Maybe you don't feel the need to retire at 30 when you are a car mechanic.

I've worked in car shops (not as a licensed mechanic) and the mechanics I worked with seemed to have a lot more fun and more free time than us office jockeys despite our 'better jobs.'

And the pay wasn't half bad either.

I personally think this is the healthier way to live. I mean all power to somebody who can be in a financially beneficial position at the same time as doing what you love...

but one's place in society is not (or at least shouldn't be if the society is healthy) an isolated position. There's that old phrase "no man is an island". I understand I'm probably applying it outside of its original context, but it works just the same. Society is an interactive and interdisciplinary thing and I think we probably have need of more auto mechanics, welders, construction workers, rescue workers, firemen, pilots, etc than we do financial blog writers. Of course, I still appreciate a diversity of opinion and there's nothing stopping a financially-sound fireman write a financial-advice and good-living blog.

Ultimately the whole retiring at 30 thing just reminds me of a Trailer Park Boys beer/plotline: "Freedom 35" (its not great beer, by the way)[0]. They work so hard and so terribly to try and escape the need to do any work, and their lives are so much worse off for it. Of course, they're a poor example of the strategy to be sure. I've worked beside warehouse types who ended up working overtime for 30 years with successful investments and all with the same dream, but they still wound up working an average of 60 hours a week for 30 years...

And I really think there are more blindspots than are even mentioned here in those kinds of ideas, though I appreciate how many people have chimed in to that general aspect already.

[0] http://www.lcbo.com/lcbo/product/trailer-park-boys-freedom-3...

I understand what you are saying (i.e., don't assume to know what a mechanic wants) and you are right. I think his point was that most people don't actually have the freedom to make that choice (live frugally to retire early).

That's what almost every one of these success stories, blogs, etc. are. They're very heavily weighted toward survivor bias and elide much context around being born into relatively privileged circumstances.

Fuck that noise.

A lot of people are born into "privileged" circumstances in america. That is one factor. Not the only one.

To quote MMM:

"Sure, privilege does exist, and it might make it easier or harder to inherit a company or win a senate seat. But it can’t control your choice to ride a bike, buy less shit, or read library books in your spare time and I argue that frugality is the most powerful factor in earning your independence. After all, most of my equally-privileged engineering coworkers are still stuck in the office to this day." - http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2015/04/01/impossible-dream/

Maybe other bloggers were "privileged", but MMM grew up in a family that didn't have a ton of money, and he payed for his own college via jobs he worked as a teenager. In short, he worked his ass off.

I worked my ass off to get where I am financially. I grew up with low income, abusive, mentally ill, and alcoholic parents. I wasn't taught hardly any life skills and I had no "connections" of which to speak. I worked hard to get where I am now (I save/invest 70% of my income a year) but I don't for a second discount luck as a big part of it. Someone making similar choices as I did can surely have a different outcome.

Plus the biggest increase in my financial status came from getting married to someone who makes just as much money as I do.

Who you marry is hands down one of the largest factors in your overall financial success. Especially when it comes to the risk of divorce.

Absolutely. Even if we got divorced tomorrow I would be in a much, much better financial situation than if I'd stayed single. My spouse knows that from the other side of things too (was previously married to a lazy mooch for six years)

Part of that goes into the "luck" category as well.

Sure, he and his wife clearly worked for what they have. Doesn't mean there isn't survivor bias (luck) and privilege at work. For example, anybody who can pay for their own college from jobs they worked as a teenager is privileged.

Take a look at his own story: http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/04/08/mr-money-mustaches...

He doesn't say he grew up in a family without a ton of money. He grew up in a frugal family. In Canada, with a number of social support systems that simply don't exist elsewhere. He could attend a local University on his teenager job savings and had a good job waiting for him upon graduation. He and his wife found a fixer-upper they could afford to fix up. And so on. These aren't things that happen to or for most people. The suggestion that his experience generalizes is terrible.

Do you mean to say he is privileged because of the country he grew up in? If so, I certainly agree.

That's certainly part of it, yes. He simply didn't have the adversarial childhood that lower and lower-middle income households in America have.

It's not like he started on third base to get his home run. More like he started on first or was intentionally walked.

What's worse is when one of these "how I became a millionaire before 35" stories gets posted somewhere like Reddit, legitimate comments such as this one are heavily criticized as "you're just being mean(!?)" and "its because you're jealous."

I'm going to extend my comment. I've been reading James Altucher's books like "Choose Yourself" and his blog. Altucher's philosophy is somewhat similar, except he focuses on tapping into your creative mind and finding unique ways to supplement your income to the point that you're not necessarily retired, but doing what you love.

The goal then is not necessarily to retire, but to just get to a point where you are working for yourself and supplementing that with existing savings + a frugal lifestyle. That's basically what MMM/Pete is doing now with his blog. That is, I believe, how a welder/car mechanic/McDonald's employee can retire early.

> tapping into your creative mind and finding unique ways to supplement your income

One of the things I do like about MMM is that there's none of this handwaviness - it's much more straightforward: get a good job and be frugal.

It's great if you can come up with a good alternative source of income, but it's not easy and not for everyone.

> but good luck trying to retire as a welder or car mechanic making $50k

Retiring at 30 while earning $50k would be difficult. But retiring at 40 or even 50 is still relatively easy on such a salary.

Really? In the U.S.? Case study? Without kids and if you don't really spend any money on recreation or vacations (before or after retirement), maybe. Or if you somehow have a job that will give you a pension (with health insurance?) at 50, sure!

I suggest just reading MMM. It's all about savings rate. As an example, I live in Brooklyn, NY (one of the most expensive places to live in the U.S.) In 2016, I spent $32k ($24k was rent!) Assuming a $50k income, that'd be a ~36% savings rate, which requires a 23 year career.

Assume someone making $50k lives in not NYC, I imagine this scenario could be a lot better.

For a more extreme version of MMM, read http://earlyretirementextreme.com/. This guy (Jacob, who MMM mentioned in this interview) never earned much money (never over $50k prior to becoming financially independent), and retired after working 5 years. With a little creativity, most people can retire far sooner than standard retirement age.

> In 2016, I spent $32k ($24k was rent!) Assuming a $50k income, that'd be a ~36% savings rate, which requires a 23 year career.

Assuming a $50k income post-tax

Knocking off 18k for 401k and 5.5k for a Traditional IRA dramatically reduces the tax liability. I recognize 50k-32k = 18k (so the full 23.5k can't be executed in this case), but it makes a significant difference regardless.

And there are methods to pull this money out well before the standard ages without penalty, such as Substantially Equal Periodic Payments (SEPP).

You are forgetting taxes (FICA, state and federal income taxes, etc), which would eat up a significant portion of those savings.

That's an exaggeration, even for frugal people. Retiring at 50 means ~30 years of working life finished and ~30 years of retirement remaining. At $50k per year * 30, that's $1.5m. Spread out over 60 years that's $25k per year before tax. I wouldn't say it's "relatively easy" to save for retirement, pay for healthcare, live somewhere safe, have children, etc. on that, even with investment returns over that time frame.

You're ignoring investment income. I suggest reading MMM. It's a trove of great information.

I second this. He has a ton of blog posts though, so it can be like drinking from a firehose. Start with this one: The Shockingly Simple Math Behind Early Retirement - http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly-sim...

Assuming you decide to not to have kids ;)

And assuming there are no bad events in your life which drain your savings, like health issues

Best thing you can do to protect yourself from bad events like health issues is to have a cushion of cash! The strategy is the same: spend less, so you can save more money.

You can't protect yourself from bad events like health issues with a cushion of cash. I mean not unless you have hundreds of thousands of dollars in the bank. My son was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at 19 months old (4+ years ago) and with what we spend on hospital, health insurance, supplies, etc we could buy a new Toyota Camry every single year. Let that sink in for a minute. I have been a contractor for quite a while so we've been able to weather it, but if I was making a 'normal' salary (I'm in the Southeast US) we'd be drowning in credit card bills to pay for our son's care.

That depends greatly on where you are living and on whether or not you have kids or student debt. In plenty of places a 40 or 50K salary would be burned up every month even if you never did anything crazy.

This is more important than a lot of people realize. "Just move somewhere cheaper!" is the battle cry which ignores "It's cheaper because there's no real jobs there."

Few industries are as flexible about working from home as the software development industry.

To apply MMM's ideas, on a 50K salary assuming monthly expenses of 1,250 (that's the hard part), if you put away 50% every year you can retire on a 375K nest egg (4% safe annual draw) after 15 years, or age 37. Roughly.

Assuming you only live to be 80, you'll have to stretch out that $375k nest egg for a whopping 43 years of inflation, rising healthcare costs, and unpredictable market conditions. And God forbid you reach 80, run out of money, and then... keep living, old and frail and weak with no job prospects. FIRECalc suggests a probability of about 20% of running out of money by age 80 with a 4% annual withdrawal rate (adjusted for inflation).

Plans like this just seem downright dangerous to me.

On a longer timeframe you'll need to have a lower withdrawal rate, but not a huge amount more. The 4% withdrawal rate is based on the Trinity Study [1] which was looking at 30 year time periods. (edit: added the link)

Per cFIREsim, with "success" defined as having more than 0 dollars at the end of the time period

375k -> 84.62% success 425k -> 96.15% success 450k -> 99.04% success

Additionally, the median portfolio value at the end went from 650k to 1.1M to 1.4M.

375k is definitely cutting things close. But at the same time...

* you're always going to have unpredictable market conditions

* you're likely to get at least some level of social security (which is unaccounted for in the above numbers)

* pulling back the expenses even a couple percent in the particularly bad years has a huge effect on success. This is admittedly difficult at 15k/year expenses, but padding the 375k by 5-10% would do a lot to mitigate that risk as well.

* If things start going downhill in terms of market returns, you retired young enough that you can reasonably go back to work for a short period of time. Even working at McDonald's at 7.25/hour would be approximately sufficient to cover the annual expenses.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity_study

To add on to this, I found the recent reddit AMA with Bill Bengen (first author on that Trinity paper) highly interesting:

https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/comments/6vaz...

Or god forbid, you work a little bit to supplement your nest egg during those 43 years.

Sure, but that changes the topic a fair bit. Part of the allure of MMM is telling people they can retire at age 30 to 40 with a relatively small amount of money if only they can keep their expenses under control and live frugally.

The reality is that as you get deeper into that 43 year period without pursuing your career, your marketable skills will diminish as well. Many careers don't "scale down" either. A person who was once making $50k may not be able to make $25k with half the hours. The choice in many careers is 100% or 0%. Programming is in many cases a wonderful exception, so that might be biasing folks here.

You may very well end up just getting a part-time retail or fast food job. In any area of the country where this plan is viable, the minimum wage is going to be quite low, possibly as low as $7.25/hour. You're going to find yourself working quite a few hours just for a "little bit" of supplemental income. Indeed, if you needed to cover all your expenses (but nothing more), that'd be a full-time year-round job at the minimum wage (and in fact you might have to work overtime).

Well, you said this was a dangerous plan. The biggest danger is that you have to go back to work.

If you continually only withdraw 4% of your nest egg (reducing your absolute withdrawal during market drops), then make up the difference if you need to in order to cover current expenses, then you'd be just fine.

Most people do not have a lot of good opportunities to supplement income in retirement. Yes, there's part-time retail--especially around the holidays--and, these days, there are the various gig economy jobs. I'm not sure that any of those are things I'd voluntarily do absent a pressing need for some additional money.

>>Plans like this just seem downright dangerous to me.

Retirement doesn't mean one sleeps 15 hours a day. It generally means one doesn't care much about the day to day financial demands of life and does what he/she always wanted to do.

If you give these $50K/yr people $400K at the age of 37, these people will very likely go on to a lot of other important things which can help them make more money.

when you retire @ 37, you can start to do yoga/tai chi religiously, 1-2 hrs a day, so when your 80 years old your not old/frail. And IF you are tired of material existence, you have the means to end your life internally by simply controlling your energy, sending it up your spine into your brain ;)

> when you retire @ 37, you can start to do yoga/tai chi religiously, 1-2 hrs a day, so when your 80 years old your not old/frail.

Ever heard of diseases (not to mention just plain old aging)? Tai chi/joga is not a ticket to immortality.

I'm guessing that part was as serious as this part:

>you have the means to end your life internally by simply controlling your energy, sending it up your spine into your brain

It's just a strangely worded way of saying it. You can practice these forms without needing to retire and/or you can continue to practice them for however long you want whenever you retire. And it might not be a matter of starting, if you've already started before you retire.

Many people (myself included) practice yoga and other internal martial arts for at least 1-2 hours a day while also having a full-time job and family.

Where are you LIVING on that kind of money? Even in a small town you're looking at probably at least $750/month for a place that's not a roach motel.

Estimate is off. $500 if the town is small enough. Additionally, typically lower-income people aren't trying to pay the whole of it (family lives with them and contribute).

May or may not be relevant in the context of this discussion.

FWIW you can buy a lot more than you'd expect for a small amount in very rural areas. Homes and acreage for well under $100k, which gives you a pretty small mortgage. Much, much smaller than $750.

I paid $220/mo for a room in Tucson during 2012-2013. Nice and big one-bedroom houses are close to the university are like 400-500 nowadays. Obviously having kids changes things.

In a perfect universe. But along the way unintended expenses happen, hospital bills, car accident, getting sued, or just drifting away from your original goals. Bottom line though is just keep saving, and don't worry so much about a hard date.

The difficulty with the bike thing, is that the closer you are to cities the more housing costs.

The housing expense often costs more than owning a cheap car.

He touches on that in this post (with numbers): https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2015/07/27/rent-vs-buy/

Those numbers dont really work in the uk.

So what numbers do work in the UK? I'm from The Netherlands, and I also find that these numbers don't work for me. However, I have a spreadsheet with my own numbers and it shows I can retire about ten years earlier than the rest. And that's nothing to sneeze at.

I've found myself saying that phrase in response to a lot of MMM's posts.

Anywhere in the UK, or just in the largest few cities?

No worries, those numbers don't really work in the US either.

He owns and rents several properties. Rentier activity like this pushes up housing costs.

Try to quantify each commute kilometer, for example, each km costs 1,000 GBP in lost time, car expense, and psychological damage. Plug that into an equation then ask yourself if it is worth it to live closer to work or not.

His blog also nets him hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. I'm sure that helps him feel smug and safe in early retirement.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/02/29/mr-money-musta...

>>good luck trying to retire as a welder or car mechanic making $50k

I know a few people here in India who as cooks and welders have retired early. You have to ruthlessly put your interests on the top. Things like frugality etc, are qualifying conditions. But the necessary conditions are keeping an endless watch on your income, learning new skills and to a degree being able to move on from your jobs to ones that pay well.

That also involves doing things like getting into renting, and squatting useful real estate by buying way in advance and having others pay for your investments later.

In short you need to consider your financial interests as the only things that matter, and do what it takes. More often than not, it will usually create a situation where you trample on others along the way.

Why are those criticisms?

The top 5% of households earn over $200,000. That is a large and wealthy audience, that is equally as interested in retiring early as people making 50k. In the United States alone, the top 5% of earners is a large audience, and again, the wealthy audience that any blog, or cult, or merchant is looking for.

The people making 50k have to figure out the irrelevance to their situation on their own.

The people making 150k don't, as they are a hop away from being in the top 5%, and a hop away from learning what is needed to cement their financial independence.

What avenue is there to retire at 30 if you make 200k by 25? I must be missing something massive.

I'm not a subscriber to this strategy, but the theory goes that if you save, in that scenario, 80% of your take home pay (annually saving ~$100k, spending ~$20k), you'll have, say, ~$500k invested in 5 years and can safely withdraw 4%/$20k per year indefinitely. Then you can quit your 200k job, 'retire', and enjoy the same lifestyle as you lived while employed.

Personally I agree with the message about the power of saving to offer financial stability and independence, but I prefer saving reasonably while also trying to find ways to do work that I enjoy instead of saving super aggressively in search of an early retirement from a job I hate.

I agree with your approach and that is what I have implemented so far as well. As much as I would love to have the 40-60 hours a week I work back to myself, it is just much too difficult for me to live off of only 20k or less per year. I am not interested in living like that anymore, I'm too familiar with it.

20k/year is tough to measure up to. From the Reddit community around financial independence, "build the life you want then save for it". [1] You might look at your expenses and decide "_____ really doesn't provide me much happiness. Maybe I should reduce or eliminate it".

If most people would look at their spending and eliminate the 5% that brings them the least happiness, they would be in substantially better positions financially in the long run. Many people spend 100% of their paychecks and have little to nothing to show for it.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/comments/58j8...

GP's example of 5 years is a very short timeframe, however. A big part of achieving financial independence is compound interest returns on investments in low-fee index funds.

Try a quick spreadsheet for yourself. You can assume 5-6 % real returns. Play around with savings rates, GP suggested over 80%, which is more agressive than I've ever heard. Try 60%, which would leave you with 60k disposable, and you'll see things go up very fast in the 10-15 year range.

In fact, MMM shows that it actually all reduces to a really simple calculation, and with that 60 % savings rate, you're 12.5 years away from retirement (if you start at 0 net worth).

http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/01/13/the-shockingly-sim...

That's pretty much most of us. I couldn't imagine sitting around at 30 with nothing to do.

Depends on what you mean by "retire." Having complete financial independence is unlikely.

However a person with no debts or children can live a nice middle-class life as a single person or partner/spouse even in the Bay Area and still save $50k/year or more. With conservative investments that $250k in savings over five years can easily be used to have a few thousand a month in income. It won't replace a $200k per year salary, but it'd be enough to live very frugally in an inexpensive place. It's much riskier than having a salary, health insurance, etc. and I wouldn't advise it.

I see, I hadn't considered the "lean fi/re" approach. I guess by that definition you can retire much much earlier than you would think normally. I can't imagine living off of only 20-25k per year during my retirment.

If I live on $30k/yr (I lived comfortably on a less for years--Austin, not SF) and pay 30% in taxes (again, Texas is an exception this way), that's $550k after five years without interest. If you can then earn 5%/yr on that $550, that gives you $27.5k/yr to live on--and you've already been making it on $30k/yr...

Basically, learn to be comfortable on a reasonably low income. In the interview, he talks about biking as an example.

I've always been confused by single people struggling on much more than I lived comfortably on, and I recently realized part of it is that the average cost of car ownership in the US is something like $8k/yr[0]. (My first two years in Austin, I was in Americorps, so that would have been over 70% of my income.) That's just one example of a major expense we just treat as a necessity.

Maybe you don't want to live without a car. Maybe you want to go out to eat twice a week. Maybe you want a bigger apartment. Those are all fine--but those are also all choices that will raise your cost of living, which will likely push out your retirement age.

Personally, I don't mind working past age 30, but if you want to retire early, it will probably require arranging your life to live without things that might seem like necessities right now.

Again, totally your choice, and it might not be for you, but let me anecdotally provide that it's very possible to live a great life without a car, an expensive phone and phone plan, etc.

I'd recommend breaking down all your spending and looking at what you want to live without and what you don't. With things you can easily turn on/off (Netflix is easy to cancel for a few months, or biking to work for a couple weeks if you have a bike--car ownership or apartment size/location, not so much), experiment on living without and see how you feel. You might miss it and you might not.

Don't rely on my experiences, but don't rely on your guesses on how much you like the status quo either. (I guess that also means I should try renting a car and driving to work for a few weeks to see if I like it better than biking.)

[0] https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/loans/total-cost-owning-car/

Yeah, I live in Houston and can totally see what you mean. I think I could reasonably get down to 30k and be pretty comfortable. I let lifestyle inflation hit me harder than it should have and that's what I'm dealing with now. I make better decisions than most, but not optimal decisions. (eg. I bought a car for 14k on an almost 0% interest loan, but the optimal choice is to not buy a car at all. The average choice is probably buy a more expensive car with a bigger interest rate loan) As I get older I realize the compounding sub-optimal choices really make a huge difference. I'm going to take your advice and really break down what my goal is and what my spending habits must be in order to hit that goal. It's definitely closer to FI at 40 than RE at 30, but at this point I'm not even sure I'll hit that.

> average cost of car ownership in the US is something like $8k/yr

The number you've quoted is about new cars. For used cars it could be 10 times less.

It definitely can be a lot less, but national average for insurance alone is $815[0]. Obviously a lot of people have costs below average, but a car is going to be a major expense. If you can do it (legally) for under $1000/yr, you're probably driving very little, taking some risks (in having minimal insurance) and doing a lot more maintenance/repairs yourself than most people know how to.

Under $8000 is easy, seeing as $8000 is average. Under $1000, I'm not so sure about. Maintenance/repairs on a new car averages > $1000/yr[1]--I'd assume used cars to be at least as high. Insurance average cost is similar. Fuel is going to be several hundred unless you have a very efficient car you drive very little.

I think people just look at their monthly car payment and ignore most other costs associated with car ownership. There are a lot of not-so-little costs. There are also lots of not-so-little benefits, but you need to weigh both, not just the latter.

[0] https://www.thesimpledollar.com/how-much-does-car-insurance-... [1] http://newsroom.aaa.com/auto/your-driving-costs/

I was just pointing out that the reference used by GP is specifically about new cars.

Also, your second reference is also about new cars. I cannot believe anyone spending ~$1000/year on a maintenance of a 'new' car. First three years while it is still covered by warranty you will need an oil/filter change once a year and no new tires. $50/year at the official dealer was the maintenance cost of the last four new cars I owned.

He has good ideas but I agree with your arguments.

Also, is he retired? How much time does the blog consume? How much income does it generate?

You can read his blog yourself, but the basic idea is that he chooses to run the blog, he's not forced to for financial reasons.

He has enough income from invested savings that he is not required to have more income to maintain his lifestyle.

He had the money to retire before the blog got big, but yes he and his wife still work, but only when they want to.

Sadly, these days good luck trying to retire EVER making $50K.

its about living within your means... you can't afford new cards, $1000 cell phones, AND retire on 50k, but you can pare that back... Life is about choices.