I was reading an article at Adventures in Money Making where a couple explains how they retired on $2000 CDN – yes it’s not even US dollars. And their retirement sounds like good – not like they are skimping. Amazingly that dollar amount (around $1,760 US) is just a little over my goal for Alternative Income Streams, something that I thought I could achieve ten years.
I highly doubt that I’ll be able to retire then. If for nothing else, my fiancee and I hope to be in the middle of raising a family. It’s still nice to know that retirement is possible if something should happen and we can’t get to our retirement goals.
Personally, I set three goals for myself. I became financially free when I could bring in $2500 a month passively (no work on my part). My next goals are $10K a month passive and $1 mil passive and then I’m out.
So, yeah- set a secure goal, then a comfortbale goal, and then a rich goal and work towards those. Learning to make your money work for you will allow you to be a better husband, father, etc. because you won’t be living to work- you can be there for your family or do the things you really want to do in life without worrying about the money.
My two cents!
One thing to remember: this trick is easier in Canada, where a national health scheme is in place, than here. I don’t actually advocate for these, but they do make it easier to retire early.
Retiring early definitely has it’s perks! However, if you are a professional, you will be missing out on your highest paid years when you leave the workforce early.
I’m a software engineer, so as long as I have ideas and a way to express them through software, I’m probably not going to fully retire. However, I would like to be in a situation where my projects could be loosely scheduled so that on any given month, I could take time off on a whim.
I’m sure I could do this via independent contracting, but I’ve tried that and it can be more stressful not knowing where the next check is coming.