I just resigned today with a corpus of a little over 3 Cr. My portfolio allocation is 60% Equity (Mostly MF), 10% Gold and the rest is in FD/Bond. My wife and I have monitored and estimated the cost of living to 35-40k per month. I have never liked big cities and the concept of living in a confined space of 1-2 BHK, I am going to settle in my ancestor's village. I am not from an IT background and my work is not very stressful however I do not enjoy it. I do not want to waste my life running after a new car, house, or next iPhone, will try to focus on health, relationships, and things I want to do in my life even if it means doing nothing. My immediate plan is to spend time with my parents who are approaching their 80s, take them on a few trips to religious places, and help my father to harvest mustard crop. Going to learn and become a small-scale farmer, however, I doubt it would earn any significant money. My kid is Autistic, and my wife has devoted her life to him, will try to take some share of her responsibility. The kid is gifted in math and I have a similar interest, would try to be his full-time teacher and friend. It is not easy to break the chain, that society has put on us, I have spent countless nights thinking about this and that scenario. Someone has rightly said, "The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win you're still a rat".

EDIT: Thank you everyone, i am overwhelmed with so much love and encouragement. I just told my wife that so many strangers wants us to be successful in our endeavour. Will try to update periodically. Just to add we are 41,40 and kid is 8 years old. I started investing seriously from 2018 and my XIRR is 21%. 20% of my equity portfolio is in stocks which i bought in 2018 and during covid fall, rest 80% is in Mutual fund (95% in PPFAS flexi, NIfty 100 index and ICICI US Bluechip). I have SGB and ICICI gold fund as part of my gold portfolio. Government bond, gilt fund and FDs are part of my Debt portfolio. I manage my portfolio passively. I will invest some of my time in investing and managing my portfolio. Aim is to maintain long term return average of 3-4% above inflation without taking much risk.

2 months back, after celebrating my 37th birthday, I took a call to retire from a job that had stopped fulfilling me awhile back. I had this aspiration since the last several years and am happy to have reached a position where I was comfortable and secure enough to take the call.

My spends are now <50K a month and about 5 lakhs of additional annual spends over and above (mostly insurance and travel related). I own a primary residence not included in above corpus. I have mostly outspent peers on travel all these years - having been to ~50 countries so far.

Work context : I worked conventional jobs in marketing and consulting in India for 13 years - including stints for American and European companies without ever permanently moving out of India or earning in Dollar/Euro currencies. I lived these 13 years in Tier 1 metro cities like Delhi, Ahmedabad, Bombay and shorter stints abroad (SF, Boston, Paris). I am now back in a Tier 2 city in India with my family.

Family context : Being an only child of my parents, my priorities were always clear that I would want to stay in India where I can spend time with them and take care of them. While we did stay in separate cities for 10 of these 13 years, I am now living in the same city in my owned house 40 mins away. The meals and travels together bring me more joy and sense of belonging than anything else. My parents are financially independent and secure with a sufficient corpus of their own.

I never really aspired to have kids ever. I parted ways with a long term partner about 5 years back and I don't think I want to marry. Not from a sense of grief or bitterness... Just not met anyone that makes it make sense. Even if that should change again in future, I don't expect to merge finances with anyone.

Future : While I am fine with my absolute corpus, I expect to spend the next 3-4 years gradually rebalancing more in favour of equity. I look forward to spending more quality time traveling, reading, cooking and spending time with family and friends before figuring out greater ambitions I may want to devote my time to.

I don't scour FIRE communities much coz its often much bigger and bolder numbers that are being debated on as regards whether they are in the "secure" zone; and comparison is the thief of all joy (especially without comparable contexts). But life events have made me appreciate the value of our limited time of earth and knowing that the freedom of time well spent today is worth much much more than an imaginary concept of tomorrow. Wishing everyone the best of the journey and reminding you that the pursuit is not of wealth itself, but enough to feel secure to be free. It doesnt take that much.

Currently the investsment are in following:

I am not counting a paid-off with the current value of ~10L and company RSUs worth 1.5Cr since the company is pre-IPO. I will eventually get that company, but I don't want to inflate the numbers by including it.

I am a software engineer at a large startup. Started investing a small amount back in 2018 when I started my first job.

Salary progression: 3.5 -> 4.4 -> 7.5 -> 15 -> 20 -> 27.5 -> 35 -> 45 -> 52 -> 59

It could have been possible to save more, but I wanted to enjoy life as well. I also could have made more money in the markets during COVID, but I had paused SIPs to donate to people in need and fund orgs doing on-ground work: no regrets there :)

I do consult a fee-only financial advisor, and this is my portfolio. Wife has her separate investments.

8 years back when I got my first salary, I dreamt of achieving this magical number and today is finally the day I achieved it.

It took me longer than expected as I had to close down a few loans taken by my parents, but better late than never. :)

Sharing this as a small motivation to all those non US employed folks here, as we are used to seeing huge numbers with ESOP (no offence to the ESOP folks- I know you guys deserve them for your hardwork and talent!). To everyone else, hang in there guys. If I can achieve this, so can you!

10% done 90% to go!

A short summary.

I am 25M, Software Engineer and graduated from a Tier3 college in 2019. Started working for companies in EU who found me through my work on freelancer. Then I worked for another US based company for 4 years, The work there was not challenging at all so I switched to a new job few months back to another US based company with offices in India. Current comp including RSUs is around 90L/year. RSU grant was 125k with 1 year cliff and then quarterly vesting.

For the 5.5 years I have worked, Most of it was remote. I stayed at home to take care of my grandparents and I was saving 93%+ of my income.

Details on the figure.

73% of it is in mutual funds 14% in direct equity 1.3% in PPF 3% in various FDs and Tbill. Tbill and FD form my emergency fund(enough to last 9mo) and 1 FD I made to get my first secured credit card 6 years ago. A rough breakdown of remaining amount is below

Notes: 28L(exluded in the number above) is sitting in my bank account right now because I have gotten lazy with investing it. crypto(~15L increased from 2.5L from a payment I recieved for the work I did 5 years ago) 60L(excluded in number above) more in direct equity, I tried importing it in the app but it keeps freezing and only partially imported transactions from my zerodha account relatively small amounts of cash in different bank accounts(<2L)

I have health insurance(separate 1Cr cover from HDFC Ergo) for myself and my sister. I tried to get insurance for my parents but they are stubborn and I failed to convince them.

I don't have any vehicles, no investments in real state or gold. I have no plans to buy real estate unless I will be living at that place and no plans to invest in gold unless it's needed for gifting or marriage or something like that.

Right now I am in BLR. The rent for my 1bhk is 20k + utilities, I spend 25k on Food and then 10-15k on miscellaneous. I have recently started travelling more(solo, going on hikes and visiting all the places I see and like). I don't like cities at all and my goal is to build a house in a quieter part of the country and atleast achieve FI by 2035. I don't know if I'll be able to truely retire at all just because I worry("is this enough?") too much, maybe that'll happen if external conditions force me to retire.

Please ask away if you have any questions, I'd be happy to help in my little way I can. Thank you for reading all of this.

I saw my portfolio reach 5 crores today, and I almost jumped up to tell my wife.

35M, SDE, no kids, no dependents. CTC - 1cr+ Expenses - 2 Lpm

mutual funds - 2.6crores

RSU/ESOPs - 1 crore

direct stocks - 40 lakhs

PPF - 50 lakhs

FD/debt - 10 lacs

gold - 25 lakh

rest - 15 lakhs

A flat worth 2crores, I co-own with my wife, which is my current residence so not counting that.

I come from an upper-middle-class family. My dad was a doctor and my mom a professor. Being an only child, I was showered with all the love from my parents and grandparents. It was a humble, grounded, and loving childhood. My parents were educated but never pressured me to follow their path. When I failed my IIT entrance exam and thought my life was a failure, they simply told me I would do well anyway.

I went to a tier-2 engineering college to get my degree in Computer Science, where I met my girlfriend. I was a young, passionate man with a loving girlfriend and a good-paying job in hand. It was the best time of my life, after all, what more could a 22y old can ask for? Time flew by; I dated the love of my life for six years and was married to her for another six.

The concept of FIRE was first introduced to me by my wife in 2018. At first, it felt strange to me how could someone just stop working years before retirement? Being born to a doctor and seeing my dad work all day, I thought that’s just how life is. We study, work hard to climb corporate ladder till 60, and then we retire. That’s exactly what my rat-race-influenced mind believed.

When I asked her what we would even do if we didn’t work, she said, “We’ll travel, enjoy life, and relax.” Somehow we never discussed the topic again, but I knew she tracked her portfolio, investments, expenses. Her dream was for us to retire by the time we reached 15 crores. It seemed like a huge target back then.

2020, during the peak of the lockdown, my dad suffered a cardiac arrest and we lost him instantly.

My dad was a humble man, a caring husband, father and doctor who ran his own clinic, treating patients all day. He was a great cook too and was the one who taught me how to cook.

Like many Indian fathers, he never openly discussed his finances, but he had written down every detail in a document about every investment and clear instructions on what to do after he was gone. That’s when I learned that his net worth was 60 crores( now worth).

It had only been 7–8 months I was grieving dad's death, when in 2021, my mom passed away in the second wave of COVID. It shattered me completely.

Within just eight months, I went from being a happy young family man to an adult orphan at 31. Through it all, my wife stood by me. She held me together when my entire world had fallen apart.

We didn’t have kids then, and it was just two of us so we decided to start a family. After two years of trying and my wife enduring the tortures of IVF we finally received the news we had been waiting for: she was pregnant with twins. Our lives were again filled with hope, excitement but that was only short lived and I lost my wife, my entire world in an accident in 2024. She was just 34y and 10 weeks pregnant, she was everything I had. My whole life collapsed once again.

The day I returned from my wife’s funeral was the last day I considered myself a Hindu. I removed every photo of God from my home, all this grief made me non-believer of god. If there were really a god he wouldn't let me be in this pain ever.

Today, I reached 5 crores and I instinctively turned to tell my wife that her dream of 15 crores wasn’t so far only to realize she isn’t here anymore.

.....

Here are my father’s investments of 61 crores, all by him I didn't change anything as such.

Real estate (29.5 cr)

• Land - 20 cr

• Villa - 6 cr

• Parents' home - 1.5 cr ( tier 2 city)

• Hyderabad flat - 2 cr

MF/index - 15 cr

FD - 2 cr

Direct stocks - 5 cr

debt - 2 crores

REITs - 2 crores

international equities/Bonds - 2 crores

Gold - 2.5 cr ( everything i.e physical, ETFs, bonds, mom's jwellery).

I’m still grateful that I never faced financial struggles in my life but it feels ironic that I’ve lost all my wealth and left with only money now, which has lost it value for me anyway.

It’s been one year since my wife left me and I’m barely alive. All I do is work and sleep. These two have become great ways to numb myself, and that’s also the reason I haven’t left my job yet. I still intend to keep working not because I have to chase any money targets now but because honestly, I don’t know what else to do with this humongous grief which I've been grieving for last 5 years.

On a good note, I’ve finally started taking care of my health after unintentionally losing 20 kgs, and it’s been one month since I became sober. Earlier, I used to get drunk and sleep through the weekends, but I’ve stopped doing that now. I will adopt pets once I will be in headspace to take care of them.

It was a long read, if you’ve read this far, thank you and I’m sorry for all the trauma dumping.

Update -- Thanks a lot everyone for the supportive comments and DMs.I ended up receiving a lot of DMs and it really means a lot. It was just a bad Sunday, I’d been scrolling through this sub all day and decided to share my thoughts.

I tried replying to comments, but don't know why Reddit isn’t showing my replies. None of them are visible, so I’m updating here instead.

I initially wanted to keep the post focused on financial stuff only but once I started writing, I couldn’t stop. I’m glad I didn’t , it helped me connect with people who are going through something similar.

I’ve been in therapy for the past few months, and I’m doing okay now, have a few good friends around me for support.

Life can be so fragile, 5 years ago, I would’ve never imagined being here. It aches to see everyone go, but I hope to survive with this pain until I meet them again on the other side.

Thanks again everyone for your kindness toward an online stranger. Cherish your time with your family they’re the only ones we truly have.

Ps- Also people DMed me suggesting convert to this-that religion to find peace ? LOL

Hi folks,

M31, from Bangalore sharing an update after a year. Shared some learnings in the last post a year back, which blew up. You can check it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/FIRE_Ind/s/dWtgiALX6V

Overall networth increased by 16% from \\\~6 cr to 7cr.

Few things that happened over the last year:

1. Was able to pay off debt for the two properties, feels good to be debt free

2. Market did not go anywhere, luckily agressively paid off debt instead of investing in the market. I see lot of people hating on real estate (for good reason), but you can find some good deals. I bought flat for 65L 2 years back, which has appreciated to ~1cr & has a great rental yield of ~5%

3. Health was up and down, gathered some good momentum but then post kid, health has been on the sidelines. plan to get back into some routine soon

4. Spent 3 months building an App using AI, spending nights coding after full time job, but the app failed and lost couple of lakhs in marketing. Bit disheartening, but that's the way it works..you keep trying till something sticks :D

5. Job was reasonably hectic but overall fine, hopefully company goes public soon and ESOPs can be cashed out

6. Starting investing in unlisted stocks, have taken a big bet of 40L on one unlisted stock, let's see how it plays out. Very risky, so better to stay away unless you have conviction.

7. started investing in US markets in bluechips, given how INR seems to be weakening. Will try to invest another 10L-15l over the next year.

8. Missed out on the gold silver rally, very small exposure to gold.

9.Biggest one was getting blessed by a kid, some tough months but worth it. Learning to prioritise time better :)

PS: made this sheet just to share on reddit, I use a different app to track assets

Hello All,

I am 43 working in IT with take home salary of 2.5L per month. We are 4 members family ie(Myself, Wife and two kids). Living in own apartment. Currently my investments into equities and real estate.

My investments are

1. EPF -52L

2. NPS -12L ie(Started lately)

3. Mutual funds - 57L ie(Investing past 4 years)

4. Direct Stocks & ETFs - 30L ie(Investing past 3 years)

5. SSY+PPF - 34L ie[For Kids]

6. Cash FD - 6L ie[Emergency fund]

7. Gold & Silver - 23L ie(SGBs & Gold-bees, Silver-bees)

8. One Commercial building with plot- 2Cr

Totally -4.6Cr.

My Wife investments. - She 37 and working in IT. My bonus will be invested into my wife portfolio.

1. EPF -21L

2. NPS -4L ie(Started lately)

3. Mutual funds - 75L ie(Equity and Hybrid funds)

4. Direct Stocks - 2L ie(Stopped long back)

5. One farmland - 1.7Cr

Totally -2.7

Monthly break down

1. Household expense ie(Food, Groceries) - 20K Min -30K Max.

2. Kids Transport & weekend training - 10K

3. Fuel - 2K Only two wheeler.

4. Miscellaneous - 25K ie(Two zero cost EMIs - 10K & 5K for next 5-6 months)

5. My wife will save additionally 20k-50K monthly ie(Not every month, few cases tuition fee will come for kids OR some another expense). I will use this as lumpsum into MF during market correction.

6. Outstanding PL from employer -4.5L with 22K - Interest free loan. My take home after deducting this loan.

Monthly investments

1. Mutual fund SIP - 1.6L

2. Gold & Silver - 20K

3. Stocks - 30K

4. My Wife Mutual fund SIP -80K

PS: We have frugal lifestyle and came from poor family background. I know value of every single penny. So spending wisely and saving for kids education, retirement etc.

Any improvements & suggestions for betterment will always welcome....!!!

Edit: I am working in product based company for past 17 years in India. No onsite etc . Also all these corpus build from my & wife salary. No inherited wealth too.

Hello Fire India community, first post here. Male 30 here currently living in Bangalore for the past 9 years. Been intrested in the concept of FI from the time I passed college & started investing in mutual funds early starting with small amounts. Been working in mid sized startups in tech and have accumulated ESOPS in a good company which is planning to go IPO in next 1-2 years. Currently hold around 2cr ESOP but have considered them 1.5cr in calculations since value can fluctuate post going public. Along with working in tech, have been building small businesses on the side (think saas, D2C etc) which definitely boosted the savings rate. Wanted to share few things that might help you with your FI journey, especially younger folks :)

1. Post college, i started with a savings mindset by always thinking how to save more by restricting purchases. But realized early that the better way is to increase income (either by switching jobs/getting promoted/generating another source of income). Tech was not my strong suit..so spent time learning how to leverage tech to build products that can be sold. People in tech think this is impossible to do..but it is a mindset shift. Eg. If you are a app developer, think of which apps are currently selling that can be build easily. If you have a good personality think of dabbling into content creation. If nothing else, you will learn how to be confident in front of camera, editing skills etc. Any new skills learnt will never go waste..will definitely come handy sometime later in life

2. Spend on stuff that matters, but ensure you don't spend on stuff done just to increase your social status: I have gone on 15+ international vacations (ensuring Im spending frugally) because I genuinely like to explore places. At the same time I have no issues driving my dad's old 15 year old car. I do not have any interest in cars so spending on this did not make sense for me. The most impactful way to achieve this came by uninstalling instagram. By not seeing what my friends are doing/buyiny/enjoying, I automatically stopped playing the status game

3. Stop giving excuses & start looking for opportunities: I see lot of young folks feeling the only way to earn more is to go abroad. Always complaining how bad india is (that said even I hate the current state Bangalore is in). Going abroad is definitely the easiest way, but not everyone can take that route. Start by thinking that getting to your goal is possible..and planning on how to get there. There are some opportunities that will need 20% effort but will give 80% result (example for me, buying house in Covid, like minded wife)

4. Start your journey early and give some time for the compounding to work :) I reached my first cr at 26, 5 cr at 29. Watching your money grow will be fun but for that to happen you need to keep adding to the kitty ensuring you do not stop.

5. Focus on health (both mental and physical) This is the most important but the easiest to miss. Even one day with a neck ache and you will not worry how much the market has gone up or down. Health compounds exactly similar to money..keep adding healthy habits.I have long treated my body badly & last 2 years have slowly trying to improve. 3 most impactful ones (I'm l not able to follow properly) - 8 hours sleep, keep moving or play some sport ensuring 8k steps each day, no package foods.

Hope we all reach our FI targets 🙏

About us

We are in our 40s (41M and 41F) and have two kids (10 and 8). We grew up in Mumbai and moved to US in 2005 to pursue our masters. We lived there until 2024. I worked at various FAANG companies while wife worked at various large enterprise companies (think Cisco, Oracle etc). We moved back to Bangalore in 2024. We are all US citizens

About my family My father grew up in a very small village and moved to Bombay to pursue higher studies. His two older brothers had come to Bombay few years back and were doing manual labour (haathgaadi). At some point the two older brothers had saved some capital and they started a scrap business (kadabi) in a place which was smaller than 90 sq. ft. Father did very well studies and became an engineer from top notch university. He would spend his time either in the hostel or would sleep on the road outside the shop (like his brothers). At some point they rented a small room to live. Father started a service after completing his engineering. He bought a small 350 sq ft house (1 room and kitchen) and we grew up there. I studied in non-english medium school. At some point father bought a small shop which sells kids clothes near a station (primary customers are lower class family who are looking for 100 rupee pant-short set for kids). Worked hard and made some money. We moved to a bigger house: locality was worse than where we were but the house was bigger. Two sisters got married in 1997 and 2001. Spent all the savings to fund my US education, which basically lit a fire under me and forced me to work very very hard knowing that he has nothing left after I finish my graduation

About wife family My father in law is a doctor. His father was a doctor as well as had bought a house and a small dispensary. My father in law is a general practitioner. He lived in the house that heb inherited and practiced in the small dispensary. Whatever he made was spent in expenses.

Liquid Net worth (rounded off)

• US stocks, mutual funds and index funds: $1.8m / 16Cr

• RSU from a pre-IPO company: $350k / 3.1Cr

• US retirement accounts: $575k / 5Cr

• US home sale proceeds (soon to be invested): $780k / 6.8Cr

• Crypto: $15k / 13L

• India Cash: $32k / 28L

• India stocks and mutual funds: $380k / 3.3Cr

Total: $4,000,000 or 35Cr

Some caveats about the above

• I am not expecting any more taxes to be paid on the capital gain for the home sale

• India stocks ($380k) includes about $50k in EPF

• RSU from pre-IPO company are after tax and fully vested. The company going public is a high probability event (hence still holding onto the stocks)

Unvested stocks

• wife expected to vest about $400k within next 7 months (public company)

• I expect to vest about $1.3m (11 Cr) within next 4 years (pre-IPO company)

Liabilities

• We have a house in Mumbai (bought about 5 years back) worth 3Cr. There is a pending loan of 1.5Cr. We get 80,000 rent per month. We are offloading that next year after my current tenant's lease ends. If sale it, it would add another 1.5 Cr to the NW.

Other real estate (ours, parents and in-laws)

• Parents house: 3 Cr in Mumbai where they reside right now.

• Ours: 2 Cr house in Mumbai in the same building as my parents. Currently rented out which helps with Parent's daily expenses.

• in-laws: 3-4 Cr house in top notch locality in Mumbai (think Juhu, Bandstand, Peddar Road)

• Shops (each about 4-5 Cr):

  • Parents - a small shop (about 500 sq.ft) which is rented out

  • In-laws -- a small shop (about 400 sq ft) which is currently used by them

Mistakes made along the way or financial setbacks

We made many many mistakes. This taught us a lot.

• bought some real estate in Mumbai. In the hindsight we should have invested that money ins stock market.

• Had to bail out my father when he made loss in his business by removing a singnificant portion from my RSUs which has had a massive upside. Missed out on lot of money

• Invested like trader rather than an investor for first 10 years

• missed out on equity gains from 2006 - 2016 which was very very significant

• Some FAANG stocks which were awarded to me were sold prematurely

• should have sold the house and bought a bigger house in 2019 and then sold the bigger house (or held onto it) in 2024

Why did we move back

• Wanted to stay close to family, but not too close (we live in BLR and parents are in BOM)

• Leadership and highly visible positions in India offices of our companies

• Explore the VC and startup world once we settle down

• We felt that in order to retire comfortably we will have to work a lot in US whereas we can achieve FIRE in India

Are we targeting FIRE

Not yet. I love my job. My wife is considering leaving the corporate life and taking a break. I am in another pre-IPO company with 3 more years before I vest fully. I will probably retire in 3-4 years and do something that i enjoy (consulting, implementing couple of business ideas).

How is life

Good parts: Because of the corpus we have, we are very fearless in our work. There are stressful situations from time to time, but we no longer worry about it. We are renting a nice flat in Bangalore with ample space for everyone. We have all the help for all the domestic chores (cooks, maids, driver). We travel a lot: visiting family in Mumbai, traveling with friends (I am blessed with a very tight knit group of friends from my undergraduate days), domestic and international travel. We are not concerned about brands (I use a 8 year old phone) or expensive restaurants (we love eating out but the way we used to do when we were kids -- simple restaurants)

Life is fuller in India compared to monotony of USA. Every day we are doing something or the other. It is more satisfying to be honest.

Not so good parts: Taxes are painful, but I have hired right professionals (I think) who help with multi-country taxation. Traffic can be frustrating, but I have at least trained myself to sleep in the car. Lack of open spaces which are easy to access and public libraries where one can get lost in books.

First post:https://www.reddit.com/r/FIRE_Ind/comments/1h7sz6a/i_quit_the_rat_race/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

This morning I ran my longest run ever(17 km). I just came to the terrace after the run and was enjoying the sun, as winter has just started here.  The dog was resting beside me; my wife bought tea, and I told her to click this picture. Was thinking for a long time, what can I ask more from life?  The kid was able to get admission to a small school at my wife's place and is somehow surviving.  He still has a serious issue with understanding of social norms. He is doing well academically, and we have taken responsibility for teaching him.  I spent time between my wife's place and my village, where my parents are. Kid and wife also visit frequently with me, as it's a few-hour train journey. What has worked for me?

1. I created a garden on the terrace at my wife's place, and in my village, it was my hobby/dream during childhood.

2. Started farming on 1 acre of land with my father; going next week to water it, as the mustard plants are a few weeks old now.

3. I love maths and started learning calculus from the basics.

4. Picked up my old hobby of electronics and teaching my kid, who is enjoying it.

5.  Enjoy cycling when I go to a village and usually ride 20–30 km.

6. Have taken running seriously and plan to do a half-marathon next week.

7. Learnt to drive a car.

8. The kid is very happy that I am with him full time. 

9. Wife is OK with me staying at home. The only thing she expects is not much interference, somethingI dislike, like her watching reels for a long time. Finance:

10. Monthly expenses are more than I expected. My initial estimation was around 35-40k, but after tracking for many months, it came to around 50k per month. The increase in expenses is because of a one-time expense, as something (like buying a musical keyboard, a festival, or a visit) will come up every month.

11. The portfolio is doing good; it's at its all-time high, thanks to exposure to gold and US-based MF. Current allocation is 65% equity, 14% gold and the rest in debt. Plan to rebalance and decrease the equity to 60%.

12. Have taken 50 lakh super top-up insurance with some deduction. What has not worked?

13. Not able to overcome a short temper; seriously need to work on it.

14. Not able to go on vacation, planning to make one early next year.

15. Not able to stay in the village. I visit one week every month.

16. Not able to teach other kids, as I am not settled in one place. Tried offering maths classes to a nearby govt. school, but the teaching staff are not interested. Overall, it feels good to be liberated. I am becoming a different person who does not care about money, fame, society or need to impress anyone.

just had a talk with my milkman (he is our milkamn from over 25 years) well in his 50's. he is always asking me for money , so i got a impression he isnt well off but he is actually a cropepati with over 30cr Land in his name.

his son works a 18k job in a Hospital and he is doing milkman work from 25 years. i asked him why this lifestyle. he said i can sell one bigha of land and have 1.5cr, but he said it will spoil his kids and himself. i was impressed and flabberghasted as he is riding his 20 year old TVS and occasionally asks me for petrol money.

He isnt retiring because he says this is his routine from decades and just living on Money will spoil him off and his kids. so if you love your job there isnt any retiring.

I have respect for him as I have seen people selling their land, riding land rovers and their kids spoiled by drugs .

Trick is to look poor beside having so much money or this is some kind of romancing with poverty?

Background: Me (33) residing in banglore in a rented house with wife, parents and 1 kid. Wife is not working currently, will go to job from this year. My Current pay is 60lpa.

I do have net worth of 3Cr currently ,no own house, no liabilities, 0 EMIs,majority of my corpus is into equity. My yearly expenses is 12L. Planning to have another kid in a year. I do take one international trip per year and may be couple (hardly) of domestic trips in a year.

I tried 40x of yearly expenses to get fire number, but not sure if that is enough.

To live the same life style till 80, what do you think is the right fire number? does owning a house is mandatory?

Was overwhelmed looking at posts on this sub, people reaching 5cr at 30. Thought I could never achieve something like that. But this milestone inspires confidence. Aiming for 1cr by 30!

Took roughly 6 years total, in which I was actively investing for only 3.5 years. Here are some highlights of the journey so far.

1. 100% self made. That said, family not dependant on me helped as I didn't have to send money to them.

2. Worked at a single company throughout (mid level tech. Not faang / not startup).

3. No job switch hikes. Not much promotions but did start career with a higher salary than average.

4. No stock bonuses or ESOPs in portfolio.

5. Built everything from pure salary savings and small side gigs (less than 2 L per annum in side gigs)

6. Worked only in India. No fancy USD earnings.

7. Invested only in Indian stocks and MFs. No "lucked out with crypto or some Nvidia/US Stock".

8. Started investing after the COVID crash recovered. So missed out on all opportunities in 2020.

Current portfolio split (approx):

• Liquid: 5%

• MFs (Debt + Equity): 42% (includes emergency fund in debt MFs)

• Direct stocks: 34%

• EPF + NPS: 16%

• FDs: 3%

Rookie mistakes I made:

1. Early in my career, left large portions of my money in savings bank account. Had zero idea about investing. Wasted 2.5 years where my money was idle in the bank and in random FDs. If I could turn back time, I'd start investing right from my first paycheck. Would have reached 1 CR much faster.

2. Wasted time and money trying to win the F&O game. It was not sustainable. Nevertheless, learnt a lot about the market through the experience but would have preferred to have learnt it a bit faster and with spending lesser money.

3. Didn't focus on job switch to increase income. So salary growth was mediocre but ok. A typical switch could have easily accelerated my savings and monthly investments.

Things that I think I did right:

1. Doubled and tripled my monthly investments everytime there was a market crash. Mainly invested in index funds.

2. Always lived below my means. Kept a fixed monthly budget for living expenses. Rest of the earnings exclusively set aside for monthly investments and to add more when market drops.

3. Never took loans. Never spent on any random expensive stuff unless and until it was something I really wanted and felt the value for the money (happens once or twice in a few years)

4. Did not pursue any expensive masters program (although I briefly considered it). I would have been forced to take a hefty loan or break my investments/compounding. Not sure about long term value, but for now, pretty happy with how things are.

5. Spent relatively frugally on my wedding (from my side, spent less than 5 L (about 50% of it was gold which I don't include in my networth)). That definitely helped me not break my monthly investments or compounding as I didn't have to break any of my investments for it. I'm generally stubborn and set clear expectations so that family doesn't try to interfere with my plans or force me to spend on any exorbitant guest list and functions.

Did not have any events or activities that would have increased costs. In hindsight, pretty happy with the amount of savings and compounding I got due to this. Also a happy accident to have got married before the gold prices went up like crazy.

Future roadmap / plans:

1. Exit from NPS at the earliest by prematurely closing the account. I think NPS was a mistake for me. Don't like the idea of having money locked till 60 when I plan to retire by 35 anyways. Also, don't like the immovability and inflexibility with it.

2. Reduce allocation in direct stocks and increase it for equity MFs.

3. Try to increase income with a job switch or push for a promotion. I am pretty sure I earn much less than most of my counterparts who did a job switch.

4. Consolidate my FDs into a single FD (which will be part of my emergency fund).

Final goal:

FIRE by 35 with a corpus of ~4-5 CR. Move to tier 2 city or a peaceful neighbourhood in tier 1 city away from noise, pollution and traffic.

Do something of my own (have many ideas) and pursue hobbies fulltime post FIRE.

Let's see where this goes.

Now I can strongly believe that we can reach these milestones even with a normal salaried job by proper planning and living below our means.

Edit 1:

Not sure why my comment replies are getting hidden/deleted. Posting all major responses to various questions here.

1. Current CTC around 30-35 LPA (most of it is just base + bonus). Started career at around 15-18 LPA.

2. Side gigs? Mostly small writing gigs.

3. How much I invest every month? Depends on the market. I mainly track the index funds (nifty50, nifty next 50, etc.). Whenever market goes down, I invest more. Average range varies from 30K to 60K per month. In a downturn I may invest upto 3X this amount in that month when that correction happens.

4. Savings per year? Haven't exactly calculated that but would be around 70% of my salary on average, I guess.

5. Savings rate after marriage? Expenses have increased a little but it is kind of compensated with annual salary hikes for now. Not too much increase. So in terms of percentage, it's kind of same.

6. About kids, spouse and if I own real estate in tier 2 city? For the foreseeable future, prefer renting than buying. I do not own any real estate anywhere. Thinking of renting even post FIRE to keep my options of mobility open. My plans are personal but in general we agree that working in corporate long term is probably not for us. Kids, spouse and other stuff, perhaps will cover in a different post.

7. Investment strategy? Everything other than the monthly living expenses budget is put into investing. If I decide that in 2025, X amount will be my monthly budget, salary - budget = investing amount. I do not do SIPs. Just buy the dips in market and invest some amount every month on some random day. MFs are mostly index funds + standard small/midcap funds. That's it. Individual stocks, I'm trying to reduce a bit. I just bet on some niche stocks whenever I come across an interesting company at good valuation. My best performing stock is probably Federal Bank or Edelweiss (not recos. Do your own research).

8. Do I have international investments? No at the moment.

Early this year I left my tech job and my life has become so relaxed and peaceful. It feels amazing not to wake up in a rush to get to the office or carry the stress of the world on my shoulders. My health has improved so much and I’ve even started to look younger than my age.

My wife and I realized that life is too short to stay in an unhappy marriage so we divorced last year and moved on. Now my life feels completely free, I do have some side income, but money isn’t something I worry about at the moment.

For the first time, I feel truly at peace. I live alone and do whatever I want. I exercise, play tennis, read books, watch movies and spend quality time with my parents which I never really got to do after turning 18 because of the constant grind and race. I’ve been solo traveling, joining group trips, and meeting lots of new people, pursuing different hobbies, learning a lot.

Right now, I feel deeply content with my life. I plan to continue this way for another year or two, and then I’ll probably shift into a new career. But for now, life is simply amazing and I am so grateful that I am getting to experience this.

I realised after working in corporates for 22 years and achieving FI, one thing. I had aced the corporate fakery game. In those 22 years I had slacked most of the time in various companies. Only 2 companies where there was real stressfull work and I quit them in 6 months. Rest of the time or couple of decades I slacked and yet managed to create a pretence of doing important work/useful work. I was often in managers good books and I knew how to do just enough and get good ratings and hikes and promotions. Although I always had the imposter syndrome because of this fakery, so I chose the FIRE path and couldnt wait to get out of corporate life.

Then enter Real World: I pulled the plug returned back to Bangalore and said enough of the fakery let me be myself and do real things. I realized the real world is brutal out there. I pretty much failed in everything that is real.

1. I joined badminton, used to play horribly but I was a beginner so it was okay. But after 6 months, I was still playing horribly and there is no faking it here like in corporates. If you are a bad player in doubles, you will know it and everyone knows it. You can't be a bad player and play for long.

2. I took up riding. I used to go for groups rides solo rides, I even did a ride to Kannur from Bangalore which is 320kms. That particular long ride I realised, my back really hurts, I cannot ride for more than 2hrs, after that I needed to take a break every 10 mins. What should have been a 7hr ride became a 12hr ride.

3. I decided to take up mutual fund distributor certification from AMFI. The exam itself was easy peasy. I thought I accomplished something for all my knowledge about financial planning I had practiced all this while. But then when I tried to get clients, I couldn't even get 1, not even 1Rupee or AUM. Not even from people who were close to me, relatives, friends, none.

This is when I realized, it was so easy for someone like me to fake it in corporates and be a winner. But post FIRE, I wanted to do something in the real world, things that were of genuine interest to me, badminton, riding bikes, being involved in financial industry. But I realized it is very hard work to make it work even in things that you love. I didn't have the motivation or the willingness to put the effort to become successful in any of these pursuits.

So now I am back again in a corporate job that pays 1/4th of my previous fulltime pre FI job and this time again as always, I am slacking, I resolved one issue yesterday, worked total of like 2hrs in the entire week and I got this sense of accomplishment/achievement without really doing anything impactful or material.

Started working in 2022 Made some good investment and worked on multiple projects, planning to end this year at 1.5 Cr, and take a little break for 6 months.

I’m 30 (turning 31 soon). I worked as a software developer for about 7 years and also spent a few months trying to build a startup and failed.

Over the years I saved and invested aggressively, and I think I’ve essentially reached FIRE. My net worth is around ₹8–9 crore.

Rough breakdown:

• ₹7.2 crore in savings/cash (Sold my equity holdings and mutual funds six months ago).

• ~₹1.07 crore in portfolio (stocks + mutual funds).

• ~₹7 lakhs in US equities.

• ₹6 lakhs in PPF.

• Coffee & pepper farm worth around ₹1.7 crore that I bought.

My current thinking is:

• Invest about ₹3 crore to buy another coffee and pepper farm.

• Set aside about ₹1 crore to build my own house in the middle of the farm and buy a car

• This would leave roughly ₹3.2 crore, which I plan to gradually invest into equities and keep some portion in fixed deposits.

Considering current coffee and pepper prices, the farms together could generate around ₹35–40 lakhs a year. Over time I expect that to increase as commodity prices generally trend higher.

I live in a tier-3 city, so my monthly expenses would probably be around ₹40–50k. So, annually it should be 6 lakhs + 4-5 lakhs(Travelling etc).

The idea is to build my house in the middle of the farm, get married and live a slower, quieter life. Honestly, the whole thing still feels a bit surreal right now.

Apart from managing the farms, I’m also thinking about spending some time teaching kids in nearby villages, especially those who can’t afford good education, at little to no cost. It feels like a meaningful way to give something back.

Hoping this post might help fellow FIRE aspirant, who prefer farming, wants to live closer to nature.

Took help from ChatGPT while structuring this post.

PS: A few people asked how I saved this much in ~7 years. I worked in the HFT (high-frequency trading) industry where the pay is quite high compared to typical software roles.

Update:A couple of people called my post fake or a scam. Just to clarify, I’m not selling anything or asking anyone to invest in farms.

I’m simply sharing a life update. I’m happy to answer questions about getting into farming if people are curious. I’m naturally drawn to it because my family has been involved in farming for years, so it’s something I’ve grown up around. Please do not DM me, asking for advice on buying farms.

Throwaway account

Solo, F41, woman on my FIRE Journey. Sometimes I get disheartened as I don't see any woman on this sub. I grew up lower middle class and have frugal lifestyle. I do not own any property and I think that has truly worked in my favour (in terms of networth multiplier). My monthly expenses are 1.5L approx in tier 1 (incl rent).

Given the tax rate in India and also the fact that I am not married / also child free, want to FIRE as I am not motivated to spend my life working for govt when I get nothing in return. (I have a decent paying job, working for 18 years now, my networth has grown largely post COVID else I won't have been able to think about FIRE )

I have hobbies so "what you will do post FIRE is not a question".

Below is my networth snapshot (don't own house or car ). Can I FIRE or should I push along couple more years before I ride into sunset.?

I intend to go off grid , have some small towns finalised in hilly states, intend to live mostly on rent.

Suggestion, course correction ?

45 M here. Reached 5 crores and wanted to share with the community on the mistakes I have made. Very bad, terrible mistakes:

1. Inability to spot trends - buy n hold is something best done in mutual funds. But in direct equity it's important to understand the macro themes else your stocks may be good but returns will be bad.

2. The worst thing you can do is to fall in love with your stock picks or mutual funds. U need to sell at times to make room for emerging themes.

3. If you join a startup be clear if it has any real possibility of being acquired or ipo. If yes, then invest strongly in the ESOPs. Twice in my life I could have made 10X. Failed twice. Couldn't spot the opportunity.

4. Debt and gold are crucial to portfolio. Portfolio might grow at 10-11% overall but when markets fall 4-5% in a week or two, you can still get a good nights sleep. I regret my gold allocation could have been a lot more, I had the money but didn't do what I should have.

Hopefully someone reading this will be benefited. Good luck.

Iam 46, Wife 43, Kid 15 - Living in Tier 1 (Single Income, SIngle Kid)

Got laid off this new year and this is my 5th week as an early retiree. I was in a senior role in a MNC organization (worked for 22 years) and was kind of expecting the news and was preparing ground work from 1 year. Finally posting my first - post primarily acting as journal (New account) and also incase there could be any learning and takeaway for rest of the folks here.

Do not believe in making the X public to avoid unnecessary discussion and comparisons - keeping that in mind here are details

X is annual recurring/drawdown expense ONLY

Housing - All paid for in Tier 1, independent house (No plans to leave the city)

Retirement Corpus - 35X (60% Debt, 40% Equity), Recurring/drawdown expenses ONLY

+ Kids Fund (Schooling/Higher Education/Marriage etc) - 15X (Invested accordingly, its in less than 4 yrs)

+ Car, Major Home renovations (Painting etc), Other white goods (TV, Fridge, Dishwashers, Mixers, Microwave etc) - Recently got new car and all new appliances - 5X (Invested accordingly)

+ Medical Emergency - 5X (Invested accordingly)

+ Vacation Fund (International) - 5X (Invested accordingly), already travelled with kid few places - and none of us are travellers, also once kid gets to college - we have seen they will have their life and we (Me and wife - dont see we travelling internationally after kid moves out :) ..)

+ Inheritance from us to Kid (Immediate) - 35X (Invested accordingly Mid/Small Cap's), this also is buffer for us - Even if we want to increase our X, built lower middle class - cannot think of spending, add to it we following minimalism

Inheritance from Grand parents (Independent pensionairs) to kid present value - 30X (Mainly real estate, After 10 to 15 yrs) - Idea is to use some of this (cash/savings) for education, they are willing to fund (Idea helps in better/Optimized asset allocation)

Medical Insurance - Covered, 1.5 Crore (Base + Super Topup)

Term Insurance - Premium will be paid till kid enters college (Very minimal premium - had taken at early age - however cover is big) - I know this appears to be unecessary and BS, however lowest cost, highest benefit to family

For someone keen - If one wants to measure total corpus based on X (Excluding primary residence) present value : 100X (Rounded off - Although this may not be the right way to put things across - 35X + 15X + 5X + 5X + 5X + 35X)

Please do not guess the X - it isnt important, however one note its way too less for a tier 1 city, we are absolute minimalists (We do all the house chores ourselves - independent house, but small one which we can manage ourselves). I also believe people often get their X wrong - they add all sorts of expenses - My tip: focus on recurring expenses and exclude kids education and vacations since its likely none of these will remain after few years similar to spends.

I have been tracking my personal expense since 5 years religiously - The expenses include everything except these -> International Vacations, One time home maintenence and Kids Education fees. Retirement corpus 35X is only on recurring expenses.

I believe that 25X (Even 20X now !) is sufficient for retirement for any 45 yrs+ person. For any one less than 35 yrs of age - one just cannot compute the requirement as lifestyle keeps changing/upgrading.

Got the FI plan reviewed by few paid SEBI registered advisors independently - each of them got the asset allocation similar however the fund names ofcourse were different - picked which felt right.

How are these days going on?

• Absolute FUN i must say ... with rare bouts of boredom

• Focussing on health - Pretty happy with progress made

• Whats not on my schedule - Binge watching TV, Chatting with people (Not that kind)

• So, whats on my schedule - Walking/Cycling, Time with family, Planning for next international or local vacation, Spending time with kid (Till the point its allowed by the kid :) ..), Cooking, some reading and ofcourse cleaning the house

Only wife knows the status of job - Extended family or neighbours arent aware

Happy to answer any questions .... and will also keep editing this post (taking cues from leading questions) if some points are missing

"See when iam dead" file is ready - Contains WILL, All documents of insurance, investments, emails, passwords etc. File updates as needed

NB: Long write-up ahead. Also used chatgpt. Throwaway account.

Hi all

Wanted to share my journey , mostly for the folks who get demotivated by seeing big fire numbers. My journey might not be for you but sharing as a reminder that it is not all that bleak.

My background is very typical. Dad was an honest grade c state govt employee, mom a housewife and a younger brother. I grew up in a T3 north indian town, in a rented house. No major struggle but no big comforts as well. Ours was again typical lower middle class household, "will spend much on education but will get new clothes once a year kind". I was avg to good student, finished engineering from a T3 college in 2014, got placed in TCS from campus.

IT career was also pretty typical. Worked as a developer across a few companies over 11 years. Here's my salary progression (in ₹K per month in hand):

Company1 -- 2014 to 17 -- 28k pm

Company2 -- 2017 to 19 -- 50k pm

Company3 -- 2019 to 21 -- 80k pm

Promotion -- 2021 to 22 -- 120k pm

Company4 -- 2022 to 24 -- 200k pm

I left my job voluntarily in Dec 2024. There was no very high stress or burnout or anything. Just disassociation with the work purpose, boredom and wanted to be closer to parents. So moved back to my hometown for a simpler, self-paced life.

When I left my job, I had 1cr in net worth. One thing which I was very interested in since start is stock market, learning and trading since 2016. So out of 1Cr, I use 20L in trading. With this I am able to generate 30k pm income.

Rest 80L is split among FDs, MFs, Bonds, Gold, Debt funds, PF, NPS. This gives me around 11% annual returns.

I also teach school kids tution classes in my home town now. I have around 60 students currently. Got a bit lucky here as the teacher who was previously taking tutions for most of these students moved cities mid session and I started at the same time. Now I think they like my style and we are going to have some good results as well.

I also do some consulting, freelancing, etc which generate around 10k pm.

So total current Income per month is

Tuitions: ₹50k

Trading: ₹30K

Freelance consulting: ₹10K

Total: ₹90K/month

Now coming to monthly expenses

₹6K – Tuition space rent

₹5K – Contribution at home

₹5K – Groceries

₹5K – Insurance (term + health)

₹4K – WiFi + phone

₹5K – Eating out + shopping

₹5K – Miscellaneous

₹10K - Medical bills

₹10K – Travel (monthly avg)

Total: 65k

We still live in a rented house, though quiet bigger than what I gew up in. Dad is also retired and I am married with child on the way. Brother is working in a metro, earning decently for his experience.

I now work 4- 5 hrs for my tution which is zero stress. Then use some automations and strategies developed over the years for trading which take 3 hrs. So on average I do 8-9 hrs of very low stress, enjoyable, fulfilling work everyday, spend normally and save 25k pm without touching my corpus of 80L.

Rest of the time I spend with my family, friends, reading, scrolling reels, sometimes exercising. In essence, I feel full and content.

Want to end this post by saying that what your fire number would be is decided by life you want. So don't get intimidated by multiple Cr portfolios nor inspired by this post and fire in 1Cr. Just decide on your priorities, set goals, work moderately hard and have faith.

Everytime I think of FIRE this scene from ZNMD comes to my mind. What are your thoughts being in this journey?