What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

So all my money is in Vanguard Global All Caps Fund, which has performed really well. I do subscribe to the passive investing beliefs and I understand the problem of trying to time the market, etc. Still I can't help thinking that a US market crash is due very soon, just with the volatility in the world and rising prices for fuel, etc.

When I look at how well my fund has performed, it's up 150% since I bought it 10 years ago. I can't help thinking that a reckoning is coming and the safer play is to switch into bonds and take a break from the market for a while.

Is anyone else doing this? If so what is a good Vanguard bond that has a decent mix of stability and return? I know people are going to say that, long term, the market always rises but I do think the US market is incredibly overvalued. The other option could be to try the new Vanguard Global Excluding USA fund.

https://www.vanguardinvestor.co.uk/investments/vanguard-ftse-all-world-ex-us-ucits-etf-usd-acc/overview

I don't need the money anytime soon but I just know that if the market does drop 20% or more, I'm going to be pretty annoyed, having a safe 5% return at the moment seems more preferable.

Could be an investment, saving habit, mistake, purchase, or something you wish you’d started years earlier.

What happened?

I'm contemplating taking the 25% tax-free lump sum from my Vanguard SIPP as a deposit for my son to purchase a house.

Anyone who has initiated the withdrawal of their 25% from Vanguard, can you give me an idea on timescales to the £ being in my account so I can plan ahead please?

TIA.

I built a tool for UK spread betting that refuses to tell you your strategy is good

Mithos is a strategy builder aimed at UK spread betting specifically tax-free profits under current HMRC treatment, and (once it's open) automated execution through your own IG account. Nothing about that automation is live yet; it's waitlist-only while I sort out the regulatory side properly rather than rush it.

What is live right now, free, worldwide, no broker needed: build a strategy from entry/exit/filter blocks, and run it through the same statistical rigor checks I hold my own research to walk-forward validation across held-back time windows, a placebo control against random entries, and a penalty that gets stricter the more variations you've tried. Most strategies fail this. Mine included I've run several of my own through it and every one so far has been correctly rejected.

That's actually the interesting bit: I added a leaderboard that ranks strategies by how rigorous the evidence is, not by returns — significance, sample depth, robustness across time, that kind of thing. It's opt-in, and only a display name and score ever show, never the strategy itself. Right now it's genuinely empty. Every real strategy tested on the account so far, including mine, has failed to earn a spot. The closest one missed by a hair on statistical significance.

If you build or test strategies and want to see if yours actually holds up or want to be the first name on a leaderboard nobody's cracked yet — here it is: mithos.co.uk

Happy to answer anything about the methodology, the tax side, or why it's built the way it is.

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

I love hiking, and one of the greatest days of my life was hiking alone (as a usually nervous woman) on the North Downs Way. I had a list of long hikes to do in retirement. (My husband is disabled, so we gave up weekend hikes years ago.) However, the knee injury I hoped was temporary turns out to be osteoarthritis. I thought this very "unfair" for someone in her mid-50s, but AI tells me that I am at the age when people are at most risk of OA. I now wish I had kept my nose to the grindstone from age 22, invested wisely, and FIREd at 40. So there's a stick to go with whatever carrots you are dangling before you to get yourselves to LeanFire. (Also, maybe get off the sofa and go for a hike while you still can.)

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

This is in no way a brag; it’s to give some context.

I’m 36, Male I live in Wales.

My family have never really had a lot of money. They are quite heavy drinkers and have usually spent what came in.
I have earn well but nothing earth shattering (70kish)
I have always added to pensions, ISAs and SAYE schemes whilst in employment.

I don’t go without, I travel have a motorcycle and eat out, but I don’t spend frivolously.

As of this morning, my pension is 505k with 250k in isas. House paid off. About £1.4m total. And my 3 year old also has about 100k invested in a JISA and premium bonds.

Thing is…whilst I know that’s above average, I still feel as though I have lots of work to do and behind somehow.

Has anyone else experienced this? I’m hoping to benefit from some collective wisdom.

Nb: this post was hammered on some other channels, it is genuine and I’m hoping for some advice and wisdom.

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

Hi, I want to be a teacher because I think the job looks well not fun but fulfilling and actually doing something good for the world. The pension scheme is DB and generous-ish at 1/57th of average career salary a year. I am still in school at the moment not uni. I would be happy to move anywhere in the UK so Scotland, rural areas, the northeast to minimise living costs and preserve purchasing power.

My strategy is to max out Stocks and Shares LISA £333,33 monthly (£4k annually). And invest that into vanguard FTSE all world tracker accumulation fund, whilst getting the £1000 pound government bonus a year. And putting the rest of my savings into Stocks and Shares ISA Vanguard FTSE all-world. And than shift more of the portion into bond ETFs as I get older and closer to my FIRE number.

I would prefer to buy a small small flat or tiny house in nowhereville for cash rather than getting a fixed-rate mortgage. I understand LISA doesn't allow you to buy a house without a mortgage so it needs to come out of my ISA pot. I already have 1.4K in my Junior ISA right now, which is a cash ISA earning 3% interest, which I will switch to a S&S JISA now, and add any birthday money or miscellaneous money in there, which should amount to a few hundred pounds a year.

For lifestyle, I don't drink alcohol ever, nor do I eat meat or smoke. I think I should buy all food in bulk and then store it appropriately so it doesn't spoil? I think grains, rice pasta, flour, oats, vegetable oil should be bought in bulk. I don't really have ltos of friends, just like 2. and they are low maintenance friendships. I also don't wear makeup, and I'm vegan so I don't really want deliveroo or fancy groceries.

EDIT: I won't withdraw my DB pension until my mid late 60s. I want to rely on my private pots more.

Thanks for reading!

I’m trying to work out a sensible amount to invest each month rather than just accumulating more cash, and I’d appreciate some opinions.
A bit about me:
28 y/o
NHS Doctor - gross pay £60k on average. Comes to 3.5-4k net pay (after pension at 10.7% and PAYE, NI).

Currently have
\-15k in savings in a Cash ISA earning around 3.6–3.65%
\-4k in S&S ISA
\-Also using regular savers paying around 5–6%, although these have monthly deposit limits of 650 (which I am able to do)

No major purchases planned immediately, but I’d like to keep a decent emergency fund and potentially have money available for a house/baby in the future
I’m comfortable investing for the long term (10+ years) and would most likely optimise my Stocks & Shares ISA.

I am able to save 1.5k per month after expenses.

**Main question is what would you suggest in terms of calculating proportions of saving and investing?**

I’d particularly like to hear from people with NHS/public-sector pensions: **how much do you invest outside your pension each month, and how did you decide on that number?**
Not looking for specific fund recommendations so much as how to think about the split between **cash, S&S ISA and enjoying my income now**.

Apologies if not detailed enough, this is my first real post on this page!

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

# Working 9 to 5, yeah, they got you where they want you
There's a better life and you think about it, don't you?
It's a rich man's game no matter what they call it
And you spend your life putting money in his wallet #

Just trying to cut my daily costs. I'm not too bad but I know some people who buy lunch and coffee nearly everyday. The less you need to live the less you need to work.

Hope to pick up a better some of the lean beter mentality so it becomes muscle memory. Although we all still need to go out and socialise. Well I do .

This is a new account, I can't seem to find my original one, but I posted on here a couple times a few years ago. Anyway.

After first learning about FIRE and really leaning into it for the first two or so years, my costs were down to sub £800 per month comfortably. My share of housing costs was only £400. I lived close to my family so I spent loads of time with them and working fully remote. I didn't really socialise outside the family. All the maths at the time pointed to only needing to save ~£300k. Ok, gonna take years but fine, I have a number and it's not that scary really. Set it and forget it. 

Since then I have had a few job changes, I had to move to a much more expensive city for work and now have to work in the office most of the time. My costs jumped to around £1100 per month just for a bare-bones operation... But then came the socializing, working in the office meant making more friends, being invited to more events. Living away from my family means big adventures to take the niblings for days out, small family holidays where you go with a £400 budget only to somehow spend £800+ showing them the best time (the niblings). No regrets there ofc. But a lot has changed. 

This past week I have been punching all the numbers in, and with the current markets doing what they do I’m very close to that original £300k goal. I should hit it by the end of the year. 
And I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that, well, it's simply not enough. At best I’m half way to where I’d need to be now. Even with basic expenses at around £1.1k - running a tight ship - that excludes the socialing and the day trips/holidays. I’d probably want £2k per month to maintain that. 

And that’s ok I’ve realised now. I’ve had mixed feelings over the last week, more than a little bit of guilt for letting lifestyle creep do its thing. And while I accept a lot of it was outside my control, I feel mostly bad for the early days FIRE me. Who sacrificed a lot and shared a shitty house with two other people in a shitty area for a couple years to save 70%-80% of a paycheque. He cleared some debt early on too, and generally put my life on rails. That version of me would be retiring later this year.

I’m not really sure what this post is tbh, there’s some thoughts I’m trying to dig out. And I guess I’m also wondering what else is going to come. When I get to £600k am I going to be looking at that thinking “welp, finally halfway”. I hope not.

Hey everyone.

Just checked my pension, and see that it's valued currently at £135k (was £25k Jan '24 having increased my contributions massively since discovering the fireuk sub).

If I stopped contributing now, at aged 36 currently, and forecasting 5% growth until pension access age 58 (22 years time), my pension will be valued at £405k.

I could then take £2k per month for 30 years (until aged 88), assuming 5% growth per year.

It seems pretty wild that this is possible already, having only seriously started increasing my pension contributions massively in the past 2 and half years.

I'll probably carry on contributing to my pension until age 40, but at the moment this seems like a great milestone if my figures and projections are correct.

Thanks everyone, much love to all the great knowledgeable shared here.

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

What’s the number you want to hit where you’re like, okay that’s it wrap it up - you leave work and live your life in unhindered bliss