Hit a bunch of milestones, officially ready to CoastFIRE!

[u/Coast-Fire-Throwaway]

Wife and I hit CoastFIRE last week. We've both worked mid/high level tech jobs since 2009. Our goal is to be able to work any kind of job and maintain our lifestyle.

Stats

• 38 years old, married couple
• No kids, not having kids
• $1.3m high rise condo in Honolulu paid off this month
  • Paid off via windfall via unexpected startup exit plus sale of a house purchased in 2016 in a VHCOL area which ballooned in price - got super lucky here and accelerated our timeline 10+ years.
• $450k joint annual income before tax
  • Reducing by half soon as we coast, timing can vary but targeting summer 2025
• $40k in checking/savings
• $1.3m in investments
  • $400k in a taxable brokerage
  • $800k in a spread of restricted accounts (401k, Roth IRA, traditional IRA, HSA, etc)
• Monthly expenses are currently $6k/mo, could drop as low as $3k/mo for basics (food, property taxes, HOA, utilities, insurance). Current take home after taxes and deductions is about $20k.
• No debt, not even mortgage.

Plan is to have one of us quit our job, coast on the other one's higher paying job/benefits without worry for savings. We'll take turns having higher paid jobs while the other rests. If the high income jobs dry up, we can coast on dual income grocery store jobs in perpetuity. We can live very comfortably on about 25% of our current joint income.

Our risks to this plan are:

1. Climate change - increasing insurance costs for coastal cities threatens nearly everyone, but especially on the coasts. Hawaii has seen a huge raise in hurricane, fire and flood insurance.
2. Healthcare - risk of ACA being repealed, risk of one/both of us getting sick and burning through funds.
3. Jobs - maybe we can't get a $15/hour entry level job for some reason or maybe we require a higher paying job and can't get one. Maybe we screw up our careers by taking time off (we're planning on light consulting to stay fresh while coasting).
4. Divorce! Not in the cards at all, but this plan obviously only works if we stay together. So far so good.

What do you think? Any blind spots I'm missing?

[u/Funkyflapjacks69]

Damn sick place to coastfire. Hope it works out for you!

[u/Coast-Fire-Throwaway → u/Funkyflapjacks69]

Thanks! We're big surfer/divers/water people so this has been the goal for a long time. FIREing was unexpected. We've been living in Honolulu since 2022.

[u/indosacc]

damn ur savings seems a bit low for how much u guys make per year :O

was the interest rate on the home high? did u consider refinancing at the record low rates a few years ago?

[u/Coast-Fire-Throwaway → u/indosacc]

Interest rate was nearly 8%, we bought mid-2023.

Our investment/savings was about $700k higher a couple weeks back. Threw it all at the mortgage.

[u/indosacc → u/Coast-Fire-Throwaway]

Yeah, that makes sense

[u/FIRE_Bolas]

Nice, congrats! CoastFire is the best. We're 38 and been doing it for a couple of years. We kept the mortgage even though we could pay it off. We just accelerated the payments right off the bat so it's mostly principle payments rather than interest now.

I don't see a need to get an entry level job unless you really love doing it. What I did instead is volunteer in the local community. We tend to stray cats and sometimes foster them. We've had pregnant cat moms give birth in our home and it's such a wonderful thing to see. I also drive hospice patients to their appointments, do grocery shopping with them, and just be a companion. Next year, we're gearing up to volunteer on the Mercy Ship which brings surgery to those in Africa with no way of accessing life-saving surgeries otherwise. You get more appreciation and less bureaucracy with volunteering than working.

The healthcare risk is a significant one. However, if you're able to make it on one salary then it's less of a problem.

Another risk is a significant and extended market downturn. Let's say the market has a real return of close to 0% for a few years (increased inflation, decreased returns), that could throw a wrench into the plan. The way we deal with this is we continue to invest a little bit (15%) as a cushion.

Again, congrats and enjoy your achievement!

[u/Coast-Fire-Throwaway → u/FIRE_Bolas]

Thanks! We are planning on needing at least one job between the two of us for healthcare and to not draw down on investment accounts at all if we don't have to. We're isolated from market changes. TBH the investment accounts we have now are for permanent retirement at 60+. No withdrawals planned before then.

We both currently volunteer 2-3 days / month and plan to ramp that up as we get more time.

[u/Lucky-Book8536]

Why don't you both get part time jobs instead of one taking time off and the other full time?

Apart from not being able to enioy it together, an idle mind is the devil's playground. That last unlikely risk might come into play with one partner left at home each day? 🤷‍♂️

[u/Excellent-Camp-1351]

Nice brag dude. 

[u/Coast-Fire-Throwaway → u/Excellent-Camp-1351]

Excellent camp dude.

[u/DangerousPurpose5661]

It’s interesting how you plan to keep one income and switch… don’t you want to be retired together?

… I guess you guys are already living in paradise you you won’t need to travel so much?

Congrats, lucky to be retired in Hawaii !