Mid Thirties Crisis

[sasguru]

Ah I love a happy ending to a thread! I can just see Milan pootling off in his grey Passat with a big grin on his face.

Bless.

[bobhope]

Out of interest, how much do the older contractors on here work when they are financially independent? 6 months a year. 9 months a year?

I'm looking at FI in 3-5 years (my definition is having about 125% of living costs covered by non-contracting income) but not sure if I would burn the old .net books completely or not.

Is 125% enough, should it be more?

[ChimpMaster]

Out of interest, how much do the older contractors on here work when they are financially independent? 6 months a year. 9 months a year?

I'm looking at FI in 3-5 years (my definition is having about 125% of living costs covered by non-contracting income) but not sure if I would burn the old .net books completely or not.

Is 125% enough, should it be more?

Depends Bob. Are you single/married/got kids? How is your life going to change in the future? How simple a life are you willing to live? Are you also willing to not save much more from when you choose to chill out?

I used to have dreams of "retiring" at 35 on £1k a month. Little did I plan for the fact that once I got married, the wife would want a bigger house, and then we'd have kid(s), who themselves need £1k a month, and then wife wants to put them in private school. And then the rest.

So now I'm aiming for £5k a month residual income. I believe this will be around 150% of our household expenses, which includes kids/schooling/bills/mistress etc.

I've got some way to go yet.... a long way... but maybe 45 looks more likely than 35 now. I'll try for 40, which gives me 6 years.

The best advice I can give is - get your investments started early. Once your investments start throwing off positive cash-flow, you can re-invest continually until you have a handful of investments all generating positive cash-flow. Takes time but it's worth it.

[nucastle]

as much as i enjoy time out from 'work', and being a lazy sod you would think i could happily live the life of leisure ....

.... but as soon as the initial contentment with doing nothing fades, your left with the grim reality that doing nothing all day would drive me slowly mad as every ounce of potential i have goes to waste as i sit about composting potato peelings and hand stitching a pair of hemp trousers in the name of self sufficiency.

Contracting is supposed to be a 'way out' ... im surprised that people are even trying to find a way out of that - personally i dunno what could be better than setting your own hours and making double or more than what the poor guy sitting opposite you does.

[ChimpMaster]

.........
Contracting is supposed to be a 'way out' ... im surprised that people are even trying to find a way out of that - personally i dunno what could be better than setting your own hours and making double or more than what the poor guy sitting opposite you does.

The dream is to be able to choose what you do and when you do it. At the moment I feel I have to work as much as possible because I have certain objectives to achieve and also I work in a niche sector which is dying out very fast indeed. However once I have sufficient residual cash-flow from sources other than contracting, I won't have to worry about that any more.

At that point I can then also do things I care more about - such as helping those less fortunate in other parts of the world.

The word "Retirement" is used loosely here - we don't imply doing nothing, just being able to choose what we really want to do without having to worry about the financial implications.

[Zorba]

Zorba your avatar reminds me of MF, only his baby is cute

I actually know this American nutter who lives the hunter gatherer life-style in his back garden, pretends he is a stone age man and goes in his backyard and hunts stuff to eat, he often hunts squirrels skins them and BBQ squirrels to eat, then posts photos for everyone to see

Guys who wont to retire @ 40, hehe just you wait till your kiddos are a bit older, its like a bottomless pit !!

For some weird reason, I thought you wrote B&Q squirrels there - I was wondering if they were going to cut the bars so the fat squirrel could escape...

<Zorba in 'sitting too near the mobile phone mast' mode>

I'll get that avatar changed for you, then. It was in honour of Angry day, and it had to counterbalance the Wispa so Carling Wotsit would calm down.

[Zorba]

So now I'm aiming for £5k a month residual income. I believe this will be around 150% of our household expenses, which includes kids/schooling/bills/mistress etc.

b)

[nucastle]

The dream is to be able to choose what you do and when you do it. At the moment I feel I have to work as much as possible because I have certain objectives to achieve and also I work in a niche sector which is dying out very fast indeed. However once I have sufficient residual cash-flow from sources other than contracting, I won't have to worry about that any more.

At that point I can then also do things I care more about - such as helping those less fortunate in other parts of the world.

The word "Retirement" is used loosely here - we don't imply doing nothing, just being able to choose what we really want to do without having to worry about the financial implications.

You dont HAVE to work to meet your objectives .... you WANT to eh. Personally thats what got me into this (along with the money), any pressure or strain is totally self imposed and you can look at it in a completely different light.

Back in the permie days, you cant just resign when the chips are down, or you end up with a terrible cv.... so this is a whole different way of looking at it, and with the environment to match.

[Jog On]

The dream is to be able to choose what you do and when you do it. At the moment I feel I have to work as much as possible because I have certain objectives to achieve and also I work in a niche sector which is dying out very fast indeed. However once I have sufficient residual cash-flow from sources other than contracting, I won't have to worry about that any more.

At that point I can then also do things I care more about - such as helping those less fortunate in other parts of the world.

The word "Retirement" is used loosely here - we don't imply doing nothing, just being able to choose what we really want to do without having to worry about the financial implications.

That's how I see FI/retirement. It's a retirement from being dependant on trading time for money. What you choose to do with your time is exactly that - a choice.

When I'm no longer spending 8 hours a day working for somoene else I don't think I'll have much trouble finding ways to fill the void.

I have so many things on my life 'to do list' I'd better hurry up and quit the day job pretty sharpish if I'm going to fit them all in!