Your situation
Not sure? Build a line-item budget in the expense estimator and it will show up here.
Assumptions
Variant settings
Bridge to 59½
Load from calculator
Pull your age, assets, savings, spending, return, volatility, and target retirement age straight from the retirement calculator. Assets and savings use today's account balances and contribution rate, not a projected future balance.
Your FIRE outlook
Net worth trajectory
Your projected portfolio if you keep investing $30,000/yr at a 5% real return. Dots mark where you cross each milestone; the dashed line is the Coast FIRE requirement, which rises as compounding time runs out.
FIRE milestones
| Milestone | Target | Progress | Reached at age |
|---|---|---|---|
Coast FIRE Stop saving today; compounding alone reaches your FIRE number by age 67. | $205,545 | 49% | 34 |
Barista FIRE Part-time income of $24,000/yr covers part of your spending; the portfolio covers the rest. | $650,000 | 15% | 41.9 |
Lean FIRE A leaner budget — 70% of your planned spending ($35,000/yr). | $875,000 | 11% | 45.3 |
FIRE Your full number: $50,000/yr at a 4% withdrawal rate. | $1.25M | 8% | 49.9 |
Fat FIRE A more comfortable budget — 150% of your planned spending ($75,000/yr). | $1.88M | 5% | 55.9 |
Coast FIRE curve
The amber curve is how much you'd need at each age to stop saving entirely and still hit your FIRE number by age 67 through compounding alone. The green dot is you today; the blue dot is where your current savings pace crosses the curve.
You need $205,545 today to coast — you're at 49% of that. At your current savings pace you'd cross the curve around age 34. Note the target itself grows each year, because waiting leaves less time to compound.
What moves the needle
How small, permanent changes shift your FIRE number and your timeline, holding everything else constant.
Bridge to age 59½
Standard retirement accounts unlock at 59½. Retiring at 49.9 leaves 9.6 years to fund from accessible money — taxable brokerage and Roth contributions. This isn't extra saving on top of your FIRE number; it's about where that money lives.
You'd come up about $11,616 short. Two levers: direct more of your future savings to taxable or Roth accounts (try the "share of new savings" slider), or plan a Roth conversion ladder — you'd need to start converting about five years before the accessible money runs out.
Monte Carlo check — will the money last?
The deterministic math above assumes the same return every year. This check runs 1,000 random market sequences (5% real return, 15% volatility) over your 45-year retirement (FI at 49.9, planned to 95) and counts how often a 4% withdrawal rate survives.
Success rate by withdrawal rate, for your horizon and assumptions — the dot is your current setting:
Savings rate vs. years to financial independence
The core insight of the FIRE movement: starting from zero, your savings rate alone determines how long it takes to reach financial independence — because saving more simultaneously grows your portfolio and shrinks the spending it must support. The curve below uses your return and withdrawal-rate assumptions; the dot marks your savings rate.
At a 37.5% savings rate and starting from zero, financial independence takes about 23 years. Your projection above is faster because it also counts your existing $100,000.
The early-access playbook
Six ways early retirees reach their money before 59½ without the 10% penalty. Most plans combine several: taxable brokerage and Roth basis first, with a conversion ladder maturing behind them.
The default bridge. No age rules — sell shares whenever you need cash, and early retirees with modest taxable income often land in the 0% long-term capital-gains bracket.
Caveat: Dividends and realized gains are taxed along the way, so it compounds a bit slower than sheltered accounts.
Direct Roth contributions (not growth, not recent conversions) can come out at any age, tax- and penalty-free. A decade of maxed contributions is a meaningful bridge fund.
Caveat: Withdrawn basis loses its tax-free compounding forever — treat it as bridge money, not a first resort.
Each year of early retirement, convert one year of spending from a traditional IRA/401(k) to Roth, paying tax at your now-low rate. After five tax years, each conversion is withdrawable penalty-free — a rolling pipeline.
Caveat: You need roughly five years of spending from other sources before the first rung matures, and conversions are taxable income that can shrink ACA subsidies.
Substantially Equal Periodic Payments let you draw from an IRA at any age without the 10% penalty, using an IRS formula based on your balance and age.
Caveat: Rigid: payments must continue for 5 years or until 59½, whichever is longer. Breaking the schedule triggers retroactive penalties plus interest.
Leave your employer during or after the calendar year you turn 55, and that employer's 401(k)/403(b) becomes penalty-free immediately — no waiting for 59½.
Caveat: Applies only to that plan (not IRAs or old 401(k)s), and the plan must allow flexible partial withdrawals.
Pay medical costs out of pocket, invest the HSA, and keep the receipts — you can reimburse yourself tax-free years later, on demand. After 65 it acts like a traditional IRA for non-medical spending.
Caveat: Contributing requires a high-deductible health plan, and the strategy lives or dies on record-keeping.
Choosing a withdrawal rate for a long retirement
The classic 4% rule comes from the Trinity study, which tested 30-year retirements. Early retirees face 40–60 year horizons, where a bad market decade early on (sequence-of-returns risk) has far longer to compound its damage — so the FIRE community typically plans on lower rates.
Your projected FI age of 49.9, planned to age 95, implies a ~45-year retirement.
| Retirement length | Planning SWR |
|---|---|
| ~30 years (retire around 65) | 4.0% |
| ~40 years (retire around 55) | 3.5–3.8% |
| ~50 years (retire around 45) — your horizon | 3.3–3.5% |
| ~60 years (retire around 35) | 3.0–3.3% |
Flexibility earns back some rate: willingness to cut spending in bad years, or Barista-style income, supports the higher end of each range. Try the withdrawal rate slider to see what a safer rate costs in dollars and years, and run your plan through the retirement calculator for a full Monte Carlo simulation with taxes and Social Security.
Healthcare before Medicare
Medicare starts at 65. Retire at 45 and you have two decades of coverage to arrange — often the biggest unknown in a FIRE budget.
- The ACA marketplace is the usual answer: guaranteed-issue coverage regardless of health history, purchased annually on the exchange.
- Subsidies follow income, not assets. Premium tax credits are based on MAGI, so a millionaire spending from taxable basis and Roth money can show a modest income and pay surprisingly little for coverage.
- The Roth-ladder tension: conversions count as MAGI, so a big conversion year can wipe out that year's subsidy. Many early retirees size conversions to balance future access against current premiums.
- Budget honestly: unsubsidized premiums for a couple in their 50s can top $1,000/mo; with managed MAGI it's often a fraction of that. Put your estimate in the spending input above and watch what it does to your number.
From 65 on, see the Medicare cost guide for premiums, IRMAA surcharges, and Medigap options.