|
My wife and I passed the $1m mark this past year. It's a weird feeling. I've been working in the same career for over a decade now. My longest period of unemployment was 6 months when I moved across the country, otherwise I've been continuously employed the whole time. I've been consciously saving and learning about personal finance and investing for something like 8 years now, so it's something I've been working towards and I feel like I accomplished something. But at the same time I was assisted hugely by an unnecessary education fund, a generous grandmother and the sale of a family business, so it's not like I earned it all myself. It's also not something I feel okay talking about with people IRL. I feel this weird combination of accomplishment tinged with shame. Money is endlessly confusing. We have a million dollar net worth, but feel like the poor couple amongst our friends. We still rent, our apartment is large but run down, we only have one car, my wife makes less than $20k a year, I can't reasonably see buying something where we live, in one of the most expensive cities in the country. Many of our friends own $1-2 million houses, drive nice cars, have fancy clothes, fancy jobs. Sometimes I wish I could just ask "How the gently caress do you do it? Are you not saving? Do you just make way way more than we do? Do your parents help? What's going on here?" At the same time, I know the stats. We're somewhere in the 5-10% of people in the country. We're far above the median net worth for most families, even farther for historically disadvantaged folks like Black families. We also have friends where we're the rich friends. We are factually extremely well off. It's odd to feel so rich but also comparatively poor at the same time. I'm also aware of how precarious life can be. My wife had breast cancer in 2021. We were incredibly fortunate that I was employed with good health insurance and we were able to get through that. It fundamentally changed both of us, and while she is currently NED, we're both still recovering emotionally three years later. So, I'd like to save more, but also gently caress it, we have to live now. My wife is convinced she is going to die young. How can you really scrimp and save with that on your mind? Anyway, sorry for the E/N portion of this post. I haven't really posted about this elsewhere on the Internet and I saw people do it in this thread so here we are.
|
#
¿
Jan 9, 2024 15:50
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 18:24 |
|
|
leper khan posted:Congrats. We didn't even realize when we hit the milestone. It's one of those things where it's objectively a lot but it's not enough where we can stop working/etc. Yeah, it's "could retire and maybe even early" money, but that's still ~20 years down the road. H110Hawk posted:First off: This is good advice, thank you. I'm 38, my wife is 36. I've been talking to her about goal setting, and I think I need to sit down and commit to something. Side note, but we were borrowing her parents 2014 Prius for a while, gotta say I really liked it. Great gas mileage, comfortable, will fit a bike with the seats down, surprising acceleration when you really stomp it. Too bad the catalytic converter got stolen. Brain Curry posted:Sup fellow 1mm net worth and breast cancer survivor! We are still trying to fully integrate the desire to live now and not defer our dreams for a time that may never come. So far she’s reduced her hours and stress at work and traveled more, but everything else is the same. Hello! So glad to hear that you're both doing well. Before my wife got sick her mom told us a story about a friend who worked her whole life, retired to her dream house in the country and immediately got cancer and died. Never got to enjoy it. The story was scary as an intellectual exercise, but now I think we understand it a little more viscerally and we're trying to enjoy ourselves. We've also traveled a bunch. We took a big trip to Japan this year and it was a milestone for post treatment life. I've been coming back to CoastFIRE calculators which say that I'm already set. I'd like to make a career switch and try something new eventually but I make good money and I like my job and there's a lot more expenses in the future. Might as well keep going. Awkward Davies fucked around with this message at 21:28 on Jan 9, 2024 |
|
#
¿
Jan 9, 2024 21:25
|
|
- congratulations it's a huge accomplishment.
. Sounds like you have a good head on your shoulders. Look at your budget, set a goal, and go do it. Leverage your million bucks in the bank to take a risk. That's what it's there for and why generational wealth tends to accumulate (see: grandma, family business, free education.)