I am feeling prickly today. How much is enough to money to be considered 'fuck you money', where you just won't get pushed around anymore?
I am not talking about 'retirement money'. Surely it takes much more to retire and leave the game. But how much money is enough to be 'fuck you money' where you can subtly let the boss know there's lines that can't be crossed? Where you can look people in the eye with the confident stare of 'I wish you would F around and find out.'
And have you ever just quit and walked (like that scene in Half Baked)? What would be the straw that broke the camel's back where if they pushed you just a bit too much you'd find something else to do with your time?
like how Bobby Axelrod quipped "What's the point of having fuck you money if you never say fuck you?"
Comments (72)
Wife watches a real estate reality show where one of the agents is married to a dude who sold his software company. They lug around in private jets, high end dining, have a gorgeous house and the wife is always blinged out head to toe. Looked into the guy and think he exit for $20 mil.
I always thought fuck you money would be at least 50, maybe 100. But fuck man, the 20 mil lifestyle looks pretty dope and free to me.
I'm sad that I know you're referring to Selling Sunset. Was surprised when I found out it was $20MM. Chick walks around like her hubby is worth $200MM.
I own it lol, it's actually quite entertaining once you strip out some of the bitchy drama. The properties are absolutely insane.
I wonder how long they keep that going. I forget if it was the baby shower, but having animals to make the "jungle" theme pop sounds a bit insane for someone who only has 20 in the bank.
The other one she got me into is based in Dubai, and the dude worth 50 mil books out the underwater restaurant and sends a helicopter for his date. Maybe that's the floor :)
It's hard to see a few takes on a show and say that is the 20M lifestyle. Plus don't know other background - could've come from money, she's probably making a TON monetizing her brand and through the show, etc. 20m lifestyle in VHCOL markets does not include jetting around and $500k parties
Sounds like they are going to spend all of it.
Maybe its just me, but $20M net worth does not seem like enough to be flying around in private jets
Likewise, I assumed it was at least 50. Likely the mrs is just draining the coffers seeing how large they live.
Agreed. Of course there is a difference between leasing and owning a private jet. Owning a private jet is probably 500k - $1M a year while leasing is $2,000 to $11,000 an hour (I would know because I am taking lessons in a Cessna 172 and I googled it). Leasing jets has become very popular. I chatted with a guy who flies for WheelsUp and it sounded like a pretty cool gig assuming you are single that is.
Can you fly private at that level? 100% yes, I do. Can you do all of that? No.
That "lifestyle" is completely faked by the show. As somone who is in that strata I can tell you with 100% accuracy that what you described at that number is not real.
Dude probably got some cushy $500k a year C Suite role in the company or in some VC as well
Depends on what lifestyle you want to have.
If you want to live a mid-career "banker lifestyle" forever--i.e. 300-500k gross pay--without drawing down your capital and living only on interest. you're looking at $10MM.
If you want to fly private everywhere, travel year-round, have multiple homes, expensive jewelry/exotic cars, you're looking more in the neighborhood of $20MM-$30MM.
Net Worth or annually.
Array
Net worth..
hourly mf
You won't be flying private/have cars that are too "exotic" when you're worth 20-30MM. My family is worth ~50-100MM with a good % of that liquid and all my neighbors who are worth similar are definitely not flying private. Sure a few of them drive raris/bentleys/lambos. But most drive a regular beamer or a big body Cadillac. Everyone does have 3-4+ houses+ with vacation homes and nice jewelry/bags, but I don't think its as posh as most make it out to be. Everyone in my household still flies commercial in economy
Flying private does not mean owning your own private jet, my guy. You can easily afford to charter private flights if your NW is c. $25MM. Just because your family has a frugal approach to money with a NW of $50MM+ does not mean they cannot afford to fly private or own a few exotic cars.
It, again, comes down to personal choices and your approach to spending.
That's because your family is classy/old money, and they will likely stay at 50-100m over time and subsequent generations
$50M+
"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
Do you really need fuck you money to let someone subtly know that there are lines they can't cross ... that's a bit sad, no?
Depends on your age and life goals, really. If you have a $5mm net worth at 25, you're single with no immediate desire to have children, you have F you money. If your boss makes your life hell, pushes too far, treats you poorly, you have the ability to look him in the eyes and tell him you're leaving the firm at that very moment. You can walk away at any point in time and live comfortably until you find your next job.
If you're roughly 30-35, I think the number likely needs to much higher, especially if you want children.
Im a simple dude and I dont need much in life. I dont think I would be any happier with a $5mm net worth vs. a $30mm net worth, and the difference in the level of effort it takes to get to one vs. the other is considerable. Therefore, I honestly think if I hit the $6-7mm range in my 30s I would feel comfortable doing whatever I wanted from a work perspective. However, the likelihood of me hitting that kind of net worth in my 30s is pretty close to zero. Therefore, I continue to smile and wave, just smile and wave boys
Enough to buy a condo on an island and live relaxing and never having to deal with anyone else's bullshit for the rest of my life. I guess you could say it's more of fuck off money instead of fuck you money for me. So while Office Space is known for the famous "If I had a million dollars? I'd do nothing." But that's almost twenty five years old at this point, so it'd probably be more like $10mm minimum thanks to the last few US governmental and Fed administrations deciding to conjure up inflation by injecting trillion after trillion of new money into the economy. I don't need to buy private planes or yachts or any of that to prove anything (literally been there, done that, growing up. Do you know the hourly cost to fly a King Air?). Just wake up whenever I want to. Do whatever I find interesting that day. Maybe own a beach side bar and just "hang out" there all day for all I care. The idea in my answer is that I have enough to shed just about all responsibility to others and be left alone and not the idea of using it as leverage to lean on anyone else.
Boss I hate too tell you but "subtly" standing up for yourself and "confidently staring" aren't the fruits of Fuck You money, those are just... things you should do
All of the $10m+ answers seem to have missed OP's question. We're looking for a smaller number where OP can breath a little easier when his day sucks.
Consider this: Buffett started his investment partnership with the equivalent of only $1 million in today's dollars. It was like $120k back then. I think there's a lesson in there about moving into your preferred career as young as possible and not waiting around to make a lot of money first.
A few years back I had about $400k saved and was hating my job and everything about it. I thought a lot about whether $400k is enough to just quit and take my sweet time finding something else. I was ready to do that but then landed a better job so never gave it a try.
I think somewhere around that mid-six figure savings level should be enough that you're willing to take your foot off the gas or push back in a bad situation.
If you have considerably more than that, you shouldn't be taking an ounce of shit from anyone. At the $700k-$1m level you could always put food on the table and live a spartan life for a really long time with no additional income. Not forever but a long ass time, assuming no wife/kids.
I like your post, but disagree. I think if you have a NW of 700k-1MM and are in your 30s with three children, you cant really afford to up and leave at all. You likely have a mortgage, and three colleges to pay for, as well as the cost of raising the three children, which will likely cost between 200k-1mm per child. God forbid you have a medical crisis or someone gets really sick, or you want to, you know, retire one day.
If you're in your 20s and understand you will inevitably have to work for someone else again or risk the majority or a good portion of your savings to start your own business, then yes 700k - 1M should be sufficient.
99% of us in finance are chained to our jobs which is why we care so much about exit opps. Very early retirement isnt on the table for anyone except the 1% that can make it to rainmaker status by 35. Every intern on here dreams of being that 1%, but as we age we get hit with the cold hard reality of the fact that 99% of us simply arent that 1%.
I had no wife & kids as a condition. So not much disagreement.
I think the primary advantage of having ~$500k saved at a young age is that it's enough to cover you for a long enough time to be really focused in the next venture. Which could just as easily be a job search as a new business.
Just for example, say you're one of the many folks at the Associate/VP level in IB who wanted to do PE/VC/HF but missed the traditional entry point. Maybe you also feel that even if the opportunity arose, you'd lose the competition for the seat because you lack XYZ tools/knowledge that would make you really competitive. And further, those non-traditional searches can take long enough that for someone with only 2 years savings, the anxiety of watching the bank account dwindle would limit the search quality and make it impractical to even begin.
This is where I think that extra level of savings can be life-changing. The number itself depends on a lot, but the idea is that it's only a fraction of the retirement number and still enough to make someone think "I have several years for this if necessary" so they can pursue it really well instead of pursuing it with limitations.
Which doesn't even mean take the plunge. It just means, to OP's concern, that the asshole boss needs to come correct from now on.
Think an important distinction here is net worth vs. savings. For net worth tied up in a house/401k/529 etc agree 500-1 mn not enough but if those are at "appropriate levels" for age/income/family status and you have 1 mn in an emergency fund i.e. liquid savings then I think you are approaching the "eff you job" status mentioned
My number is similar to yours, but maybe a bit lower. No kids and no mortgage, so if I'm in a horrible work situation I can walk away already and cover my own expenses for at least a few years with 0 work and with 0 lifestyle reduction.
That number isn't very high. I'm also assuming I will get back to work in <1 year if I ever have to walk away, while taking my time to find a great role. At the same time, I used to be a consultant and I'm positive I could earn some side income as a freelance consultant (could possibly even make more than most normal jobs) if I ever need to walk away from something.
Warren Buffett's dad was a US Congressman.
A lot harder for someone to decide to just go all in on a business venture or a career they're passionate about when they have to give up the surety of a solid paycheck that is supporting their parents and their children.
Not getting this comment.
First of all Buffett's dad was only upper middle class. Just like the parents of 80-90% of the people reading this.
But what really throws me is you said its "hard to give up the surety of a solid paycheck" which . . . I mean, yeah, but that's what this whole thread is about. It's about what amount of money would one need, given that they have these other concerns. So I'm not really picking up what you're putting down I guess.
Why are you all so obsessed with "fuck you money?"
Sir, have you gotten lost and taken a wrong turn on the internet? This is www.wallstreetoasis.com
Freedom for me.
"Can we get this done for tomorrow morning". Fuck you, no
"Can we chat Sunday afternoon". Fuck you, no thanks
"Please add these 10 new pieces of analysis in v23 of the deck for tomorrow". Guess what, fuck you.
I think you need confidence, not money buddy
Array
confidence doesn't pay bills
Depends who you're saying fuck you to. IBD VP comp would be more than enough for me to shit on 99% of people I went to school with.
FU money is more than out-earning your classmates. It is about the ability to be completely independent of everything, forever.
"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
FU money to me is $0. I live life on my own terms.
Homeless
"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
"It's either Axelrod Hall or go fuck yourself hall"
- Bobby Axelrod
"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
It's different for everyone, but for me it would probably be enough to not think about money. I'm not big into luxury cars or a huge house (don't want too much maintenance or attention lol). Smaller house/apt but in nice area would be important. The two big things I might splurge on is private school tuition for kids and flying business class.
Personally probably $20-25M+. Know two families with net worth of at least $25M (one family is well over $50M, probably $100M+) back where I grew up and they live extremely well off. Their children had an incredible leg up vs. other peers IMO because of their family connections. Most of them were humble but I can think of one of these families where their youngest child is a super smart kid - went to a target school / started up on the MF buyside post undergrad. Eventually started his own fund but still drops an extraordinarily amount of money on 'amenities' that he grew up with back home. Not going to be too specific because I'm not sure if this kid lurks on here.
Ridiculous homes and car collections. The richer family of the two has a helipad at their home to fly into NYC whenever they like. The other family has a car collection that's worth around ~$3M.
Both generated wealth through entrepreneurship - not pure tech companies but think tech-enabled services / products.
To your point, this isn't retirement money but more like the kind of money where you can stand up at your job, say I quit, and take a year to find something else with a worse comp progression. If you have a family, that's a family decision. As a single person (who may or may not have a family), that's probably 2-3m
Wrong. F U Money is forever.
"If you always put limits on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them." - Bruce Lee
Haha, don't just come at me as "wrong." OP specified they weren't looking for "retirement money" answers, so I tried to qualify my definition of F U money if it isn't the amount you're good retiring on. Damn. In the past I've answered the retirement question before, which to me is 10-15m without kids and 20-25m with kids
30 million
Like most things it depends and assuming current income/lifestyle is adequate to meet expenses/debt service/savings, I would propose:
1.) what are you/your family's annual expenses in a comfortable not belt pinching scenario- include annual retirement/college savings contributions and if you had to buy health insurance yourself
2.) include any major cap ex needs over the next few years (house, car whatever)
3.) what is a realistic timeline given your skillset that you could land a similar paying new gig if you were choosy to find a nice employer (incorporate examples of people you know who went through this)
#3 * 2 * #1 + #2 + #1 or lets assume number 3 is 1.5 years, 1 is 300k, and 2 is 100k then would be 1.5 *2 *300K +100k + 300k or 1.3 mn in a pure liquid emergency fund NOT counting any retirement/college/other investments or said otherwise ~4.5 years true annual expenses to maintain current lifestyle in emergency fund savings outside investments
*where this gets really tricky is if you dont think you can land a job at current income or if currently living well beyond means
**This assumes "eff you" money means you are not beholden permanently to any employer/in-law/other source of $ as the OP suggests; if one were referring to true "eff you" money of never really working again, spend without looking at bills and/or disregarding any/all social norms then think the mid 8 figure suggestions are reasonable
x16 of your annual lifestyle cost =
x1 is taken out each year to cover your lifestyle
x15 is invested to generate x1.05 of your lifestyle cost/yr. (assuming the 7% benchmark).
*the x16 could be way lower or way higher depending on where you live (Spain vs. US). So you may not have "f u money" in one country, but you'll do in another one
**depending on how frugal/lavish your lifestyle is the x16 can change drastically
Search timebrook investment if interested in crypto
Depends. If you want to just buy one $15M house and fly first class forever, $30M should do the job. Else $50M minimum in my opinion
surprised at how high all of these answers are. 10mm means 500k+ pretax income just in annual capital gains alone, which is more than enough for anyone. maybe i'm just way off base... like you don't need to work if you're making 500k as a family. no, it's not private planes, but the question is f you money, and to me that = not having to work again if you don't want to. *shrugs shoulders*. That said, i'm not a believer in earning it just to die with it in the bank / leaving it on to my kids. would rather have 10mm and drain it down as i age, spending my young years traveling. sorry kids, our gift to you was your brains, work ethic, and leaving them with more cash than we had when we started eg pay off college and have some money for them when we pass, but they don't need the 10mm. don't really care about a dynasty once i'm in the dirt.
I feel like "fuck you" money is just being financially independent.
it's not even about money. I see plenty of senior people at my firm making very good money (own multiple multi-million houses etc.) and they're in constant fear of losing the job and will do anything it takes to save their ass including being pushed around.
and I see people who work minimal wage and they don't care and won't let anybody push them around. for example, I had a furniture delivery about a year ago, my doorman was rude to the delivery guy or something, so the delivery guy just said fuck you and drove away and marked the delivery as "unable to deliver". I also had uber eats drivers just taking my food and marking it as delivered. some people just don't give a fuck.
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