Has anyone here retired early?

Excellent answer, thank you for the in-depth reply and insight.

Hope to follow in your footsteps in a few years - will keep in touch!

Don't think I've seen your story before - congratulations mate. Enjoy life, you've earned it

Thank you for the post, this is really helpful as someone relatively early in their career looking to pull a similar maneuver (looking at SE Asia specifically). How much did you have at the bank at retirement? What did you do beforehand / what was your earnings trajectory like? Do you have a wife and or kids? Apologies if you addressed this somewhere already in a separate post or comment, I’m happy to look at that too so you don’t have to rehash everything 

I lived in Valencia for six months in college. I love that city. I feel it is very authentic as there are less tourists there than Madrid or Barcelona.

CompBanker

Indeed. I retired a few years ago at 36 at the end of 2021. Spent the following summer in Sardinia, loved it, and started going back for six months every summer. Have since spent time in Valencia, Amman, Cape Town, and the glorious Naples Florida (which is technically my home base, although I’m only there a few months of the year). Planning to spend the first half of next year in Thailand + Japan cause it gets a bit cold here in Sardinia in the winter…

It’s a really strange adjustment at first and it definitely takes a certain type of personality. I initially spent five months in London (where I was working when I retired) and the city takes on a whole new light when you have literally no work to be done. I found myself completely free during the weekdays and filled up my evenings with five-a-side football (soccer) as well as seeing friends when they got off work. Work from home is also a godsend for the retired because working friends can usually break free for lunch. Everything also becomes a lot easier when you aren’t trying to do all of your grocery shopping, go to the gym, schedule a doctor’s appointment etc. after work hours when everyone else on the planet is doing the same activities.

If you don’t have hobbies or the ability to self-entertain, be prepared for a world of boredom or the need to reconstitute your friend circle. Given my desire to travel, I synced up with a bunch of Digital Nomads via a Hacker Paradise trip to Valencia and later two months in Cape Town (www.HackerParadise.org). It was really cool because most of the participants don’t have typical 9-5 jobs, are freelance and make their own hours, or work USA hours despite being located in other time zones, so it gives you a huge community of people to experience things with.

As much as I love a good humblebrag, I got a lot of stunned looks when I told people I was retired. As a solo traveler, I also think it’s dangerous to tell people you are wealthy. Finally (although admittedly the least of my worries), my parents were concerned that I wasn’t doing anything with my life. So I decided to launch a ‘business’ providing career guidance and mentorship to finance professionals — that way I could tell people I was employed. It was originally intended to just be 5-hours a week (and it was at the start), but it’s kind of taken on a life of it’s own and now I find myself putting in 10-20 hours pretty regularly, plus admin time (I know — this is a joke compared to finance hours — but I’m also making about 3% of what I was making in private equity)! Link in my signature block (which may only be visible from a web browser and not the app version of WSO).

Unless you retire with oodles in the bank (I’m talking tens of millions), be prepared to take a step back in lifestyle. Even if you CAN afford it, the fact that you’re no longer earning a paycheck and have to life with your savings is daunting. I overcorrected at first and cut all discretionary spending, but that only lasted for six months or so. You’ve also got to get comfortable with the fact that you COULD have been making millions more if you hadn’t quit, so if you’re easily jealous of others’ wealth, this is definitely not the path for you. In fact, you need to truly feel deep down that you value free time more than anything else in the world — otherwise you’ll struggle interacting with former peers. Basically — you need to live with your choices without regrets.

Relationship wise you can definitely make it work. You will no longer be appealing to someone who values fancy things and flying first class. I personally started dating a girl I met last year in Sardinia. She teaches Italian online so we can pretty much travel anywhere together, which is key. Downside / Upside is a tremendous amount of time together. That said, we managed to crush a pretty complex puzzle this week in less than two days, so life is good. Like me, she doesn’t have expensive hobbies or expectations, so we mesh pretty well. Basically, you need to find a partner who shares the same type of mentality. They are out there, although generally in less abundant supply in major cities.

Going to stop this ramble but hopefully this answers your questions.

Just doing the quick math on this. 10 - 20 hours per week is $125K - $250K per year at $240/hr. If this is 3% of what you were making in PE, that equates to $4M - $8M per year before you left - is that right? Was it hard to leave when you were at the peak of your earnings?

Always love to get an update from you, glad to hear things are going so well. Finding someone with the same values and lifestyle preferences makes life so much mor fulfilling. Hope shes a keeper!

Do you think you'll stay retired? 

Why