
I Am Retiring at 32. Should’ve Done It Years Ago - Envec83
http://danielscocco.com/i-am-retiring-at-32-shouldve-done-it-years-ago/
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anu7df
Yet another lifestyle article with pearls of wisdom like drastically reducing
expenses by cutting maid service and weekly massages. Do these guys even know
what real life struggle is for most people? Not sure why this is up on the
front page. He is able to retire at 32. Good for him. Let's move on and talk
about something meaningful or at least fun.

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pasquinelli
i thought you must've been exaggerating about the maid service and weekly
massages.

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dhruvkar
To be (sort of) fair, he's based out of Brazil. In many developing countries,
maid service and massages is fairly standard for the middle class.*

source: I lived in India and China.

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supercoder
Cool, why didn't I think of just not working, it's so simple.

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ZenoArrow
I understand your sarcasm, but I think you may have missed what the author is
getting at.

Looking at what the author uses as a definition for work, he's basically
implying he wants to make money a secondary goal. In other words, instead of
working for the sake of earning money, find something you enjoy and find a way
to earn a living doing that. The difference comes down to whether you'd enjoy
doing what you do as a job even if you didn't get paid. If you'd enjoy it even
without earning money, then the argument is that it's not really 'work' (I'm
using that term loosely as pursuing your interests may still take up a lot of
time and effort).

That seems to be the basic gist of it. I'm sure we've heard similar messages
before, but it's still good to see people learn from their experiences. I wish
the author well with enjoying his new path.

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smsm42
> find something you enjoy and find a way to earn a living doing that

If that is what is called "retirement", I've been retired since I was 15!
Thanks for finally opening my eyes to that! I guess I don't need those 401ks
and IRAs now - I'm retired already, so no point in saving for retirement.

> If you'd enjoy it even without earning money, then the argument is that it's
> not really 'work'

I'm not sure redefining words to have weird meanings specific for one's
argument is going to convince anybody in that argument.

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peterlk
Here's the cached copy.

[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:8xTiQWh...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:8xTiQWh4_joJ:danielscocco.com/i-am-
retiring-at-32-shouldve-done-it-years-ago/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

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TACIXAT
Summary - OP works hard for money for some time and then decides that isn't
fun. Now they work only on things that interest them and call that retirement.

As someone interested in financial independence and early retirement, this
blog was not what I expected.

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pyrophane
This post is climbing really fast despite not really having anything
interesting to say. What's going on here?

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dahdum
For anyone considering early retirement, I highly recommend following this
subreddit:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence](https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence)

Also recommend this calculator focused around early retirement, accounts for
inflation, decreased spending as you age, social security, etc..

[http://www.firecalc.com/](http://www.firecalc.com/)

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matchagaucho
_"...my first company runs pretty much on autopilot now. Company [x] is being
managed by my co-founder."_

That's not really retiring. That's delegating day-to-day operational
management.

Watching over a portfolio of passive income assets is basically the "job" of
an Investor/Owner.

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outericky
Assuming you have enough money to survive the rest of your life, then retire.
If not, you'll be back. And understand it gets harder with age. Want a family?
those 16 hr days to run that business get nearly impossible. Want to return to
work 18 years later at 50 because you realize you have at least 30 more years,
and not enough money? Good luck finding that dream job.

Of course this is all possible, but it's very easy to be shortsighted.

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hkmurakami
It's all about balance and tradeoffs. OP isn't really "retired" per se, since
his projects have a positive monetary expectation. But he's decided to make
tradeoffs and made following his curiosity and interest a priority, instead of
putting money first.

The more relevant question is to ask ourselves what our priorities are, and if
possible, be able to answer, what our _#1_ priority is -- the one we truly
want to maximize. Once we know that, then we can look at the paths we have
available to maximize this, and what sort of tradeoffs with other valuable
factors (like money!) it would entail, and whether it's something that makes
sense in each of our lives.

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allemagne
Deciding to give up some lavishness and to stop working after acquiring some
passive income and a reputation to fall back on seems like a pretty
straightforward if healthy decision for somebody who can afford the luxury.

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smoreilly
Gotta love when the front page of hacker news takes down a blog

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codecamper
sounds like yet another scam from someone who actually makes money by selling
a guide on how to retire before 40. yada yada

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kchoudhu
Plenty of people are noping out of the rat race in their early 30s.

It's one of the few joys of working in this lovely industry of ours.

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themagician
What is plenty? 1%? 2%?

It's possible, but it's difficult. In most cases luck ends up being a huge
factor whether you want to admit it or not. For many in the Bay Area it just
comes down to good timing: moved here 10 years ago, locked into a monthly
payment less than $1,500/mo, spent the last few years making ~$200k. Sure, you
put in the time. But someone else can put in the time today doing the same
thing you did and they will have a completely different outcome. It's not
reproducible, because the largest factor was good (lucky) timing.

The hardest thing to do is reduce you monthly housing expense. The best
"advice" is actually playing the which-city-should-I-live-in lottery. Pick
correctly and the 30% of your income that goes towards housing can increase by
200-300%. 10 years later, there's your retirement. Pick incorrectly and you'll
be stuck with average gains like everyone else.

It's just a different kind of lottery. You can make a smart bet, but it's
still a bet.

