I’m trying to sanity-check how I’m allocating savings given an early retirement goal, and I’m curious how others here think about this.

    I’m 23, living in the Bay Area. I make about $200k total comp. After taxes and all expenses, I’m able to save roughly $100k per year. My goal is to retire somewhere in the 35–45 range.

    My current accounts look roughly like this: about $80k in a taxable brokerage, ~$25k in a Roth IRA (I’ve been maxing it every year since my early 20s, backdoor as needed), ~$50k in a 401k, and ~$8k in an HSA. Also have roughly 25k in a HYSA as my emergency fund. (~180k total NW)

    Right now I’m contributing to my 401k only enough to get the full employer match, maxing my Roth IRA, maxing my HSA, and putting the rest into a taxable brokerage. I’m not doing a mega backdoor Roth.

    I see a lot of advice that says to always max every tax-advantaged account, but that advice seems more geared toward people retiring closer to 60. Since I’ll need to fund a long “bridge” period before 59½, prioritizing taxable feels more important to me than allocating money into accounts I won’t touch for decades.

    For people aiming for early FIRE, how do you think about the balance between taxable and retirement accounts? How much is “enough” in tax-advantaged accounts if you don’t plan to work into your 50s? And at what point does maxing a 401k stop making sense?

    Early retirement (35–45) — how much should go to taxable vs retirement accounts?
    byu/reptile24 infinancialindependence



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