I hit a milestone this week that I can't share with anyone in real life, so I'm sharing here! I've had a goal for a while of reaching a 300k net worth by my 30th birthday. I just had my birthday this week, and while I didn't quiiiiiiite reach my goal (296k), I'm blaming the recent market activity and celebrating anyway – especially because this is already technically 3x my regular full-time income since I make 96k, not 100k. If you count irregular side income, it's more like 104k in income with 2.8x expenses saved, but still worth celebrating at this milestone birthday if you ask me.
Here is roughly how I did this:
- Kept expenses as low as possible and invested as much as possible. I've always been a natural saver, which was especially important in my early-mid 20s when I was pursuing a graduate degree and making 30-40k. I've never had a car, which is a significant money saver. I also cook my own meals and pretty much never eat out except if a friend group is going as a social activity, and even then I watch the prices pretty carefully. Not drinking much also helps keep costs down, as does not having kids. With all of this, I live in a HCOL area but still only spend about 35-37k/year, the majority of which is rent.
- Invested as much as possible for my income level. In my lower income years, I started making some extra income from side hustles (anywhere from 2k to 36k depending on the year), and I kept my expenses the same as before and invested the extra. Even now with my full-time income of 96k, which started about 1.5 years ago, any extra money that comes my way from side hustles, credit card cash back, etc. always goes straight into my brokerage account (after setting aside a portion for self-employment tax when relevant). Now, I max out my 401k, Roth IRA, and HSA, and contribute as much as I can to a brokerage account with whatever is left over after expenses (usually around $100-500 at the end of each month). I'm also fortunate to receive a 10% retirement contribution from my employer, so in total (me + employer) there is about 48k going into my investments each year.
- Avoided debt. As I mentioned, I don't have a car, and I rent. Another big help is that I don't have student loans, due to a combination of merit scholarships that I applied for and my parents being willing and able to pay what the scholarships didn't cover. This is obviously a huge privilege, and I'm well aware that I wouldn't have hit this milestone so early if I were dealing with student debt.
Anyone else on a similar timeline? What did you focus on after reaching this point? With all my tax advantaged accounts already maxed out, there's not much left for me to focus on other than increasing my income to continue to add more to brokerage. I've also been exploring the idea of CoastFI and wondering if it's worth decreasing my savings rate to be able to spend more on experiences now, but as a naturally frugal person it's hard to be imaginative enough to decide how to spend more or allow myself to do it. Has anyone else been in a similar boat?
300k (3x income) at 30
byu/Empty_Phrase9214 infinancialindependence
Posted by Empty_Phrase9214
1 Comment
Cool. This should be in the daily thread.