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Is the F.I.R.E concept possible ?

By definition, it is a known fact that ‘retirement’ is a stage in life when a person decides to leave their workforce, business and career mainly because of the age factor or health-related concerns and are willing to live off their sources of income and savings made throughout their earning years. Apart from the financial aspect, conventionally on hearing the word ‘retirement’, we associate an individual’s personality with having a sedentary lifestyle, consuming simple food or following a timebound schedule.

However, there is now a deviation to this thought process. The ‘FIRE’ movement i.e., ‘financial independence to retire early’ has caught the attention of the younger generation in recent years. It is a thought process where in the individual wants to retire between the age of 40-50 and challenges the conventional methods of working till the age of 60 or beyond.
The question that emerges here is whether have they given enough thought to this so-called revolutionary idea.

Keeping aside the financial calculations, they need to think about many practical thoughts such as: Post their early retirement, apart from pursuing their passion or desire to travel at their will or simply live a relaxed life, what type of soft ancillary activity are they going to do to keep themselves occupied? If they wish to retire in their mid-40s, it might be a cosy scenario for the first few years but for how many years can one enjoy their ‘stay at home’ tenure or even pursue their passion? Would it be apt for them to sit at home without an active profession for the next say 25-30 years of their life? Their children that yet might be growing may need their parent’s support, have they prepared for that?

Another challenge could be what if they wish to return to work out of boredom or any other reason at a later stage in their life. It would be difficult for the early retired individual to pick up the threads after taking a break. The next generation after them would be moving in the fast lane. Technology today is developing and growing by the minute and the updates and changes could be a challenge faced by them if they might have to start afresh due to the age factor in spite of having years of work experience.

Numerically speaking, if they are willing to retire at the age of say 40 or 45, how much of a retirement corpus will they require? This needs to be properly calculated in order to avoid unfortunate scenarios at the time of retirement. Many factors such as inflation, post-retirement expenses, current age, life expectancy and retirement age are to be considered while calculating a retirement corpus. Current life expectancy has increased because of better health care services as well.
Can one imagine that even if one were to determine the corpus required to retire at an early age during their initial career phase, what level of stress or real hustle would one have to undergo during his working life to achieve the FIRE goal?

These questions might seem gruelling to someone who is focused on getting out of the rat race but they are as much crucial.
It is easy to glamourize this new budding concept but somewhat difficult to pull it off.

Here are some ways to commence your journey towards achieving this goal of retiring early:

• Start Early – If you begin to aim for this goal at an early stage and with discipline, you give enough time for your money to generate wealth and consistently take full advantage of the power of compounding.
• Secure High-Paying Job – The more you earn, the more you can save and invest for the long term. You might have to restrain your existing lifestyle expenses to save substantially and make the right investment decisions for the goal.
• Invest in the right instruments – The investment made solely for retirement corpus could be in EQUITY for the long term in order to reach the target corpus. The equity component in the portfolio has to be dominant as there is a long life span.
• Insurance – One must have sufficient life and health insurance as per their financial profile but for a LONG TERM. While calculating the retirement corpus, they should also keep in mind the premiums to be paid for these insurance policies.
• Clear Liabilities – In the post-retirement age, there will already be a lot of expenses for an individual to take care of without having a regular source of income. One must clear all the loans and liabilities in the short term since it would be difficult for an individual to provide for paying an EMI as well from the corpus in the post-retirement age.

Given the above points which seem easier said than done in reality, it is important to be sure of your thoughts and aspirations of retiring early and the subsequent benefits and consequences of it. In reality, the goal of retiring early may not be the only goal in an individual’s life. There are other goals which one would want to pursue during a lifetime.
Let’s not forget that wealth is no doubt a crucial aspect but one should also maintain good health at all times in order to enjoy these pleasures in life.

A parting thought – This concept of FIRE is yet debatable as we do not have ‘successful cases’ justifying it, but for sure this concept is nullified by none other than the biggest icon of our Indian film industry, Mr. Amitabh Bachchan who is yet blessed to be working at the age of 80 has a different FIRE in his belly and is not even thinking about his retirement!