I’ll let Tim respond to your other stuff, but just wanted to chime in real quick and say that having $4k/extra a month is pretty damn incredible!! Well done!!

Tim, I feel your pain with health insurance costs.

My wife and I are both 29 (gonna be 30 on Tuesday). She’s a teacher, I’m in the private sector. Household income about $90k, though we’ve been around $70k most of our late 20s.

We finally have all student loans paid. 2% interest loan on her car that we could pay off in 3 months. NW of ~$45k if you consider home equity of $12k on a house worth $85k (we owe $71K), ~$3k in cash.

Retirement accounts: Her pension is worth roughly about $25k, my retirement accounts about $10k (I slacked so we could pay off debt).

Anyway, what I’m getting at is that our living expenses for a family of 3 are right around $2,500/month.

We will be able to start socking away about $4k+ a month starting Jan ’18. My goal is to be done at 40 if not more soon, barring any unforeseen life catastrophes.

My fear is that health insurance is going to start eating away at our savings, and will certainly hinder us from retiring early if there is no end in sight to the health insurance increases we’ve seen the last few years.

I’m also dealing with the dilemma of whether to leave my $38k a year salary job for a straight commission job selling solar systems, which could be anywhere from $0 – $100K+ annually.

If you don’t mind me asking what was your 1st and 2nd career path?

I just want to do work that is more meaningful, and lucrative ain’t a bad byproduct.

Thanks. It’s really not a time consumer. It’s pretty much a “save as” and strip away the unneeded items, decrease a few amounts like rent, and drop the income down.

Daaaaanggg!!!! Crazy low expenses, you are The Man!

Good :)

Hot damn – not a bad position to be in at all!

Never too late!!! Keep going!!

Oh $hit- and if you can keep your spending at $1,000 for awhile, you’ll be banking that money in no time!!! It’s when your lifestyle keeps creeping up that gets us in trouble!