Dual Military FIRE: T-minus 6 years
***Edited due to excellent input from the ChubbyFire Community.
Hello All!
This is meant to act as our countdown post until we FIRE in Summer 2032. We’ve appreciated reading others journies and wanted to catalog and share our own. 6 years out and counting!
About Us: My wife (35) and I (40) are both active-duty military officers. In Summer 2032, my wife will hit 20 years of service and I’ll have 23 years. I am on the legacy retirement system so I’ll retire with the 2.5% x # years of service x average pay over the last 36 months and my wife is on the new Blended Retirement system and so she’ll get 2.0% x # years of service x average pay over the last 36 months + the 5% match into the TSP. My wife is currently an O5 and I am an O4 with about 3 years of prior enlisted service prior to commissioning. We have two kids in high school.
Our FIRE Goal: Upon retirement from the military in Summer 2032, we will no longer need to work nor reduce our lifestyle (18-20k monthly GROSS income). Our combined pensions should pay $140k annually and we plan on our investments to generate the rest. We likely will take on other endeavors, but not driven by need to trade our time for money. We plan to retire to a MCOL area with some favorable taxes for military retirees. We want to buy or build our forever home and move in when we hit retirement. We are looking at houses in the $900,000 - $1.2 million range. ***We have access to Fee Free VA Loan funding that does not require a significant down payment, though we plan to do so anyway.***
Our Plan: The foundation of our plan is to accompany our military retirement income with withdrawals from after tax brokerages pre 59 ½ and shift to a 3 bucket withdrawal strategy using retirement accounts. We plan to have our pensions cover our needs and base lifestyle, and for withdrawals to enhance that lifestyle (and cover the mortgage entirely). We plan to do a variable withdrawal strategy with guard rails. We will accept the volatility in income in retirement since our pensions will cover life regardless of the market’s whims.
- INVESTMENT INPUT: Over the last 2 years we are averaging 100k invested annually. We anticipate a promotion in the next 18 months that will increase that savings rate. Even sustaining 100k annually over the next 6 years would likely put us over the targeted 2.5 mil.
Current Monthly Investment Minimums: (Though we average more.)
- After Tax Brokerage: $5k
- Roth TSP: $1000 (Enough to get my wife’s 5% match and no more)
- (Backdoor) Roth IRA: ~$1400 (Max)
- HYSA: $500
- Short Term Savings (Travel): $250
- 529’s: $280
- ANTICIPATED RETURNS: BLUF is we use 10% as our anticipated returns, understanding market volatility is a real thing. We largely invest in VIGAX Large Cap Growth Fund. It's 10 year average return is 17.75% compared to the S&P 500 at ~13%. I have no plans to shift into target retirement funds or change my allocation away from 100% index stock. So 10% average return feels feasible to me. So if we sustain our investment rate of 100k annually (through multiple anticipated pay increases over the next 6 years) and we have a return of 10%, that would have us sitting at 2.8 million.
- WITHDRAWAL STRATEGY: We have not complete finalized our withdrawal strategy as of right now. However, the Variable Withdrawal Strategy (VWS) with guard rails that has us withdrawing between 3% and 6% initially appeals the most to me at the moment. We can weather market volatility by keeping our fixed expenses below our fixed retirement income. No sequence of return risks either which is a plus.
- BURN RATE: We are averaging approximately 9k burn rate each month which includes travel and other luxuries. In retirement, we'd anticipate 12-14k being incredibly comfortable.
A look at the numbers: Everything is in today (2026)’s dollars.
Current Liquid Net Worth: $1.1 million
Debt: None
Current Monthly Net Income: ~21k (no Basic Housing Allowance since we are stationed abroad but our housing is covered.)
Current Balances:
- Brokerage Balance: $590k
- TSP Balance: $302k
- Roth IRA: $120k
- HYSA (Sinking fund and Emergency Fund): $37.5k
- College Savings Goal: Allow the kids to go to an in-state school debt free.
o GI Bill: I’m splitting my GI bill between my two kids which will cover 2 years of their college each.
o 529s:
§ Kid 1: 26k
§ Kid 2: 20k
- Pensions:
o Me: Making a safe assumption that I make O5 and hit high three before we retire, my pension should be approximately $84,500 a year or about $7,000 a month.
o Wife: Assuming my wife also retires as an O5 high three, her pension will be $56,160 a year or about $4,700 a month.
o Disability Pay: Both my wife and I have some wear and tear and will likely have some disability income. However, we are not counting on this income at this time.
o Inflation Adjusted: The pensions increase each year based off the same cost of living increases that the active duty receive, ultimately stabilizing the spending power of the pension over time and combating inflation.
o Survivors Benefit: We do not plan to take the survivors benefit for either of us as we have a laddered Term life insurance that would replace the pensions and phases out as we become more self insured over time. This keeps more money in our pockets.