r/LeanFireUK

Hi all,

I've just joined this group based on its description, and because I've been noticing lots of high earners on the FIRE UK group who plan to live off 50k a year in retirement. I'm not exactly anti-consumerist or totally minimalist, and neither am I on a low income, but I was slightly at a loss wondering how do you even spend that much? Granted, cost of living is higher some parts of the country, but by that much?!

Anyway, I'm guessing Lean fire peeps are not big spenders prior to stepping way from work life. What's the norm here? Will you plan for any increases in retirement?

This pondering led me to check my spending as I haven't done it in about 5 years - eek! Excepting highly exceptional one off spends (like trips away, new bathroom), it was under 17k a year. My surprisingly big spend is on gifts and special occasions - big family and some big occasions this year.

My other half's (whose finances are separate, and has partial interest in FIRE) yearly spend is 15k - naturally frugal (And fewer gifts/occasions lol). We have 1 child and a paid off mortgage.

This led me to realise I'm close to FIRE, so am considering what my passions are before I jump ship! I'm giving myself 3 years max so I'm not leaping into a fear of unstructuredness! Also, been thinking about making a website for myself to do bits of consultancy (academic) or training in future. I put my heart into building my niche and it'd be sad to lose it completely. But is setting up something small like this more complicated than it sounds??

Thanks - if you've any thoughts on my ramblings, I'd love to hear. :)

Hi everyone,

I’m 23 and currently investing in an all world ETF. I recently crossed the £10k mark and have been consistently contributing since September 2025.

Right now I’m putting in around £500 to £1.2k each month and my goal is to max out my ISA this year.

I was wondering if it makes sense to just keep focusing on the all world ETF or if there are other things I should start looking into investing in as well at this stage.

Would really appreciate hearing your thoughts, experiences, or any advice you might have.

Thank you

Don't worry, I have not started vibe coding.

It's not brand new, but I've just discovered that the earlyretirementnow.com guy has made a web tool FIRE drawdown simulator which I find much more useful than his spreadsheet.

It's here and the only reason I mention it is that it's unique (AFAIK?) feature is that once you input your data, you can use simple sliders to limit the historical scenarios by what CAPE* value they started at and also to limit scenarios by how far into a drawdown you are.

I think this is especially relevant/useful now and actually strangely reassuring in a way, given we're at ridiculously elevated levels at present. Though it obviously shows that higher withdrawal rates fail far more often when you start off at elevated CAPE levels, it also provides reassurance there's huge potential to increase your SWR% rate if you happen to FIRE into a declining market.

I was using it last night (I know how to spend a damn good Friday night) to stress test scenarios where equities drop 40% or so and actually found it quite reassuring.

On the flipside, it is rather interesting that if you slide the CAPE slider all the way up to 40 (roughly where we are now in the US market anyway), then that limits the 1,737 available past scenarios to, um, 6. Which rather shows just how rarefied the air is up here. Though 4% does still work for some parameters!

*For anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about, CAPE is a valation metric one can use to try and say how over/under valued markets are. No metric is perfect, but it does have a reasonable correlation with long term outlook. I wouldn't personally say pin your hopes and dreams or worst fears on it, but use it alongside everything else, including your gut!

I’m 23 and starting to properly learn about investing and personal finance.

If you could go back to your early 20s, what would you focus on first? What mistakes would you avoid? And what ended up mattering way more (or less) than you expected?

Could be investing, budgeting, career choices, debt, saving habits, books/resources, mindset, anything really. Interested to hear what people wish they knew earlier.

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.

As of now I’m investing-

£200 p/w into a cash ISA (for a few months of Solo travel - this is only until September then I will be able to invest in stocks)

£75p/w into a pie that consists of

70%- Vanguard FTSE ALL WORLD
20%- S&P 500
5%- Apple
5%- Microsoft

£25 p/w into Tesla
£25 p/w into NIVDIA

£20 p/w into Bitcoin

How can I improve?
Where am I going wrong?
What are you thoughts?
General advice

Hi all,

I’m 23M and wanted to get some opinions and hear from people with more experience regarding my current situation and what the best thing to do might be.

At the moment, every month I invest into my LISA, which I max out every year without fail, as well as my Stocks & Shares ISA. However, after looking at current house prices, buying just doesn’t feel affordable for me right now.

I’m also in two minds about taking on a mortgage. Part of me doesn’t like the idea of being in debt for such a long time and paying so much interest to the bank before the house is truly mine. Because of that, I’ve been wondering whether it’s better at my age to continue renting, avoid large debt, and focus on maximising my investments and ISAs instead.

My other question is whether there’s still much point continuing to put money into a LISA if buying a house doesn’t seem realistic for me at the moment.

I’d really appreciate hearing your thoughts, opinions, or experiences.

Thank you!

I currently have around £70k in my ISA and I’m hoping to build this up to around £200k–£250k over the next 5 years by maxing out contributions and getting some investment growth.

Hypothetically, if I had £250k in the ISA, could I move it into an investment fund paying around 8–10% annual dividends?

My thinking is that this could potentially generate £20k–£25k a year, which I could use to cover mortgage payments, while switching to reduced hours or part-time work to cover other bills.

Is this realistic, or am I missing something important around dividend yield, risk, sustainability, or ISA rules?

I’m a couple of years into working now and have only recently started taking saving and investing a bit more seriously. At the moment I’m putting away around £300–£350 a month, nothing crazy, but trying to stay consistent and build the habit.

The thing I keep getting stuck on is how much time to spend optimising vs just sticking to the basics. It’s easy to go down the rabbit hole comparing platforms, fees, different setups, etc. But then part of me feels like at this stage, just increasing income and staying consistent probably matters way more than getting every detail perfect. For those further along, what actually made the biggest difference for you early on?

Hi everyone,

I had a question: where does everyone keep their emergency fund?

At the moment, I keep mine in Premium Bonds. They’ve done okay, but I’m not convinced the returns are keeping up with inflation, so I’d be interested to hear where other people hold theirs and why.

Thanks, looking forward to hearing your thoughts and opinions.

I’m 23 and been looking at UK house prices from the 70s–2000s and how much they’ve grown. It made me wonder if what property was for previous generations is now basically index funds/ETFs for ours.

If you just consistently invest in a global ETF over decades, are you not getting roughly similar long-term % growth to property anyway?

ETFs seem to have some obvious upsides
Easy to sell and access cash quickly
No repairs, tenants, maintenance, or surprise costs
You can start with small amounts instead of needing a huge deposit

Property still has its strengths
Leverage via mortgages
Rental income potential
It’s a real asset everyone needs

But it’s also expensive to get into, harder to sell, and comes with ongoing hassle.

Genuinely curious where people land on this. Is this a fair comparison or am I missing something key?

Just a slightly cautionary tale and I can’t tell anyone in real life. Hit FI this month but too pension heavy to take any action. I spent a few years almost maxing pension due to tax relief available. Always fill 20k ISA first as this is such a powerful vehicle for FIRE in the UK.

Focus is now on boosting bridge funds. No rush for retirement, happy with employment…but it sure is reassuring to have funds there just in case.

FI number 575k

Pension 340k
ISA 198k
Cash 13k
Crypto 26k

Annual spend 23k (average of last 5yrs).

Age 37, earliest pension access probably 58, likely older.

Never thought I’d hit “FI” so quickly when I started with ~20k assets to my name in 2020.

All investments are in global all cap. Salary ~70k in 2020 and ~100k now.

Cars owned outright. House has small mortgage remaining ~50k, but in no rush to pay it off.

Just wanted to share my current investing approach and get some opinions on whether I should keep doing what I’m doing or if there’s anything else worth considering.

I’m 23 and currently invest around £500–£1.2k a month into an all world fund. Pretty much all of my investing goes into that, and I’ve recently crossed the £10k mark which I’m happy about.

My plan right now is to keep things simple, stay consistent, and aim towards building it to £100k over time. I know boring investing is usually the best approach, but I’m interested to hear other people’s perspectives, especially from those further along in their journey.

Would you just continue with the same strategy at my age, or is there anything else you’d personally look into alongside it?

Thanks in advance.

Always curious about others networth and their age/ salary/. Married/sharing expenses /single or joint owner/ gender but just knowing other people's achievement

Also curious if you include emergency fund and holiday/spending money fund as part of your networth.

Some days I do and some days I don't.

What have you been working on this week? Please use this thread to discuss any progress, setbacks, quick questions or just plain old rants to the community.