Coast FIRE with $500K

What $500K pays for at 65

If you add nothing more and leave $500,000 invested until 65, this is the yearly spending it supports, in today's dollars.

Growth is 7% a year before inflation and 3% inflation, about 3.88% a year after it. Social Security and any pension come on top.

Is $500K already Coast FIRE?

"Yes" means $500,000 grows to your full FIRE number (spending divided by 4%) by 65 on its own. Otherwise the cell shows the age you'd cross the line if you kept adding $1,000 a month.

Half a million dollars is the balance where Coast FIRE stops being a distant idea for most people in their 30s. Up to 35 it pays for a $60,000-a-year retirement on its own. After 45 it’s a strong start that still needs years of saving.

Who has $500,000 saved, and how unusual is it?

Unusual at any age. In the Federal Reserve’s 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances, the median retirement account balance for families aged 35 to 44 who had one was $45,000, and for families aged 55 to 64 it was $185,000. Only about 54% of families had a retirement account at all. Those figures leave out taxable brokerage accounts and pensions, so they understate some households, but a 38-year-old with $500,000 invested is still far ahead of the middle.

People who reach it in their 30s usually got there one of two ways: two incomes and a decade of large 401(k) contributions, or one high salary plus stock compensation. The question they tend to arrive with is whether they can ease off yet, and the tables above answer it for most ages and budgets.

Tobias: three years from the line

Tobias is 38. He has $500,000 across his 401(k) and a Roth IRA, adds $2,000 a month, and expects to spend $65,000 a year in retirement. His FIRE number at 4% is $1,625,000, and his Coast FIRE number today is $580,893. He’s $80,893 short.

At his current pace he crosses the line at 41. After that, the money he already has grows to his full number by 65 without another deposit. If he keeps investing the whole way, he reaches full FIRE at 57 instead.

Two changes move that date more than you’d expect. If he budgets $75,000 for retirement instead of $65,000, he reaches Coast FIRE at 46. Planning on a 3.5% withdrawal rate instead of 4% does about the same: he’d get there at 46. Neither is a wrong choice. They’re the two numbers I’d want him to settle honestly before he cuts his contributions, because a five-year swing in the date comes from a guess about spending 27 years from now.

Coasting at 41 or retiring at 57?

This is the real decision at $500,000, and the calculator can’t make it for you. If Tobias stops saving at 41, he can take a lower-paying job he likes more, cover his current costs, and still retire at 65 on $65,000 a year. If he keeps his $2,000 a month going, he’s done at 57 and doesn’t need to work at all.

I’d split the difference. Once he’s past the line, I’d have him keep the employer match and treat everything above it as optional. That keeps the free money, and it lets him drop to part-time or a calmer job without feeling that he’s broken the plan. The guide to what to do after Coast FIRE walks through the other versions.

What $500,000 doesn’t tell you

The account mix matters. A dollar in a traditional 401(k) is worth less than a dollar in a Roth IRA, because withdrawals are taxed as ordinary income. If most of your balance is pre-tax, budget for that tax in your spending figure or you’ll overestimate what you can live on.

Home equity doesn’t belong in the number unless you plan to sell and move somewhere cheaper. Neither does money you’ll need for a house down payment or a child’s tuition in the next ten years. Count only what you’ll leave invested until retirement.

Social Security works in the other direction. Every table on this page ignores it, so a benefit of $20,000 or $25,000 a year from 67 lowers your target by several hundred thousand dollars. The Social Security version of the calculator shows how much, using the estimate from your own statement.

And the 7% return is an assumption. A decade of poor returns early on could push Tobias’s date back by years. If you want to see how often the plan works when markets don’t cooperate, run it through the Monte Carlo calculator before you cut back.

Other balances: Coast FIRE with $100K, Coast FIRE with $200K, Coast FIRE with $300K, Coast FIRE with $1M, Coast FIRE with $3M. You can compare them all on one page, or see the Coast FIRE number by age from 20 to 60.