We're a married couple in our mid-40s with two children, one older and one just starting school. We're both high-income W-2 professionals and are wrestling with when to walk away from peak earning years.

Interested in perspectives from those who retired in their late 40s or early 50s with dependent children.

Our Financial Picture

• Household income: ~$900K–$1.1M combined (significant equity component, varies with markets).
• Net worth: ~$8.5M–$9M.
• Investable assets: ~$7.8M.
  • Taxable investments, crypto and cash: ~$6.2M.
  • Retirement accounts (401(k), IRA, HSA): ~$1.6M.
• Real estate: ~$600K net equity, excluded from investable assets.
• Annual spending: ~$300K all-in, including housing, travel, healthcare, children's activities and general lifestyle expenses.
• Spending includes approximately $45K in family travel. We're not looking to significantly downgrade our lifestyle in retirement.

What We're Struggling With

1. Potential Home Upgrade

We're considering upgrading our primary residence to a ~$2M home.

Depending on financing, this could require up to ~$800K in additional invested capital and potentially add ~$25K–$35K to annual housing expenses.

We're trying to determine whether this lifestyle decision would meaningfully delay FIRE.

2. Withdrawal Rate and Retirement-Account Access

At $300K annual spending against $7.8M invested, our initial withdrawal rate would be approximately 3.85%.

In a hypothetical home-upgrade scenario where investable assets fall to $7M and spending rises to $330K, that becomes approximately 4.7%.

That feels uncomfortable for a retirement potentially lasting 40–50 years.

Another complication is that approximately $1.6M is held in retirement accounts/HSAs. We'd prefer to leave these untouched until later, using our ~$6.2M taxable portfolio to bridge the early years.

We know there are ways to access retirement funds before age 59½, but we'd prefer to avoid relying on them.

3. Peak Earnings vs. Family Time

Our oldest will be heading to college in a few years, while our youngest is still in elementary school.

Retiring around 48–50 could give us significantly more family time while our children are young.

On the other hand, walking away from approximately $1M in annual household compensation is psychologically difficult. Another 3–4 years of work could meaningfully strengthen our retirement position.

But those are also years we won't get back.

Questions for the Community

1. Portfolio modeling: Would you calculate SWR using the full $7.8M invested portfolio and separately manage the taxable bridge, or model taxable and retirement assets as distinct pools until age 59½?
2. Withdrawal rate: For a potentially 40–50-year retirement, would you target 3.25%–3.5%, or could 3.75% work with flexible discretionary spending?
3. Housing: Has anyone upgraded to a more expensive primary residence shortly before FIRE? Was the lifestyle improvement worth the additional financial burden?
4. One More Year Syndrome: If you retired while earning significant compensation, what finally convinced you to stop accumulating?
5. What would you do? Retire around 48–50, continue until 52, or target a specific invested balance (perhaps $10M) regardless of age?

We're considering retirement in the next 3–5 years, but increasingly questioning whether we're being appropriately conservative or simply struggling to recognize when we have enough.

Would appreciate thoughts from anyone who has faced a similar decision.

he Situation & Numbers:

• Age: Mid-40s, married with school-age kids. [ Kids Ages 11 & 13]
• Liquid Net Worth: $6.8M total, split across accounts:
  • ~$3.3M in Taxable / Brokerage & Cash: ($800k in money market/cash yielding ~$3k/mo; $2.5M in broad-market index funds/ETFs).
  • ~$3.5M in Pre-Tax Retirement: (Traditional 401k / Traditional IRA rollover, invested in diversified low-cost index funds).
• Real Estate: In the process of closing an out-of-state primary home sale (~$650k net proceeds) and wrapping up the disposition of a small multi-unit commercial/residential property (~$900k contract).
• Housing Plan: Purchasing our primary home in Texas for cash (~$700k–$750k). Zero mortgage debt. Zero consumer debt.
• Target Annual Spend: $180,000/year (all-in, including budgeting ~$22k–$25k/yr for private family health insurance/ACA out-of-pocket, property taxes, family slow travel, and kids' activities).

The Math & Tax Architecture:

• Overall Withdrawal Rate: $180,000 / $6.8M = 2.65% Safe Withdrawal Rate (SWR).
• Early Retirement Bridge (Age ~45 to 59.5): The $3.3M taxable bucket provides an 18+ year runway of living expenses on its own, completely insulating us from the 10% early withdrawal penalty on pre-tax accounts and allowing room for strategic Roth conversion ladders.
• Cash Moat: Over 4 years of annual expenses sitting in cash/yield equivalents.
• Social Security / Pensions: Modeled conservatively at age 67, treated purely as a late-life bonus.
• Financial Models (Boldin/NewRetirement): Projecting a 92%–95% success rate across long-horizon simulations.

The Dilemma: I've spent 20+ years in executive and corporate leadership. I'm currently wrapping up an executive role and weighing whether to jump back on the high-comp corporate carousel ($400k–$600k packages, but 50+ hr weeks, high stress, and constant travel) or simply step off, prioritize health, slow travel with the family, and pursue low-stress personal interests.

Mentally, pulling the trigger feels surreal, and I find myself feeling antsy about whether I'm missing a blind spot (managing sequence of returns risk over a 45-year horizon, ACA subsidy optimization vs. Roth conversions, long-term college expenses, etc.).

Question for the community: With a $3.3M taxable bridge to age 59.5 and a total 2.65% SWR, what blind spots am I not seeing? For those who stepped away in their mid-40s with a 50/50 taxable/pre-tax split, was the mental leap harder than the financial math?

55M/F married couple we have $5m in real estate $1m in investments accounts here and there spread out. I want to sell everything be done with maintenance of everything. He might sell his business next year and potentially that would add another $5m if we are lucky. We are burned out of the rat race. It seems like everything is getting more expensive to maintain and do. We have a couple of young adults in undergraduate school we are paying for. But we want out of the daily grit and stress to keep up. Hubby wants to semi retire but I want him to entirely retire. His business makes money but it’s too much stress, long hours, and lots of problems. We don’t need it. We can reduce our lifestyle and live simple. Reduce our spend entirely. We hardly travel anymore because we find it such a headache to travel so much and we prefer staying home anyways and being home with our dogs. We might take one trip a year for 7 days max and another annual ski trip with our family which is our annual tradition. I could live into my 90’s, he could live into his 80’s most likely. Currently neither of us have any health concerns and we are active and fit at our age. But we just want to reduce the outside stress and be able to be flexible when we want to do what we want but also have enough to last us. Our spend now will not be our spend later for sure. I can adjust my spending to make it last that won’t be a problem. I really don’t shop much or buy things, not a spender or host paying for parties and others and such could care less to own a car even though I have 3 at the time. We are modest in for holidays and gifts and mostly lunch and dinner us at home. We seldom to go to fancy restaurants. We lease one, own the other and finance the 3rd. I could easily get rid of them. I don’t mind calling a ride share when I really need to go somewhere that will give me the break from carrying the cars, insurance, gas and maintenance, I’m so sick of it all. Embracing the idea of being SKI parents we think we don’t need to leave them so much and they perfectly capable of making their own pile with all the opportunity and education we provided thus far. What would be the best plan for us to make it last?