How to Retire 10 Years Earlier | Episode 541
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What does it take to retire ten years earlier?
We are back in your life, and today we are talking about how you buy yourself another 10 years of financial freedom. Mike, as we're here at 8 a.m. on a Thursday, a few extra years of freedom doesn't sound too bad.
Yeah, mate, ten extra years sounds great. Um, you know, uh hopefully wouldn't still be working during those ten extra years. Imagine that. I'm gonna buy myself another ten years of working. If you're like, what's the point?
The implied bit of freedom we are talking about for the record.
Retiring earlier? Sixty-five is our current goal. That's where everyone you gotta get to to get the super. You know, that's where you get the big retirement party at work. They give you the box of pizza on the way out. Um Pat on the back. Pat on the back. Thanks for the forty years of service. Um, what happens if you wanna retire ten years early? What does that actually take? Well, you actually gotta have a plan.
Uh so what we're gonna do today is we're gonna roll through um some kind of uh really good tips around how if you want to retire earlier, what you can do. Big thing to say is a lot of people like work. And if you like work, then work longer, spend more money as you go. Uh the other piece is shout out to our friends at MoneyHub. So Money Hub have provided uh this guide. We're gonna pop that in the show notes as well so you go have a read. They got heaps and heaps of Of really useful resources on their website. So if you are as you know, maybe enjoy listening to our voice, but like to read a little bit as well, go check out Money Hub. They got lots of good stuff on there.
Yeah. And when we're talking about big goals like this, it's really important to think about how we set goals, right? Because, you know, I want to retire 10 years early. Well, that's great. That's the big, big, audacious, hairy goal, you know, that we're going to strive for. What we've got to do is break that down into smaller components to figure out like, can I actually achieve that? What is it actually going to take? Because if you just think I'm going to retire 10 years early, you don't do anything about it, chances
Yeah, and everybody's situation is very different. This could be quite an easy goal or an incredibly tough goal to achieve. It just depends on on what's going on. And essentially there's a few variables that you can work through. And essentially this is just prioritizing how important this is to you, right?
A hundred percent. So, James, what does someone actually need to work out before they can start getting stuck into this?
So the first thing you probably gotta do is go like, is this important to me or not? Um, is this something I wanna work towards? And if you've got a partner, is your spouse on the same page? Yeah because nine out of ten couples, I'd say, uh, you know, for whatever reason we attract different money personalities. Uh like I guess
Which one of us is the spinner and which one of us is the saver?
Mate. One of us dresses way better than the other. We win. We're
wearing the exact same thing. You're wearing like we're literally just wearing a different color polar.
Why are the three financial levers (mortgage, spending, investing) essential for early retirement?
Yeah. A couple of finance pros in a finance world. Uh so the first thing you do is go, uh, is this goal important to me? The next piece is going, okay. When we talk about financial freedom, freedom means how much money are we spending and while we've turned off our income tap, right? And we've got assets that can pay us an income. People need different flow from their income tap, right? So some people And they need maybe like 70 grand a year and they're super happy. Yeah. Some people want like three, four hundred thousand dollars a year. And the math on how much money they need to invest, say the pace they need to go at to be financially free, they're completely different games.
Yeah, three or four hundred K a year passive financially free is a hell of a goal. Um, I've got a sneaking suspicion that that's gonna take a lot of assets.
And a lot of yeah, a lot of assets, a lot of income, right? Like the you gotta be consistent, be good time.
Be good time though.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What does it take to retire ten years earlier?
0:00–2:39
2
Why are the three financial levers (mortgage, spending, investing) essential for early retirement?
2:39–5:29
3
How does paying off your mortgage faster accelerate retirement?
5:29–8:31
4
What budgeting strategies help you control spending and free up cash for investing?
8:31–11:49
5
How can you use a detailed budget to track spending and stay on target?
11:49–14:34
6
What investment approach (KiwiSaver optimization, diversified funds) should you use after the mortgage is paid?
14:34–17:36
7
How does the example couple’s numbers illustrate the path to retiring at 55?
17:36–21:01
8
What are the final steps and key take‑aways for building a debt‑free, investing plan?
21:01–22:57
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from Cheques and Balances
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