5 Choices That Led to My Early Retirement at 35

I never planned the outcome but the process was deliberate

Photo by Keren Fedida on Unsplash

When there is a whole host of people out there chasing an “early retirement” it may sound pretentious of me to say that I never really planned my early retirement.

Yet, I sit writing this nearly a year into my retirement at the fairly young age of 35.

But facts are facts, and my wife and I never set out a goal of early retirement.

In fact, what triggered my decision was the fact that we wanted either or both of us to be present while our kids were still young. Hence, the only reason I am retired today is because I wanted to be a full time stay-at-home-dad and not because I wanted to quit working.

However, the fact that I was able to make this decision has a lot to do with the fact that we were able to achieve the financial independence or cushion that we needed for such a drastic step.

Despite not having done it with the goal of retiring early, we were very deliberate about how we structured our lives to get to this financial position.

Here are some of the key decisions that got us to this point.

1. Don’t choose your lifestyle for others, but for yourself