Under $100k Avg Annual Income Millionaires and How You Did It?

[quantAndHold]

It’s really just math. $1m is 10x of $100k. To get to 10x, you need to save roughly 15% of your gross for about 25 years, depending on asset allocation and returns.

But by then you will probably need 3 million to have what 1 million buys today.

I don’t disagree. OP asked how get $1m, not how to get the spending power of $1m, or whether $1m will be enough for anything useful.

The answer is, though, is to save 15-20%, invest sensibly, and after 30-40 years, you’ll be financially independent, at whatever amount it takes to be financially independent then.

All of these discussions need to take inflation into account. I mean, my first post college job paid $28k. My last one paid $280k. Some inflation was involved.

[teen persuasion]

Man, you guys are a bunch of pessimists.

You CAN get to a million in retirement accounts with kids.
You can get there with lower income.
You can get there in under 40, or 30 or 20 years.

It's all about saving rate, and being efficient, especially with things like taxes and college.

We popped over the two comma line last year, at age 57. We have 5 kids, youngest is currently in college. DH retired mid 2021, I'm working part time. DH's peak income was low $50k, for his last 3 years; prior to that his income was in the $30ks and $20ks. My peak year was last year, exactly $30k, but mostly teens and low $20ks. I was a SAHM for nearly 20 years and have only been working the last 15 or so years.

Our mortgage rate was an ugly 9.75%, so early on I worked on paying it down early whenever I could manage. I had written out an amortization schedule for myself on the back of an envelope, so I could track payoff. I could see that payments early on made more progress - if my principal portion of that month's payment was only $50, then adding an extra $200 knocked 4 months off the end date. So windfalls were applied there, monthly, and any tax refunds were applied as a lump sum.

Tax refunds were a big part of paying off the mortgage. Initially they were in the $3500 range annually, all kid related refundable credits. Around 2008 or 2009, DH's employer decided to cut their 401k match; he'd been contributing only the 5% to capture the match - not very much on ~$35k or less. He thought he should stop contributing altogether; I realized we needed to increase his contributions to replace the lost match. So I tweaked his withholding to see if I could double the contribution to 10% w/o changing the take home noticeably - with the refundable credits and 5 kids, we didn't need anything withheld at all, actually. Success! I began working part-time very low hours to start, a bit more income, I had him double his contributions again. Still painless. Doubled them again, now up to 40%, from 5%. The interesting part was how reducing his AGI affected those refundable credits - I did a deep dive into how the CTC vs EITC were affected by our numbers. EITC with 3+ kids has a high phaseout rate of 21%, effectively an additional marginal rate, and since EITC is matched by our state at 30% that is another 6.3% marginal rate. So it makes sense to capture as much EITC as possible by driving down our AGI and w2 wages. Our tax refunds rose to $10-11k annually, which we used to knock down our mortgage. It was paid off in less than 15 years. Once that was gone, we diverted the tax refunds to fund a Roth IRA for each of us. Once the mortgage payment was gone, we could increase DH's 401k contribution to max it for the first time.

We were about 43 when we made these changes and got serious about saving for retirement above a token 5%. DH's 401k balance was less than $20k, and a previous employer account was also less than $20k, so we had < $40k in retirement at that date and dropping with the market in 2008-9. Thus we began dumping money in at the bottom and rode it up, accidentally. Tax refunds continued to be used to max 2 Roth IRAs, until 2020 in anticipation of DH retiring in the near future. I got access to a SIMPLE IRA mid 2019, and immediately tried to max it, shifting some of DH's contributions down to compensate. Our three highest combined income years were about $75k each, and we were contributing probably $50k+ to tax deferred accounts, including an HSA.

[CoAndy]

Teen Persuasion, thank you for sharing that. Very nice and inspiring story,

[CyclingDuo]

But by then you will probably need 3 million to have what 1 million buys today.

I don’t disagree. OP asked how get $1m, not how to get the spending power of $1m, or whether $1m will be enough for anything useful.

The answer is, though, is to save 15-20%, invest sensibly, and after 30-40 years, you’ll be financially independent, at whatever amount it takes to be financially independent then.

All of these discussions need to take inflation into account. I mean, my first post college job paid $28k. My last one paid $280k. Some inflation was involved.

We agree with Quant that the math is the easy part.

Amount saved, rate of return, and time required to achieve a certain level of savings/portfolio is no secret. There are numerous calculators and graphics available that tell you how much to save per month starting at any age, and how long it will take to achieve the seven figure mark based on amount of monthly savings, and a certain return.

The discipline portion of the equation of periodic investing/setting aside a portion of your income by having your expenses all in check is the more difficult portion of the equation for far too many. We post many times on the importance of getting the three big expenses right from the get go: housing, transportation, and food. For many, that means taking on a roommate or two in the early going. That's how our generation did it as well back in the 80's and into the 90's. Both my wife and I never had an apartment without a roommate before we met each other and hooked up to start our own dual income household, and eventual family. Ditto for our young adult kids who are out on their own now, as they have a roommate in HCOL cities to help get the equation right on keeping housing costs lower so they can create enough delta to save and invest.

The millionaire study done by the Ramsey Group that fueled the books on millionaires by Chris Hogan and Dave Ramsey showed that the majority of the 10,000+ millionaires they studied had more than $1M as you can see in this graphic (and this was back in 2017-18)...







Or in the words of Charles A. Jaffe, "It's not your salary that makes you rich, it's your spending habits."

Some other data points from the millionaire study...

•Only 31% averaged $100,000 a year over the course of their career, and one-third never made six figures in any single working year of their career.

•The overwhelming majority (79%) of millionaires in the U.S. did not receive any inheritance at all from their parents or other family members. While 1 in 5 millionaires (21%) received some inheritance, only 3% received an inheritance of $1 million or more.

•Three out of four millionaires (75%) said that regular, consistent investing over a long period of time is the reason for their success. So, the story about the young computer genius who developed an app that earned millions overnight is the exception, not the rule.

https://www.ramseysolutions.com/retirem ... s-research

CyclingDuo

•Update to the post we made in this thread years ago...

How long was our combined gross income under $100K?: 1985 - 2010, and now single income household from 2024 to present for a total of 28 IRS years.

How long was our combined gross income $100K or more?: 2011 - 2023 for a total of 13 IRS years.

[Bulldawg]

Man, you guys are a bunch of pessimists.

You CAN get to a million in retirement accounts with kids.
You can get there with lower income.
You can get there in under 40, or 30 or 20 years.

It's all about saving rate, and being efficient, especially with things like taxes and college.

We popped over the two comma line last year, at age 57. We have 5 kids, youngest is currently in college. DH retired mid 2021, I'm working part time. DH's peak income was low $50k, for his last 3 years; prior to that his income was in the $30ks and $20ks. My peak year was last year, exactly $30k, but mostly teens and low $20ks. I was a SAHM for nearly 20 years and have only been working the last 15 or so years.

Our mortgage rate was an ugly 9.75%, so early on I worked on paying it down early whenever I could manage. I had written out an amortization schedule for myself on the back of an envelope, so I could track payoff. I could see that payments early on made more progress - if my principal portion of that month's payment was only $50, then adding an extra $200 knocked 4 months off the end date. So windfalls were applied there, monthly, and any tax refunds were applied as a lump sum.

Tax refunds were a big part of paying off the mortgage. Initially they were in the $3500 range annually, all kid related refundable credits. Around 2008 or 2009, DH's employer decided to cut their 401k match; he'd been contributing only the 5% to capture the match - not very much on ~$35k or less. He thought he should stop contributing altogether; I realized we needed to increase his contributions to replace the lost match. So I tweaked his withholding to see if I could double the contribution to 10% w/o changing the take home noticeably - with the refundable credits and 5 kids, we didn't need anything withheld at all, actually. Success! I began working part-time very low hours to start, a bit more income, I had him double his contributions again. Still painless. Doubled them again, now up to 40%, from 5%. The interesting part was how reducing his AGI affected those refundable credits - I did a deep dive into how the CTC vs EITC were affected by our numbers. EITC with 3+ kids has a high phaseout rate of 21%, effectively an additional marginal rate, and since EITC is matched by our state at 30% that is another 6.3% marginal rate. So it makes sense to capture as much EITC as possible by driving down our AGI and w2 wages. Our tax refunds rose to $10-11k annually, which we used to knock down our mortgage. It was paid off in less than 15 years. Once that was gone, we diverted the tax refunds to fund a Roth IRA for each of us. Once the mortgage payment was gone, we could increase DH's 401k contribution to max it for the first time.

We were about 43 when we made these changes and got serious about saving for retirement above a token 5%. DH's 401k balance was less than $20k, and a previous employer account was also less than $20k, so we had < $40k in retirement at that date and dropping with the market in 2008-9. Thus we began dumping money in at the bottom and rode it up, accidentally. Tax refunds continued to be used to max 2 Roth IRAs, until 2020 in anticipation of DH retiring in the near future. I got access to a SIMPLE IRA mid 2019, and immediately tried to max it, shifting some of DH's contributions down to compensate. Our three highest combined income years were about $75k each, and we were contributing probably $50k+ to tax deferred accounts, including an HSA.

This is an awesome report on managing the boglehead way ! Maybe you should be included in a case study in a future book per Millionaire next door profile .
We have followed a similar path ( I seem to recall having similar FAFSA strategies ?)
Don’t you have a math background?

[wander]

If you want to become a millionaire, just set it as a target, work on it and you will make it. It's that simple. Plan means nothing without action. The rest is how long it takes to get you there. If you make more money, you will get there faster. It's okay if you cannot make it. At least, having a goal keeps your portfolio staying above the water.

[kayakprof]

Married with two kids. Wife and I are 52. My first 15 years of work (teenager/undergrad/grad student) saw under $35k/year earnings. I have had 4/36 years of earnings at or above $100k, the highest of which was $108k. Wife always earned less or similar.

Our combined pretax accounts hit one million last year. Neither of us has a million individually.

Paid off student loans pretty quickly.
Bought a starter home and then found our dream home for ~$350k @ 2.85%.
Rarely carried debt on credit cards, cars, or home renovations.
We buy modest new cars in cash (Honda/Subaru) and drive them for 12+ years.
High savings rate for us (though nothing like what I see from others on this forum). We max HSA and "max" pretax @ around $23k each/year. Sometimes we find a way to get $$ into roth, usually not.
Keep an emergency fund and generally try to build a fund for lumpy expenses.
I guess we live modestly? LCOL area, rarely eat out, not into clothes or cars, not into motorized toys. We do have a hot tub and we take long vacations (usually in one airbnb for 6-8 weeks). Otherwise we prefer to camp.
College is on the horizon, and we do not have large savings for that. This makes us quite nervous.

[Michael Patrick]

Married with two kids, one with special needs.

I basically had two careers, first doing low-level accounting work while pursuing an accounting degree at night. I took two years off of work to pursue a masters, and since then I've worked in state government. For most of that time I joked that I was the lowest of the low level bureaucrats because on the org chart there was a line running into the box with my name but no line running out... A few years ago I was promoted, and moved up one level in the org chart, and got a decent bump in pay with the move. Point being that for a majority of my career I was not high income, and nowhere near $100k.

My wife has worked less than full time for over 20 years to be able to provide care for our autistic daughter. And the part-time work she's been doing is for nonprofit social service agencies. You don't go into work for nonprofit social service agencies for the money.

We added the second comma to the total in our retirement accounts a few years ago. We did it by making our contributions automatic. The money came out of our paychecks (my 457(b), her 401(k)) and out of our checking account (both IRAs). Every time one of us got a raise we increased the amount we were contributing. We kept up with that no matter what was happening in the market, right on through the Great Recession and every other downturn and bull market. And we never pulled any money out.

To make a short story long, it is totally possible to become a millionaire with less than $100k in income.

[Vinny_in_NJ]

My wife and I have always been sub $100K singularly and maybe $130K together, but that was only the last few years. We lived paycheck to paycheck for a lot of years when we had 2 kids as we decided it was important to us that she stayed home to raise them. We started saving for retirement around 40 YO when she went back to work part time so we had about 20 years of saving, she retired in 2019 to take care of her Mom. I did get an inheritance when my Mom died of around $130K which we used $80K for my oldest son's college and used it for other things as well but I did well in the market and it was about $150K at retirement. We are a working class family! And we live either at our means or below or means.

When I retired in June 2024 we had a little over $1.5 M total in all of our accounts, all built in about 20 years. I expected to be around $800K when I first started tracking our retirement money. We invested in our 401Ks mostly, whenever we had some extra money we put it into Roths and our investment account grew as mentioned above. When the market took a nose dive in 2007-2009 I upped the 401K contribution from 6% to about 13% and my employer did match 50% up to my 6%. When my wife retired I went back to 6%.

I stayed 100% in stock funds until I was 58 YO when I started transitioning into bond funds; which in hindsight I probably should have started transitioning into bonds around 55 YO - but through dumb luck it worked for us.

It can be done!

[Hacksawdave]

I averaged $74K per year over 40 years. I reached both $100K and $1M metrics at age 44. I would have reached $1M a bit sooner, but our plan was still under old CODA rules until 1990.

Achieved by hard work and remembering elementary school math and high school accounting.

[finite_difference]

Our three highest combined income years were about $75k each, and we were contributing probably $50k+ to tax deferred accounts, including an HSA.

So you had expenses of $25k/year for a family of 5, albeit with no mortgage?

[dknightd]

If you save an average of 15%, over 30 years, you will likely be OK.

Edit: I worked for 31 years. In the last years I saved more than 15%. I wanted to be more than just OK.

[Vinny_in_NJ]

delete

[1moreyr]

I'm not quite there, but close. There are no real secrets:

- Live below your means
- Don't overspend on house and car
- Save and invest consistently, using low-cost funds
- Use all your tax-advantaged space, and defer your taxes as much as possible (say at 20% marginal and higher)
- Have some luck with the markets - this one you don't really control, obviously!

all of this and stay married. Divorce is a killer.

the other thing is I was a millionaire by 40 (and under $100K salary) the first time and then i got to be a millionaire two more times before it stuck. The market gives it and the market takes it away

[dknightd]

Divorce is a killer.

The darling one and I agree. We can't afford to be divorced.

[Dottie57]

It never ceases to amaze me when I read post from people making $100k a year and more. I never earned $100k in my life. Best I can remember, the most I ever made was around $67k, and most years much less. Of course I can remember when the people across the street built a nice house for $12k. I'm retired now with a networth around $7.5 million, at least that's about what it was before the latest downturn. I can't really remember my age when I hit my first million, but it probably was in my early to mid forties. As too keys to success, I would say an extremely high savings rate had a lot to do with it and living below my means. You can't keep up with the Joneses if you want to get rich. I also got into investing in mortgages, which was very lucrative; and rental property investments. Some of these types of investments would be considered risky, but you have to take more risk if you expect to get higher returns. The risk I took were calculated risk that paid off. Every penny I invested stayed invested and compounded for many years. To this day I have never spent a penny of any money I invested except for rental income. I live on the income from rental properties and social security.

Why invest if you never want to use the money? I invested to be able retire comfortably. I see you created an income stream.

[Lonewolf123]

Household income less than 100k (never made over 100k), 3 kids, stay at home wife when kids were younger. 1 million in retirement savings, net worth of 1.3 million, current age 48
a few years qualified for earned income tax credit,
Also made a few mistakes early on, cashed out old 401k for payment on house, wished I would have stuck with SP500 index funds,
At age 30 started to save 25% and company match 8%
Biggest thing is start early, don't wait. Never have credit card debt
Currently only saving 10%, kids (14, 16, 18) get very expensive when they get older. Cars, insurance. etc. Just glad I saved when I did, retirement should be set.

[ScubaHogg]

They are a ton of work and definitely change your life, but some people act like others are crazy for having them.

I’ve done a lot in my life, including some things they make movies about

Nothing, literally nothing, is even in the same galaxy of awesomeness as having kids

[Marq1]

Save, save, save, save.

Dont buy anything new, especially cars, there are bargains galore out there you just have to keep an eye open.

No vacations, dont waste money on "toys".

Live well below your means, if your trying to impress anybody you have failed, nobody cares!

[Maverick3320]

No kids is key.

This also turbo charged my savings.

Just one example - I was talking to a co-worker about a trip to Hawaii that I had just returned from. She sighed heavily. "Because you don't have kids, you can travel when it's cheap. We have to go on vacation when our kids are not in school; that's when everyone else is going and the prices are astronomical."

"Sigh. We just had to take the whole family to Hawaii...life is so unfair."

[Maverick3320]

You can do it with kids, because they're also little tax-breaks.

But you're probably not going to be jetting off to Hawaii.

My pre-tax has just begun to creep close to or over $100k and my calculations show a NW nearing the amount.

And that's with not much more than always going for the company match, getting some government matching on IRAs via the saver's credit, and some real estate. I could be much, much better off if I hadn't spent as much (but that's true of everyone).

The key is not going into debt as much as you can, and then minimizing your expenses; the easiest way to do this is to live "down a level" or two. If you make $70k a year and live amongst those that make $50k, you're already $20k "in the black" - now just save that instead of wasting it.

Someone who makes $200k a year and saves 10% may end up similar to someone who makes $70k and saves $20k.

There is no world in which the tax breaks make children break-even. Each child (depending on which calculation you use and whether you adjust it for inflation) costs you minimum $250k and probably more like $600k, and that's just expenses, not even factoring lost income if one spouse stops working and then the mommy tax if they do rejoin the workforce.

Where are you getting the 600k figure from?

[teen persuasion]

This is an awesome report on managing the boglehead way ! Maybe you should be included in a case study in a future book per Millionaire next door profile .
We have followed a similar path ( I seem to recall having similar FAFSA strategies ?)
Don’t you have a math background?

Computer science, but yeah I semi supported myself in college working as a math tutor. Definitely a math nerd.

[teen persuasion]

Our three highest combined income years were about $75k each, and we were contributing probably $50k+ to tax deferred accounts, including an HSA.

So you had expenses of $25k/year for a family of 5, albeit with no mortgage?

Let's see - those 3 years were DH's last full years, so at that point kids 1, 2, & 3 were independent, 4 was in college, 5 was in Jr HS/ HS. Down to a family of 4 at that point. Yes, expenses were likely $24-25k annually.

You also have to remember, I'm including those tax refunds in contributions to TDA. With only two kids, one in college, one under 17, refunds were reduced from the peak $11k with 4-5 kids simultaneously, to maybe $7k? The $75k number was earnings.

[lws]

Stable profession.
Good saving and spending habits.

[bombcar]

Where are you getting the 600k figure from?

Every time I’ve been able to track it down the main expenses turn out to be private school and college, as if every kid has to have $10k/yr private school and will fully pay their own way to some Ivy League college.

Or they make assumptions that don’t have to follow - my first kid meant we needed to buy a 500 sq ft larger house in a nicer area and that cost $100k more so each kid costs $100k minimum.

The Bogleheads™ way is to not invest in individual kids but instead in broad-market index funds of kids - stack ‘em in rooms like cordwood and diversify!

[CoAndy]

My wife and I aren't quite there yet, but we are close. Started the journey in 2014 with about $160k in debt with an income of around $60k. We have saved anywhere from 50-70% of our income the entire time. For the last 3 years we've been at roughly $160k gross while keeping our expenses roughly the same. We take advantage of a governmental 457B, Roth IRA, Traditional IRA, and Taxable accounts maxing them all out into low cost index funds mainly VTSAX. She also has a government pension that I don't factor into our net worth. We live in Southeast Missouri and the cost of living here is extremely cheap. Small paid for home. 15 year old Nissan Altima. We grocery shop and cook at home, rarely eat out. We love bourbon and cigars. We take trips. We live life and have fun and are still able to keep our savings between 50-70%.

Does your wife also smoke cigars? I am a big cigar aficionado, but my wife never touches them.

[quantAndHold]

the other thing is I was a millionaire by 40 (and under $100K salary) the first time and then i got to be a millionaire two more times before it stuck. The market gives it and the market takes it away

The first time I realized I was a millionaire was in early 2008, when Vanguard sent me a welcome to Flagship status letter. Then in early 2009, Vanguard sent me a 2 sentence letter revoking my Flagship status. Sigh.

[heyyou]

My "how" was just living below our means for decades with my steady, entry level job that paid a union pay rate.
My work was laboring at a mega-corp that paid decent wages in a lower cost Southwestern state.
Intense saving for 25 years after being laid off for six weeks within a year of getting my first and only mortgage, was my single layoff in my 30 year career. That mortgage ended after I transferred from the city to a rural town where I paid cash for a small house, which was later remodeled.

I maxed the 401k earlier each year by directing my annual COLA pay raises into that account in addition to my fixed contributions. When full there, the payroll deduction went into the after-tax investment account for the remainder of each year, so I didn't ever see any extra money in my take-home pay. Annually, the 401k provider would fill my 401k first, then the Roth IRA, then switch to depositing into taxable savings, with an overall 60/40 stock to bond allocation.

My top earning years were only in the high $60K range, but I was saving all I could for 25 years, starting in the late 1970s. Near the turn of the century, I described our life style as "living in the 80s" since that was when our reliable used vehicles were manufactured. A coworker once mentioned that I had the oldest vehicle in the parking lot at work. I had bought it used, then drove it until it was 25 years old. It had a known-to-be-reliable engine and a manual transmission so the clutch could be easily replaced every hundred thousand miles, instead of ever needing to have an entire automatic transmission rebuilt.

I married late, having already chosen to not have children. Dear wife was a more efficient tight wad than I was, but her income was a fraction of mine. Note how steadily living-below-our-means for 25 years built a portfolio that grew to a two-comma size. These days, my delayed until age 70 Social Security has outgrown my no-COLA pension and my portfolio spending method is my RMD % applied to my entire two comma portfolio amount plus spending dividends and interest, so I now have three barely $40K annual income streams in my mid-retirement years.

[secondopinion]

Sadly, I spent a lot of time and money on college; so, I am trying to catch up. But it is certainly doable per the numbers to reach 1 million. Just spend less and earn more.

[xStylezx]

My wife and I aren't quite there yet, but we are close. Started the journey in 2014 with about $160k in debt with an income of around $60k. We have saved anywhere from 50-70% of our income the entire time. For the last 3 years we've been at roughly $160k gross while keeping our expenses roughly the same. We take advantage of a governmental 457B, Roth IRA, Traditional IRA, and Taxable accounts maxing them all out into low cost index funds mainly VTSAX. She also has a government pension that I don't factor into our net worth. We live in Southeast Missouri and the cost of living here is extremely cheap. Small paid for home. 15 year old Nissan Altima. We grocery shop and cook at home, rarely eat out. We love bourbon and cigars. We take trips. We live life and have fun and are still able to keep our savings between 50-70%.

Does your wife also smoke cigars? I am a big cigar aficionado, but my wife never touches them.

Absolutely! We both got into them a little over a decade ago. We're big Fuente and LFD fans. Brothers of the leaf! ha ha

[invest4]

We had 14k credit card debt when we finished college. Got our first jobs and prioritized that debt…credit debt never to be seen again.

* We made saving a priority from the beginning. We still went out to eat and have family vacations, but fitting for our income

* We have always bought used cars…no matter our income. Focus on car makers who we thought had better reliability and longevity (Honda and Toyota)

* We did not buy too much house. Always 3x income or less.

* We have utilized our mortgage as leverage to enable more investment toward financial independence. Our first mortgage was 8.25% and we rode it down via refinancing the debt when the opportunity presented itself. We did the same with our current house…and that debt is at 2.6% and will simply pay as is for the duration we are living in it.

* My wife was a SAHM after our first was born. I thought we could swing it and while we lost her income, we saved on other expenses like daycare, etc.

* We bought our 4 young children’s clothes at used clothing stores, etc. They grow so fast, it didn’t make sense to us to buy new.

* We did our own yard work and attempted our own house repairs when possible.

* I was not an informed investor and made the usual mistakes before I discovered this great place in my 40s. Thankfully, nothing catastrophic.

* Never been unemployed (so far).

As income grew, we saved more and spent more. Mainly better food and vacations as that was what we enjoyed most.

I remember when we had achieved $1M…in the kitchen of our first house. Enjoyed in the moment and then kept on going…”wash, rinse, and repeat” on our continuing journey to financial independence still in progress.

What has always resonated for me is the same:

* Always live beneath your means (always)

* Save consistently and increase contributions as your income grows

* Remember to also enjoy life along the way.

[barberakb]

Just looking for the millionaires on here that did it on less than a $100k average annual household income, and what your main keys to success were? Also, if you wouldn't mind posting at what age you achieved this milestone and any other relevant facts. Thanks!

TIME in the market.

The longer you wait to start investing the harder it gets

Around 40

[cshell2]

Age 56, single, two kids (22 and 14). I have never come close to 100K income. Closest has been the past few years when it's been around 60K, but before that it was 30-40K/year. I was also getting about 10K/year child support for most of those kid years, but that money went 100% to the kids. Private school, activities, college savings...just got the oldest through college debt free and launched with an engineering degree.

NW was about 1.6M (have been afraid to look the last couple weeks!) 1.2M retirement and 400K home equity.

I got there sloooow and steady. It took me almost 15 years to get my first 100K in retirement accounts. I've kicked up the savings rate quite a bit in the past 7 or 8 years.

2005 100K
2013 200K
2016 300K
2018 400K
2019 500K
2020 600K
2021 700K
2021 800K
2023 900K
2024 1000000
2024 1100000
2025 1200000

[cshell2]

You can do it with kids, because they're also little tax-breaks.

But you're probably not going to be jetting off to Hawaii.

My pre-tax has just begun to creep close to or over $100k and my calculations show a NW nearing the amount.

And that's with not much more than always going for the company match, getting some government matching on IRAs via the saver's credit, and some real estate. I could be much, much better off if I hadn't spent as much (but that's true of everyone).

The key is not going into debt as much as you can, and then minimizing your expenses; the easiest way to do this is to live "down a level" or two. If you make $70k a year and live amongst those that make $50k, you're already $20k "in the black" - now just save that instead of wasting it.

Someone who makes $200k a year and saves 10% may end up similar to someone who makes $70k and saves $20k.

There is no world in which the tax breaks make children break-even. Each child (depending on which calculation you use and whether you adjust it for inflation) costs you minimum $250k and probably more like $600k, and that's just expenses, not even factoring lost income if one spouse stops working and then the mommy tax if they do rejoin the workforce.

Meh. I'm 56 and haven't even made a million in my life yet (according to SS earnings), but have one kid launched (including college) and a teen at home. I don't think I spent anywhere near that much even with them attending private high school. One certainly CAN, but the lower your income, the more the cost of having kids is subsidized as well. For example, in my state college tuition is free for households with incomes under 80K.