FIRE stands for financial independence, retire early. Financial independence means your investments can cover your living costs, so working becomes a choice rather than a necessity. Retiring early is one thing people do with that choice. Others keep working, go part-time or switch careers. This page explains the core idea in a few minutes, shows how to use the calculator, and gives an order for reading the guides.
CokeGas is written for US readers: the accounts and tax rules are American, and they don’t apply elsewhere. Everything here is general education, not personal financial advice.
The idea in three numbers
- What you spend in a year. This sets your target. At a 4% withdrawal rate, you need about 25 times your yearly spending invested; $40,000 a year means about $1,000,000. That 25× rule comes from research on 30-year retirements, so early retirees often plan more cautiously (the 4% rule vs 3.5%).
- What share of your take-home pay you save. This sets your speed. Starting from zero at a 5% return after inflation, saving 25% takes about 32 years; saving 50%, about 17.
- What your investments earn after inflation and costs. This is the part you control least, which is why keeping fees low matters.
Run your own numbers
The FIRE calculator takes six inputs: take-home pay, spending, what you’ve already invested, your age, the return you assume after inflation, and your withdrawal rate. It shows:
- FIRE number: the portfolio that could pay your spending at your withdrawal rate.
- Estimated years to FI: how long, at your savings and assumed return, until you reach it.
- Savings rate: the share of take-home pay you invest.
- Coast FIRE: the amount that, invested today with nothing added, would grow to your FIRE number by 65.
Every result is an estimate. The calculator assumes the same return every year, and real markets don’t behave that way. Use it to compare choices, such as spending $5,000 less or saving for two more years, rather than to predict a date.
What to read, in order
1. Understand your number
- How your savings rate changes your retirement timeline: why the share you save matters more than your income.
- Lean FIRE vs Fat FIRE: build your spending target from a budget.
- The 4% rule vs 3.5%: choose a withdrawal rate for a long retirement.
2. Build the foundation
- Emergency fund before FIRE: how much cash to keep before you invest.
- How to choose a high-yield savings account: a safe home for that emergency fund.
3. Invest at low cost
- Three-fund portfolios for FIRE beginners: what to own and where to hold it.
- Investment fees and your FIRE date: what a fee really costs.
- Portfolio rebalancing for FIRE: keeping your mix on target, cheaply.
- Fidelity vs Vanguard vs Schwab: where to open the account.
- Coast FIRE: the milestone where you could stop saving for retirement.
- Tax-loss harvesting: using losses in a taxable account, and the wash-sale trap.
4. Plan the exit
- Sequence-of-returns risk: why the first years of retirement matter most.
- How to build a Roth conversion ladder: reaching retirement accounts before 59½.
How CokeGas is researched
Guides are built from primary sources (IRS publications, SEC and FDIC guidance, fund prospectuses and providers’ fee schedules) and link to them next to the claims they support. Comparisons use providers’ published documents; we haven’t opened accounts to test them. The About page explains the process, who is behind the site and how it makes money.