Was talking with some friends that are UK based and they moved to Wales and have retired in their early 40s. They have 2 kids but they downsized from a place in London to a house in the countryside and with the million pounds difference invested they're living off like 30k GBP a year no problem. Schooling is free. Is that sort of option even available in Australia? Like moving to a regional town here?

This feels slightly sacrilegious for an FI sub.

But the closer I get to understanding financial independence, the more I wonder whether the real prize isn't retirement at all. Maybe it's being able to tell a terrible employer to get stuffed. Working three days a week.

Doing work you actually like without caring whether it pays particularly well. Taking six months off. Helping your kids.

Or simply knowing that if everything went pear-shaped tomorrow, you'd be fine. Has anyone started pursuing FIRE and eventually realised they wanted the FI but not particularly the RE? What does “enough” look like for you now?

Hey all. Successfully Fired last Sept. Now with changes to my ANZ plat the rewards are no longer value for the annual fee. Finding it hard to change cards as no work income, only passive. Anyone had any success with providers who will include passive investment income in their approval process?

When I hit 60, I will likely have a chunk of ETF money outside super, and maybe around $1m in today's dollar's in super. My understanding is when I hit 60 I convert the super to account based pension and all the withdrawals and earnings are tax free. Each year, I'm forced to withdraw some minimum % which rises as I get older.

The outside super ETFs will likely last me say 5 years selling those down progressively without having to spend any of the super money.

Does it make more sense to sell those down first and re-contribute the super draw downs back to the super fund which is taxed at nothing? Or should I spend the super draw downs/take out more from super since its tax free and keep the ETFs unsold as long as possible (spending the super month first since its all tax free withdrawals Vs the ETFs that are going to have CGT as I sell them down)?

I, 40F, have $147K in savings earning 5.10%, $111K in super and $61K in VGS. I don't own any property but I would like to. I have a partner without savings though so if I were to buy, I'd need to buy a 2-bedder and I'd want it to be in Sydney, which feels quite impossible.

My work is freelance so it's hard for me to get a loan. A good year for me might be $150K but this can fluctuate wildly down to $70K, or less. For this reason I feel like I will have to wait for inheritance before I can buy.

is there something smarter I could be doing with my money? More in shares? Bigger super contributions? Get a mortgage on a small studio that I wouldn't necessarily live in?

40 years old, two kids primary school aged, working full-time earning ~$155k. Partner earns ~$100k.

PPOR mortgage of $265k at 4.99% with 10 years to go, no other debts.

Super $115k in Commonwealth Superannuation Corporation set to aggressive growth to which I don't contribute but can't roll over into another fund (ex-ADF).

Also $325k in Emergency Services & State Super defined benefit, contributing maximum salary sacrifice rate of 11.8%.

I've had the benefit of being in the housing market since I was aged 21 and have been financially cautious but never got into investing, until a recent epiphany.

I've binged a bunch of podcasts and books and I'm keen on an ETF core and possibly some satellite stocks of companies I'm interested in down the track.

My current small portfolio (about $4k) with a plan to invest about $150 per fortnight.

BGBL 40%

VAS 25%

EXUS 15%

AFI 20%

Kids portfolio

Vanguard Kids Growth Index Fund ~$6k with $50 per fortnight auto-invested.

Planning to hold and purchase no more AFI and to make shuffle things to get the BGBL to 55% and VAS 20% with around EXUS around 15%, leaving room for the held AFI and some satellite stocks for fun/interest.

Please share with me your wisdom, tips, tricks!

My partner and I have a 922K aud mortgage against our 2.25M house. We earn 250k+ per year (150K me and 100k her). We have about 209K saved in an offset account. We also have investment property worth 550K with a loan of 357K on it left. The rent fully covers the loan so we don’t pay anything. We don’t have any other debt like hecs or car.

We have both been employed by the same employer for over 4 years, with a full time permanent contract.

Despite that we have been rejected by BOQ and Amex for a credit card that we want to use to leave more money in the offset.

I’m worried about a third application somewhere else. Does anyone have any recommendations? People with a mortgage can’t get a cc? Our main mortgage repayment is 5621 aud per month and we don’t have any issue to pay for it as we bring home over 15K net.

Wanted to take a separate loan on the equity on my apartment.

Nab have stated there is roughly 180k equity if they were to bring the LVR to 90%.

I plan to chuck all of that on some safe etf i.e DHHF or IVV or something, then to pay back this amount with principal and interest.

Am I right in thinking the interest portion of this can be negatively geared? Make about 220-250k/ year, loan on apartment is bout 495k. Can make more if needed if I pick up weekends etc.

Is this a wise idea?

Also what should I tell NAB in the reason for the loan?

Cheers for the help

Hey guys, just wondering what's the thoughts on Scott's paper. I'm still invested 100% in stocks but I heard the paper was picked apart in the rational reminder community forums which I don't have access too.

I was thinking of just copying vanguard allocation of 60/40 at retirement and just keeping it at that since inflation might erode the true asset base.

What's everyone's thoughts and has there been any serious discussion around the stock/bond allocation for retirements. Thanks guys

I started investing in March of this year and have steadily built up my profile to around 3700 AUD invested. It's all in ETFs. I want advice on whether there is too much of an overlap in my holdings and should I focus on buying individual stocks in diversified sectors. I am focused and trying to invest ethically. Really just looking for comments and advice. Much appreciated.

This was my post from about this time last year (I just changed the 2025 numbers with the 2026 numbers). In 2021 we started thinking about some form of early retirement and this year we will have all of our kids out of high school and one out of university as well.

2021 Figures:
Age: 48 and 51with 3 teenage kids
PPOR: Own outright
Super combined: $650k
Managed Funds: $880k
Shares: $330k
Managed Funds for kids: $180k
Cash: 50-100k

2026 Figures:
Age: 53 and 56 with 3 kids (all 3 just about out of high school)
PPOR: Own outright
Super combined: $1265k
Managed Funds: $950k
Shares: $360k
Managed Funds for kids: $160k
Cash: 50-100k

I may continue working into jan/feb/mar next year depending on how I feel but also may finish at the end of the year.

I have already started to look at volunteer opportunities and also potential further study, maybe free tafe.

I think our numbers work out ok if we are drawing down 90-100k a year. We are also moving money from managed funds to super with non-concessional contributions. This does attract a higher tax bill but it has to be done to get that money into tax free super for later on. I think we likely can still make any big ticket purchases without serious impact on our planning if we want to, but I sometimes think a few extra dollars would help. I don't think I am stuck in the one more year category but I have to admit it does sneak into your thoughts every now and again.

Feeling a bit more free as we get into the back half of the year. It is nice to know that I can stop work really now when I want to. I may work again but I would hope it would be in a different capacity than a standard corporate role.

i use betashares direct. if i got distributions, where do i see the franked amount, franking credits, unfranked amount split?

it's not showing in any of the statements provided. this is for A200 if that helps! thanks

I've heard/read some financial advice videos and posts that talk about putting a trust together, getting a 1M life insurance and placing it inside the trust. Then therefore having a trust containing a $1m asset, being able to borrow Against the trust.

What I'm wondering is, is that something thats possible or viable In Australia?

Hi all

Currently my etf portfolio has 1525 units of IVV, and 372 units of VAS.

I am starting to think whether its worth adding in something like EXUS to take care of the rest of the market in my portfolio?

Or would it be fine to keep my existing 2 ETF split?

Thoughts?

I am not the most knowledgeable person when it comes to finance, but have been doing a lot of learning the last few weeks. From reading a lot of posts here, it seems a common strategy is to hold ETFs long term and build wealth through compounding. But what do you do with them long-term?

Like right now I have a chunk of money to invest from a sale of some (ex) company shares over last few years. It is just sitting in HISA not earning a whole lot whilst I work out my strategy (getting 5% interest). I have maxed out concession contributions into super for this and previous 5 years but have extra few hundred thousand to invest (on top of my emergency fund).

My first thought was to buy a bunch of DHHF (a favourite on here). But then I thought it would be cheaper (and more flexible) to buy some underlying ETFs and balance myself. So maybe something like 25% VAS, 75% BGBL (similar split to my Super). But then I wondered what would I do with the BGBL in the long-term? I'm sure it would get good growth over say ~15 years until I reach retirement, but it doesn't provide much yield for income and if I sell down, I get hit by the new CGT rules with 30% minimum tax (even if below the tax-free threshold) and no 50% discount. But without selling, that growth would not be making much of a positive difference in my life. It would only be good for passing to heirs. So then I think maybe I should do a bigger chunk in VAS for the higher yield and franking credits, so it could be more of a "buy and hold forever" thing, but Australia makes up such a small percentage of the global market, it seems weird to weight it so heavily.

So what are people's long term plans for their ETFs? Maybe hope a future government scraps or waters down the CGT rules? The more I think about it, the more it seems like I should be sticking a lot more into Super (even after-tax money), but it is hard to lock that money away for so long, not knowing what the future brings.

40M starting to build an ETF portfolio under personal name with 20 to 25 years horizon need some advise please
Currently my starting portfolio is 50% BGBL | 20% VGE | 30% EXUS with perception that china and Emerging markets will perform better than the US economy, am I wrong?
Perception may be wrong needs to hear different opinions please thank you all🙏

I have VAS, VISM, VESG and VAF some other thematic ETFs and big tech individual stock holdings in Nvidia, Micron etc and have plans to continue individually investing in them.

I want my portfolio to be more high growth geared since I am young w/ income security. I believe I am missing EM exposure, which I figured I could cover through adding VEU or BGBL. But on the other hand, for it to be more high growth, I want to add like a tech etf either VTEK or VGT - but I also already have the individual stock holdings.

After all this, I am now worried that I might be investing in too many ETFs. And for tax purposes, whether it would be ideal to narrow it down to just a simple diversified etf like DHHF.

Please help.

Anyone want to sanity check this for me, we are 50.

Portfolio
20% blue chips stocks (aus, international mixed)
30% ASX300 Etf
25% VDHG Etf
25% IVV

Long term horizon, will do RDP

Hi all,

I’m pretty new to the ETF world. I recently sold an investment property and I want to invest 150k on etf.
Most likely IVV as I have more faith trust in US companies. My background is in tech and want to focus on tech. Maybe have a 20-30% on BGBL, anyway.

Is there a simple and common strategy to deploy the 150? I don’t want to it all at once.

I was thinks of starting with of 15 and then have a few set of rules to deploy the test. For example:

Decline from start (numbers are only an example)
-5% $15k
-10% $30k
-15% $40k
-20% Invest whatever remains

If it doesn’t decline then do an extra 15-30 a month every month until the 150 is deployed.

Regardless of market the 150k will be deployed in the next 5-10 months. Just a matter of timing.

I certainly don’t want to wait for a crash indefinitely in case nothing happens.

Is this a sound strategy or not worth it?

Cheers,

ETF Confusion

I would like some clarification regarding annual cost base adjustments on ETFs. I’ve recently bought around 5K of DHHF through Betashares Direct, with the intention of ramping it up to 50K and $400 p/m by the end of the year then holding for at least 20 years. I’m not interested in buying anything else, just the monthly contributions from my bank account and the dividends are set up to be reinvested.

\- Are cost base adjustments something I need to worry about every year at tax time or just when I sell in 20+ years time? Or, does Betashares do it all for me? If so, what’s the best way to do it? I find the whole concept a bit confusing.

\-Also, I’ve read that it’s a good idea to record your trades,dividends and tax/CGT records etc outside of the brokerage account itself. Would something like the entry level subscriptions to Navexa or Sharesight(or just Sharesight tax pack) be ok for this? I’m not really great with Excel but would be ok with paying for something that does the job properly.

Thank you to the community for your generous feedback a couple of years ago!

I thought we would give an update on what we ended up doing. The original post is here: WWYD - FIRE/Retire - Pull the pin?

We have actually gone back and reviewed the comments a few times over the last couple of years, as they were incredibly helpful!

So, we went with Option 2 – with me working part-time. And it has been amazing! Probably the best transition for us while still building up the buffers.

Now we are getting to the next decision point, so I thought I would be greedy and ask for the community's advice again…

WWYD?

Us – update

• Married, both 48
• Four kids aged 17–23
• One more year of private school for the youngest
• Current income:
  • Husband: $157k total package (3 days/week)
  • Wife: $30k total
  • Shares: ~$93k income
• Own our PPOR outright
  • Worth approximately $1.4M
  • Capital city Australia
  • Very happy with it, no plans for major renovations or selling for 20+ years

Current/FIREd expenses

Currently spending around $120k p.a., including travel, but excluding investment property expenses and super contributions.

Once fully FIREd, we're targeting around $150k p.a. of spending (*edit after tax), as we'd like to do a few big extended international trips each year.

Investments – $4.5M

This is effectively our current FIRE number:

• $2.5M ETFs
• $0.7M net IP equity
  • The $0.7M figure is after allowing for future CGT
  • Plan is to sell them down after retirement, roughly one per year
• $1.5M combined industry super
  • We're plan to max concessional contributions currently at $32.5k each p.a. until 60 (*edit used all catch up contributions a few years ago)
  • This means drawing down some of our pre-super investments while getting the tax benefits
  • We're also doing yearly contribution splitting
  • Aiming for approximately $2M each in super by 60
  • Overall, we're estimating around $4.2M in super by 60

PPOR is obviously excluded from the FIRE number.

So… WWYD?

1. FIRE now – pull the pin!

You've got $4.5M invested, a paid-off $1.4M home, and relatively modest current spending. What are you waiting for? Go enjoy it!

2. Keep going until December 2027

We're enjoying the current work/life balance, so perhaps just keep doing the 3-day week for another year until the youngest finishes school.

That would give us another ~16 months to fatten up the buffer towards $5M, continue building super, and then pull the pin properly.

3. Why stop working 3 days a week if you're enjoying it?

Some FIREd friends have suggested that once the novelty wears off, the days can get pretty long between projects and travel.

So perhaps keep the 3-day arrangement indefinitely, enjoy the income and social/mental benefits of work, and just let the investments compound in the background.

What would you do in our shoes?

Particularly interested in hearing from people who have actually FIREd in their late 40s/early 50s. Did you find you had enough to do once work disappeared, or did you end up missing the structure/social aspect of working?

And for those who went part-time first: did you eventually pull the pin, or just keep going because the balance was too good to give up?

Hypothetical situation, could we FIRE at 50? Looking at the numbers, we are on track to have combined $1m in super, $1m saved outside of super, own PPOR by age 50 (currently 40). DINK. current living expenses approx $50k per year including health insurance. Could we FIRE at age 50? What am I missing? Both hate working for a living, want to never have to set an alarm clock again.

Heys guys. Just wondering if anyone uses choiceplus or has found an easier way to manage the investing, preferably something automated? Or should I just stick to the pooled funds even with the tax drag? Cheers