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$2,300,000 net worth (age 43)
“Recalibration” – 43, single, MCOL city. In-house counsel, about $300k household income. Assets: $2.3M in investments, still renting with no home equity. Growing up just above the poverty line as a child of immigrants, he left law school in 2009 with roughly $150k in student loans and walked straight into a bad job market. Over time he pushed through harsh firm environments and difficult managers to hit an original “freedom number” of $1M, then burned out and took a mini-retirement abroad. Now in a much calmer corporate role he actually likes, his thinking has shifted: instead of the old $1M target, he is eyeing $3.5M to allow for a future dream home and a more padded retirement.
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“I’ve more than doubled my first retirement target and I’m still wondering if it’s enough. I used to roll my eyes at people with over $3M debating whether they could retire; now I catch myself doing the same thing.”
TAKE-AWAY:
Once work stops feeling terrible, the bar for “enough” often moves. A number that once looked like a finish line begins to feel like a checkpoint, especially for people who grew up with scarcity and are now adjusting to abundance. Until the emotional side of “I’m safe” is addressed, the dollar target has a way of drifting higher.
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