James Chen & Priya Mehta
Hit their coast number at 30. Now just… coasting.
Could retire 15 years early
See how they made it work ↓
The story
James and Priya met at UQ, graduated into decent salaries, and spent their twenties living like students while earning professional wages. By 30, James had $200k in super and $180k in ETFs. When their daughter Anaya arrived, they made a deliberate decision: they'd done the hard saving, now they'd coast.
They reduced voluntary super contributions to zero, started spending on travel, upgraded their car, and Priya dropped to four days a week. They're not retired — they're just not optimising anymore, and the maths says they don't need to. Their combined super today sits at $380k. At 7% nominal growth, that becomes roughly $1.9M by age 60 — more than enough for a comfortable retirement.
What FIRE means to them
They've already 'won' — their coast number is hit. FIRE isn't a future event to obsess over; it's a present-tense freedom. They work because they enjoy it, not because they have to maximise. If James gets made redundant, they won't panic. If Priya wants to drop to three days, she can.
Retirement plans
Proper retirement at 60 isn't the goal — the goal is the security of knowing it's handled. They'll probably both keep working in some capacity well into their fifties. When they do wind down, they want to split time between Brisbane and Priya's family in Melbourne.
Key challenge
Lifestyle creep is real. Their expenses have climbed from $65k to $105k since Anaya arrived (childcare alone is $25k/yr). The tool needs to show whether their coast assumptions still hold with higher current spending — and what happens if Priya drops to three days.
The numbers
What is Coast FIRE?
Coast FIRE means you've saved enough that — even without adding another dollar — compounding alone will grow your portfolio to your FIRE number by traditional retirement age. You've 'front-loaded' your savings and can now direct your income to enjoying life today. The key insight: time is the most powerful variable in compound growth.
The projection
Annual income sources in retirement
Stacked bars show where income comes from each year. Line shows target expenses.
Bars above the red line indicate surplus spending capacity (SWR floor > expenses)
↑ Dashed vertical lines show ATO minimum pension drawdown rate step-ups (ages 65, 75, 80, 85, 90, 95). The ATO requires increasing minimum annual withdrawals from super pension accounts as you age — causing the visible income jumps at each bracket.
Key insights
That's 15 years after FIRE — the non-super portfolio must bridge this gap entirely.
Priya works 15 more years, covering ~70% of household expenses during James & Priya's early retirement.
Eliminates ~$38k/year in housing costs, freeing cash for investments.
A savings rate above 30% is the engine that powers early retirement. Every dollar saved today compounds for decades.
Key takeaway
Coast FIRE is the ultimate set-and-forget strategy. James and Priya did the heavy lifting in their twenties so compounding could do the rest. Now they can spend more, earn less, and know retirement is still on track.
What James & Priya did next
The projection showed FIRE achievable at 45 — fifteen years ahead of their plan. They ran it three times thinking there was a bug. There wasn't.
They immediately stopped all voluntary super contributions. Coast FIRE means letting compounding do the work — extra contributions beyond the employer SG rate just delay Coast status and don't materially change the retirement outcome. James negotiated a 4-day week. Priya opened the ceramics studio she'd been quietly researching for a decade, booking a market stall for the first Saturday she had free.
They're not "retired" — they're just working on their own terms, and the portfolio is doing the heavy lifting. They still talk about money, just differently. Less "how much can we save this month" and more "what do we actually want this year."