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What We Spend

On FIRE

What We Spend

Audacy

Society & Culture, Personal Journals

4.6689 Ratings

🗓️ 2 July 2025

⏱️ 42 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Michelle is a copy writer in Australia, and she’s part of the FIRE movement—Financial Independence, Retire Early. After watching how her parents worked, she set out to take a different path—and retire by 35.

If you want to be on What We Spend, we'd love to hear from you. Write us at whatwespendpodcast@gmail.com

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

A heads up before you listen. This podcast is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only.

0:07.4

We are not financial advisors. You should always do your own research and consult your own

0:12.3

financial advisor before spending or investing your money. Please note that all income,

0:18.2

financial information, and expenses in what we spend are self-reported.

0:24.2

When do you want to retire?

0:26.4

It's changed.

0:27.6

So originally, when I first got into the fire movement, I would have been like,

0:32.2

get me out of work as soon as possible.

0:34.8

I hate this.

0:36.2

I do not want to be doing this. I think it was more like

0:38.7

sticker shock of just like, I have to do this every day. Five days a week. I only get two days

0:44.0

to myself. I only have to spend a whole day just washing my clothes. And so I was like, how soon can

0:49.8

I get out of this rat race? Because this is just not for me. Once I did all those calculations, that number sat pretty firmly at like 35.

0:58.2

I'm 33 now.

0:59.7

We would still be on track, give or take a couple of years to see out that plan and stop working

1:08.2

at least as much as we are now by 35.

1:15.6

This is Michelle.

1:18.6

She's a self-employed copywriter with two kids,

1:21.6

and she lives on the central coast of Australia,

1:24.6

which is about an hour and a half, on a good day, north of Sydney.

1:29.6

What does retirement look like in Australia? They call it Preservation Age, which is just like

1:33.9

such a horrible way to describe it. Oh, they do it in Australia. Yeah, Preservation Age. It's a

...

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