FIRE for Founders
Financial independence looks different when your income is a business, not a salary. Stress-test your plan, decide whether business equity counts, and buy time without killing momentum.
Financial independence looks different when your income is a business instead of a salary. The standard FIRE playbook assumes a steady paycheck, a fixed savings rate, and a portfolio you draw down at 4% — none of which describe a founder whose revenue swings month to month and whose biggest asset may be equity they cannot sell tomorrow. This hub adapts FIRE to founder reality: stress-testing a plan, deciding whether business equity belongs in your number, and using geoarbitrage and spending tricks to buy time.
How to use this hub
- Start with the framework guides — stress-test the plan before anything else.
- Then decide how (and whether) your business equity counts toward your number.
- Finally, the spend-less / buy-time pieces keep the plan livable.
Build Your FIRE Framework
FIRE stress test: will your plan survive a bad decade?
Ten questions that pressure-test whether your FIRE plan survives a bad decade.
Read the guide →01DECISIONFIRE decision tree: buy vs rent vs relocate in 5 minutes
A quick decision tree for the buy-vs-rent-vs-relocate question on the path to FI.
Read the guide →02CALCULATORFIRE opportunity cost calculator: purchases in months to FI
Reframing purchases as months of delay to financial independence.
Read the guide →03RISKSequence-of-returns risk when your income is the business
Managing sequence-of-returns risk when your "portfolio" is your own company.
Read the guide →04Counting Business Equity in Your Number
Counting your business equity in your FI number
Whether — and how — to count illiquid business equity toward your FI number.
Read the guide →01COAST FIRECan your business equity count toward your Coast FIRE number?
How business equity interacts with a Coast FIRE target.
Read the guide →02HEALTHCAREBarista FIRE is broken for founders: the healthcare Plan B
Why Barista FIRE breaks for founders, and a healthcare Plan B.
Read the guide →03Spend Less, Buy Time, Stay Sane
The FIRE two-account trick: spend guilt-free, save more
A two-account setup that lets you spend guilt-free while saving more.
Read the guide →01TRAVELThe FIRE travel paradox: travel more, spend less
How to travel more while spending less on the way to FI.
Read the guide →02GEOARBITRAGEVietnam geoarbitrage: the 0.30 price ratio explained
What a 0.30 price-level ratio means for stretching dollars in Vietnam.
Read the guide →03RELOCATIONWhy founders flee: the countries entrepreneurs prefer
Where founders relocate and what makes those countries appealing.
Read the guide →04BEHAVIORWhy social media might be hurting your FIRE dreams
How social media quietly inflates spending and stalls your FIRE plan.
Read the guide →05MINDSETMoonwalking to FIRE: what entrepreneurs can learn from Michael Jackson
An unexpected lens on persistence and reinvention for the FIRE journey.
Read the guide →06Build a FIRE plan that survives founder reality.
Weekly guides on adapting financial independence to variable, founder income.