How do Indie Hackers retire?
I love the IH community and I think it's admirable how we all (try to) get by doing what we love. As a full time IndieHacker ($5k MRR), there's a bunch of things that keep me up at night. One I find particularly interesting;
How do IndieHackers plan to retire?
Honestly the whole "sell your startup at the end of it all" idea is a pipedream for most.
Take profits early, take profits often.
Reinvest MRR into your business, yes, but also reinvest in your own portfolio.
That means 401k, index funds, crypto, stocks, savings account, etc.
Don't pull all your eggs in one basket and then cry when it all goes up in flames.
And lastly don't forget to reinvest in quality of life.
Actually spending your money... which is the whole point of it all.
You could die 9 months from now for all you know.
Are you even taking chips off the table before the unknown date of your curtain fall?
Interesting take; so do you see IndieHacking purely as 'fun' or do you see it as a viable lifestyle?
When I was younger, I was dirt poor. I wanted to do startup right after I graduate. In fact, I did a MSR project that MSFT said I can take the project and go ahead to start a company. My dad was strongly opposed to the idea. It died fairly quickly (bad timing 2003 and bunch of other reasons). I learnt a ton. I went to take on several jobs. Learn a lot of useless stuff that I don't care about. Basically traded my time for $. Financially I am much better off than when I started (at least I am not starving and able to pay rent)...
Back to your question, is IH viable lifestyle. It definitely is a viable lifestyle but perhaps it's not suitable for everyone and not anytime. When you have family, when you have life, you probably have to shift some priorities. Since I am engineering trained, I always think for plan B (which might not be the best for entrepreneurship). Having more (education, experience, financial, etc) definitely helps.
Again, with megatech with $250k to start, it's hard to justify IH when you have no money.
That's very logical. I think having a plan B is not bad, for many people it will come down to a question of what makes them eventually the most happy. Having financial stress can make you pretty unhappy.
Making $250k/year is great to create a buffer for any not so successful ventures in the future ;)
I think engineers deal with calculated risks. Which often time is also bad as an entrepreneur as it takes that leap of faith and conviction to go somewhere.
I think that a good idea is to invest profits in real estate, they are assets that always increase in value over time and renting them out would be a fixed profit as a retirement plan.
For sure! I'm no expert, but I do feel like it's one of the safer investments (if you have enough cash and are willing to do your research).
Seeing a lot of people voting that their MRR will continue till they die. Even though that would be awesome, don't forget that nearly all plants die if you don't water them regularly!
Get a SEP IRA and just start contributing.
Yep! Let's hope everyone includes it in their ramen profitability
This is honestly a point that I hope people are taking seriously. If you do nothing else at all today, I'd really suggest learning a small amount about passive investing.
My recommendations would be https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Bogleheads®_investment_philosophy and https://www.reddit.com/r/Bogleheads/.
If you wish to throw money at something and not think too much about it, the above cannot really be beaten (IMO).
Agree! It's easy to get lost in the joy of building but we should not forget that a normal employment contract sets aside up to 20% of your income for your retirement (at least here in the Netherlands). That's a lot to make up for if you're to late!
Thanks for the resources, very helpful!
You are most welcome. Hope they come in useful!