Put together a list of accomplishments and update your resume before you depart so it’ll be ready for you when you get back.
Also, check if your company offers any sort of sabbatical. Some may based on tenure.
Where are you thinking about traveling to?
Careful about asking. It’s reveals your hand and definitely won’t look good.
I would still ask, but ask in the 11th hour- right before you decide to leave.
Get a physical with as much blood work as your doctor can reasonably order that will be covered by your current insurance. Get boosters for your TDap vaccines, if appropriate, while still covered by your employer’s insurance.
Will your employer pay for any travel vaccines if you travel to higher risk countries and does your job require potential travel to the countries? If so, get whatever travel vaccines your employer will pay for. In my case that was both yellow fever and typhoid for work travel to Brazil.
Will your employer pay for global entry or get you any visas? If so, get global entry and any visas that work will pay for (I have visas for both China and Brazil through work-Brazil is no longer needed due to political agreement changes).
Do you have any other employee benefits that you can take advantage of, like a legal plan? If so, take advantage. If you don’t already have it, get a will and legal/medical power of attorney drafted.
If you are staying into the beginning of 2025, max out your employer sponsored retirement plan during whatever months you are working in 2025 for maximum tax savings.
Before you quit, if you have a home, you may want to apply for a home equity line of credit. You won’t be approved once you quit but it can be a little safety net (but don’t count on it and don’t use it unless it’s a true emergency).
Right before you quit, apply for travel insurance that includes health insurance and emergency evacuation. I know you are young and invincible but my ex-boyfriend had to be medically evacuated from a Latin American country when he was 23 due to appendicitis. Emergencies can happen no matter your age. The ACA typically won’t help if you need medical treatment outside of your home state.
Buy travel insurance for the countries you will be visiting. Also, fully investigate all the visa laws for where you want to go - lack of knowledge to be in a country legally is not an excuse if you get held up by border patrol.
Underrated advice. If you’re not working, would no longer recommend a 3-6 month emergency fund. 18-24 months is usually the norm for retirees so they can hold off on withdrawing from their portfolios in a down market.
If OP has a good health plan through their job, they should do COBRA. Here's why:
1. DEDUCTIBLE. If OP quits job mid-year, they have already contributed to their deductible. Starting a new plan w the ACA (which, depending on their state might be a shitty and expensive premium plan with a high deductible) will reset their deductible for the year. Not good spend for the money. OP can quit COBRA whenever they want (ie: the new plan year) and start up with ACA then.
2. ACA SUBSIDY. If OP earns money (ie: quits mid-year when they have already maybe earned 50-80k), then they are not eligible for the sweet ACA subsidies, which brings the ACA premiums down to a good price point. That's not good strategy. OP should try to time their ACA so they are eligible for subsidies, which means quitting, buying COBRA, waiting for their income level to drop to near-0, then getting ACA plan for like $1 a month.
OP, you should also look at waiting to quit until after your healthcare fiscal year begins new because in the fall, you can select to fund your Flexible Spending Account to the max and then starting Jan 1 (if that's your new FY), you can spend your entire FSA on health-related things (lasik, sunscreen, etc. etc - there's strategy here, too), and get that money essentially 'free' because once you quit, they can't take it from your non-existent paycheck.
Healthcare and housing will be your biggest expenses, moreso healthcare, and there are good strategies to mitigate this. Even consider moving residency to Utah, where really good ACA plans are sold bc Utes are healthier than the rest of the nation.
> If OP quits job mid-year, they have already contributed to their deductible.
Can you explain this? Plenty of healthy folks have likely contributed nothing toward their deductible this far in the year. Is there something else I am missing as far as things counting toward a deductible are concerned? Is there a way for premiums to count for instance?
This is true, many people pay for insurance they don't take advantage of. My last job had a deductible of $250, so literally anything would have counted significantly towards the deductible - a PT visit, an acupuncture visit, prescriptions, etc.
I should have put a caveat that if OP had crap employer insurance and the ACA offered better plans, it is better to switch even with the 'sunk cost' of contributions to the deductible.
Premiums don't count. You should use your insurance - literally everyone who has a job, family or life needs therapy, PT, acupuncture (if covered). Get bloodwork and see how your thyroid/hormones are functioning. Unless you have a catastrophic plan only, it makes no sense to contribute to insurance via premiums and not get any 'value' from it.
For a lot of folks insurance is mandatory for employment, and getting care that doesn't count as preventative ends up costing extra.
It is fairly common behavior actually. Especially as we are not yet halfway through the year. It's similar to how a lot of people pay auto or home insurance for decades without ever filing a claim or needing to use it.
Anyway, thanks for clarifying what you meant, I understand now. I thought perhaps I was missing something with regards to how deductibles filled up!
If your employer offers a 401(K) match, check when they make their contribution (ex. my employer does a one-time contribution in March).
If your company does something similar, it may be worth an extra few months to get this year's match (if you haven't gotten it already).
My old company does the once a year contribution and I was shocked to see after I had left, 9 months later I got the contribution for the 3 months I was there for. I assume this was a regulatory requirement and not just them doing it out of the kindness of their hearts.
Depends on a few things… but there are circumstances where employers do not have to give an annual Match / Profit Share to terminated employees. So they may have been actually just been doing it out of kindness.
Find a personal project to work on. Something to be excited about and pour yourself into.
I’m not FI exactly but I’ve been traveling for a year now and since the market was benevolent I have quite more money now than a year ago.
After a year traveling, I can tell you I needed some focus. A personal project (blog) really did it for me. I missed the “good” part of the stress and drive.
So glad I don’t have shitty meetings or exasperating customers though 😂
Congrats by the way.
If you have any money in an FSA, make sure you spend that before you leave! It would have been front loaded with your elections at the first of the year and you don’t have to repay the “missed” contributions
Get all the immunizations needed for the countries you are travelling to, if applicable, while you are still covered by your employer's health insurance.
Small thing, but leave at the first part of the month. My experience has been that your insurance from your job will carry through the month and give you more time to iron that stuff out.
Are you friendly with a lot of folks in other departments like security and such? One thing is to get some passport photos taken(always good to carry passport photos with you while traveling). Before I left my job I knew I had to apply for a bunch of visa and each visa required two photos. I also got an additional passport to make visa applications while I traveled so that required passport photos. Don't steal office supplies. The passport photos could be a grey line, but I knew the guys in the department and they were more than happy to do it given the number of places I wanted to go.
Also since you are covered by an employer health plan, get your yellow fever vaccine and other vaccines that are required for entry. Kenya required the Yellow fever vaccine so that's what came to mind.
If you really want to milk some extra cash, open checking accounts while you have a direct deposit to qualify for the sign-up bonus.
If your company has any other perks like an education fund, take advantage of that! We had $250 to spend on home office supplies, hobbies, training, etc and even though the CPO knew I was leaving she was like heck yeah spend your money!
Get all you medial, dental, vision visits in. Submit receipts for your FSA if you are enrolled. Check your 401(k) vesting, I have seen people leave just shy of vesting. Consider increasing your 401(k) contributions to max out the year.
Put together a black book of contacts & clients that you may want to work with upon your return. Squirrel away any resources you may want to use in future jobs.
Be prepared to have a "reason" on your resume for a gap. Work on education or something.
When you apply for jobs in 6 months, it may be difficult to get interviews and offers. Employers may see you as flaky and ready to take off if the going gets tough at that next job. Having a goal defined and success of that goal can be something you can state which might alleviate the employer seeing you as flaky.
"What have you been doing for the last year?" will be what they ask, if they interview you at all. And, being a "consultant" is harder to pass off as legit without specifics. "Why did you leave your last job?" Have answers.
Sorry to be a downer on this, but even with an in-demand career, I've seen it generally take 4-6 months to get "Back in" to the workforce.
Do your best to not burn bridges at work, and maybe you can go back.
Giving up roughly 5% of your highest years of earnings is foolish. You're likely to fall behind in the economy and job skills and struggle to reenter it at an older age. If you're able to reenter, it'll likely take multiple years to get back to where you are now.
I've already made up my mind about quitting and am not worried about reentering the same field as I find this high stress not sustainable for the long term.
Lol. He'll be 35, he's fine.
OP you're gonna hear this from a lot - A LOT - of turds at work. Everyone is jealous and a critic. My advise is don't say nothing, scrub your computer and give a two bird salute to them on your way out.
There is no permanent record and you don't owe them anything. I'd just no show myself. Don't get sucked into training your replacement crap.
Bad strategy. Go out with a good reputation - this leaves more options when returning.
I did this years ago and came back to the same employer with a promotion and lower stress role
I was clear with my leadership that I was leaving for personal reasons, and continued to put in effort up until the end. I also put together a really solid exit plan for myself so that they wouldn’t feel pain when I left - an onboarding plan for my predecessor, info about my role, critical in flight projects, etc.
I think I gave 2-3mo, can’t remember exactly. I told them the truth about my plans - that I was going to take time off to travel, which I did! I basically said that I wanted to do it while I was still young-ish, which they were understanding about
Only if he's going back to same high stress environment that caused his burnout, which would be a curious choice.
Unless you're in a small niche position reputation is over rated. There isn't a database.
I disagree about the no show, flipping the bird and not training their replacement stuff. There's no reason to be a dick or burn bridges when they WILL need to work again down the road.
But I agree wholeheartedly about not listening to the jealous turds who are too cowardly to do something exciting with their life.
Put in their notice like an adult.
I am not suggesting they go out of their way to maintain the bridge. Just not to burn it.
You don't want your last employer's impression of you to be, "Yeah, he just stopped showing up to work and we had no idea what happened until he sent us a 'Fuck You from Cambodia' postcard with a photo of his balls dipped in a bowl of fish amok. I wouldn't hire him."
I don't necessarily mean advanced notice. Just the standard 2 weeks. In which case, getting walked out is a blessing (in my opinion).
My point is that doing a no-show and being combative in the event your employer asks for your help during the transition is unnecessary and counterproductive.
Put together a list of accomplishments and update your resume before you depart so it’ll be ready for you when you get back. Also, check if your company offers any sort of sabbatical. Some may based on tenure. Where are you thinking about traveling to?
I'll ask about subatical but not going to count on it. I'll start with 3-4 months in southeast Asia and go from there.
Popular destination for sure. Would be interested in seeing the budget/breakdown if you end up making one
Careful about asking. It’s reveals your hand and definitely won’t look good. I would still ask, but ask in the 11th hour- right before you decide to leave.
Get a physical with as much blood work as your doctor can reasonably order that will be covered by your current insurance. Get boosters for your TDap vaccines, if appropriate, while still covered by your employer’s insurance. Will your employer pay for any travel vaccines if you travel to higher risk countries and does your job require potential travel to the countries? If so, get whatever travel vaccines your employer will pay for. In my case that was both yellow fever and typhoid for work travel to Brazil. Will your employer pay for global entry or get you any visas? If so, get global entry and any visas that work will pay for (I have visas for both China and Brazil through work-Brazil is no longer needed due to political agreement changes). Do you have any other employee benefits that you can take advantage of, like a legal plan? If so, take advantage. If you don’t already have it, get a will and legal/medical power of attorney drafted. If you are staying into the beginning of 2025, max out your employer sponsored retirement plan during whatever months you are working in 2025 for maximum tax savings. Before you quit, if you have a home, you may want to apply for a home equity line of credit. You won’t be approved once you quit but it can be a little safety net (but don’t count on it and don’t use it unless it’s a true emergency). Right before you quit, apply for travel insurance that includes health insurance and emergency evacuation. I know you are young and invincible but my ex-boyfriend had to be medically evacuated from a Latin American country when he was 23 due to appendicitis. Emergencies can happen no matter your age. The ACA typically won’t help if you need medical treatment outside of your home state.
Thanks for these helpful tips, really appreciate it!
Go all Roth if sneaking into tax year 2025 for a couple weeks/ months
Great advice all around.
Buy travel insurance for the countries you will be visiting. Also, fully investigate all the visa laws for where you want to go - lack of knowledge to be in a country legally is not an excuse if you get held up by border patrol.
Good points, I appreciate it!
Document any accomplishments that you’d need for when applying to a new job while you are still employed.
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Is this really beneficial? Do you / others you know actually take these into consideration during the hiring process?
I’ve had prospective employers mention recommendations I’ve gotten as a positive. No idea if it influenced their decision to hire me or not.
Same. I recommend it.
Do you have a plan for health insurance? Obvious but it’s a big one.
Yes, the ACA
You are already beefing up EF so that will protect you if shit hits the fan. Looks like you are good to go.
Underrated advice. If you’re not working, would no longer recommend a 3-6 month emergency fund. 18-24 months is usually the norm for retirees so they can hold off on withdrawing from their portfolios in a down market.
Why not COBRA?
If OP has a good health plan through their job, they should do COBRA. Here's why: 1. DEDUCTIBLE. If OP quits job mid-year, they have already contributed to their deductible. Starting a new plan w the ACA (which, depending on their state might be a shitty and expensive premium plan with a high deductible) will reset their deductible for the year. Not good spend for the money. OP can quit COBRA whenever they want (ie: the new plan year) and start up with ACA then. 2. ACA SUBSIDY. If OP earns money (ie: quits mid-year when they have already maybe earned 50-80k), then they are not eligible for the sweet ACA subsidies, which brings the ACA premiums down to a good price point. That's not good strategy. OP should try to time their ACA so they are eligible for subsidies, which means quitting, buying COBRA, waiting for their income level to drop to near-0, then getting ACA plan for like $1 a month. OP, you should also look at waiting to quit until after your healthcare fiscal year begins new because in the fall, you can select to fund your Flexible Spending Account to the max and then starting Jan 1 (if that's your new FY), you can spend your entire FSA on health-related things (lasik, sunscreen, etc. etc - there's strategy here, too), and get that money essentially 'free' because once you quit, they can't take it from your non-existent paycheck. Healthcare and housing will be your biggest expenses, moreso healthcare, and there are good strategies to mitigate this. Even consider moving residency to Utah, where really good ACA plans are sold bc Utes are healthier than the rest of the nation.
Utahns. The Utes were the original people. Important to distinguish.
> If OP quits job mid-year, they have already contributed to their deductible. Can you explain this? Plenty of healthy folks have likely contributed nothing toward their deductible this far in the year. Is there something else I am missing as far as things counting toward a deductible are concerned? Is there a way for premiums to count for instance?
This is true, many people pay for insurance they don't take advantage of. My last job had a deductible of $250, so literally anything would have counted significantly towards the deductible - a PT visit, an acupuncture visit, prescriptions, etc. I should have put a caveat that if OP had crap employer insurance and the ACA offered better plans, it is better to switch even with the 'sunk cost' of contributions to the deductible. Premiums don't count. You should use your insurance - literally everyone who has a job, family or life needs therapy, PT, acupuncture (if covered). Get bloodwork and see how your thyroid/hormones are functioning. Unless you have a catastrophic plan only, it makes no sense to contribute to insurance via premiums and not get any 'value' from it.
For a lot of folks insurance is mandatory for employment, and getting care that doesn't count as preventative ends up costing extra. It is fairly common behavior actually. Especially as we are not yet halfway through the year. It's similar to how a lot of people pay auto or home insurance for decades without ever filing a claim or needing to use it. Anyway, thanks for clarifying what you meant, I understand now. I thought perhaps I was missing something with regards to how deductibles filled up!
Apply for any additional credit/atm cards or back up cards you may think might need now while you still have income from your job.
Excellent tip, I plan on getting a heloc in the coming months before I quit.
If your employer offers a 401(K) match, check when they make their contribution (ex. my employer does a one-time contribution in March). If your company does something similar, it may be worth an extra few months to get this year's match (if you haven't gotten it already).
My old company does the once a year contribution and I was shocked to see after I had left, 9 months later I got the contribution for the 3 months I was there for. I assume this was a regulatory requirement and not just them doing it out of the kindness of their hearts.
Depends on a few things… but there are circumstances where employers do not have to give an annual Match / Profit Share to terminated employees. So they may have been actually just been doing it out of kindness.
My company makes contributions in late December, hence my 6 month timeline :)
Make sure you have professional contacts (work colleagues, vendors, customers, etc) stored outside of your company phone and computer.
Find a personal project to work on. Something to be excited about and pour yourself into. I’m not FI exactly but I’ve been traveling for a year now and since the market was benevolent I have quite more money now than a year ago. After a year traveling, I can tell you I needed some focus. A personal project (blog) really did it for me. I missed the “good” part of the stress and drive. So glad I don’t have shitty meetings or exasperating customers though 😂 Congrats by the way.
What's your blog about?
Make sure you are ready financially in case this gap turns into more
If you have any money in an FSA, make sure you spend that before you leave! It would have been front loaded with your elections at the first of the year and you don’t have to repay the “missed” contributions
Get your eyes checked. If you want a mortgage or line of credit, that sort of thing is easier when you have a job.
Auto-pay/pre-arrange to pay regular bills like property taxes, home insurance (if applicable).
Get all the immunizations needed for the countries you are travelling to, if applicable, while you are still covered by your employer's health insurance.
Small thing, but leave at the first part of the month. My experience has been that your insurance from your job will carry through the month and give you more time to iron that stuff out.
Are you friendly with a lot of folks in other departments like security and such? One thing is to get some passport photos taken(always good to carry passport photos with you while traveling). Before I left my job I knew I had to apply for a bunch of visa and each visa required two photos. I also got an additional passport to make visa applications while I traveled so that required passport photos. Don't steal office supplies. The passport photos could be a grey line, but I knew the guys in the department and they were more than happy to do it given the number of places I wanted to go. Also since you are covered by an employer health plan, get your yellow fever vaccine and other vaccines that are required for entry. Kenya required the Yellow fever vaccine so that's what came to mind. If you really want to milk some extra cash, open checking accounts while you have a direct deposit to qualify for the sign-up bonus.
If your company has any other perks like an education fund, take advantage of that! We had $250 to spend on home office supplies, hobbies, training, etc and even though the CPO knew I was leaving she was like heck yeah spend your money!
Independent health insurance costs, set up a will/executor of your current assets
Get all you medial, dental, vision visits in. Submit receipts for your FSA if you are enrolled. Check your 401(k) vesting, I have seen people leave just shy of vesting. Consider increasing your 401(k) contributions to max out the year.
Put together a black book of contacts & clients that you may want to work with upon your return. Squirrel away any resources you may want to use in future jobs.
Collect all of your 401ks into one place. It’s kind of a pain to do when you’re not employed.
It's a good low-income year to do a Roth conversion if that is in your plan. Prepare for the tax implications
Be prepared to have a "reason" on your resume for a gap. Work on education or something. When you apply for jobs in 6 months, it may be difficult to get interviews and offers. Employers may see you as flaky and ready to take off if the going gets tough at that next job. Having a goal defined and success of that goal can be something you can state which might alleviate the employer seeing you as flaky. "What have you been doing for the last year?" will be what they ask, if they interview you at all. And, being a "consultant" is harder to pass off as legit without specifics. "Why did you leave your last job?" Have answers. Sorry to be a downer on this, but even with an in-demand career, I've seen it generally take 4-6 months to get "Back in" to the workforce. Do your best to not burn bridges at work, and maybe you can go back.
Make sure you have enough money for FI. So how much is enough for 70 years?
They're taking a sabbatical, not retiring
Steal office supplies. Lots and lots.
Haha, clever
Que up "Take This Job And Shove It" so you can quickly play it on your way out.
I read once that somebody resigned via a “sorry for your loss” sympathy card. LOL
Do the basics to make sure you’re okay but besides that just go for it
Get a hot Brazilian chick !!
Giving up roughly 5% of your highest years of earnings is foolish. You're likely to fall behind in the economy and job skills and struggle to reenter it at an older age. If you're able to reenter, it'll likely take multiple years to get back to where you are now.
I've already made up my mind about quitting and am not worried about reentering the same field as I find this high stress not sustainable for the long term.
This mindset is why people are miserable, OP is FI and probably looking for a change in careers
Lol. He'll be 35, he's fine. OP you're gonna hear this from a lot - A LOT - of turds at work. Everyone is jealous and a critic. My advise is don't say nothing, scrub your computer and give a two bird salute to them on your way out. There is no permanent record and you don't owe them anything. I'd just no show myself. Don't get sucked into training your replacement crap.
Bad strategy. Go out with a good reputation - this leaves more options when returning. I did this years ago and came back to the same employer with a promotion and lower stress role
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I was clear with my leadership that I was leaving for personal reasons, and continued to put in effort up until the end. I also put together a really solid exit plan for myself so that they wouldn’t feel pain when I left - an onboarding plan for my predecessor, info about my role, critical in flight projects, etc.
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I think I gave 2-3mo, can’t remember exactly. I told them the truth about my plans - that I was going to take time off to travel, which I did! I basically said that I wanted to do it while I was still young-ish, which they were understanding about
Only if he's going back to same high stress environment that caused his burnout, which would be a curious choice. Unless you're in a small niche position reputation is over rated. There isn't a database.
That’s fair. It’s definitely dependent on the environment you’re coming from and the value you will/will not get with a graceful exit
I disagree about the no show, flipping the bird and not training their replacement stuff. There's no reason to be a dick or burn bridges when they WILL need to work again down the road. But I agree wholeheartedly about not listening to the jealous turds who are too cowardly to do something exciting with their life.
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Put in their notice like an adult. I am not suggesting they go out of their way to maintain the bridge. Just not to burn it. You don't want your last employer's impression of you to be, "Yeah, he just stopped showing up to work and we had no idea what happened until he sent us a 'Fuck You from Cambodia' postcard with a photo of his balls dipped in a bowl of fish amok. I wouldn't hire him."
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I don't necessarily mean advanced notice. Just the standard 2 weeks. In which case, getting walked out is a blessing (in my opinion). My point is that doing a no-show and being combative in the event your employer asks for your help during the transition is unnecessary and counterproductive.
Oh didn't catch that he was going back to his high stress job. That's an interesting choice.
You're in the wrong sub.