Retire at 35

Some people who have known me for a while know of my big idea to retire at age 40, something I had a year before I graduated from college. While it seemed like a lofty goal back then, I think I have a pretty good chance of making it happen, given what I have learned. In fact, I might retire earlier than that.

I came across this blog post from earlier this year that sounds like something I would write today for recent graduates along those lines:

If you continue your frugal college habits, and avoid the temptations of consumption, you can easily save enough money to be able to retire at the age of 35. If your monthly salary is $5,000, and you save 25% percent of your salary or $1,250 per month, you will have $400,000 at the age of 35.

Live below your means, save what you can, etc. Until you reach $X and can retire off of that. Simple enough -- just a matter of getting the right numbers. The numbers here don't actually add up to $400K. According to the comments, there's an extra 9% compounding thrown in.

Yet it seems most people my age who earn a substantial amount of money don't follow this. I think there are several possible reasons for it:

1. They don't know that this can be done, thanks to the near-lack of good financial education in America's government schools and colleges/universities; or they don't know of any way to achieve the rate of compounding necessary.
2. They're used to the career-building mindset as opposed to the wealth-building mindset. Many people equate wealth with having a high income rather than a high net worth. This is the difference between an upper-middle class mindset and an upper class mindset, I believe.
   
3. They're not willing to put off buying luxury goods and live below their means.

On the other hand, I wonder if my own perspective comes from having found the means to obtain substantial returns on my savings as well as a job in low-cost Texas. If I didn't have these, maybe I would be more focused on building my career (not that I slack off with it). Maybe I would be resigned to working for the next 20 years rather than being able to retire in 10 years or less.