Meet the people trying to save enough to retire by 40

Followers of the Fire – Financial Independence, Retire Early – movement say it’s possible to amass enough cash to quit work and follow your dreams in mid-life

For many, it is an idea of heaven – shutting down the computer one last time and leaving the office in the full knowledge that you are financially stable enough never to have to return. And all at an age that most people would consider to be barely midway through their working life.

But a growing movement is focused on just that: encouraging people towards a mixture of extreme saving, frugal living and smart investment that will allow them to stop working and put their feet up decades before their peers – in some cases, when they are still in their 30s. And the Financial Independence, Retire Early (Fire) doctrine claims that people do not need a six-figure salary to get there.