Bored at work? Have a dream? Looking for leisure? Just want to try something new? Maybe it’s all of the above. Your motivation for digging into early retirement doesn’t have to be pure or simple, and you don’t necessarily have to wait till you are financially independent. The Cubicle Conundrum The standard outsiders view of the F.I.R.E. community tends to boil down to escaping the rat race. If you are dissatisfied at work you might dream of the day you can just walk away. This may be a motivator for many early retirement dreamers, but I don’t think it’s the only one. It may not even be the most important.…
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Book Review: The 4 Laws of Financial Prosperity
Get Control of Your Money Now! by Blaine Harris & Charles Coonradt The Point The point of the book is to teach basic personal finance principles through a story about a guy in debt that is taken under the wing of an older lady who is very wealthy. She teaches him four principles of prosperity. The book is well written and the narrative style makes the material more enjoyable to read. The Four Laws 1. Track your spending, 2. Set targets or financial goals, 3. Trim your spending to achieve the goals, 4. Train your brain by learning about finance. I figure I’m pretty far along the path to financial…
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One Weird Trick to Double your Stock Market returns!
That’s right, I have the secret trick that will double your returns. It’s not clickbait, it’s not a scam, and I’m not going to make you wait till the bottom of the article to find out what it is. Here is the secret that the entire mutual fund industry has been fighting for over forty years. Do Nothing! Just buy and hold. You heard me. Do nothing. Don’t sell when the market is high, don’t sell during a market crash to limit losses, don’t buy when the market is low, don’t keep a reserve of cash to use when stocks are on sale, just buy an index fund and hold…
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Triple Your Food Budget!
There are a lot of naysayers in the personal finance space that scoff at the idea of giving up your $5 cup of coffee to build financial security. The $5 coffee seems to be the target of many F.I.R.E. bloggers. Why do we spend so much time on such a small thing? Because small things add up to big things! What does $5 get you? The $5 coffee or $5 breakfast sandwich adds up to about $100 per month if you are only buying during workdays. Since we are talking about retirement here the opportunity cost of the $5 is about that much less you can invest. Now of course…
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Book Review: Safety-First Retirement Planning
An Integrated Approach for a Worry-Free Retirement, by Wade Pfau Philosophy This is another Wade Pfau book that I enjoyed for its in depth coverage of annuities and cash value life insurance products. If you have read any of Wade’s other books on retirement you will be familiar with the background material he presents in his books. Much of it is a repeat of what he presents in his other books. So you can skip to the chapters that interest you. If you are unfamiliar with terms like “Sequence of returns risk” or “longevity risk” then you’ll want to start at the beginning. Main Points The main point of the…
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Mortgages on F.I.R.E.
How do I choose between a 15 year mortgage and a 30 year mortgage? Does the F.I.R.E. philosophy change the game? How the Game is played In general, the more you can invest in high growth rate index funds the better off you are. This is especially true if you are a standard investor with a 30 to 40 year investment horizon. In the standard timeline you are likely better off taking a 30 year mortgage and investing the rest, than you would be taking a 15 year mortgage and investing less while you pay off the mortgage. In a long timeframe strategy, the compounded growth of the extra investments…
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Book Review: Reverse Mortgages
How to Use Reverse Mortgages to Secure Your Retirement, by Wade Pfau This is an interesting book. It goes against much of the conventional wisdom I absorbed growing up. I read it because I was impressed by Wade Pfau’s other book on withdrawls in retirement. He does and in depth and academic review of the subject. Wade’s style might be a bit dry for some but I find that the genre of financial writing can be a bit hyperbolic, so I don’t mind an objective and academic style. Use early, use often The primary conclusions of the book are that many retirees could benefit from a reverse mortgage, and that…
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Part Time Work as Strategy
How do you bridge to pivot projects, let your nest egg grow, and de-stress your life all at the same time? Go part time and get a head start on all your pivot projects even earlier. The accumulation phase During your accumulation phase years, you are working full time and saving your pennies for the future. There are at least four things happening during that time. You are saving and investing part of your money You are allowing your nest egg to grow You are learning to control your spending by living on less than you earn. You are aging Adjustments that increase your savings rate will both increase your…
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Level up your life
How to make time to exercise, and level up your life. The conundrum Every once in a while I think, “Wouldn’t it be nice if I had time to exercise.” I can make time on an infrequent basis to get a workout done after work, but more often than not, something comes up and the workout gets shelved. So how do you make time when you don’t have time? The solution For me the solution was to turn my commute into my workout. I began cycling to work. Fans of the F.I.R.E. movement will have already heard the financial arguments for cycling. If you can do away with most of…
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F.I.(ish) P.E.E. from another angle
I became interested in the early retirement movement as a consequence of a rising sense of dissatisfaction with my job. It seems a bit ungrateful no matter how I look at it. I have a very good job, doing important work. Nevertheless I have a hard time doing the same thing day in and day out. Gratitude So what is the solution to mid life blues? I think having options is a good start. Having a sense of gratitude for what I have now is another piece to the puzzle. I have a great life, a wonderful wife, and good children. In nearly all ways I’m already a very rich…
