Well what else can be said about the month of April other than YIKES!
As April came to a close so did our time in Texas. We had such a great time during our 2 month stay in South Texas and it was actually hard to leave our spot. We had the same amazing neighbors throughout our entire stay, which is a bit unusual. We enjoyed everything about the area as there was a wide variety of things to do…
Disclaimer - I have not yet retired. However, I decided to start this blog to track my journey, and hopefully give others ideas on where to go. I am located in the US so I will be referencing US Tax law, the general principals should translate to other countries (or not be applicable in the case of healthcare costs!)
Below is a summary of the advice in this post, and below that is the actual post.
Questions welcome!
Pieces of Advice:
If you’re young invest in high risk high growth stock funds (preferably 0 fee index funds), then transition to lower risk lower growth bond funds as you get older.
If your job offers an FSA or HSA choice: Get the FSA if you have consistent known medical expenses each year because those funds won’t roll over. Get the HSA if you don’t (and MAX it). Check to see if your HSA allows you to invest funds. Mine allows investments past the first $2,000 and any gains are 100% tax free.
Max out your 401(k) if you can. If you can’t at least get the max company match.
IRAs are great. If you don’t make much now and hope to make more in the future use a Roth IRA. If you plan on retiring early and living on a low income use a Traditional IRA.
If you want to invest for fun while also building some value Robinhood is free and I’m a personal fan. join.robinhood.com/amandaw1188
Real estate investing can be a good way to build your assets. But REITs also work if you don’t want to buy a house (or aren’t able to yet).
You need a budget!
First, I’ll give you some background. I am 24 years old (okay 23, but I turn 24 in a month) and have been working since I was 17. I also SUCK at budgeting! So where have 6 years of work and 9 years of budget gotten me? A net worth of about $50,000
Which, as it turns out, is slightly above average for the above average person (according to Financial Samurai - which is an excellent FIRE blog if you want something established rather than evolving).
I’ve been investing since I was 18 when I opened an American Funds account. Unfortunately, I opened it with someone who was used to handling money for people in their 60s so he put it all in a bond fund (read terrible returns!) so I lost out on years of growth before I thought to check and see why the returns were so much worse than my other investments. I’ve made more in the last year in a Growth Fund than the first three in the Bond fund.
Speaking of other investments, Robinhood is Really good for shits and giggles! I don’t recommend it for long-term investing goals, but if you have $100 to spare (or really like $5 you don’t need to start big) it can be fun to invest just to see where you go.
If you sign up with this link: join.robinhood.com/amandaw1188 you get a free stock too! My coworker, the lucky bastard, got one worth about $400. The max is $500 and in my experience the average is ~$5. But hey, that’s $5 free dollars.
I went to college when I was 18, and was lucky enough to take out minimal loans. I did that by attending a lower cost college, taking advantage of education tax credits, working ~45 hours a week during the semester and ~70 during the summer, and getting some scholarships.
In Spring of 2019 I transitioned to a “Big Girl” job (by only taking night classes that semester) and was working a corporate job as a Financial Data Analyst a few months before I graduated.
In the first year I maxed my HSA and put some money into my 401(k) - though I didn’t put anything into an IRA (My Bad!). Instead I built up enough cash for a deposit on a duplex.
An aside on the HSA - check to see if you can invest a portion of your funds. I’ve been dumping mine into stock and made an extra $1,300 that will never be taxed. Even if you are a relatively healthy individual - you will get old and having some money set aside for medical expense will be useful. If you aren’t a relatively health individual it’s even more important to be building funds for medical expenses. (Part two of that plan is to retire to somewhere that isn’t the USA since we have such a terrible healthcare system).
Now I live in one side of the duplex and have renters on the other side. Unfortunately I live in a housing bubble so the mortgage - rent = ~my rent prior to buying the house. But at least now I’m building equity!
This year in 2021 I will be maxing my 401(k), HSA, and IRA. (The alternative is to save for another house but my area is expensive and I don’t really want to manage a rental from a distance).
To manage all of this I will be living on less than half of my original paycheck. So when I say I suck at budgeting - I mean I have an unfortunate problem to overcome! However, I also have the benefit of hating to spend money. . . I blame spending my childhood thinking I was going to be homeless (fun times. . . )
Okay so that was a long and probably not that interesting post! But future ones should be more finance focused. I’m always happy to answer questions, and if I don’t know the answer I will research it for you because I love any excuse to learn!
P.S. I chose Tumblr as a platform because I hoped that a lot of you young’uns might be interested in planning your finances before you get to the money making stages. And because I hoped that some older users would also be willing to share their perspectives and experiences!
It’s hard to believe the time for another monthly update is already here. November seemed to fly by and with the end of the month came the end of our time in the Sedona, AZ area. We absolutely loved every minute of our time there and we look forward to returning next year. In fact we already made reservations for the entire Winter next year and have the option to work camp and stay for free!
We…
I think one of the first and subsequently most overlooked steps in pursuing FIRE is letting go of the guilt and shame that's been beaten into us from Day One under the guise of a good christian work ethic. Let go of your guilt over your perfectly natural and normal desire to want to spend your time how you please, dictate your own schedule and create a life that you want rather than one that others want for you. Screen out the messaging around FIRE, the snide remarks from people who assume everyone pursuing early retirement just wants to sip mai tais on a beach somewhere. So what? Maybe that's what FIRE looks like to some of us. And that's fine. There's as many different versions of FIRE as there are people. Why am I the weird one for not wanting to spend the next 40 to 60 years of my lifespan stuck in a windowless cubicle? The truth of the matter is this: someone else needs my spot just as badly as I do, and quite frankly, I don't want to be in my spot beyond the next 5 to 10 years at most. I'm still using my spot, but someone just as hungry will take it once I've moved on. Why on earth would I camp out in my 9-to-5 spot for another 50 years when I can't stand a single minute of it as is? I'm not waiting till I'm 65 to start living. No thanks.
Welcome to our July 2024 dividend portfolio update! Most of our time over the last month has been spent dealing with our home build. As such, everything else has taken a back seat in priority.
With our busy schedule there hasn’t been any time to work on generating investible cash. And we certainly haven’t had the time to spend researching companies or reviewing our holdings. So everything is…
As ours reader are probably aware of by now, we have been looking a location to find or build our forever home. Over the last few months our search has taken us from Montana down to Texas and everything in between. While our forever home search started out very wide, and across several states, it has since narrowed. As much as we love Montana and our Temporary home state of South Dakota the…
It’s time for our October 2023 dividend portfolio update and unfortunately there aren’t many positives to report. The markets continued to sell off for the third straight month and our dividend portfolio continued to take hits on all fronts. If there is a silver lining for investors it’s that there are buying opportunities everywhere as we have entered correction territory.
We arrived at our new…
It’s time to close the books on the economic disaster that was 2022 and we are going to start by closing out our dividend portfolio update for the year. This will also be the first time we incorporate some more historical data points in order to give more visual prospective to the growth of our portfolio and positions.
Since our last update just a few short weeks ago the markets have dropped, we…
