People ask me about my health insurance a lot. For the first few years of my retirement, I paid for Obamacare. It wasn’t ideal because of the high deductible and I used it only for physicals, which were free and showed me in good health. Whenever I traveled, which was always, I paid out of… Read More »
My friend Mimi is contemplating relocating from Chicago, Illinois to Sydney, Australia for her job. The assignment would last anywhere from 18-24 months and comes with a cost of living increase. She asked me, since I’m trying to impersonate a personal finance guru, if the move was “worth it.” So I asked her some questions… Read More »
The year ended! 2018 retired and it’s time to update my chart! But, first, if you don’t mind, a stroll through history. History lesson I was reading through my old journals and I came across some fun stuff I think you’ll like seeing. Or maybe you won’t. I don’t know what you like anymore. How… Read More »
When my financial avatar, Mimi, was a finicky baby with more student loan debt than sense, I checked her pulse hourly. Before I retired, I popped my head in monthly. Since retirement, I’ve been poking her to make sure she’s still breathing three times a year. Mimi is getting annoyed with my poking, though. She… Read More »
When I started this blog, updating my chart each month was great fun. Even when the market was temporarily down, my net worth almost invariably went up. It’s a delight to plot your way to retirement while you’re working and making gobs and gobs of money in a bull market. The deeper I wade into retirement… Read More »
This reminder popped up for me recently: Check your net worth, my darling! Oh. Right. It’s September. Another four months of living and not working and it’s time to write another post updating my progress on this early retirement experiment. This is normally my best shot at evangelizing. Look, it’s working! Truth be told, I… Read More »
Hi guys, how you going? That’s how Australians say “how are you” and not poor grammar on my part. It’s time for the only post you really care about! I’m updating my chart for the first third of 2017! Whee! I check in with my financial avatar three times a year, making sure she hasn’t started… Read More »
I’ve been doing some research on publishing the book I’m writing and several sources suggested starting my own publishing company. Since “start a business” is item #11 on my life bucket list, I decided to knock that one out now. Thinking of starting your own? Here are my occasionally U.S.-centric steps for doing so. Come up… Read More »
It’s time to update my glorious early retirement chart for the last four months of 2016. I do it three times a year because I don’t like to think about it more than that. Thinking about money is boring. I’d rather think about burritos. Here’s where I sat at the end of August 2016. The… Read More »
Last December, I wrote a bit of a love letter to my new-at-the-time phone and plan — Project Fi by Google. I had retired a couple of months prior and no longer had data at my fingertips paid for by an employer. 14 months later, I’ve paid an average of $23.41 per month for the service. Are you paying more for your… Read More »