Financial Independence Moving abroad, FIRE home stretch is in sight

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• Moving abroad, FIRE home stretch is in sight
• What was your dumbest financial mistake?
• Daily FI discussion thread - February 04, 2019
• 401k rollover process: time out of the market feels awful...
• Soon to be married, how do you handle finances with SO?
• Weekly FI Monday Milestone thread - February 04, 2019
• My 403(b) plan administrator has a 1-click, hassle-free re-balancing tool. How often should I use it?
• FIREing overseas: List of "best places", cost of living info and more
• If you were explaining FIRE to a friend who was interested...am I missing anything here?
• How can you be sure your Coast FIRE number is right?
• Free End of Life Documents (Will, Power of Attorney, Etc.)
• Any already FIREd folks doing part-year in an RV (snowbird)?
• Budgeting for 20 years in the future

Moving abroad, FIRE home stretch is in sight Posted: 04 Feb 2019 06:16 AM PST I've never written one of these status posts but given it's the new year and some life changes are about to happen, I reckon this is as good of a time as ever to start anew. ​ Background about me Bit about me, I am 32, living in an Ultra HCOL (NYC) and have been actively saving for FIRE for the last 4 years (no kids, probably no plans to). Previous to that, I had a few years where I succumbed to the standard life inflation lifestyle that befalls everyone but I was young and down to party. I always managed to save my bonuses and made some decent investments that had good returns. It wasn't really until 2015 when I read a few articles and blogs that it all clicked. I work in Finance so my salary and bonus is probably higher than most, but not out of the realm of other FIRE peeps here. I was making $200k+ in salary and bonus before I was 30. However, NYC is expensive and a one bedroom apartment in Manhattan is $3.5 to $4k/mo so it all works out. Plus we have the highest taxes in the country. ​ Why FIRE? Everyone has their own reasons for FIREing and mine is perhaps no different to most others. It's not that I absolutely hate what I do in Finance. I mean I studied, went to colelge, and prepared my whole life for it in one way or another. I thought I was all about it when I first started because as a 22 year old, you think this is what I am supposed to be doing in life and the path to full on adulting. But as time goes on, as I traveled more, I realized that there is just more to life, and I am supposed to be doing something else that is no looking at multiple monitors for the entire day and making powerpoint presentations. So my plan is to continue traveling around the world full time and eventually work as a dive instructor somewhere and maybe even transition to some sort of marine research that involves lots of diving. ​ Account Values I started working weeks before the Lehman collapse. Didn't really know what was happening at the time. My NW before 2014 are all estimates as I was not tracking anything during that time period. ​ 2008: -$20,000. Student loans, irresponsible credit card debt accrued in college killed me the first few months of adult life. $65k entry salary. 2009: $25,000 A sign on bonus, year end bonus, and tax return wiped out most of my credit card debt 2010: $60,000 Was making about $100,000 at this point. Didn't save anything as I was partying but decent investments propelled my net worth up 2011: $100,000 More of the same 2012: $170,000 Started some side hustles that took off but really didn't save much still. 2013: $220,000 Continued side hustles and started saving some more money. 2014: $280,000 Combination of market returns, decent savings, and continued side hustles propelled me further up 2015: $350,000 Bought an apartment, discovered FI/RE. Race was on. Started maxing out 401k. 2016: $475,000 70% savings rate and market returns really helped, also real estate appreciation 2017: $650,000 More of the same, making over $200k by this point, and market returns helped, real estate appreciation 2018: $760,000 More of the same, market drop in equities and real estate ​ ​ As of the beginning of 2019, my networth is split as such: Pretax Accounts: $150k Post tax accounts: $300k Cash: $50k Real Estate: Estimated value about $850k, with a $500k mortgage left. After broker fees and such, I reckon I have about $300k of real estate equity Total Net Worth in 2019: $800k Expected cash flows in Q1 2019: $35k (bonus after tax), $25k (relocation sum post tax), $10k (tax refund) = $65k cash ​ Was hoping I would have a higher Net worth but the markets shitting into the end of the year did me no favors but it's since come back some. Currently, I am saving about $100k in pre and post tax accounts per year. I think the lesson to be gathered here is had I started FI/RE back when I first started working, I'd probably already be FI/RE'd by now as I started my career during the great recession. But like picking stocks, hindsight is 20/20 and it's all about moving forward! ​ Life Change in the works Now for the big life change. I am moving to Europe for my work! I've lived abroad before and have wanted to do it again. Plus I've always found that living abroad is a great way to get away from all the political nonsense I read on a daily basis. But that is just personal preferences. I am taking a job in Germany that will pay roughly 160k euros on a salary+base level. Converted to dollars, this is actually a slight pay cut but the $ is strong so it's a moot comparison. The cost of living is so much lower there, that I will be living like the king I never could be in NYC. Taxes there are high but comparable to NYC. One of the main reasons for the move is so I can travel Europe and the surrounding areas on the regular with my 7 weeks of vacation a year. ALso, my GF has a remote working job so she will join me in Germany and will claim the FEIE which shoudl boost her salary greatly. ​ FIRE Goal My FIRE goal is $1m or thereabouts. With $40k a year, I will have more than enough money to do the things I want to do, which is mainly travel the world full time and work as a dive instructor in the places I want to be in (this will pay roughly $1,000 - $2,500/mo and many jobs offer free room and board). Also, my blog generates about $500 a month at the moment, and hoping to get this to $1,000/mo by the time I FIRE. Plan is to rent my apartment in NYC for a 3-4 years and sell it before FIRE'ing and cashing out. I am hoping to reach $1m in the next 2-3 years which is about how long I will want to work in Europe anyway. Assuming the markets don't meaningfully decline, I think it should be doable. Anyway, it feels a bit surreal that FIRE is almost within grasp especially with all these changes happening. Thank you to everyone on this reddit that's been fighting the good fight and here's to a good 2019! ​ submitted by /u/johncnyc [link] [comments]

What was your dumbest financial mistake? Posted: 04 Feb 2019 07:36 AM PST I apologize if this isn't allowed. I read the sidebar and FAQ, so I think I'm good... ​ I am often tempted by higher risk investments, which generally speaking our sub tries to avoid. One of the many ways I use to not fall into the "but I could shave years off of my retirement if my return is 20%/year" type opportunities is to read about investments gone wrong. ​ What are some examples that in hindsight were terrible decisions. Ever buy a high risk individual stock? A leveraged ETF? submitted by /u/FIat45istheplan [link] [comments]

Daily FI discussion thread - February 04, 2019 Posted: 04 Feb 2019 03:08 AM PST Please use this thread to have discussions which you don't feel warrant a new post to the sub. While the Rules for posting questions on the basics of personal finance/investing topics are relaxed a little bit here, the rules against memes/spam/self-promotion/excessive rudeness/politics still apply! Have a look at the FAQ for this subreddit before posting to see if your question is frequently asked. Since this post does tend to get busy, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts. submitted by /u/AutoModerator [link] [comments]

401k rollover process: time out of the market feels awful... Posted: 04 Feb 2019 03:41 PM PST Sorry if this turns into a rant, but if there is any advice or help anyone can give me to help with this or future rollovers, I'd great appreciate it! So to give context, I switched jobs recently and got around to moving over my old 401k during the holidays. This was partially due to my old company cancelling their 401k which meant I only had a few weeks (from early-mid Dec til Dec 31) to start the rollover process, or else they would move it to one of their shitty IRAs. After calling my old 401k and new 401k a bunch of times to figure out all the info needed by each party, I was able to mail in a notarized request to begin the rollover process by Dec 20. Unfortunately for me, this wasn't processed by the old 401k company until Dec 28th (4 days after the market dip). To keep the story short, it took until Jan 28th for the new company to process the 401k (due to mailing errors and 2day shipping taking ~8 business days). Given that the index funds I sold/ re-bought on average grew back to where they had been at the start of Dec, I essentially sold right after the dip and bought back to pre-dip, losing what would have been ~10% gains as they climbed back to pre-dip levels. Is there any way to avoid this in the future? Or better yet some way to recoup some losses (I doubt it) since both companies took way longer than should be expected to process a request, especially the first company which made numerous errors? Luckily I'm relatively early in my career, so I essentially lost a few thousand dollars. But if I was close to retiring, this would have been tens of thousands of dollars lost that was basically me being forced to take a huge chunk of my portfolio out of the market for an extended period of time that happened to coincide with a dip. TL;DR: Old Company 401k was being cancelled, I had a few weeks to roll it all over. Rollover took a full month to process, meaning I was mostly out of the market for that month, which coincided with being just after a substantial dip in the market, losing me thousands of dollars. How can I avoid this in the future? submitted by /u/the_other_mouth [link] [comments]

Soon to be married, how do you handle finances with SO? Posted: 04 Feb 2019 03:23 PM PST Soon to be married. Money prior to marriage Stays with that person. Other partner can't touch it. Money after marriage ~60% of earnings per partner are pooled. We share this money used for big things ~40% of earning per partner is saved for themselves. Used to buy each other gifts or not have to get permission to spend Anyone do something similar? If not, how do you handle your money. Edit 40% doesn't mean anything. Don't concentrate on the numbers. Just the general idea. We don't have to spend it. Can invest it instead. We don't have to spend it. submitted by /u/Childish_Samurai [link] [comments]

Weekly FI Monday Milestone thread - February 04, 2019 Posted: 04 Feb 2019 03:09 AM PST Please use this thread to post your milestones, humblebrags and status updates which you don't feel warrant a new post to the sub. While the Rules for posting questions on the basics of personal finance/investing topics are relaxed a little bit here, the rules against memes/spam/self-promotion/excessive rudeness/politics still apply! Since this post does tend to get busy, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts. submitted by /u/AutoModerator [link] [comments]

My 403(b) plan administrator has a 1-click, hassle-free re-balancing tool. How often should I use it? Posted: 04 Feb 2019 02:32 PM PST Annually? Quarterly? Monthly? Let's say my allocation is 90% stocks and 10% bonds, and let's say my stocks do well and now I am at 91% stocks and 9% bonds. Should I re-balance at this point? It probably won't make a huge difference in the in, but just curious what modern portfolio theory has to say about it. submitted by /u/CD_Johanna [link] [comments]

FIREing overseas: List of "best places", cost of living info and more Posted: 04 Feb 2019 11:27 AM PST "Where should I FIRE overseas?" This question comes up often around here and today I found this website linked from an article on cnbc. Seemed like a site with some good information beyond the typical best places list. The site really wants to send you 'free reports' via email (probably to sell you something). I don't know what you will get because I didn't sign up. Hope some here will find this useful. Best Places List: https://internationalliving.com/the-best-places-to-retire/ Best Healthcare List: https://internationalliving.com/countries-best-healthcare-world/ Cheapest Places List: https://internationalliving.com/the-cheapest-places-in-the-world-to-live/ Cost of Living in Spain (other countries too): https://internationalliving.com/countries/spain/cost-of-living-in-spain/ Taxes in Spain (other countries too): https://internationalliving.com/countries/spain/taxes-in-spain/ submitted by /u/SeriouslyJoking88 [link] [comments]

If you were explaining FIRE to a friend who was interested...am I missing anything here? Posted: 04 Feb 2019 03:14 PM PST Hopefully this is helpful to others as well. I don't talk much about FIRE to my friends, co-workers, or even family, but I do have a close friend that is very open minded to the concept and I'd like to explain it to them a bit more in detail. Anyway, I jotted down some notes so I don't forget anything important. Am I missing anything glaringly obvious here? Start by calculating your number based on 3-4% SWR (Trinity study, etc.) Investing - Power of Compounding - Automated investing (setting up automatic bank transfers on payday to Vanguard, Fidelity, etc.) - Index funds - Tax advantaged accounts - Roth Conversion Ladder to access retirement funds for RE - Historical returns - Story of Bob the world's worst market timer - Time in the market vs. timing the market (never try to time the market) - Never try to "beat" the market Max out tax advantaged accounts (at first the very least should be the match) - List of various tax advantaged accounts - SEP IRA or Solo 401k (for self-employed) - 401K, etc. Live below your means (stop living paycheck to paycheck) - Pay yourself first (automation and maxing out tax advantaged accounts) - Don't keep up with the Jones' - Don't budget, rather track your spending (tools like mint, personal capital, YNAB, etc.) Increasing income - Side-hustles: hobby/business, real estate investing, "sharing economy (ie Uber, fivver, upwork, etc.)" - Job hopping - Negotiating salary increases or how to work towards getting a promotion Decrease your current expenses (house, car, retail splurges, vacations, etc.) - Pay off high interest debt Emergency funds - Unexpected expenses - Unexpected income loss Constantly work towards increasing your "savings rate" Consumerism vs. selling to consumers: explain how both large and small businesses receive money vs. you giving them money, etc. As an entrepreneur or with a side business you would rather be the seller rather than being the buyer (this may be redundant?) Index investing means you own a small piece of many of the world's most profitable companies. Concept of over consumption vs. responsible consumption Ways to save money - Working on your own car(s) - Doing your own home repairs (if you're a homeowner) - Alternatives to various transportation Drastic money makeover: downsize cars and house Sequence of returns risk - Mitigate this with a bond tent submitted by /u/wmrob [link] [comments]

How can you be sure your Coast FIRE number is right? Posted: 04 Feb 2019 07:48 AM PST I'm really interested in Coast FIRE. I own my own business and it is pretty stressful and demanding. I'm not sure I want to be doing it (or at least at this level!) long term. I've been running some numbers and I think I have my family's Coast FIRE number figured out, but it seems awfully low. I'm only 35, hope to Coast FIRE at 40 (ie. pull back on the business, or shift toward paying off the house early to pull back even more), so I know this number has lots of time to grow. I can't imagine not working at all, so I think I'd likely do odd jobs, passion projects or retail or something until I'm 60 or 70 and not touch the principal or interest in my investments. Anyone have experience here? When you're in your 30s, in a LCOL area, will the amount you need to Coast FIRE be fairly small? submitted by /u/n_box [link] [comments]

Free End of Life Documents (Will, Power of Attorney, Etc.) Posted: 04 Feb 2019 11:38 AM PST My husband and I are currently saving for FIRE and are about halfway to our lean-FI goal. I don't own any real estate and have no children. My parents have minimal assets and are in their late 50s - mid 60s, but we would like to minimize the stress associated with their passing to have any helpful documents in place. I know there are key documents to have in place in preparation for end of life, including a will, medical power of attorney, etc. Does anyone have a comprehensive list of these documents? What are some good sources for creating these forms for free? ​ submitted by /u/tablife [link] [comments]

Any already FIREd folks doing part-year in an RV (snowbird)? Posted: 04 Feb 2019 10:06 AM PST I love New England (if you hadn't heard, we have some decent sports teams), but the winter blues for a non-skier definitely mount. Simultaneously, I can't go a week on this sub w/o reading about cautionary tales of owning multiple properties (especially from afar). Has anyone on here FIREd and lived in an RV for all of or part of winter? It would be a big financial outlay and I'd hate to be wrong. TL;DR - Anyone escape winter by living in an RV for part of the year? submitted by /u/Guy1029384756 [link] [comments]

Budgeting for 20 years in the future Posted: 04 Feb 2019 07:09 AM PST I know what my current 25x number would be but I'm in my 20s with a new mortgage under my belt, a job that pays most of my healthcare costs, possible marriage in the next few years, maybe kids after that, and other life unexpectedness to pop up in the 15-20 years between now and my target FIRE date. Any help in budgeting for what that life might cost? Or is the recommendation just to re-evaluate every year based on that years situation? submitted by /u/sarahuhmanduh [link] [comments]

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