Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Hey @JP! thanks for the comment. So far I've been able to interact mostly with people from the lower of the low end of the economic spectrum, something I've found interesting and rewarding as before I was in a "bubble" of folks with MBA's. I never thought of the value of socializing with f...

It's been a little more than a year now since I quit working. I'm not certain if I'm "adjusting" to FIRE life like others. Sometimes I feel, I don't know.. guilt for lack of a better term.. for my lack of productivity. Is it an American cultural puritanism that drives this self-doubt about...

Welcome! How old are you now? You are in a great position to achieve FI and ER or do whatever you wish in a few years. Keep your housing and transportation costs in check (avoid lifestyle inflation) and you're golden. If I was in your shoes I'd make the minimum payments on the loans this year and ta...

Quicken says I'm up 1.17% for the year which seems about right I guess. Essentially a flat year. One thing I don't understand is that Quicken shows my discretionary trading account as up 4.85% while Fidelity (where I keep it) tells me the return is 2.76%. 1.1% 401K (holds IVV and AGG) -0.3% After ta...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohnuyqJyEW0

I watched the documentary on Netflix and had NO IDEA.

I graduated from college with a useless degree in psychology. What was I thinking? The lady at the temp agency where I went for help finding a job said I had "limited skills". Eventually I found a job doing a physical asset inventory for a small local credit union. This task lasted a few m...

In finance and accounting I've not come across anyone with a personal professional website nor do I check their FB. Don't worry about that Zalo. For me the candidates that express a lot of enthusiasm for the job/industry and those that do their research really stand out. Don't be forced about it lie...

But I am concerned that there is a risk I could have real struggles getting back into a professional job upon my return on the basis that I am unemployed at time of searching and on the basis that they could think it is odd, frivolous and irresponsible to be doing something like this at my age (34)...

thrifty++ wrote: - Answer my phone when people ring.

I smiled when I read this. I am awful about answering the phone and keeping in touch with people. Chatting on the phone is awkward for me. It should be used to set up times to meet and/or to transmit important information.

Greetings,

I like how you summarized your income, spending and career up to now so succinctly. Welcome.

I'd be interested to read a tax expert who defends Vanguard's transfer price calculation. We've only heard one side of the story. IMO it's a large headline number to bring a lot of attention. I'm sure there have been similar cases and Vanguard has had plenty of lawyers and accountants sign off on th...

@henrik, also part of the rationale for increasing the retirement age is that people are living longer. To the extent that certain ethnic groups or genders aren't showing the same improvement in life expectancy they would be impacted. Ethnicity A might have increased the average life span by 1 year ...

I might also buy some USD at some point since it such a nominal currency. Certainly not at the moment though! The main reason I am staying away from US stocks at the moment because I will get fucked over with the exchange rate at the moment. USD is way high ATM. I am wondering if Americans are thin...

Thanks Thrity and LiberateMind! I met with a recruiter *gulp* the other week. Putting on nice clothes and printing my resume brought up some feelings of anxiety and I almost called and cancelled. In the end I am glad I went and I enjoyed talking to her. A friend of mine uses the firm and said they n...

As a side note for US readers, certificates of deposit were paying in excess of 10% for much of the 1980's. Assuming you bought them qualifying for FDIC insurance (no risk of loss of your principal) you could have achieved a truly risk-free return of as much as 14%. In YMOYL the author recommended u...

OP, You are seriously underestimating the level of financial knowledge of many of the participants of this forum. I don't consider myself one of the smartest people here and I've read the Financial Mentor.. I follow and read Dr Pfau and Michael Kitces. It does concern me that the Financial Mentor re...

Let my put this nonsense about the perceived risk of my initial strategy to bed. ... I've made it clear here before that my initial plan was based on rental income from 8 commercial and industrial properties with a total of a couple of hundred tenants. The income to be derived was a known based on ...

Ok, I made it through your entire post.. The thing is, you're talking to people here like you think they are idiots. Everyone here already understands that having a wider safety margin between income and spending means a higher success rate. [/i] . This comment sums up much of my feelings regarding...

Happy Holidays to you all and thanks for all your interesting and thoughtful contributions to this forum.

steveo73 wrote:Hi Carlos - I'm stoked to see that you have become FI. Well done.

Thanks Steveo!