I've spent most of the last couple weeks poring over old threads and journals, and reflecting on my own situation. A couple of the gold mines:
viewtopic.php?f=21&t=9398&start=20
This thread helped me understand forum dynamics and expectations better, in particular jacob's point about intermediate folks helping noobs, so experts don't have to (and because experts are so far above noobs it can be almost impossible). It helped me think more critically about what I'm replying to / how I can contribute here, and potential actions to avoid as a new person still working on his first $100k.
- Share expert knowledge (instead of personal opinion).
- DAFS - don't ask anyone to hand-hold through beginner knowledge, seek it out thyself
- If confident about expertise/value on a subject, post. For now that probably just means sharing thoughts on western-state vandwelling.
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=7870
This thread helped me think more deeply about my goals and strategy with respect to what's my desired buffer? What's my desired post-FIRE income? Do I want to not have to work again ever, or am I excited by the idea of putting together diverse income streams because I have a smaller nut?
"what's your number?" This thread also helped me understand the distinction between ERE and E-ER.
This quote in that thread tied the ERE/E-ER concept together for me:
fish wrote:"E-ER is freedom through investments, ERE is freedom through skill. Period. What they have in common is low expenses. For someone with an ERE mindset, the function of investment income is to provide enough confidence to start relying entirely on the skills that got him to FI. Whereas if the E-ER practitioner were to be separated from his investments, he would have no choice but to get a job. That’s the difference."
I also read the yields and flows thread several times. Most of it is going over my head, although I can tell it's important. It's saved so I'll return to it often.
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Thoughts on my approach to ERE
I noted that a pattern that many high-earners seem to follow is to aim for a more E-ER approach rather than ERE approach; that is, they tend to aim for higher incomes ($15k-25k) and larger buffers (30-45x), relying more on security due to financial assets as opposed to security due to skills/Renaissance Lifestyle. I'd be interested if this perceived trend is actually true, or just seems so from my read.
My aim is the multidimensionality of diverse skills, and so my financial FIRE target will be lean. Exact numbers TBD. I stated in my first post that my aim is to attain Wheaton 8+, which I know I barely understand if at all sitting here at Wheaton 3 if I'm being generous, but I stand by it.
Jacob spoke of his arriving at 1 Jacob (~$8,500/yr in today's moneys) from a global sufficiency perspective. If everyone lived off 1 Jacob, everyone would have enough. That is enough of a moral principle to motivate me to attain that level of cost of living as well.
I also highly,
highly value freedom, and multi-dimensional skills seem to obviously support that aim. While I'm a complete noob to investing and markets, I have a low confidence in the continued growth of the market
over the course of the rest of my life, so I plan on not planning on it. I think it likely that in a few decades, just about everyone will be living a de-financialized lifestyle regardless of what their portfolio was in 2020. My aim is to beat the rush [hat tip to John Michael Greer]. (I recognize that I'm straying in to "personal opinion" rather than "expert knowledge" territory here, but this is my journal and it's relevant to how I'm designing my system. Also: no one has expert knowledge on the DJIA performance circa 2040-2075)
7wannabe5 wrote:"Much of the discussion on this forum focuses on seeking simple answer to "how much buffer?" rather than "How to achieve diverse and independent and complex?" this makes sense if you believe that circumstances will only change within a given (known unknown) range. It doesn't make sense if you believe that you don't know what in the hell might happen in the future."
In short, my strategy is to wisely use money in such a way as to decouple my wants/needs nexus from money as much and as quickly as possible. I have a ways to go.
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Thoughts on financial performance for January to date
I didn't dig in to ERE until about January 10. I immediately cut out eating out and a number of other expenses. Still, I'd already dropped a few hundred dollars on some 'discretionary' budget items, and some other big purchases like really expensive firewood for our un-insulated apartment. I'm going to come in at about $5k this month. That's ~7 jacobs. I debated even posting this because frankly it's embarrassing.
I started tracking every expense that both DW and I make. I'll continue the practice until we've habituated spending at levels I'm comfortable with.
My monthly burn is going to remain high until a) we move out of this $1,800/mo apt in May and b) DW gets her business running at ~$1k/mo. But, there are other categories I can work on in the meantime.
Food. Our January grocery bill will be about $700 for both of us. We try to avoid excessive carbs, and DW can't digest legumes or beans, and avoids wheat and rice as much as possible. We eat local/organic/hippie food for ethical reasons. This makes getting the food budget down tricky, but I'm determined to eat for $450 for both of us in February, and to keep pushing it down from there. Long term plans include hunting, foraging, gardening, etc. Short term plans include reducing quantity of meat, me eating more legumes/beans/carbs, and finding cheaper sources of bulk staples.
I've taken over cooking this month. For the first time in my life, I'm motivated to figure out how to cook tasty food, because I'm motivated to get the cost down and I know DW will mutiny if we eat boring food every day (and I refuse to feed her lentils if we're going to be in the same general area after the meal...). A revelation I had a couple days ago was that I can cook lentils food for myself, and more interesting stuff for her, as a way of balancing the expense. I eat more calories anyways.
Discretionary. I spent about a grand this month on "fun" stuff. Some of it was trips occurring in the future, some of it was mopping up gear I needed for snowboarding, some of it was just stupid crap before I ran back in to ERE. I don't want to talk about it. I'm aiming for $400 next month.
I found, and plugged, a bunch of small leaks. Old website domains I don't use anymore, subscriptions to software I don't really need, a couple magazines, some Patreon artists.