Nick Halden's Journal

Where are you and where are you going?
NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

March 2017 update

Net Worth: 19.1k (+1580€)
Savings Rate: 32%

There was a discrepancy between my accounting and my actual bank accounts so I corrected that, also historical figures. Not too much of a difference, but just in case someone really takes a calculator to my graphs.

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Income vs Expenses
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Quite happy about it. Overspent on a present for our daughters birthday (230% of alloc budget), and we had to pay some property/waste taxes (5% of our savings rate down the drain, altough we knew about this in advance so no real problem).

One more month like this hopefully and then the big money should come in May. The grey area in the nw-graph represents cash, so that should be the moment the emergency cash buffer is filled with about 14k. Which is more than enough to replace anything we own at the same time, or enough to survive for 6-12 months in case one of us loses our job and cannot find something new. Which is extremely unlikely. So after May I am going to shift focus to investments (blue area on top).

Current Investment results
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Red line is overall CAGR. Blue lines are different funds.

Allocation in case you are interested
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NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

Hi all,

I don't have much time to write as I am about to leave for a business trip to the US soon. Wanted to post a journal entry earlier but the forum seemed down?

Anyways last month was not great. Did not hit the 20k NW as planned. We had to bring our kids to daycare a lot the month before, we paid for a holiday, spent almost 60% more on groceries, payed a lot of taxes and the bi-annual bill for the newspaper was also this month. Ended up saving only 6%...

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This month is going to be great tho, yesterday we already received over 3k in taxmoney that we overpaid last year and our holiday allowance will come in later this month.

Jason

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by Jason »

Bi-annual bill for the Newspaper?

That seems a bit anachronistic, especially for a guy your age who can rock the psychedelic savings charts.

Is it a specialty newspaper related to your work or just the normal type that you take to the bathroom to peruse while taking a dump?

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

It does conflict with my financial goals but I consider it a work related investment, like a good suit. It is the local equivalent of the financial Times, but it comes with a lot of extra magazines and papers that are essential for me to gain insights for my work. I was recently promoted to a c-level position and I need all the info I can get to fit in at that level. E.g. I often share tech articles with other board members that are relevant to our industry. I am also responsible for our marketing efforts at our company so I also want to be able to see what our competition does as well. So it fits multiple purposes and mainly just enables me to talk like a thought leader, even though I am indeed only 26.

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

It does conflict with my financial goals but I consider it a work related investment, like a good suit. It is the local equivalent of the financial Times, but it comes with a lot of extra magazines and papers that are essential for me to gain insights for my work. I was recently promoted to a c-level position and I need all the info I can get to fit in at that level. E.g. I often share tech articles with other board members that are relevant to our industry. I am also responsible for our marketing efforts at our company so I also want to be able to see what our competition does as well. So it fits multiple purposes and mainly just enables me to talk like a thought leader, even though I am indeed only 26.

Jason

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by Jason »

I figured as such. Plus I imagine you can read it on the can so its a win win.

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

May 2017 Update

Net Worth: 24750 (+5150)
Income: ~10k (including holiday allowances and tax returns)
Expenses: ~5k
Savings rate: 50%

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Okay, so this month was very good in terms of income, but not that good in terms of expenses. Paid for a holiday, paid some extra taxes and bought a new barbeque after messing around with a very old small rusty one for years. Still a 20% increase in NW, so I am very happy about that and we now have about 10k in cash again for emergencies which gives a very good feeling. Now that we have this emergency buffer we can put the money towards investments.

Had a great ERE meetup in the Netherlands a week ago, very interesting stories and people and I definitely intend to go again if the opportunity presents itself.

One thing I learned is that everyone has their own way of making it towards financial indepedance and that the journey has to be bearable in order to be successful. So as long as we stick to our forecast I am fine with it and at the moment we are several thousands above forecast this year - still.

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

Haven't posted in a while, but we're still on track.

2017 results so far:

Net Worth: 40,000 € (+25k since last year)

Our house is up for sale now since our plans to acquire the new property seem to move forward. This is the property I mentioned earlier that contains 4 houses, where we will live in the primary one and then rent out the other 3. Financing and building permits are almost finalized. It will come with a pretty steep interest loan but at least the tenants will be covering a large part of our housing cost moving forward. The transaction itself will cause a slight drop in net worth initially because of closing costs et cetera, but then provide a much better savings rate. Also the property comes with a huge piece of agricultural land and several sheds and barns that can be exploited in many ways in the future.

Also on the income side I got a 10% raise so that also helps next year.

Moving forward I will try to update more regularly :)

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

Q1 2018 Results

Net Worth: unknown.

Sold the house and finally acquired the property. Now living temporarily in a mobile home while we are renovating the primary residence for our own use. The rental properties are doing fine, all tenants are happy with the new situation and we should be getting our first rental income the first of may.

In terms of finance this is not the most ideal situation but fine for now. I got a private investor to lend me 400k€ interest-only (4.0%) for 15 years with the ability to pay back earlier if I want to and when I want to. Then I lent another 120k without interest from family to finance the renovation, and now I am the official owner of 7000+ m2 of land and all four of the houses. The rental income covers the interest and maintenance of the properties. So that means we can save quite a lot every month - but eventually I need to either refinance the loans or pay it back. I am thinking I might just save up the cash, acquire more properties in the next few years and then I should be fine by the end of the 15 years. A bit opportunistic but we will see if this works out, worst case I pay back like half of the loan and refinance the other half. The property itself provides lots of opportunities as well, like having animals, providing our own food, plenty of room for solar panels etc.

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

Just an update from a renovation perspective, not so much from a financial one. New house is coming together quite nicely.

What we bought:
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Demo week!
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http://i.imgur.com/147fI8ul.jpg

New highly insulated pre-fab roof
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Current situation
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So now that the roof and tiling is on and the windows in it is at least watertight but the inside of the house is still completely empty, no walls, no floors, no electricity, gas or water. Blank canvas to work on: my favorite.

From an ERE perspective this is kind of an double edged sword: obviously we could do with a much smaller house, but since rental income is covering the mortgage one might say it is even cheaper than the previous situation. Also I have come to the realization that find this quality of life in a beautiful environment for ourselves and our kids more important.

I would currently estimate our net worth between 10-50k based on appraised value of the properties subtracted by debt - but since we are probably never going to sell it, it doesn't seem to make sense to keep track of that any longer. I am now more looking from the perspective of how much of our expenses are covered by passive income. When the reno is done I will probably start keeping track of my savings rate again but I have come to the realization that for me it makes more sense to focus on increasing my passive income instead of reducing cost of living.

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

Update:

Financial
Base salary increased by 5%. Now slightly over 4,000 eur/month. Quite happy with it, although I am used to higher raise percentages.
Currently living off a 33% savings rate, but the real estate I now own is probably increasing in value much faster especially because most savings are going towards that.

Not a very good year for my index investments, seem to have lost a few percent but no sweat.

Real estate
Renovated one of my rental apartments with double glazing and PIR-roof insulation. Because the rental price is all inclusive this should be a pretty good investment. Cost about 5k.

Rented out one of my barns for 260€ per month. Tenant is paying for it by helping with my home renovation for 10€/h minimum wage. He appears to be a pretty good craftsman and woodworker and I would say he is easily worth 30/40€ per hour so this barn is really a wealth generator right now. The guy is a former drug addict and he loves to have some purpose in life again, so this is truly win-win.

Renovation of our own house is going pretty well. Bathroom and children's bedrooms are finished, now working on the master bedroom and the guestrooms upstairs. Downstairs we have a fireplace installed but still needs a lot more work. Doing everything myself so I expect to need another 3-4 months. Spent roughly 210k just on renovation YTD. Expect to spend 25k more and then it should be finished. According to expert valuation it should have increased the value of the property by roughly 115% of the cost of the renovation. So pretty good investment if you discount the time involved.

Health
At our last Dutch ERE meet-up someone warned me that I was taking on too much for a normal human being. He turned out to be right, no wonder as he seemed like a very wise man. I pretty much ignored his advice but unfortunately working 12-14 hours per day for about a year straight has led me to feel kinda stressed out. so finally after being struck with a random panic attack I have taken it slightly slower which seems to work quite well for me. I keep reminding myself: there is no rush - I am only rushing myself.

Vision for the future
I have found that increasing income for us is much easier than saving. Without the extreme focus on cost saving that I used to have, life has become more fun and exciting. So we are living a quite lavish lifestyle at age 28 with 2 kids, and tenants are pretty much covering the most of the cost associated with it. I realize this is quite the opposite to what is preached in here but I guess everyone has to figure out his or her own path.
Edit:please note that our spending level is not increasing, it is just remaining stable right now as we do not want to sacrifice much more.

ItsALongStory
Posts: 40
Joined: Sun Jan 13, 2019 9:50 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by ItsALongStory »

Super impressed with your progress, everyone carves their own path. No need to try and keep up with the Joneses, just do what works for your family.

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

Thanks Itsalongstory!

Also a quick two photo's of the exterior progress of our new house.

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prognastat
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Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by prognastat »

Hadn't read your journal before and saw the pictures in your last post and immediately went. "hmm that house looks dutch." Then checked the first post for confirmation XD.

House is looking great though. How have you been enjoying it now that the big renovations seem to be mostly done?

ItsALongStory
Posts: 40
Joined: Sun Jan 13, 2019 9:50 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by ItsALongStory »

Stunning house and renovation especially doing lots of it yourself.

J_
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Location: Netherlands/Austria

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by J_ »

Prachtig resultaat Nick! Is your living tempo smarter now?

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

prognastat wrote:
Tue Jan 15, 2019 1:02 pm
Hadn't read your journal before and saw the pictures in your last post and immediately went. "hmm that house looks dutch." Then checked the first post for confirmation XD.

House is looking great though. How have you been enjoying it now that the big renovations seem to be mostly done?
We're enjoying it a lot, also the process. Putting on roofs and now finally finishing things like bathrooms and bedrooms is cool but it needs a few more months before it is habitable. We are now living in an RV next to the house - which kinda sucks because it is freezing cold right now and heating cannot keep up. But we view it is a small sacrifice.
ItsALongStory wrote:
Wed Jan 16, 2019 12:38 am
Stunning house and renovation especially doing lots of it yourself.
Thanks!
J_ wrote:
Wed Jan 16, 2019 8:43 am
Prachtig resultaat Nick! Is your living tempo smarter now?
Thanks J_, yes it works much better for me but I have to keep reminding myself almost on a daily basis to not fall into the same trap again. E.g. often on Sundays (when I don't do any work) I feel anxious, or even downright stressed because there is so much to do and I don't like sitting on my hands.. But I know now that if I keep working I might be burned out at the end because is much worse.

prognastat
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Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by prognastat »

Well all the more motivation to make more progress XD.

Keep up the good work.

ItsALongStory
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Joined: Sun Jan 13, 2019 9:50 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by ItsALongStory »

Any more updates?

NickHalden
Posts: 67
Joined: Wed Nov 04, 2015 3:48 am

Re: Nick Halden's Journal

Post by NickHalden »

Finally an update from my side. I have not been here for over 3 years. These three years were very tough, physically renovating our house, having two more children, and working like crazy. No surprise I mentally also went down the drain, even though I already mentioned the first warning signs in my last post in 2019. Borderline burned-out, panic attacks and much more but now finally on the other end of the tunnel. I did not keep track of my finances during these years as I was overwhelmed by many things and also by the number of invoices I got, especially concerning the house renovation that cost much more than expected. Now in a much better space and even got around to updating my financial spreadsheets, including the 'lost' years. I did enter those details on a much higher level of detail though.

The good news is our annual income sky-rocketed to about 180k for this year (see image below). Dark blue is my salary, light blue is my wife's part-time job, and grey is rental income. Seeing my last update in 2019 where I made 4k a month, considering I now make 10k starting this month. I have to say I am quite proud of that.

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Even though I was no longer tracking income and expenses, making much more money and heavily investing in both our own house, as well as our two rental properties resulted in a big net worth gain.
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We are still on our path towards ER(E) at around 40 years old (7 years from now).

Below you see I spent every single after-tax euro the last few years. Not proud of that but I think sharing it also may help others.

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You clearly see the decreased level of detail, and some one-off spikes that show the money we invested in acquiring our current property. It did hurt our liquidity badly but we hope to resolve that this year and have a larger percentage of index investments and cash on our hands.

So in summary, I worked a lot on mental health over the last 3-4 months, lost some weight and spent a lot more time with my family. Let's stick to this path.

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