Rube's journal

[rube]

I have learned that sometimes the nicest and best things have happend to me by just taking a shot at it, especially when there isn't a lot to lose.

In this case, when I was approached, I felt kind of curious, flattered, was wondering if I could still land such a job and if it would be a nice adventure. They also made it very easy, I could do all interviews just from home so it felt like there wasn't a lot to lose for me but perhaps a nice new adventure could happen.

[J_]

Good luck rube!
I suppose in this new job you can use your special knowledge and skills as you gathered in your former job. Or is it very different?

[rube]

Thanks @J_. And you are correct in your assumptions.

[McTrex]

Another one bites the dust…

Just kidding, if you like the challenge, go for it! No reason not to. I also thought I would never work again, couldn’t see myself doing it. Now, I have a job in a field that I’m passionate about, with a team that I love. Serendipity is a thing.

[DutchGirl]

I'm smiling at "another one bites the dust", but yes, Rube, like McTrex says: why not, if you like the challenge? I hope you enjoy it tremendously, and if not, you have enough money to pivot.

[LiberateMind]

All the best rube! Congrats on the getting the dream job.. As years cross by i realize living your best life is more important even if means not being absolute best in one area.. You have crossed a milestone and have options now. What's the worst can happen.. you don't like the job.. then quit it.. Enjoy the journey.

[rube]

Thank you all.

I'm a few weeks in and got my first paycheck. Ofcourse I need to learn the company, the persons, the systems and the products, but it is going surprisingly fast how I can do things on my own and really get things done, help others.

It is fun and challenging, although I forgot a little bit how much energy and time it takes. Hopefully this is partly because in the beginning it the learning curve is always steep(er).

I see it as a challenging project and I am curious if I will be able to make change to the department/company to bring them up to a higher level. Currently I am responsible for a large region, but it would be even more interesting and a real challenge if I could change this as the head of the department globally. This position does currently not exist, but it is likely that it will be made in the (near) future. We'll see.

The transfer of another apartment (not sure if I already wrote about this) is in about two weeks from now. We will then halved our appartement portfolio from the peak. Financially things are going great, almost so good it feels like it can't be real.
With taking this job on, I allow myself to spend money more easily than I did before. Time is much more important at this point than saving a few (or more) bucks and the energy or stress it would take.

DW is more into charity than I am, but we agreed to give away more than we used to do so far and set a rough target amount for next year. One of the things we likely will add to what we already do, is to sponsor a student in college through an organization we met and visited during our travels. In the grand scheme of things I know we can't change the world, but it is nice to see some effect on a small personal level (which I realize is still selfish and not truly altruistic).

If I am up to it, I'll give another update in about a month, seeing how I feel about the job after another month.

Added: it's perhaps a bit strange to write on this forum called "early retirement extreme" the experiences about a new job . But...."the job" now feels very different from the one 14 years ago. Now I can see it as a challenging project, instead of a dreadful day in day out experience.

[DutchGirl]

This update makes me smile. I hope you continue to like your job and that you'll find that you're able to make a positive impact.

I'm not sure whether we should put altruism on such a pedestal that you can only call it altruism if it hurts. Let's make altruism something that is good to do, even if it not only helps others but makes you happier, too.

Have a good December with some nice festivities!

[rube]

Something else, Energy numbers 2024:
Used: 10825 kWh
2026 kWh heating + hot water
4665 kWh electric car (~30K km)
4134 kWh house (cooking, freezer, fridge, washmachine, lights, computers, TV etc.)

Produced: 11496 kWh PV (solar panels)

Produced slightly more than consumed year round.
On monthly basis we produced more than used during 6 months.
Due to the seasons we need more kWh for heating when PV are producing less.

Currently 41% of direct consumption is produced by our PV. We could increase this to about max. 65% with smarter use and/or a battery of about 15 kWh.
Or....use less energy.

Our energybill has been zero or negative for the last 5 years and will be for the next 2 years. Thereafter it will go up due to changes in the feed-in tarif, but I estimate it will still only be 100-125 euro a month.

[J_]

Impressive numbers. If I recall well you do not use “aardgas” for heating your house? So you have really a netto energy balance. If the cost of energy stays at the present level, in how many years your “house electricity investment” is paid back?

[rube]

Correct, since a couple of years we don’t use natural gas anymore for the heating, our house is fully electric (and really comfortable).

Some of the renovations are a combination of aesthetics and energy efficiency. So it's a bit hard to put an exact price on the cost for energy effciency alone. And for about one and a half year electricity prices were extremely high, as a net producer (car was still petrol back then) we earned a lot. This changed now, hardly getting anything for our surplus but that's "solved" with the more or less free electricy for the car.

All in all that means we already earned it all back in 4-5 years time. Saving us at this moment roughly 400 euro's a month (compared to previous situation/neighbours who haven'tdone anything: electricity + natural gas (roughly 225 euro)and diesel (175 euro).

[J_]

Thanks for your answer. Inspiring. You have also in this aspect of life a good hand for investing!

[rube]

Thanks. Regarding investments, with some changes by selling two rentals last year en in mortgages (received and given) I have been reshuffling funds. Still some work to do, but in a few weeks it looks like:

7% Own home (net value to us, after deducting of mortgage at around 65% LTV @ 1,69% @ 15 years)
25% 3 rentals (net value, only 1 mortgage, overal 17% LTV @ 2,2% @ 5 years)
68% Portfolio based on Golden Butterfly Portfolio https://portfoliocharts.com/portfolios/ ... erformance with some local adjustments, mostly for the bonds.

Breaking down further:
7% Own home
25% 3 rentals
27% Stocks: Roughly 50% Total Stock Market, 50% Small Cap value
27% Bonds: Due to (local) tax reasons and other opportunities this is largely mortgage backed loans and savings acounts
14% Gold

I believe with this diversification I can withstand serious marketdownturns and still sleep well at night, while still can expect a reasonable return.

WR: Annual Expenses / Net worth = 2,1%* / 3,6%**
*Excluding wealth Tax
**Including wealth tax. If my real yield is lower thant the "fixed" yield per tax rules, it's possible to get this lowered.
Current wealth tax (and possibly future capital gain tax) is substantially compared to the "normal" expenses.

Lots of other details and variables (i.e. rentals are appreciated conservatively, not included college cost for the kids, lifestyle inflation, not included social security and pension in 19 years (10+% of NW) and both currently working and income will probably add another 5+% to NW).

Even with EVERYTHING is high (gold, stocks, real estate) I believe we're in a good spot for future retirement (when we reitire for the 2nd time )

I have stopped a long time ago posting absolute numbers, but the % give probably still a good impression. Feel free to comment or ask about the diviersification/portfolio.

Add: the net cashflow of the 3 rentals, the loans and dividend are covering out expenses incl. the wealth tax.
It means that increase of value of real estate (rentals + own home), stocks and gold should make up for inflation.

[rube]

I neglected to give a monthly update about the new job, so here's the short version of the 1st quarterly update: many ups and downs. If it goes on like this, it is not sufficiently fulfilling for me for to continue for a long period. But I don't want to "give up" too quickly as the start might be somewhat difficult. Besides, in the comming months I expect to be able to do a couple of interesting things, which also should give me enough information to decide if I want to continue (for some time), or maybe not much longer. We'll see in the next couple of months I guess.

[DutchGirl]

Ooh, Rube, may I pick your brain? You have mortgage-backed loans. Are those from jens.nl pretty secure? My sister-in-law (SIL), who recently inherited some money, is considering them (and she found them because they handled the mortgage for the people buying her inherited house). To me they indeed look like mortgages, with the house as the valuable object that can be sold if the homeowners don't pay the mortgage. So pretty solid. I believe the loan's value is a maximum of 50% or so of the house's value, so for my SIL to lose her investments would mean that a homeowner stopped paying and that the house's value dropped by a lot. Correct? Or am I perhaps missing something here?

(And NB, it's true that if you want to own a house, you generally would first try to be approved by a regular bank with regular interest rates. To go to jens.nl means that you will get a (much) higher interest rate, at least until you can refinance. So these are not the highest-quality borrowers...)

And for your work situation: hopefully you find your answer in the upcoming months. Good luck!

[rube]

LTV is very important. What I saw on the website after a quick check, many are higher than 50% while the interest is not too high imo (6.5%).
It looks like that you are lending money together with others to fill it up to the requested amount. Meaning, you are together with others on the mortgage papers. Advantage is that you can spread your money (and potential impact in case of issues is lowe) but you are also more depending on other lenders in case of issues.
There is many more to it, but I would need to check things more thoroughly. If your SIL is serious, I can have a further look at it and email or call for more details and share experiences.

[rube]

I guess it's time for an update. Last couple of months:
-I had a nice two week overseas businestrip.
-we had a nice nine short holiday with the family. We arrived when Dutchgirl just left the area! (as I found out afterwards)
-My backpain didn't resolved, worse, I got diagnosed with something that might require surgery. I investigated all the different options and altough I prefer no surgery, I'm alsmost certain a PETD surgery is likely the best. I hope I can get appointment(s) in the next couple of weeks to figure this out and schedule a surgery if I decide so.
-I started to dislike more and more things of the new job. After a half the honeymoon is over. I can do the job, but I can't get done what I had hoped before I started. That's probably a bit on me, but certainly also the organization. It isn't giving me a lot of joy while it is taking so much time and energy. Sitting the whole day is not healthy. Reasons I would stay are: 1) it feels somewhat like a failure 2) I feel bad for a couple of colleagues 3) learning some new things now and then 4) money in a relatively easy way (100% from home if I want to). All in all not good enough reasons to stay. Currently I estimate the chance around ~80% I will resign later this month. I wrote this as a draft last week and I feel like the 80% has increased to 90%.
-DW resigned last month. She might be looking for something else end of summer again, untill then it's time to enjoy the best seasons of the year. She will go on a 2 week hike trip on her own next month.

[ertyu]

Sitting the whole day is not healthy.

Standing desk?

[rube]

Yes, I got for this new job an electric adjustable sit-stand desk. It is better, but still being tight to a monitor 8+ hours a day with little movement is not great.

[DutchGirl]

There is many more to it, but I would need to check things more thoroughly. If your SIL is serious, I can have a further look at it and email or call for more details and share experiences.

Sorry I never came back on this. She did decide to put some of her money on the line, but not all of it. So let's hope for the best. (i.e. her getting her money back plus the interest and no or little issues along the way).

So it's sad that the new job does not seem to work out as you'd hoped. Sometimes it is like that, unfortunately. And then I'm happy that you have the option to quit and go find more rewarding things to do with your time. As for your health, I hope everything will work out.

And so you were on Sicily too? Maybe with better weather than we had... I hope you liked it; I liked it a lot and it was a much-needed period of rest for me.