Re: Just an Another Average Expat's FI Journey
Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2018 7:40 am
May Spend % - 18.45%
Started investing in Equity Market - a major step for me personally. For a start, Bought Stocks of well known Companies and Mutual funds both based on 200 DMA in the Indian Market for 3K USD. My mother had a bad experience from the dot com bubble market crash. The compensation from my dad's employer after he passed away in 1999, went into Mutual Funds and it took close to 2006 for us to recover the principal money invested in the Indian Stock Exchange with not much returns. A major transistion for me going forward is to move roughly half or 60-70% of the funds to Equity and this past experience plays a huge barrier in my mind. I want to invest in India since I do not want to invest in markets that are unknown to me and will not have long term access. I will have 20% of my Mutual fund investments exposed to International markets though, but that will be my only exposure to the other national markets. Also the lure of a developing country with a huge population and a democratically elected government (however bad they may turn out to be, like the current one) attracting the huge companies of the West trying to capitalise on its market is something I do not want to miss. The simple thought of 6k index value from 2006 when we exited to the current 34k index makes me feel sad about a lost opportunity for the family, but coming from a conservative mindset who have always had investments in gold and Term deposits, seeing the market crash of 2000 felt like a big jolt and waited for 2006 to exit the market how much ever we have invested. Unfortunately, I bought into Mutual Funds which are brokered and so has a higher brokerage. Fingers burned but lesson learnt. Tried buying directly from AMCs but being away from India there is only so much that can be done online, so had to suspend any further transactions.
Recently heard from mom about my sister bringing up conversations on selling off one of our properties since its proving to be quite difficult to manage remotely. I have been the only one in the family to fight everyone from selling it over the past 20 years, but did it purely for nostalgic reasons. Over the period of time, its value has increased substantially for what my dad bought it some 30+ years ago for 1k USD to today's value somewhere in the ballpark of 150K USD to 212K USD.
Reviewing the possible options I have about inheriting it from my mom, I want to settle in that place for a couple of reasons - objectively evaluating
removing the nostalgic/ emotional reasons- since its a tier II city- lesser cost of living, lesser traffic & population and so lesser pollution, Still some
greenery left in every backyard and finally the plot is pretty pretty big close to 3k sqft where the current old house (foundation put up in '74) occupies only 900 sqft, so the remaining area is all just garden with a few coconut/mango/teak trees and bare soil which I can use for growing food. FOr buying out my sister's share, going by market rate, I will have to shell out close to 74K USD (conservative estimates) which makes a huge dent in my NW. So not sure if I should be going that way. If we sell it, my NW is going to increase by the same value(again by conservative estimates) but I am not sure if I want to venture this way since buying a property in India is always considered a highly complicated task and equated to marrying someone (Indian way)
Also if I am bringing down the current structure (already have leaky concrete roofs and moist walls due to the substandard materials used in '74), replacing it with a new double storey house (estimate the cost to be around 70k USD), I can expect a steady monthly income by renting it out. Also it will provide me with a place to stay if I want to live there in addition to bringing in some rent. I know I should not mix up emotions/sentiments with assets, but Indians always have had an emotional attachment to properties they buy unlike the US where they are tossed around if they does nt work.
I have not travelled anywhere since coming to Poland and I have plans to wrap up my assignment here by December. Before moving to India, I am planning to see the Northern lights (tentatively chosen Inari, Finland for visiting) in December. Cities do not interest me much and I am yet to come out of the mental barrier that travelling is possible without a personal car.
Started investing in Equity Market - a major step for me personally. For a start, Bought Stocks of well known Companies and Mutual funds both based on 200 DMA in the Indian Market for 3K USD. My mother had a bad experience from the dot com bubble market crash. The compensation from my dad's employer after he passed away in 1999, went into Mutual Funds and it took close to 2006 for us to recover the principal money invested in the Indian Stock Exchange with not much returns. A major transistion for me going forward is to move roughly half or 60-70% of the funds to Equity and this past experience plays a huge barrier in my mind. I want to invest in India since I do not want to invest in markets that are unknown to me and will not have long term access. I will have 20% of my Mutual fund investments exposed to International markets though, but that will be my only exposure to the other national markets. Also the lure of a developing country with a huge population and a democratically elected government (however bad they may turn out to be, like the current one) attracting the huge companies of the West trying to capitalise on its market is something I do not want to miss. The simple thought of 6k index value from 2006 when we exited to the current 34k index makes me feel sad about a lost opportunity for the family, but coming from a conservative mindset who have always had investments in gold and Term deposits, seeing the market crash of 2000 felt like a big jolt and waited for 2006 to exit the market how much ever we have invested. Unfortunately, I bought into Mutual Funds which are brokered and so has a higher brokerage. Fingers burned but lesson learnt. Tried buying directly from AMCs but being away from India there is only so much that can be done online, so had to suspend any further transactions.
Recently heard from mom about my sister bringing up conversations on selling off one of our properties since its proving to be quite difficult to manage remotely. I have been the only one in the family to fight everyone from selling it over the past 20 years, but did it purely for nostalgic reasons. Over the period of time, its value has increased substantially for what my dad bought it some 30+ years ago for 1k USD to today's value somewhere in the ballpark of 150K USD to 212K USD.
Reviewing the possible options I have about inheriting it from my mom, I want to settle in that place for a couple of reasons - objectively evaluating
removing the nostalgic/ emotional reasons- since its a tier II city- lesser cost of living, lesser traffic & population and so lesser pollution, Still some
greenery left in every backyard and finally the plot is pretty pretty big close to 3k sqft where the current old house (foundation put up in '74) occupies only 900 sqft, so the remaining area is all just garden with a few coconut/mango/teak trees and bare soil which I can use for growing food. FOr buying out my sister's share, going by market rate, I will have to shell out close to 74K USD (conservative estimates) which makes a huge dent in my NW. So not sure if I should be going that way. If we sell it, my NW is going to increase by the same value(again by conservative estimates) but I am not sure if I want to venture this way since buying a property in India is always considered a highly complicated task and equated to marrying someone (Indian way)

Also if I am bringing down the current structure (already have leaky concrete roofs and moist walls due to the substandard materials used in '74), replacing it with a new double storey house (estimate the cost to be around 70k USD), I can expect a steady monthly income by renting it out. Also it will provide me with a place to stay if I want to live there in addition to bringing in some rent. I know I should not mix up emotions/sentiments with assets, but Indians always have had an emotional attachment to properties they buy unlike the US where they are tossed around if they does nt work.
I have not travelled anywhere since coming to Poland and I have plans to wrap up my assignment here by December. Before moving to India, I am planning to see the Northern lights (tentatively chosen Inari, Finland for visiting) in December. Cities do not interest me much and I am yet to come out of the mental barrier that travelling is possible without a personal car.