Currently, I feel that my wife and I do a pretty good job with our money. We invest in index funds for our retirement, we are close to paying off our house, and we have paid off all of our non-mortgage debt. We are even working together with our money to budget for our goals, values, and dreams. Aren’t we just perfect with our money? Of course not! Although we do a great job with many financial things, there are many things that we can do better. Sometimes we blow through our budget or argue about how money should be spent. Other times, we don’t even talk about money and try…
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Become Wealthy By: Using the Library and Your Own Coffee Pot
I know that it is really fun and easy to go to Amazon or Barnes and Noble to buy books. Both of these retailers have millions of books that can allow us to get lost in a fantasy world with Harry Potter, walk on the Appalachian Trail with Bill Bryson, or learn about the workings of the universe with Stephen Hawking. And, like so many people, I love reading: from huge fiction collections like Game of Thrones to non-fiction thrillers like Into Thin Air. Books, blogs, and magazines can both help us escape from reality or figure out how things work. I absolutely love books! Over the past few months,…
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The Stock Market is Tanking … Now What?
One of the toughest things in life is to do something that goes against our intuitions. After all, our intuitions help guide us through many important decisions that we make every single day. However, sometimes, our intuitions can be wrong. One of the times that our intuitions are often wrong is when we are investing in the stock market. We may think that we should sell all of our stocks right before the stock market goes on a five-year rally. Or, we may know that a stock is going to double in value, right before the company files for bankruptcy. Again, our intuitions are often completely wrong when it comes to…
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The 4% Rule and Investing for Retirement
Many retirement planners like to use the 4% rule when trying to determine the amount of your portfolio that you can safely withdraw in retirement. The main concept of this rule is that you can withdraw 4% of the money that is in your portfolio when you retire, every single year of your retirement. For instance, if you have $1 million invested when you retire, then you can safely withdraw 4% of this amount, or $40,000 per year. Not only can you withdraw it every year, but you can also increase the amount withdrawn for inflation, and your portfolio will continue to grow. Of course, the 4% rule is not actually…
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Index Funds Can Save You Over $200,000!
It’s a pretty outrageous claim that I made in the title of this post. Index funds can save you (and me) over $200,000 throughout the course of our lives …. Hmmm … that certainly doesn’t sound true. But, just in case it is, let’s explore the statement. Since I started writing this on Black Friday (the ultimate shopping day here in the United States), this could actually be the biggest Black Friday savings ever! Before we dive into saving money with an index fund, it helps to know what it actually is. Basically, an index fund is a collection of stocks put together to make up a mutual fund. This…
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Planting a Money Tree
Earlier this year, we planted a small, rather pathetic-looking, maple tree in our backyard. This tree was about 6-feet tall when we planted it and it really served no purpose except to provide a little bit of food for the deer who came by to eat its leaves. It does not provide much shade and currently only serves as something extra for me to mow around.
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Why a New Car is an Absolute Financial Disaster
Yikes!! This new truck costs around $50,000 to purchase and it's not even the most expensive truck on the lot. This price is actually fairly average for most of the trucks on this new-car-lot.
