It’s a great feeling when things are going good. You have a great job, stable income, business is going well, you’re going on vacation, kids are growing, and your new puppy is finally listening to commands. Then there are moments where you think the world is running against you. After returning from my vacation, I came home to a hot house. My HVAC unit broke in the middle of the summer and had to get that fixed ASAP. I had…
Summer is upon us and that means vacations and trips. I just finished a trip to Charleston, South Carolina and Atlanta, Georgia driving from the DC area. Going on vacation is fun but planning a vacation is stressful especially when you’re trying to avoid breaking the bank. While vacations are meant to be relaxing and enjoyable, the worries of cost and how much you spend on vacation may be on the back of your mind. Here are some ways I…
If you’ve read my past articles, you know that I’m a proponent of retirement investing early. Maximizing my 401K early in my career will put me in a good position when I retire. You also will know that I also have a Roth IRA account but I rarely invest any money into it. After meeting up with a friend who retired early, I found out that he only invested in post-tax Roth retirement accounts. He said that it was the…
When it comes to building a financial independent life, it’s doesn’t happen overnight. It is a long process, a transformation, and a life long journey. Do you want to change your financial status? Do you want to increase your income, decrease your debt, and start having a positive balance? Where do you start? You start with yourself. You need to look at yourself and start making changes. Change doesn’t happen overnight. When you are going to school, you don’t fast…
I love to travel and to travel affordably I use travel points. There are a number of travel points programs and I have a favorite one. I’ve use these points to get free flights, free hotels, and free car rentals. I can convert my points to cash if I choose to. I haven’t tried all the travel programs out there as a disclaimer. This is just my personal favorite one from my experience. Chase ultimate rewards is my favorite travel…
I don’t have a FIRE number and there’s a reason for that. I don’t want my goal to be a certain dollar amount. I want my goal to be a certain lifestyle. As I wrote in my About page, my goal is to get to the point of financial flexibility so I can explore other opportunities without financial burden to myself and my family. Truthfully, I don’t know what the FIRE number would be to get me to that financial…
We come across opportunities available to us each and every day. We need to take off our blinders and notice them. Opportunities can be knocking on our door but it’s up to us to open that door. Once opportunities are gone, they may not come again so make sure to seize each opportunity. What opportunities am I talking about? It could be anything that helps your career, your relationships, your friendships, your financials, your network, your knowledge, your exposure, your…
Finances has always been a personal topic and many of us don’t openly discuss it even amongst family and close friends. It’s like some taboo that we can’t discuss finances yet we can comfortably talk about everything else. If we never talk about it, how do we get to understanding it more? Do we have a fear of trying to understand finances and is that fear holding us back? Up until I got married, I never took the time to…
Does your work give you perks or benefits just for working there? Do you know the perks and benefits of memberships you have or just for being a customer? If not, you might want to inquire, ask a colleague, or even your Human Resources (HR) office. What kind of perks am I referring to? Here’s some that I’ve experienced. Discounts for my cell phone plan All the large organizations I used to work for, they had relationships with cell phone…
Where you should invest your money in is always a great question and two types of stocks you can invest in are growth stocks and income stocks. Growth stocks are stocks that are expected to continually grow. Income stocks are stocks that provide a consistent income stream. Which one should you invest in? Growth stocks refer to companies with growth potential. Where there is growth, there is growth with stock prices. These stocks tend to experience volatility however investors will…