As ESI readers know, I don't spend a lot of time bragging about how good stores are. It's partly because no one cares and partly because there aren't that many that are great. But this time I have to say something because Amazon shocked me. Background Before I get into that, let's cover a bit of back story. It started several years ago, probably the same way it did … [Read more...]
Archives for June 2016
Become Wealthy by Having a High Income in a Low Cost City
I have seen tons of articles over the years about the financial impact of where you live. I've even written some of them myself. :) Today I'd like to tackle the issue of your home location's impact on your finances. The result can be pretty substantial. The Different Philosophies There are many different philosophies on why people live where they live when it relates … [Read more...]
A Different Retirement Plan
As I explained in The Goal: Financial Freedom, my basic retirement plan is to 1) put together enough assets and then 2) invest those assets so they generate enough income to more than pay my living expenses (which I have roughly estimated at $100k per year). This would allow me to never have to spend a penny of the assets themselves — just live on the income they … [Read more...]
Managing College Costs by Offering an Incentive
Other than retirement, we only have one major expense left in life: college for our kids. Some might say that it's not really our expense but one for our kids, but we've always wanted to pay for our kids to go to college if they were so inclined. This post will detail what we've done to pay for it as well as the path chosen by each of our children. Background Many years … [Read more...]
Various Forms of Retirement Income
As I was thinking through my financial freedom plan (aka retirement plan) the other day, I started listing various forms of income available to me during retirement. As I noted in The Goal: Financial Freedom, my plan basic plan has been to 1) put together enough assets and then 2) invest those assets so they generate enough income to more than pay my living expenses. This … [Read more...]
What Financial Advice Would You Give New Graduates?
Recently I received this note from a reader: I have great news to report in than my oldest son who graduated from college this past December will be starting his first full time job tomorrow. He has a degree in industrial and entrepreneurial engineering (engineering and supply chain management). He graduated from the honor college with a 3.68 GPA and is a member of the … [Read more...]
An Update on My Peer-to-Peer Lending Investments
Since I posted that I had gotten into peer-to-peer lending (P2P) as part of my financial freedom/retirement plan readers have been asking about my performance. In this post I'll get you all up to speed as far as what's going on. Summary Remember that as of my last post I had invested $75,000 with Lending Club. Here's what's happened since: I received the $300 bonus … [Read more...]
Physical Fitness and Financial Fitness
In What I’ve Been Reading I happened to mention the following: "I’m on a bit of a health kick (lost 7% body fat in several months) which I’ll write about sometime." A few readers commented on this and asked me to give some details. This is the post that will do that as well as relate physical fitness to financial fitness. Background Let's begin 25 years or so ago. I … [Read more...]
Introduction to DRiP’s
A few months ago I mentioned I was looking into dividend investing as part of my financial freedom plan. Soon thereafter a reader offered to do a guest post on how he has set up his dividend investing plans. This added a practical take on my initial theory. Today we have another reader who is offering his experience with dividend stocks, this time how he has used DRiPs to … [Read more...]
