The other day I was listening to a podcast where the person being interviewed was talking about living on 25% of her family's income. The implication was they saved 75% of what they made. But I don't think that's the entire story. She said her percentages were based on "take home pay". Immediately I started doing the numbers in my head -- what did that really mean? I … [Read more...]
The Value of an MBA
In The Value of Growing Your Career: A Real-Life Example I mentioned that getting my MBA was one of the vital moves I made to grow my income. Separately, I was listening to an Afford Anything podcast about careers and the issue of return rate on various career investments came up. They were talking more about seminars, training, and the like, but the same principle applies … [Read more...]
My Jobs, An Interesting Transition
Last time I shared some of my career history I left off when my company had a big downturn. Today I continue this series by giving details on the next position I held. As you recall, the company was doing poorly at a key time period and the blame was being placed on my shoulders. At the same time, a few other things were going on: As I mentioned in the last post, … [Read more...]
The Value of Growing Your Career: A Real-Life Example
In the course of writing the follow-up post to How to Go from Zero to Millionaire, Part 1 I ran a boatload of numbers on Quicken (thankfully I have 22 years of data saved) and recorded my earnings by year (for the years I didn't have, I knew my first starting salary and estimated from there until I got to the point where I had data). I'll be continuing that series with part … [Read more...]
Explaining Early Retirement to Strangers
Last fall I shared responses I received from people when I told them about my early retirement. These were family members and friends -- people I know well (of course.) They know me and our family and while they may have been surprised, it wasn't a total shock given what they know about us. But there's an entirely different dynamic when you explain early retirement to … [Read more...]
My Jobs, The Blame’s on Me
Last time I shared some of my career history and left off when the dot com bubble burst. Today I continue this series by giving details on the next position I held. As you recall, I made the shift to the head of marketing for a sister company when the dot com I was working for went under. The company was what I'd call a smaller mid-sized company ($300 million in sales) that … [Read more...]
Spending $4k at a Moment’s Notice
Question: When is an 18-year old furnace most likely to stop? Answer: Once the outside temperature drops to zero. This is the story of how we had to make a multi-thousand dollar decision very quickly in a 55-degree home. History of Our Furnace As most of you know, we moved to Colorado in the fall of 2015. When we bought our house we had it inspected (of course). Part … [Read more...]
My Jobs, The Dot Com Bubble Bursts
Last time in this series I left off where my dream job had turned into a nightmare and I wanted out. Today I continue this series by giving details on the next position I held. After biding my time for two years, working hard and yet still wanting a new job, opportunity came knocking. I was approached about working for a new web start-up in our industry that had $40 million … [Read more...]
My Income Tax Preparation Process
I am knee deep in tax stuff this time of year. How about you? Are you done with taxes or do you still have them left to complete? I thought I'd take a break from the mind-numbing work to share how I prepare for mine. As you probably know, I use a CPA to do the hard work. And I have some good reasons why I do. The highlights of my process: I track EVERY expense and … [Read more...]
My Jobs, The Dream Job Turns into a Nightmare
Last time in this series I shared some of my career history and left off where I had just accepted my dream job. Today I want to continue this series by giving details on the next position I held. The dream job was everything I had hoped it would be -- lots of great projects, interesting people to work with, a growing company with lots of energy, a bigger title, more money, … [Read more...]
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