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Welcome to My Journey to FI Part III: Finding FIRE. See below on how I kicked my savings into overdrive, and completely overhauled my life. Thanks for following along on my Journey to FI series. If you missed the last post in the series, you can find Part II here.
Part III of my Finding FIRE journey picks up around late 2015 – early 2016. At this time, I wasn’t in love with my job, but I had been working hard at it and was on track for a promotion which I received in March of 2016. However, the promotion would require me to move – to Texas. The building was located close to Austin, TX – which I was extremely excited about as I knew Austin was an up and coming city for young professionals. Plus, I had visited a friend there the previous Fall, where I had an absolute blast and fell in love with the city.
Finding FIRE
Around this time, I stumbled across the concept of FIRE- Financial Independence Retire Early. I had never even heard of FIRE before – until a good ole clickbaity Facebook article popped up on my newsfeed, with something along the lines of “See How This Couple Retired at 30yrs Old to Travel the World“. If I remember correctly, I think it was Kristy and Bryce from Millenial Revolution. I clicked on it, fully expecting it to be some multi-level marketing scheme – where they sold some special kind of juice, and they miraculously made millions of dollars over the next few years. To my surprise it was neither the article went on to describe that the couple had typical professional jobs, saved over 50% of their income, read Mr. Money Mustache articles, and followed his advice. Boom, simple enough, right?
I had always been interested in saving and investing my money. I read I Will Teach You To Be Rich, The 4-Hour Workweek, and countless other books on investing and entrepreneurship. But, besides the 4HWW most books about early retirement seemed to be along the lines of “earn lots of money from starting a business, sell it and retire in your 30s”. You need millions of dollars to “retire” don’t you? I had always thought that was the only way. So the concept of FIRE seemed so foreign and too good to be true to me. It couldn’t be this simple, could it? I had to find out “ so I read the Shockingly Simple Math article on MMM and devoured countless other posts during any free time I had. And slowly, a vision started to form in my mind. So simple but so profound “ I saw myself traveling, spending time with family and friends, working out, relaxing on a beach somewhere living the good life”. MMM was the start, but I quickly discovered others who had done the same, and you bet I read all of those as well. Most notably, the Mad Fientist blog and podcast.
Finding FIRE completely changed my life.
The FIRE was burning inside of me, pun intended. I didn’t know what I would do if I achieved FIRE, but I knew I’d be happier if I didn’t have to work, right? This FIRE thing would magically fix everything wrong in my life. My days would consist of endless bliss; I would wake up and spend my time living the good life.
Even as a kid, I prided myself on my imagination. I recently took the CliftonStrengths assessment, an idea I got from Ayo, the author. According to Gallup Strengths, my top strength is Futuristic. I have always had a strong vision of a positive future and how my life was going to turn out.
With this vision of life after FIRE consuming my thoughts “I started making positive changes that would eventually pay dividends many times over to my future self.”
Positive Life Changes
So to pick back up with the story, in March of 2016, I earned a promotion with my company. Earning a promotion and increasing my income by almost 50% and finding FIRE all at the same time, turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me. Plus, moving to a state with no income tax didn’t hurt either.
Pay Off Debt/ Increase Savings Rate
I had close to $1,500 on my car loan remaining, which I immediately paid off. I increased my 401K contributions to the max for the first time, maxed out an IRA and switched my health insurance to a high deductible plan with an HSA and maxed it out. Money that was going towards my car every month was now split between a savings account for an emergency fund and the rest to a taxable investment account. As the saying goes, I began paying myself first.
Avoiding Lifestyle Inflation
I had many wasteful, stupid, habits which I immediately began addressing – including spending $1000s of dollars per year on clothes and nutritional supplements. I had to re-read some good face punching articles from MMM to realize more things would not bring me happiness. Maybe I’m stubborn, or a slow learner since I should have learned this lesson earlier from when I first moved to Louisville. The more things I acquired brought me no such lasting happiness. I read about the dreaded lifestyle inflation and wanted to avoid it like the plague. Even with the increase in pay, I didn’t upgrade my life or spending in any serious way.
Knowing that I tended to spend any money I felt was lying around, I quickly made sure to not allow any to be lying around. Maybe some people have self-control, but not me. If you spend throughout the month without saving and paying yourself first, you will fail to achieve anything close to financial freedom. So, knowing this, I automated everything and paid myself first. Rent automatically came out of my checking account at the beginning of the month, right at the same time savings and investments would also be taken out. Food, gas, and all the usual expenses were right around the same every month. I tracked my spending and would challenge myself to reduce in areas where I spotted an opportunity. I ramped up my savings rate gradually every month.
Making The Move
So, with this FIRE burning inside me, I completely overhauled my life. I aggressively ramped up my savings rate and moved to Austin to start my new job. There were certainly some stressful and anxious times as there always is with any significant life change. This was also three major changes at once- a new job with more responsibility, a move to a new city, and the relationship with my girlfriend in Louisville ended when I moved to Austin. But, at least I had my financials in order and was excited to begin a new life in a new city.
My brother had recently graduated from college with no job prospects. So, I invited him to move to Austin with me and look for a job there in the booming job market. Mid 2016 to mid-2017 was probably the best time of my life since college. Work was stressful with another building launch to complete. But, luckily I was still working M-F and was able to flex my schedule slightly to align with my personal life. My brother and I had an awesome friend group and enjoyed exploring a new city as well as soaking in the beautiful weather with some epic pool parties – life was great. I also had met a great girl and found myself in a new relationship with all the joys that come along with any new romantic relationship during the honeymoon phase. I wasn’t FIRE, but I was on the path and enjoying life in my new city.
Check back in for part IV here.
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- Real-Estate Investing, Turnkey Rentals and How to Stop Trading Your Time for Money with Eric Martel of Martel Turnkey | NOF #83 - October 3, 2021
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