How does fitness fit with FIRE

You health is very important part of reaching financial independence and retiring for that matter.  There is very little point in saving and living the FI lifestyle if are not around to enjoy it.

There is really to areas to your fitness. What you eat and physical activity. 

This area isn't talked about much, but it is important and can really cost you.  Memberships to various gyms and fitness places can be as low as $10 all the way up $200 and beyond per month.

If these places motivate you then great keep it up.  For the vast majority of the population that is not the case.  I bet either you or someone you know has a membership to one of these places and haven't gone for at least 6 months.  Truth be told that is how these places want it.  If everyone who had a membership to these places used it everyday they would have to turn people away at the door.

This expense doesn't even include if you are a runner and participate in races. Which can average $50-$80 for a local race and $100 on a big sponsored race.

Here is the thing. You need to stay fit, you need to eat healthy, because you want to live your life to enjoy it.  I workout 5 to 6 times a week for 45min to an hour.  I go have a gym membership for about $25.  I go to this gym 1 to 2 times a week sometimes more during holiday times.  I also have started collection pieces for a home gym.  Treadmill, bench w/ bar bell, a one size fits all dumbbell, and a punching bag.  Really this is all I really need and I could cancel the gym membership. Reason I don't is I like the ability to get out of the house and try different equipment and I seem to push myself harder when I'm not at home.  Another reason I have a great deal at the gym. I got grandfathered in at a low rate about 50% off normal price. 

I did my yearly health checkup a couple of days ago and somehow I have high cholesterol. This doesn't make much sense to me or my wife.  We eat the somethings and she is fine. Honestly we don't eat much that is high in cholesterol. We don't eat red meat sticking to mostly chicken, fish and turkey. I have always had problem with low LDL the good fat. This is the good fat you get from eating avocados, fish and such. Well this is a problem that I will need to take care of quickly.  First step is to figure out what in my diet is negatively effecting my health. It is time to bring back MyFitnessPal and start inputting all my meals. 

Get out their and stay healthy.

Saving money on weekend trips

The family and I occasionally will go on a weekend trip with friends.  These can range from camping to skiing. i.e (cheap to expensive).

We always look for way to save on these potentially expensive short trips.  First off share a condo and a rental house. Granted you need to be OK being in close proximity with another family. User reward points.  Thing to remember you don't need to be right next to the lifts most places have free buses from almost anywhere to the lifts.

If we are staying for a day or so we being our own food. One thing we like to make before hand it waffles and freeze them.  After that just bring syrup and warm them up.  They can feed an army and they are tasty. Next is lunches.  Easy PB&J and bread or your favorite lunch meat, granola bars, and chips.  Good thing about that you can bring lunch with you on hikes or skiing. Dinners our go to is spaghetti and we usually bring along garlic bread.  These are easy meal that can make a lot.

I believe if we do it right these weekend trips should cost less then $100 a person for the weekend.

What is money? - explanation to a kindergarten

A question from our favorite cartoon eating utensils. What is Money?

In short is it a medium to exchange goods and services.  In the past countries like the US used to back their currency by precious medals like Gold.

The good thing about money she is a very hard worker.  If you can put her to work for you she will grow and multiply and help led you to retirement(time where you can enjoy your favorite activities).  The thing is she works slowly so her friend time is another big part of her working for her.

If you leave money by herself he can get kinda lazy and gets smaller.  This is called inflation which makes she worth less.  Meaning that breakfast you bought last year may require more money to buy it this year.  

How do we get money to work for us.  Here is the fun part. It really isn't very hard to do.

The first way to a Savings account. You give you money to the bank to hold for you and they give you a certain amount to hold her for you.  They usually calculate that amount on a percentage and give you the interest based on that percentage.  The good thing about this way is it is safe and predicable and you money will not get smaller doing this.  Lets say you have $5 dollars and you let it just sit there for in a savings account for 30 years it will end up being $9.11. That is time and money working together at the bank.

The second way is though the Stock Market.  The stock market is where people buy and sell portions (shares) of a company.  In this way you buy portions of companies and the companies shares with you profits in what they call dividends.  The reason money can grow faster in the stock market is other people want to own the companies you have so they are willing to pay you more. This is like buying a Pokemon card today for a dollar and your friend is willing to pay you $2 for it.  Lets also put $5 dollars into stocks and money and time work for 30 years and you will end up with $50.  Wow that is much bigger.  How did that happen?  Well there is demand for owning companies so growth is quicker roughly 8% so money and time working together has a bigger impact.  One thing to know is some times the stock market goes down and you lose money. This can happen, but over long enough period usually that is not the case.

The last way is to just keep it in your piggy bank.  It's save you have access to it and you can spend it anytime.  This is way your $5 is worth $5 now and when you take it out in 30 years. But in 30 years your $5 will really buy as much as having $2.06.

This all gets more fun the more money and time you have. Let her grow.

The sky is falling?!?!

For awhile now the market has been doing well.  Almost every news feed is making some type of declaration the bull run is over an we are going into a bear market. The old the sky is falling. 

Who cares!!!! What goes up must go down.  What goes down never stays down.

The question is what will you do?  Will you freak out and look at your investments everyday?  Will you count the % of your lost or the amount your portfolio went down?

What you will do or have done is the past during this time will help you determine your investing personality.  You probably will fall into one of these three categories.

1. freaked and sold; you are risk adverse.  
2. You stayed put or maybe sold some; then worried and though about selling everyday. 
3. You just ignored the noise.You believed in your plan

Note this post and remember it every time the market falls.  For a long term investor obviously the third way makes your life the easiest. Falling into the other two categories isn't bad; just knowing who you are lets you overcome the inner-you and develop a plan you can stay the course with.

Remember stay the course; keep your plan; and diversify so when the sky is falling it falls a little less.

New Year now time to get to work

Welcome to 2020!!

Now the new year is here it is time to do some financial spring cleaning so to speak.

Here is my checklist

1. Check mine and wife's 401k balances
2. Re-balance 401ks if needed I like to be in the 80 stock /20 bond range give or take 5%
3. check IRA contributions for 2019
4. Check auto deposits for 2020 IRAs
5. Perform a backdoor roth conversion (ideally wanted to do at the end of 2019)
6. Check auto investments of HSA
7. Start gathering tax information
8. scan and input all health care receipt not already entered
9.  make appointments 2020 physicals to get job discounts

Now is also a good time to see how much damage the holidays did to your bank account.  It was not pretty for mine.  

All is not lost.   The good thing about kids is they will also outgrow things which leaves lots of good toys or clothes to be resold or donated. For me; my kids have outgrown our Bob Duallie stroller and it should help recoup some of our XMas spending.  This should also be true to the kids old bikes they have outgrown.   

Happy New Year let this year be prosperous.