Dec 26, 2012
In my ongoing and painstaking research on what separates Wealthy Mustachians who feel life is full of abundance, from Consumer Suckas who can’t seem to get ahead because of life’s many expenses, I notice many patterns. Certain behavioral habits tend to make people wealthier, and others provide a grinding pull towards the gutter. Complainypants disease, an…
So the Mustache family is now happily living in the little vacation suite I built for us with the indispensable help of my friend and host Johnny Aloha. There are still some finishing touches to add (including paint), but for the most part everything works now. The nicest part of this place is the shower,…
Want to hear something really weird? All this time, I’ve been writing this blog about financial independence, a term and movement that is often credited to the 1993 book “Your Money or Your Life”. I had been assuming that Mr. Money Mustache himself was at least partly motivated by a long-ago reading of that book…
This Hawaii place has quite a reputation to outsiders. You can’t get halfway through the word without people’s eyes fogging up as they start to dream about beaches and scenery and sunshine. And much of it is true – even on my third visit, the magic of this place remains. For me it’s the temperature,…
Whew! It has been quite a week here in Hawaii, as I’ve been in Nuclear Robot Work Mode since arriving. It has been incredibly fun so far, and yet mixed in with all the fun and hard work have been some important life lessons pertaining to both early retirement and home renovation. As we’ve learned…
This is just a note for the fun people of O’ahu who wrote emails and comments last week, interested in getting together. I’ll delete this post after the Hawaii trip ends, since it is only relevant to us islanders. There are a surprising number of Mustachians around here – over 50 have gotten in touch…
So, here I am on a tropical island. It’s 4:06am local time. The only light is that of the moon peeking through the canopy of Monkey Pod trees that covers the entire property and the only sound is the rustling of leaves in the night wind. Temperature is in the bare feet with t-shirt range…
The real estate market has been pretty interesting in my area in recent months, and perhaps in yours as well. It’s a topic worthy of discussion on this blog, since many of us consider property ownership to be a key part of our early retirement strategy. If you live in an area where houses are…
Dear Boss, This is to inform you that an opportunity has come up for me to spend the next seven weeks in Hawaii, and thus performance of my regular work duties will become spotty and unpredictable during this time. love, Mr. Money Mustache I’ve been keeping this a secret from you for a while,…
“Spend Less!” “No, Earn More!” The battle goes on, with scathing mockery volleyed between the opposing camps. Mainstream personal finance pundits like Dave Ramsey and Suze Orman advocate lower spending for those in debt. Yet they have an apparently unlimited upper ceiling on how much increased spending can still lead to happiness, as evidenced by…
I, Mr. Money Mustache, am going to gain twenty pounds of muscle mass, AND set a lifetime bench-pressing record…by March 21st, 2013! You heard it here first, and now I absolutely have to get it done, to avoid an incredible public ridicule and loss of credibility. I’m both nervous and excited as I type this,…
Ahh, consumerism. The growing Mustachian Army fights and slashes away great swaths of it, night and day. We wake ourselves from the nightmare of our irrational desires for 400-horsepower SUVs and 4000 square foot houses.We advance further to slice the enormous lovehandles of fat from our daily routines. We disband our armies of domestic housekeeping…
Despite the fact that he wears mostly ripped jeans and installs his own sewer pipes, Mr. Money Mustache is occasionally accused of being a privileged upper-middle class elitist who doesn’t understand the problems of real people. So this week we look at a call for advice from a reader with more challenge packed into her…
One of the questions that comes up in the face of Mr. Money Mustache’s unrelenting optimism about the state of the world is, “Will human prosperity continue even as we run out of the cheap fossil fuel energy that has powered us for the last 200 years or so?”. In a nutshell, I always say:…
It’s finally November 1st, and it means that for the first time in history, the Money Mustache family is running on a fully unsubsidized health insurance plan which we’ve paid for out of our own pocket. Isn’t that scary? As noted in past articles, I’ve had a pretty cozy health insurance situation up to this…
“The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself” – F. D. Roosevelt, 1932 “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” – B. McFerrin, 1988 Most of us know enough not to disagree openly with unassailable pillars of wisdom like those above. But somehow, we also have a hell of a time putting them into practice in…
