Apr 2, 2020
So here we are just a month later, in a full-blown economic panic, and at the start of the most sudden recession ever. The pandemic has spread much further and faster than most uninformed people (including me) would have ever guessed, and the whole world is on some form of lockdown. Nothing quite like this…
Mr. Money Mustache can tend to get a little high-level at times, talking about all these feelings and philosophies that underlie the proper path to wealth. But you can’t just smile your way to the top – there are real numbers at work in the background, whether you understand them or not. These can gang up and…
Pretty much since I learned to walk, I have had an unusual disdain for waste. I noted the inefficient route of the school bus and wondered why it couldn’t just pick us up at a few centralized locations. Tracked my allowance with multi-year forecasts and kept the dollar bills organized in a photo album. Always…
This summer, Mr. Money Mustache broke his own rules and burned an absolute shitload of gasoline to criscross the continent in a not-very-efficient vehicle. Sure, I can list a few excuses as to why I did it (it was a 7-week family vacation, I needed the big vehicle to carry all my carpentry tools and…
Hey! It’s time for a Reader Case Study! I almost forgot about this cherished category of posts, partly because my MMM contact email address stopped forwarding way back on January 10th. “Ahh, this is relaxing”, I thought, “I guess nobody has any questions for me these days!”. Mrs. Money Mustache laughed at my naivete. I fixed the…
I was recently enjoying a conversation with a new friend. Despite my best efforts to sound normal and busy, this person eventually figured out that my wife and I don’t actually do enough paid work to sustain the normal middle-class life we seem to lead. From here he pried out the fact that I am…
And by lately, I mean the past several years or more. The value of the S&P 500 index of stocks, where most of us hopefully have a good chunk of our retirement savings stashed into index funds, is up about fifty seven percent in just the past two years. And it has more than doubled…
A couple of years ago, Mr. Money Mustache lost some credibility among the faithful when he wrote this blog post about actually trying to spend a bit more money, while buying a Tesla as the first step in that program. “Look at me!”, I thought to myself at the time, “I’m such an enlightened middle-aged…
“I used to read Mr. Money Mustache”, some people say these days, “Until he got all rich and fancy so that he no longer understands the common person’s plight. Stash probably doesn’t even practice any of these money-saving things he preaches any more!” When I read things like this, I can’t help but laugh. Because…
Whoa, have you seen what just happened to interest rates!? Suddenly, after at least fourteen years of our financial world being mostly the same, somebody flipped over the table and now things are quite different. Interest rates, which have been gliding along at close to zero since before the Dawn of Mustachianism in 2011, have…
As I type this, I’m jumping through the various hoops involved in buying a 2023 Tesla Model Y, a rather expensive, luxury “crossover” that is absolutely loaded to the gills with excess: all wheel drive, faster acceleration than a Lamborghini, enough space for seven people and enough computer gadgetry to function as a small Google…
Well, looks like it has happened again. Since the last time we spoke, I got sucked into building my 17th(?) kitchen, and I have finally emerged from its messy yet addictive grasp as I stand here at the new breakfast bar, typing this report to you. Why am I so hooked on this strange pastime?…
One of the reasons I don’t write as often these days is that my life has gradually evolved into a Personal Finance Bubble. The people around me have learned to be purposeful with their money, which means they now have plenty of savings and never have to stress about the stuff. Good ideas have naturally…
As strange as it may sound, earning financial freedom is a lot easier for certain people than claiming that freedom once they have earned it. And if the following statement rings true to you, you may be suffering from this same hardship: “I think I’m close to having enough money to jump into early retirement,…
During our recent discussion on Inflation, a Badass reader stopped by and caught my attention by dropping the following block of wisdom into the comments section: “A final note if you are worried about inflation: sledgehammer the TV and go for a walk in the woods. Trees get bigger every year unless you cut them…
It has been a good while since we’ve done a reader case study here on MMM, but that hasn’t stopped them from arriving in my inbox. And since 2022 is becoming a year of interesting financial changes, it’s time to spark things up again, go back to our roots, and start covering some of the…
