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Are You on the Right Path? Codie Sanchez from Contrarian Thinking is someone I enjoy following via her newsletter and numerous podcast guest appearances.  She generally talks about building and especially buying “boring” cash flowing businesses that I think would greatly appeal to the FI Community. I’m highlighting her here for a Twitter thread she recently posted on checking in weekly to determine if she’s on the right path in life, as I think it can be useful for you. From Codie: “Every Sunday I have a little ritual where I check in to make sure I’m on the right path. I use a framework called the 1 in 60 rule. It means that for every 1 degree a plane veers off its course, it misses its target destination by 1 mile for every 60 miles you fly. Further you go, further away from your goal you get. I think this is true in life too. So how do you make sure you’re even on the right path? You grab yourself a nice big glass of red. You sit down to some music (I like instrumental). You open your computer. And you ask yourself some questions. Am I happy doing what I am doing right

Travel Rewards Updates Our team worked hard to update and streamline the free travel rewards course on the ChooseFI website and now it’s available as a series of 6 blog posts (instead of a 20-part email series) you can digest quickly and easily to get started maximizing travel rewards.  Get started with Part 1 now and there’s a link at the bottom where you can navigate to Part 2 and beyond… Two FI Resources Our good friend Cody Garrett, an advice-only financial advisor at Measure Twice Financial, continues to add tons of value to the ChooseFI Facebook group.  Here are two posts that I think will add value to your life: Capital Gains Tax Rate income thresholds for 2022. It’s incredible to see the taxable income levels where you qualify for 0% for long-term capital gains. Cody’s charts make it simple to digest. The ‘Rule of 72’ is an “easy way to conceptualize how quickly money doubles when invested.” Cody’s chart shows your annualized return from 1% to 12% and how long it’ll take your money to 2x, 3x, 4x and 5x.  Never seen it presented like that! Teach Me Something Interesting Tim Urban, from ‘Wait But Why’ (I’ve mentioned his article ‘The Tail End’ numerous times, but

Put Your Finances on Autopilot The entire reason this newsletter exists is to compel you to take action to make your life better. Today my ask of you is this: Find at least one thing in your financial life that you do on a recurring basis where if you invest a few minutes today you could put it on autopilot for the rest of time. I call this “frontloading the sacrifice” though that’s overplaying the difficultly level calling it a ‘sacrifice,’ but hopefully you get the picture: What can you spend a few minutes on today to eliminate that decision or time investment every month in the future? Some examples could include: Put your credit card payments on autopay Find any bills you still are paying by check or logging into an account to manually pay and see if they have an autopay option Setup automatic investments each month into a mutual fund or ETF of your choice. Financial Literacy Month: Favorite Reads April is financial literacy month and if you’re just finding the world of Financial Independence, I’d highly suggest you start with our free FI 101 Course, check out Episode 100 of the ChooseFI podcast and read JL Collins’ ‘The Simple

Brian Feroldi’s Book Releases Today We’ve been excited for months about the preorder for Brian Feroldi’s book, “Why Does The Stock Market Go Up?: Everything You Should Have Been Taught About Investing In School, But Weren’t.” Well, good news is, as of today, this is a preorder no more because today is the official release of the book and it’s available everywhere books are sold! Simply put, this book is incredible. I think it vaults instantly into the top tier of essential personal finance books, and is a must-read for anyone who wants to, among other things, understand the stock market, what it means to invest in stocks, how to consider how stocks are valued and why the stock market goes up (and down). Here is a link to purchase ‘Why Does the Stock Market Go Up?” on Amazon. Impact of Rising Interest Rates One of the more unusual thoughts I hold about personal finance is this:Our homes don’t have a specific inherent value. What I mean by that is this:  Since most people finance 80% to 99% of their home purchase price through a mortgage, the actual market value of the home isn’t the only, or even the major, determining factor in

What is a Share of Stock? Brian Feroldi’s book, “Why Does the Stock Market Go Up?” releases next week and while recording our episode with him, I brought up a sentiment I’ve heard distressingly often in the FI Community: “I just don’t believe in investing in the stock market. It all seems like gambling.” My response is usually something like this: Owning a share of stock means you are a part owner of that company. A company like Ford broke ownership of their company into 4 billion little pieces, each piece represented as one share of their stock. If you don’t ‘believe’ in stock market investing at all, that means there is literally no publicly traded company in the United States that you want to be an owner of. That’s impossible. So, let’s be clear, investing in the stock market isn’t gambling and it isn’t some nebulous unknown.  You are buying small ownership stakes in companies. In the case of a total stock market index fund, you are buying an ownership stake in over 4,000 companies. This is not gambling, it’s investing. Maximizing Cash Back Credit Cards If maximizing cash back on your credit cards is more your thing than travel

Community Feedback and Tips 1) Paul wrote in and I wanted to share since the quotes he posts daily to Instagram are really profound. I’ve bookmarked his account and I suggest you do as well: “Brad, Love reading these emails. It’s a gentle reminder to keep motivated. The luck surface area note (from last week’s FI Weekly newsletter) is great. I haven’t heard that term before. But the sentiment is true. You have to be ready. A way to keep myself personally on track, I’ve been posting a quote every day on an Instagram account I created. I post myself every morning. Helps keep me grounded. I’ve been saving quotes for years and planning to give them to my daughters when they get older. But figured, I’d post them and share the account with them and anyone else who happens to come across them. I tell you this because I think the quote I posted today lined up with the luck surface area. “The unprepared mind cannot see the outstretched hand of opportunity.” – Sir Alexander Fleming 2) Russell then wrote in with info on a program I hadn’t previously heard about: “I’ve been meaning to write with my ‘1 percent better’ for a while

Challenge Your Thinking I genuinely enjoy ideas that challenge my preconceived notions and though it will probably appear otherwise with the 2 links I’m including in this section, I’m not trying to build a case against home ownership. I thought these articles were worth your time as a way to challenge your thinking on this important topic: Why Renting is Sometimes Smarter than Buying Why I Don’t Care About Our Home’s Market Value (Nor Should You) Increase Your Luck ‘Surface Area’ I’m both intimately aware of how much luck factors into success and simultaneously always looking for ways to increase my luck “surface area” – to make it more likely through preparation, connections and knowledge that luck will strike positively for me. This Twitter thread from George Mack entitled “How to Get Lucky (without being rich)” was a really good example of increasing that luck surface area.  Quotes that jumped out to me: Be interesting. And seek interesting friends. People will remember you when they have an interesting opportunity. Assume everything is a game of skill and there’s always something you can control. Don’t wait for others to do nice things for you before you do nice things for them. Just relentlessly

Spring Decluttering On the ChooseFI website we just published “7 Decluttering Tips to Organize Your Life” as part of our March ‘Spring Cleaning’ month, and I really recommend you check it out. I get intense psychological satisfaction from decluttering and turning a room into an “oasis” that’s free of clutter, so this article speaks to my soul. Laura and I got started decluttering our living room in an effort to turn this room, which is normally a source of stress, into one that is actually enjoyable to spend time in. Community Success Stories My favorite part about the FI Weekly is reading the emails you all send me each week as they are loaded with amazing success stories, questions, suggestions and actions you’ve taken to make your lives better. I’m thrilled when I get emails that are so good that I want to copy and paste them into my next newsletter.  Here are two: Asking For a Raise: Sarah wrote in: “Last year I listened to several ChooseFI podcasts about asking for a raise. I did the salary research, reviewed my accomplishments, and in October, I finally mustered the courage to ask for 15 – 20% more. (When I told people close

Going Outside 365 Days Per Year I don’t usually go back and listen to our ChooseFI episodes after publication, but I made an exception for Episodes 364 & 365, which I think is our best two episode stretch in the history of the show. If you haven’t had time to listen to them yet, download them on your podcast player of choice. I got this great email from Greg which added on to a theme from Episode 365: “Hey Brad, Loved the discussion on the latest episode, #365, about the magic of getting outside. I 100% agree, and I think it’s one of the easiest ways that millions of Americans can radically improve their lives. And the science agrees with me: more and more studies are completed every year confirming the benefits of nature exposure, from reducing anxiety and stress to improving creativity, and so, so much more. I personally take it one step further and advocate for getting outside every single day. A few years ago, I set a goal of going outside and covering at least one human powered mile every single day. It took me a few tries to make it to 365 consecutive days, but now

More Advanced Online Security In the November 30th newsletter I included 8 simple tips for online security which I think will put you ahead of 95% of people in terms of online safety. But as Jonathan recently spoke about on the podcast, those are certainly not enough, as he was a victim of a ransomware attack that went through the router controlling his home network. A friend of mine is a cybersecurity expert and he was quite impressed with Jonathan’s explanation of how we should all “block port forwarding in the router for UPnP (Universal Plug and Play)” and he sent me this article from Wired with more information on how we can all secure our Wi-fi routers. This is an easy fix that can go a long way towards safeguarding your home network. Wordle…and Much More At this point you’ve almost certainly heard of the viral sensation Wordle, which is a combination word game and logic puzzle.  It’s genuinely a lot of fun and usually takes just a few minutes, so give it a try. I wanted to pass along some other similar games that my family has gotten into recently that you may not have heard of that are every bit as fun

Financial Tracking Spreadsheets In early January I wrote that we all should do an annual financial audit to have a sense of where we are with our personal finances, both in terms of net worth (assets & liabilities) and your income statement (income & expenses). However, at that time I wasn’t able to provide spreadsheets that could be used to make the exercise dramatically easier for you. Luckily our good friend Brian Feroldi reached out with his financial spreadsheet templates that are available for you to download completely for free. This is a good time to remind you that Brian’s book, “Why Does The Stock Market Go Up?: Everything You Should Have Been Taught About Investing In School, But Weren’t“, is available now for pre-order. I’ve seen an early copy of the book and it’s genuinely fantastic.  If you have even a passing interest in learning more about investing, you need to read this book. A Life Well Lived I saw this Twitter thread from Nicolas Cole titled “30 rules for a life well lived” and a number of them jumped out to me as particularly important: “Make decisions from a place of abundance, not scarcity.” “Live within your financial means.” “Who

What is Coast FI? In trying to make the concept of Financial Independence relatable, I often look for those ‘eye opener’ moments for people, and the concept that I was initially surprised resonates so deeply is what’s known as ‘Coast FI.’ But upon further reflection, it shouldn’t be surprising at all. Because Coast FI is both intuitive and a really powerful concept. You’ve reached Coast FI when your investable assets are large enough where they will grow to your ultimate FI Number by your intended retirement age (either early or a more traditional date – your choice of timeline of course) with you putting ZERO additional dollars away as savings. Simple back of the envelope calculation using an example of a 35-year-old looking to reach FI in the next 20 years: Their FI Number is $1 million, which is 25x their annual expenses of $40,000. They currently have $250,000 saved and invested. Using the ‘Rule of 72’ and assuming an 8% annual market return, we would expect their assets to roughly double every 9 years. At 44 they would expect an investable net worth of about $500k and 9 years later at 53 they would expect their net worth to