Wandering Money Pig - A journey of early retirement and FIRE (financial independence retire early)

  View of Montreal from Mount Royal During the 20 plus years my wife and I lived in New York City, one of our favorite places to visit was Canada.  We visited Canada five times or so together.  We visited Montreal (twice), Ottawa, Quebec City, and Niagara Falls.  Canada will always have a place in our hearts for all its natural beauty, the warm friendly people, the delicious food, and LaBatt Blue beer! Home to over 4.2 million inhabitants, Montreal is the largest city in the province of Quebec, Canada.  It’s set on an island near the St. Lawrence River, and it’s named after Mount Royal, the triple-peaked hill at its center.  Montreal is the largest primarily French speaking city outside of Paris, France.  About 60% of the population can speak both French and English. Montreal started out as a French colonial missionary settlement in the 16th century, but soon became a fur-trading center thanks to the St. Lawrence River.  Montreal was the largest c...

Emerald Isle Boating Access Area, North Carolina  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe:  “Many people take no care of their money till they come nearly to the end of it, and others do just the same with their time.” Welcome everyone!  I’m a recent early retiree at the age of 48.  My wife and I (and our Pomeranian dog) have been slow traveling across the eastern parts of the United States and we’ve been spending time with our family since last August.  In this post, I will lay out my principles for how I try to live my life.  These beliefs are what made early retirement possible for me. This is my ‘ Early Retirement Manifesto ’. Principle One: Get rid of debt!  No debt is good debt.  The so called ‘bad debt’ including credit card debt, personal loans, and car loans are bad.  But so are so called ‘good debt’ including mortgage and student loans.   The LESS debt you have, the faster you’ll be financially independent.  It’s never good to pay som...

Sunset at Atlantic Beach, North Carolina  I have been retired since August 2020.  My wife, myself and our Pomeranian dog have been traveling since we sold our home around that time.  We retired early to accomplish two main goals.  One was to spend more time with each other (including our Pomeranian), while the other was to spend time with our family (parents, siblings, nieces and nephews). So far we are successful doing both of these.  We’re not sure where we will be traveling to next, but it’s been fun so far since retiring.   In this post, I would like to share my thoughts and observations on the pros and cons of early retirement.   Pros of early retirement: Have plenty of time :  Time used to be something I never had enough of.  Sunday evenings would be spent getting ready for the coming work week.  This meant getting lunch and snacks ready.  Monday mornings in particular, were hectic.  I needed to get up at 6:40 am to get r...

Birds Sunbathing! My wife, myself, and our Pomeranian dog have been traveling to various destinations in the US since our early retirement in August of 2020.  We did extensive research on the best option to stay long term (month at a time).  At the end, we settled on Airbnb sublet over other travel booking websites due to their cost and   better rental choices.   Using Airbnb sublet, we stayed at Ocean City, Maryland and Atlantic Beach, North Carolina.  We feel we got a fair deal at both locations.  Ocean City cost $865 while Atlantic Beach cost $1000 per month.  ***Please check out this post ‘Slow travel during the pandemic...’ here . Please see below for our top tips on how to save money when traveling. Tip: We’re currently doing slow traveling.  This means we’re booking one month at a time or more to stay at one location.  What this allows through Airbnb sublet, is that it reduces the cost of renting vs booking few days or a week at a time...

  Falls Lake Dam Recreation Area, Wake Forest, NC After my wife and I sold our home at the end of August 2020, we headed down to Wake Forest, North Carolina.  This would mark the beginning of our early retirement.  We wanted to spend time with my brother in law and his family, who we haven’t seen in over a year.  It was during this visit that we discovered this fantastic recreation area. Falls Lake Dam Recreation Area is a man made reservoir located in the upper portion of the Neuse River Basin, nestled near North Carolina’s bustling Triangle Area.  The reservoir covers nearly 12,500 acres of water and is surrounded by 25,500 acres of public land.   The lake stretches 22 miles upstream to the confluence of three rivers: Eno, Flat, and Little Rivers. Falls Lake Dam Recreation Area boasts hiking trails, fishing, water sports, biking, wildlife viewing, etc. See my notes below when visiting the Recreation Area: The main entrance to the Recreation Area is access...

  Building your wealth with a retirement plan! Retirement plan, like the 401k, is one of the most important tools you can use to accrue wealth.  About 58% of Americans were active participants to 401k plans according to a report in 2018.  The built in tax advantage of a 401k plan allows individuals to grow their money tax deferred.   Other advantages like company matching and automatic enrollments are beneficial in ensuring individuals have the best chance at growing their nest eggs for retirement.   However, for all the advantages of a 401k, it’s widely believed that many Americans are falling behind on their savings.  A general rule of thumb says you should have saved the following amounts equal to your current salary: Age 30:  One time your annual salary.  If you make $30k, then you should have $30k saved. Age 40:  Three times your annual salary.  If you make $30k, then you should have $90k saved. Age 50:  Five times your annual ...

  Garage Sale! My wife and I recently sold our home during the pandemic and had to figure out whether or not to do a garage sale to get rid of our belongings.  We had decided to retire early, so starting around June 2020, we decided to downsize to get rid of about 90% of our stuff.  We weren’t going to be living permanently elsewhere.  Instead, we were planning to travel and spend time with our family.  This meant we needed to downsize and do it in a hurry within about 2 months! This is our story about us getting rid of our stuff we had accrued over the 14 years we’ve lived in Pennsylvania.  Included are our observations, tips, and know-how of doing a garage sale during the pandemic. Once we hired a real estate agent around mid-June, we set about exploring options to downsize within the next two months.  We had done a garage sale few years ago and it was a moderate success.  We managed to make about $220.  For this garage sale, we needed to g...