Year in Review of My 2023 Investments
About 3.5 years ago, I set a goal to reach $10 million by age 40. However, I set this goal when I lived in an expensive city in Silicon Valley, where median home prices exceeded $1 million. In the specific neighborhood I lived in within that city, homes were easily above the $2 million mark! Now that I live in a town with a lower cost of living in the Dallas metro, it would be tempting to lower that goal. However, I still believe reaching $10 million by 40 is attainable. To help accomplish this goal, I compare my investment performance to the S&P 500’s and Nasdaq’s at the end of every year. In this post, I will share my comparisons and see how my investments fared in 2023.
Financial Resolutions with Little Effort but Big Rewards
Happy New Year! I hope your finances had as great a comeback in 2023 as mine did! Now that it’s the start of a new year, you’re probably setting some resolutions for yourself. So be sure to include some financial ones, too. Here are some practical ones that require little effort but reward you handsomely in the long run.
How To Evaluate Investments
Whenever I talk shop with another investor, I’m often asked how I determine if an investment is a good one. While the answer is very subjective and personal, I evaluate 5 specific things every time I decide to pour money into a new investment. Today, I share what those are with some basic examples.
How My Investments Are Faring in 2023
Near the end of 2022, about 9 months ago, I shared that my net worth had plummeted a whopping $1.7 million! The losses were primarily attributed to a terrible year for stocks, with the Nasdaq down roughly 33% and the S&P down 20%. Going into 2023, I kept my expectations low due to the Fed’s aggressive rate hike plan and stubbornly high inflation. However, this year has proved to be one heck of a turnaround! In this post, I’ll share how much my net worth has recovered and what I’m doing with both stocks and real estate.
5 Things That Helped Me Retire Early
When I tell people that I’m retired, they usually assume that I came from money, struck gold from a tech IPO, or that I got lucky throwing my life savings into Tesla or Bitcoin. But none of those are true. To achieve financial independence sooner than most, I think that I simply developed certain habits early in life that put me ahead of the curve.
After reflecting on what I did to retire at age 31, I came up with a list of 5 things that helped me accomplish my goal. Surprisingly, not everything on my list has to do with money, so read on to find out more!
Actions I’m Taking During These Uncertain Times
I can’t believe 6 months have flown by since my last blog post! Life has been absolutely crazy for my family and me, having just retired at the end of last year, moving from California to Texas, selling our California home, moving again from an apartment to our new home, and finally settling in and acclimating to the new area. It was exhausting for me to type out those life events just now! Suffice it to say, I’ve been busy as usual. Blogging takes a surprising amount of time to plan and write out content, and I didn’t want to post something just for the sake of posting.
Anyway, the dust has settled for the most part in my personal life for the time being. However, the world economy has really hit the breaks this year, taking most of us by surprise. With out-of-control inflation coupled with the Fed raising interest rates at break-neck speed, investors like myself have really taken a huge financial hit all of a sudden, scaring me into taking action. Read on to see if you could benefit from doing the same!
How I’ll Spend $2 Million Dollars
After selling my primary residence in California for almost $1 million over asking price, I received over $2 million in cash from the sale. I can’t let that amount of cash just sit around idly; it’s always best to put money to work so it continues to earn more on your behalf. In this blog post, I will share what my plans are for the $2 million. And no. I’m not going to gamble it all away in crypto!
What's A Better Investment: Primary Residence or Stocks?
Normally, a primary residence should not be considered an investment unless you house hack and rent out part of the home while you live in it or you end up selling the home. In the house hacking scenario, your primary residence acts like an investment because renting out a portion of your home could certainly reduce your housing costs. Better yet, if done right, it could even net you a profit!
If you end up selling your primary residence, the home acts like an investment because you will hopefully yield some capital gains after building equity for many years. Plus, selling your primary residence has a nice tax perk where you can exclude up to $250K (single) or $500K (married) of the capital gains from taxes! The latter scenario is what my partner and I recently did when we sold our home in California for nearly $1 million over asking. So how does our primary residence as an investment compare with, say, the stock market? Let’s dive into the numbers today and find out!
7 Traits of Highly Successful People
The past 5 years or so of my life have really kicked my finances into high gear. It’s not just a feeling of success either; it’s real and backed by data. By tracking my net worth over time, I have the data to tell me whether or not my finances are moving in the right direction. And in the past few years alone, I’ve seen my net worth increase by a couple million! That said, it’s important to self-reflect and understand how I’ve come this far in such a short period of time. In this post, I wanted to share the things that have really helped my partner and I become so successful so young.
Risks and Tradeoffs of Real Estate Investing
In my past post, 6 Reasons Why I Invest In Real Estate to Build Wealth, I talked about the many benefits of investing in real estate. However, it’s important to highlight the risks and tradeoffs, too. So what are they, and are you willing to accept those risks anyways?
Why Everyone Should Start A FIRE Journey
Embarking on a FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) journey isn’t just for those who want to retire early; it’s for everyone. While the premise may sound bold, I believe my reasons are pretty compelling. As a reader, I want you to think long and hard about the questions I will pose throughout this post and see where your answers take you.
6 Reasons Why I Invest In Stocks to Build Wealth
A few months ago, I wrote an article on why I invest in real estate to build wealth. While I am a huge fan of real estate investing, there are many benefits of investing in stocks that I also love. In this post, I’ll dive into the top reasons why I invest in stocks to help bring me closer and closer to my $10M fat FIRE goal.
Predictions of 2021’s Economy and Investing Landscape
Between COVID-19, the March 2020 stock market crash to all-time highs for a basket of stay-at-home stocks, no one could’ve predicted what 2020 had in store for us. Let’s have a little fun today by looking into our crystal balls and predict what 2021 has in store for us! At the time of writing, it is December 30, 2020. By the time you’re reading this, some of my predictions may have already come true!
2021 Business and Personal SMART Goals
Happy New Year! To kick off every new year, I like to set goals for all aspects of my life, both personal and professional. To make sure that my goals are clear and reachable, I create Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound (S.M.A.R.T) goals. By publicizing my goals, it helps me stay accountable for the things I set out to accomplish for the year. In this post, I’ll talk about my personal finance and business goals. Now, let’s dive in!
End of 2020 Reflection on My Retirement Accounts
It’s an understatement to say that 2020 has been a crazy year. Nevertheless, at the end of every year, I like to review how well my investments have performed. Regardless of how good or bad each account has done, I find it healthy to review them as objectively as possible to see if any changes should be made to them for the following year. In this blog post, I will go through each of my retirement accounts one-by-one, see if I met my contribution goals, check their overall performance, and determine if my current 401(k) plans need any rebalancing or reallocating.
6 Reasons Why I Invest In Real Estate to Build Wealth
I know plenty of successful investors who invest entirely in the stock market and in no other asset classes, like real estate. On the other hand, I also know many successful investors (myself included) who have done even better putting their money to work in real estate. Consider the following 6 reasons why I include real estate in my portfolio and why you should consider it too.
Reaching Financial Independence in Silicon Valley With $10,000,000
Financial Independence, Retire Early, AKA the FIRE movement, has become a major theme among millennials this past decade, including myself. Shortly after you start reading about it, you’ll learn that FIRE means different things to different people. In this post, I’ll give my take on what FIRE means to me, why I think it’s important, and how I determined my FIRE number. That is, how much money one needs to reach financial independence and retire early.