In the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic, many people find their personal finances in complete upheaval. We want to share real stories of how people are coping with the crisis. Our new series, the “COVIDiaries” will share individual experiences with how the pandemic is impacting income, savings, debts, and more. You can read more here. We [...]
A financial crisis can mean a lot of things to different people. While a global crisis is something that affects us all at different levels, there are also more individual experiences people go through throughout those tough times, and the less financially fortunate you are, the more likely you are to experience economic turmoil and [...]
It seems that the high amount of debt Canadians carry is still not being paid off. And with economic downturns, stock market losses, and an ongoing health crisis, can you really blame us? Although most of us can’t spare a lot toward our looming debt, there are some low-cost strategies that could make a big [...]
First up, I finished my “intro to FIRE” course course for Audible and turned in the manuscript. Once the script is approved, I'll head to the recording studio. Not sure about any projected release date, but we're moving along.
At the same time, it looks like development on the brand-new Get Rich Slowly site design is done. Well, mostly so. There are still a handful of tweaks we'd like to make — but we'd like to do them after the new site is public. To that end, we intend to push the new design live in the next 24 hours or so. This shouldn't cause any hassles…but you never know.
Once the new site is up, please please please give us feedback. We need to know what works and what doesn't.
Behind the scenes, Tom and I are both very excited about the future of Get Rich Slowly. We've been doing so much background stuff for the past year that the actual front-end has been a little neglected. That's about to end.
HOWEVER…there's also a bit of bad news.
For the past few weeks, while she's been furloughed from work, Kim has been handling all of the home and yard chores while I finished my course. She's excited for me to be finished so that I can lend a hand.
As part of that, we went to Home Depot this morning to buy a wood chipper. When we went to load it into her new RAV4, my left elbow went *crunch*, then my bicep and forearm instantly became sore and tight. Kim insisted on driving me to urgent care (because we Roths don't do that kind of thing — we just suffer for weeks). X-rays found nothing wrong, so the doctor put me in a sling and put me on muscle relaxers. I'm supposed to use my arm “75% less than normal” for the next few days. If things don't improve then they want an MRI.
So, while I'm mentally ready to go, and while the new design will roll out shortly, actual new articles may be a little slower to follow than I'd planned. But they're coming.
I hope all of you are doing well. And I hope you like the new layout. Once we have all the kinks worked out, it should be much more usable for everyone. Bring on GRS 4.0!
For many students, graduation is the happiness of getting their degree is mixed with the misery of having to deal with their student loans. After years of not really worrying about the balance accumulating behind them, graduation day can be a big reality check. Every year, I encounter a number of myths and misunderstandings about [...]
In the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic, many people find their personal finances in complete upheaval. We want to share real stories of how people are coping with the crisis. Our new series, the “COVIDiaries” will share individual experiences with how the pandemic is impacting income, savings, debts, and more. You can read more here. We [...]
After 4 years of assignments, exams, stressful nights meeting deadlines, and a strike, I have finally completed all of my university classes! I feel relieved, proud, and reflective. Getting my degree has been an experience full of surprises and stress. And I can honestly say that my degree has given me things that I am [...]
Step 5 is what I’m announcing today: A $25,000 match to help people in need during coronavirus. Hell, we’ll donate $25,000 regardless — but I want to tap into the IWT community to maximize our donations to help.
I announced this donation to the IWT team yesterday. Here’s what I told them:
“I’m extremely proud of every one of you. During the last few weeks, with massive changes in the world, every one of you has been a complete professional. You stayed calm, you adapted, and showed the world what kind of team we’ve built.
I always wanted to build a company that reflected my values. Look at us on this video call today — I never wanted to work in an office under fluorescent lights. So we have the flexibility to work from home.
I wanted to build a community of amazing customers so every one of us — you, me, our support team — is happy to interact with them. We’ve done that. We have the best community and customers in the world.
And I always told people 3 things about money:
First, money is a small but important part of living a Rich Life. At IWT, we show people how to save and earn money, but it’s rare for someone to show them how to spend it.
Second, a Rich Life is lived outside the spreadsheet. The point of saving and earning is not to count it in Excel — it’s to use it to create a Rich Life. And when there are people in need, that’s the time to deploy your capital.
Third, I always told people, when I’m successful, I’m bringing everyone with me. In this situation, we get to do exactly that.
Because of the work that each of you has contributed to IWT, we’ve built a healthy, profitable business. Now we get to deploy our skills and capital to help people who need it. We get to bring as many people as we can with us.
Today, I’m announcing a $25,000 donation to help people during coronavirus.
As always, I’m proud to work with the best team in the world.”
Here’s the donation link. There are millions of people who will need help — starting with food. Please join us in helping them.
Once you donate by this Friday, please forward your donation receipt to ramit.sethi@iwillteachyoutoberich.com, and we’ll match your donation up to $25,000.
This is part of our Rich Lives and we hope you join us.
-Ramit
P.S. Please forward your receipts by this Friday, April 10th. And when you write in, please let me know why you donated and what it means to be part of the IWT community. I can’t wait to hear from you.
It might seem contradictory to use debt to pay off debt, but taking out a line of credit to pay off credit card debt can be a great financial decision. How to take out a line of credit to pay off credit card debt It’s usually easiest to get a line of credit from your [...]
After nearly three weeks of hiatus, it's time to get things back to normal around this joint! Has anything happened while I was away?
Despite the ongoing coronavirus crisis, I'm ready to resume writing about personal finance. I've (nearly) completed my “intro to FIRE” project for Audible and The Great Courses — we're now in the editing stage — Kim and I (and our beasts) are healthy, and I have plenty to say about money.
Let's do this thing!
A Little Housekeeping
To start, let me say that I'm aware some folks have experienced trouble actually seeing new articles here at Get Rich Slowly. I've received several reports that things have “stuck” on the cybersecurity basics article from mid February. Some people cannot see new articles or comments.
Obviously, people with this problem aren't going to see this post, so I can't ask them to drop me a line. But if you were experiencing this issue and know anything that might help us resolve it, please let me know. Tom and I are baffled by the situation.
We did change hosting companies around the time the trouble began. We switched servers, and that seems to have created some sort of caching issue. Maybe? Like I say, we're not sure.
While I've been hard at work on my Audible course, my business partner Tom has been messing with things behind the scenes here at GRS. At long last, we think we're close to launching our redesign, which has been in the works since I repurchased this site 2-1/2 years ago. If everything goes well — and it is, so far — the new design should go live by the site's 14th anniversary next Wednesday.
Here's a preview of the new log and the new home page:
It's possible (likely, even) that we'll have some bugs when we launch the redesign. I'm counting on all of you to help us find them and squash them!
With that housekeeping out of the way, let's talk about how the first quarter of 2020 went for my finances. Short answer: Aside from the stock market (which I cannot control), things were pretty darn good!
First Quarter Finances
Here's a look at some of my spending numbers from the past three months and the first quarter of each of the past four years. Please note that this isn't all of my spending. It's just spending on select categories. Also, this is my spending and doesn't include Kim's purchases. Tracking numbers (whether for fitness or finance) drives her nuts so she doesn't do it. That means there's no way to know for sure how much we spend on things as a family.
January and February had relatively similar spending. Why was March so high? For three reasons.
The $450 annual fee for my Chase Sapphire Reserve card came due.
We bought a new mattress for $2450.10. (More about this soon, I hope. It was a process!)
We renewed our tickets to Broadway in Portland for next season. That cost $1473.50.
Without these three expenses, my spending for March was only $2433.44. That's great! Too bad I can't just ignore major purchases like mattresses and theater tickets haha.
When taken as a whole, my first quarter spending was down 21.4% from the same period last year. It was down nearly $6000 (31.1%) from first quarter spending in 2017! That's some fine progress.
Here are some thoughts on individual categories:
I am very very happy with my decline in spending on alcohol. As you can see (if you look at the “sin” category), I drank nothing in January. And most of that $233.92 in February went to the pot tincture I take most nights before bed. I bought two bottles of it. (Pot is legal in Oregon.) In fact, it's only since the coronavirus quarantine that my alcohol consumption has increased. Even so, I'm not drinking nearly as much as I have in previous years.
My big goal for this year is to reduce my food spending. The pandemic is helping with that. You can't go out to eat if all of the restaurants are shut down! Still, I find it curious that I spent roughly the same on food in March as in previous months despite only going out to eat twice. There's no doubt we've been buying more groceries. My food spending for the quarter was half what it was in 2017. Nice.
Last year, I made a focused effort to reduce my iTunes spending. That's clearly reflected in the spreadsheet. I'm definitely spending more on iTunes in 2020 than I did in 2019, but it's less than in previous years. One change I've made is to rent more movies. What's the point of buying Frozen II if it's unlikely I'll ever watch it again?
Lastly, I find the utilities trend interesting. You see, in 2017, we still lived in the condo. Some of our utilities were covered by our outrageous HOA fees. In 2018, we were in this new house but had not yet installed the hot tub. For the past two years, the utility fees include heating the spa. It looks like (during the winter) we're paying an extra $150 per quarter or about $50 per month to keep our water warm.
The big news, of course, has been the flash crash of the stock market. The S&P 500 lost one-third of its value in a month — and has since bounced back 20%. (Which means it's still down 20% from its peak. Funny how math works.)
I've seen far far too many posts in Facebook groups about people wondering when they should sell. This makes me tense. If you're a long-term investor, you shouldn't sell during a downturn! This is the opposite of what you should do. If your wealth snowball is meant to be used twenty years from now — or even ten years — what do you care that the market is down right now?
Anyhow, the market drop has certainly melted some of my personal wealth snowball. At the end of 2019, my net worth totalled $1,437,543. At the end of March, it was $1,234,053, a decline of $203,490 (-14.2%).
The End of the World
So, the first quarter went well for me financially despite the stock market drop. I'm pleased with my current level of spending all the way around. I've been so deeply focused on my work on the Audible course that I really haven't done anything else. Seriously. I've blocked out the world for the past three weeks.
In the evening, I've been indulging myself by reading and watching post-apocalypse fiction. It's one of my favorite genres. And our current situation makes this material feel more relevant than ever.
One of my favorite books, for instance, is the 1949 novel Earth Abides by George R. Stewart, which takes a realistic look at the aftermath of a global pandemic that wipes out nearly all of humanity. It sounds dreary, but the book is actually hopeful, optimistic. Hardly anyone knows Earth Abides, and it's a shame. It's great.
I've also been watching movies about the end of the world, including The World, the Flesh, and the Devil (1959), which I'd never heard of before. It's fascinating.
After a radiation catastrophe destroys most life on Earth, one man finds himself alone in New York City. Eventually, he meets a woman. Adam and Eve, right? The trouble is he's black and she's white. They're in love but cannot consumate their relationship because of the race issue — despite the fact that nobody else is left. When a third survivor appears — a white man — things get complicated quickly.
Judged by today's standards, this film is pretty tame. But in 1959, it must have been bold stuff. Personally, I think it's a pretty powerful indictment of the racist standards of the time. (And it takes a few stabs at sexism, too.)
Oh, and like everybody else, Kim and I watched the awe-inspiring train wreck that is Tiger King. Holy cats!
Okay, that's enough for now. I need to begin editing the lessons for my Audible course. After that, I'll go help Kim tackle the yard. There's tons to do! But over the next few days, we'll resume a more normal publication schedule around here. And, as I said, look for the launch of the GRS redesign in about a week. Take care!
In the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic, many people find their personal finances in complete upheaval. We want to share real stories of how people are coping with the crisis. Our new series, the “COVIDiaries” will share individual experiences with how the pandemic is impacting income, savings, debts, and more. You can read more here. We [...]
Struggling to get things done is something we all go through. When your productivity is taking a hit, your finances inevitably do too.The more productive you are, the more money you’re likely to make and the more organized you are, the more organized your finances will be. The following productivity hacks are some simple ways [...]
In the wake of the COVID-19 global pandemic, many people find their personal finances in complete upheaval. We want to share real stories of how people are coping with the crisis. Our new series, the “COVIDiaries” will share individual experiences with how the pandemic is impacting income, savings, debts, and more. You can read more [...]
The Canada Economic Response Plan provides financial support to individuals and businesses in response to the global COVID-19 pandemic. Justin Trudeau announced Canada’s COVID-19 Economic Response Plan in March 2020. This $82 billion plan provides a multitude of credits, payments, and additional supports, like extending the tax filing deadline, to Canadians. Here’s how to get [...]
Maple is a telemedicine platform that lets you speak to doctors 24/7 for common health treatment, prescriptions, lab referrals, and more. With Maple, you can skip the trip to the clinic and access a physician on demand when you need one. This is perfect if you are feeling unwell and don’t want to leave your [...]
The topics of economic mobility and wealth disparity make for some of my favorite conversations, because I want to understand all the facets of wealth. I am not fascinated merely by the rich, but by the process of getting rich. I used to perceive the wealth equation as very linear: earn money, save money, get rich. [...]
