You Can Retire Early!: Everything You Need to Achieve Financial Independence When You Want It PDF
Preview You Can Retire Early!: Everything You Need to Achieve Financial Independence When You Want It
Thank you for downloading this Simon & Schuster ebook. Get a FREE ebook when you join our mailing list. Plus, get updates on new releases, deals, recommended reads, and more from Simon & Schuster. Click below to sign up and see terms and conditions. CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP Already a subscriber? Provide your email again so we can register this ebook and send you more of what you like to read. You will continue to receive exclusive offers in your inbox. Contents Introduction Chapter 1: Start with Why Discover Your Why How to Find Your Why A Retirement Lifestyle Early Retirement on Different Incomes Keep Your Plan Visible When Is the Right Time to Retire? Chapter 2: How to Develop a Personalized Plan What Is the Lifestyle You Want in Retirement? Start with a Budget Create Your Budget! Analyzing Your Expenses Try the Cash Method Understanding Your Net Worth Increasing Your Net Worth Growing Your Wealth for Early Retirement Chapter 3: Making the Most of Your Income What the Wealthy Know That the Rest of Us Don’t Steps to Minimize Your Expenses How to Increase Your Income Penny Wise, Pound Foolish Chapter 4: Opportunity Cost and How It Affects Wealth Where the Money Goes The New-Car Purchase The Gym Membership Purchase Small Purchases Can Really Add Up Comparing Opportunity to Opportunity Cost Chapter 5: The Role of Fixed Debt How Fixed Debt Impacts You What Is a Healthy Debt-to-Income Ratio? Types of Fixed Debt How to Use Cash Instead of Debt Encouragement for Avoiding Fixed Debt: Focus on Your Why Chapter 6: Credit Card Debt Can Kill Retirement Plans The History of Credit Card Debt How to Avoid Running Up Credit Card Debt Paying Off Credit Card Debt—A Fantastic Investment Other Helpful Tips Chapter 7: Investment Vehicles That Will Get You There The Top Three Investment Vehicles People Use to Retire Early Investing in the Stock Market Real Estate Investing Business Ownership Other Investment Options Hire a Financial Adviser or Go It Alone? Robo-Advisers Chapter 8: Stick with the Plan Get-Rich-Quick Schemes and Scams Why Perseverance Matters Creating an Environment That Helps You Achieve Your Plan Take Advantage of Continuing Education Create or Join a Community of Like-Minded Individuals My Method and Why It Works Chapter 9: How and When to Track Your Plan The Budget How to Measure Your Progress How Often Should You Assess Progress? Keep It Simple with Software Investment Fees Chapter 10: How to Deal with Setbacks Fallout from Economic Downturn A Changing Family Medical Issues Identity Theft Keep Your Why in Front of You Appendix A: Ways to Increase Your Income Appendix B: Glossary Appendix C: Types of Businesses Franchise-Based Brick-and-Mortar Business Online Income: Product Based Online Income: Service Based Appendix D: Resources Book Recommendations Blog Recommendations Podcast Recommendations About the Author Index Dedication I would like to dedicate this book to my wife Kim and my two children, Finn and Avery. They mean so much to me and are the reason I started my journey toward financial independence. Introduction It is possible for nearly anyone to retire long before the age of sixty-five, and in this book I’ll show you the steps you need to take to plan your own path to early retirement. Having the money to retire early means you won’t have to wait until you’re sixty-five or even older to start living your life the way you want to live it. When you have the money to retire at fifty, forty, or even thirty years of age, your outlook on life will be different. You’ll be able to stop working on someone else’s terms and finally live life the way you want to. People who have succeeded at retiring early make their decisions about life based on what seems right to them rather than what everyone else is doing. They make choices that allow them freedom; this means they are conscious of every financial decision they make and its impact on their retirement plans. Different people have different concepts about what it means to retire early. For some, early retirement means being able to retire at age sixty. For others, their early retirement dream means to be able to retire at age thirty-five. According to the Social Security Administration, full retirement age (FRA) is anywhere between age sixty-five and sixty-seven, depending on the year you were born. This is the time when you can start collecting full Social Security benefits. If you choose to retire and start drawing on your Social Security benefits before your FRA, you’ll be penalized with smaller benefit checks. However, by following the guidelines in this book, you can retire as early as you want without needing Social Security benefits. As I discuss how to formulate your early retirement plan (ERP), I’m going to help you plan as if you are not going to receive Social Security retirement benefits. In this way any Social Security retirement benefits you receive later on will be an addition to your income instead of something you’ll depend on. Regardless of what your target early retirement age is, there are many benefits to having the financial means to be able to retire early. People who are able to retire early have the freedom to travel, to spend time with family, to devote themselves to hobbies, to start their own business, or even to go back to school. When you’ve planned your finances in a way that gives you the freedom to be able to quit your job, you can spend your time doing things you want to do and stop being stuck in a job that gives you nothing more than a biweekly paycheck. What does early retirement really look like? The answer varies from person to person, but most agree that they want to retire early to allow themselves more time to do the things they really want to do. Believe it or not, making a plan for early retirement is much simpler than it sounds. All you need is enough income- producing assets to provide for your living expenses for the rest of your life. Now let’s look at how to achieve that goal. CHAPTER 1 Start with Why Is it really that farfetched to retire at fifty or even forty? Over the years, I have met people who have retired even earlier than that. You might think that retiring early means you must have a large income, but in fact it’s possible, as we’ll see, to do this with many levels of earnings. The key is to have a plan. HOW MUCH DO I NEED TO RETIRE? How much money you need in your nest egg in order to retire depends on two issues: • What do you want to do in retirement? • What do you anticipate your basic costs to be in retirement? However, creating the plan isn’t the hardest part of reaching early retirement. The most challenging task throughout your journey to retire early will be sticking to that blueprint. You might think that only big purchases can derail you from your plan for early retirement, but the fact is that even small, everyday purchases can lead you off track. You may purchase a used car rather than a new one in order to save money, but if you are eating out three times a week rather than cooking at home, you’re negating all the savings you made by forgoing that new-car purchase. That is the reason you need a strong why. Why do you want to retire early? Your why will be what motivates you through the tough times. It will give you the strength to say “no” to distractions that may hinder your ability to stay on track.
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