With April upon us the tax deadline is looming and I decided to sit down this past weekend to work on our taxes. My go to tool is TurboTax and I have a love/hate relationship with this software but that’s a story for another day. After going through dozens of documents and forms the software…
$1.5 Million To Retire Comfortably?
The Wall Street Journal has an article (paywalled) out stating that the new number to retire comfortably in the United States is $1.46 million. The article didn’t state if that is per individual or couple but do you think that is correct? It Depends Many of these articles are often fairly useless because there are…
Zepbound: My Health Journey – End of March Edition
War! That’s the only way I can describe what happened to me after I finally got my second month of Zepbound. I rotated from taking the shot on Thursdays to Saturdays because of the fiasco that ensued in February. Note: I had intended on posting this at the end of March but I went on…
The Whopping Costs of Vacationing In Europe!
I just got back from spending Easter in Europe and I am shocked at how much inflation has grown there and the whopping costs of living there. Airfare I was lucky enough to find “cheap” airfare to Europe for $760 but it was only because I have an alert on flash sales setup on my…
Inflation At Home 2024
Inflation is like a boa constrictor that slowly squeezes every nickel and dime out of you but lately it feels like a Titanoboa and we must battle it everyday. I got a bit of a shock early this year with the cost of utilities. Both electricity and water went up far beyond what I was…
Personal Finance Blogs That I Read
I’m on vacation this week but I prepared some posts because nothing sucks more than not having anything new to read. I tend to favor data driven analysis in anything I do so if these blogs seem a bit too analytical then you have been forewarned. Financial Samurai has a great post on Ranking The…
Why Central Bank Rates Matter For Dividend Stocks
I’m on vacation this week but I won’t leave you empty-handed. One of the things I monitor closely is what the Federal Reserve does at each of their FOMC meetings. As a matter a fact, I have these meetings in my own personal calendar and I will always take my lunch break around watching CNBC…
Update On Retirement Planning Spreadsheet
A while ago, I wrote a five step retirement plan that culminated in putting all the steps together here. The net result of all of that work was the creation of a spreadsheet to show us how our retirement money flows might pan out. I am still working on tweaking the spreadsheet and there are…
Off To Europe For The Easter Holiday
I will be traveling to Europe for Easter holiday but I have an exciting update to my retirement spreadsheet primed to post tomorrow. The comment feature should be working now but if your comment doesn’t show up it’s because I was unable to get access to approve it. Happy Easter!
My Personal Finance Toolbox – FRED
I’m starting a series on tools I have in my personal finance toolbox. These are the tools I use either daily, weekly or monthly to make financial decisions. If you wonder how I have time to use these tools, write this blog, and focus on my investments, the answer is easy. I often multi-task and…