Early Retirement Extreme

Financial independence, frugality, self-sufficiency, ecology, capitalism, and voluntary simplicity

How to get a solid desk for free (this opportunity doesn’t last)

Published in May 24th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in budgeting, expenses, spending

If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!When it comes to consumer durables, I rarely pay retail. These days stuff is generally well made (lasts for years), yet people have a desire to buy things as if they were going out of style — well, maybe [...]

A salary veils economic reality

Published in April 1st, 2008

Posted by Jacob in job, motivation, spending

6 Comments

I just sent my first invoice as a freelancer. It turns out that I have covered all my cost-of-living expenses (and then some) for March by working just a few hours every other day. What an amazing proof of concept.
Being paid an hourly rate and being able to work whenever (when there is work available) [...]

The real reason it is so easy/hard to get ahead

Published in March 20th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in budgeting, saving, spending

4 Comments

DW and I were talking about how personal finance can be easy in theory and hard in practice. I think the reason is that theory, like language, occurs in two steps. Passive and active. Understanding and speaking. Passively, yes, sure we understand that we should spend less than we earn, that we should save money. [...]

My list of 25 money saving tips

Published in February 5th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in saving, spending

9 Comments

Frugal for Life recently posted a big list of tips to save money and The Family CEO posted list of 25 things I do to save money, so I figured I would make my own list as well. These suggestions range from rookie to expert.

Get netflix or blockbuster instead of going to the movies. Watch [...]

How I became financially independent in 5 years - Part II

Published in December 27th, 2007

Posted by Jacob in assets, budgeting, clothing, cooking, cost of living, spending, standard of living

13 Comments

I posit that most people can attain financial independence in less than 10 years and in less than 5 if they are truly determined. I also submit that many people not are willing to make the necessary changes.

Read part I here
One thing I noticed early on was that small expenditures could quickly add up. [...]

Wear a wide brimmed hat and retire extremely early

Published in December 22nd, 2007

Posted by Jacob in anticonsumerism, assets, budgeting, cost of living, expenses, investments, liabilities, net worth, personal finance, recipe, spending, standard of living, voluntary simplicity

4 Comments

And here’s the extreme version of Wear sunscreen and retire early. I promise this will be the last blog on sunscreen for a while
Spoken to the tune of “Wear Sunscreen”.
If I could give you a single piece of advice. This would be it: Be wealthy. The long term effect of accumulating wealth has [...]

Don’t wear sunscreen

Published in December 21st, 2007

Posted by Jacob in consumerism, rat race, spending, standard of living

2 Comments

… a tongue in cheek follow up to yesterday’s Wear sunscreen and retire early.
Spoken to the tune of “Wear Sunscreen”.
If I could give you a single piece of advice. This would be it: Live beyond your means. The long term consequences of living beyond your means have been demonstrated to lead to bankruptcy whereas the [...]

Anti-consumerists can retire early from the rat race

Published in December 7th, 2007

Posted by Jacob in anticonsumerism, consumerism, rat race, saving, spending

1 Comment

Maybe you have heard comments from the 1950s where some people predicted that the introduction of robotics would lead to work weeks of only a few hours with robots taking care of everything else. I’m sure the steam engine lead to similar predictions. In fact the opposite has happened. We seem to work more than [...]