Contrary to other personal finance bloggers out there, I have no big debt or financial emergency story to tell. It’s one of the main reasons why you won’t find any “how to get out of the red” advice or a “from financial zero to hero” narrative on my blog. I do, however, enjoy reading those kind of stories and I’ll tell you why.
Here’s one reason why I love English so much: its extensive and highly granular vocabulary. Through its Germanic roots, Saxon influences and heavy French borrowing, the English language offers its users a wider range of words and expressions than most other speakers have at their disposal. Last weekend that fact hit me again like a ton of bricks during a conversation on personal finance with an American.
Financial independence is all about optimizing your income and your expenses. About balancing wants and needs. About finding a happy medium between saving as much as possible and maximising your life enjoyment. Even though that’s clear to most of us, some unnecessary consumption is unavoidable. What about expensive hobbies, for example?
There’s no doubt about the fact that you’ll find the comment “I can’t believe your rent is so low!” under my income and expenses reports the most. As someone who tries to min-max his way towards financial independence I obviously try to keep my rent as low as possible. Because my rent-to-income ratio remains below 20% I succeed at doing so, if I may say so myself. However, many of my friends disagree with this approach and believe I should buy a home as soon as possible. Are they right?
This is a weird post to write because I’ve actually never owned a car, so how could I compare car ownership to being car-less, right? My parents always had a car, but I hardly ever used it. Come to think of it, my parents hardly ever used their gas-guzzler themselves, so maybe the lack of love for Europe and America’s ultimate symbol of freedom has rubbed off on their favourite son – don’t worry, I’m their only male child and my sister is a much more likeable person.
