When I first discovered the FIRE community in 2016, I found myself drawn to money-saving tips and articles, rather than income-generating ones. Right up to the end of 2019, my mindset was to work a boring cubicle job and save every dollar that I could.

However, the 3-4 years that I spent working in a cubicle up to the end of 2019 really took a toll on my mental health. I was chronically bored, and nothing interested me. I never had the energy to wake up in the morning. I felt extremely restricted having to sit at my desk from 8.30 a.m. to 5.30 p.m., and very worn out from all the office drama and politics. Eventually, I developed OCD and anxiety.

In 2020, I transitioned from a full-time role to a part-time role, and this gave me a lot more time to explore my interests.

Eventually, I stumbled across the power of niche sites, and am planning to invest a lot of time and money into this, in the hopes of creating an enjoyable stream of income.

This has, by far, been my biggest and most valuable mindset change in 2020, and I do believe that I’ll be focusing on creating enjoyable streams of income from now onwards, instead of saving every penny that I earn, for the following reasons:

There’s no ceiling for generating income, while there’s a clear limit to saving money.

Taking niche sites as an example, if I can get an article ranking and making $50 a month, I can easily scale by putting out more articles, or by creating more niche sites.

However, in contrast, when it comes to cutting savings, there’s a clear limit as we still need to spend money on housing, transport, food and other essentials. While I could go without spending money on housing by sleeping in McDonald’s outlets, that’s not something that I want to do.

Penny pinching can sometimes feel miserable.

During my most aggressive phase of money saving when I had no money, I went to the extent of cutting down on meals and walking instead of taking public transport. Years later, even when I wasn’t saving that aggressively, I still found myself feeling restricted and stressed out by trying to save as much as I could.

Working a cubicle job in order to save money can lead to a lot of dissatisfaction in life.

The most fatal flaw behind my mindset of working a boring cubicle job and saving every dollar is that I spent 45 hours a week doing things that I really disliked, and another 5-10 hours a week commuting. It always felt that I had little to no energy and time to do things that I love, and that created a lot of unhappiness and dissatisfaction.

To do this for another 10-15 years felt a little like agony, and I didn’t want to feel that I wasted the best years of my life working a cubicle job.

I already have $200,000 in savings.

One of the main reasons that I’m considering investing money into generating income, rather than saving money, is because I already have about $200,000 in liquid net worth (cash, stocks and bonds, excluding retirement account contributions).

This money will generate anywhere between $4,000 to $6,000 in dividend income a year, and can pay off a lot of my monthly expenses (such as food and transport). My plan is to never touch my invested money in stocks and bonds, and to just live off the dividends.

An enjoyable stream of income can last for many years.

Another reason I’ve decided to invest in generating income is because an enjoyable stream of income can last forever. I can foresee myself working on my niche sites for many years (even if it’s not for the rest of my life), and I also have the option of carrying on with my sites after retirement.

In contrast, I stop earning from my cubicle job the moment I quit, since it’s purely active income. Passive income from niche sites beat active income from cubicle jobs any day.

My Plan for Creating Enjoyable Income

As such, my focus for the next few years is to invest money into finding and building enjoyable streams of income, rather than to save every penny. This will hopefully allow me to quit my corporate job much earlier than at 40 years old, which seems like a dream.

I’ve already put this plan in action by spending a lot of money and time on my niche site. I’ve build out a plan for my niche site for the next year or two, and I plan to focus on that.

Admittedly, I’ve been spending all my money each month, and I haven’t saved anything for months. But for now, as long as I don’t touch my $200,000 of savings as well as dividends, I’m good with that.

What do you think about the saving money vs. generating income debate?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting the blog.

Recognising Mediocrity

Childhood Years

I had many dreams during my childhood, and I wanted to do many things with my life. I had dreamt of becoming a singer, a pianist, a drummer, a professional athlete, a martial artist, a world traveller, a polyglot, and more.

Because I had so many goals, I often tried to fit as many of these activities into my daily schedule. For example, a typical day might involve:

• 30 minutes of piano
• 30 minutes of drumming
• 1 hour of exercise/martial arts
• 1 hour of language studies

While this might seem productive, when I look back on my childhood as an adult, I realise that I accomplished nothing more than mediocrity.

I’m a mediocre piano player, and can barely pass as a beginner on the drums. I’ve tried a variety of martial arts (Karate, Muay Thai, Ninjutsu) but am proficient at none. I can barely understand Chinese and Japanese, let alone French, despite having taken lessons for all of them.

Year 2020

My lack of accomplishments didn’t stop at my childhood. When I entered year 2020, I told myself that I would still go full steam ahead toward early retirement (with my corporate part time job + part time tutoring jobs), while working on 2 different websites at the same time, while not neglecting personal development (reading and exercising).

While I wish I could say that my 2020 ended with a bang, it didn’t. I’m no closer towards early retirement, my 2 websites are kind of stagnant, and my personal development isn’t outstanding. In addition to that, 2020 felt busy, sometimes overwhelming.

From October to November 2020, I decided to step away from work and blogging, and to take an extended break for reflection. And here’s one of the most important things I learnt.

Focusing on Only One Thing

Oftentimes, people try to chase after too many dreams at once. They believe they can squeeze in 1 hour of exercise, 1 hour of meditation, 1 hour of piano practicing, 3 hours of building a business, all while holding down a 9-to-5 job.

However, the truth is that when you stretch yourself too thin, all you’re setting yourself up for is mediocrity. You become decent at these activities, but find it hard to push past that into mastery.

As Greg McKeown aptly puts in his book “Essentialism, the Disciplined Pursuit of Less”, the image on the left results in the “unfulfilling experience of making a millimetre of progress in a million directions”, while the image on the right results in the “satisfying experience of making significant progress in the things that matter the most”.

Similarly, in Gary Keller’s “The One Thing”, he asks this powerful question – “What’s the one thing I can do such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?”

The idea here is simple – focus on only a few things, or better yet, just one thing.

That isn’t to say that you’re to drop everything else and do only one thing. What this means is that you should prioritise your one thing every single day by means such as time blocking.

Putting the One Thing into Practice

Unlike 2020, I’m hoping that my 2021 turns out a little differently.

In 2020, I had many priorities, such as:

• My part time corporate job
• My tutoring jobs
• Tracking my finances actively
• Following the crazy stock market and learning about picking stocks
• Working on this personal finance blog
• Working on the niche site
• Taking courses everyday

However, in 2021, I plan to pare down my priorities to the following:

• Writing for the niche site
• Creating videos for my niche YouTube channel
• My part time corporate job
• My tutoring jobs
• Tracking my finances actively
• Following the crazy stock market and learning about picking stocks
• Working on this personal finance blog
• Taking courses everyday

Instead of 7 goals, I plan to focus only on 3.

While I would absolutely love to quit my corporate job, buying gear for my niche site is super expensive so I have to keep it at least for the next 6 months (hopefully, I can last for 12 months).

Unfortunately, I won’t be tutoring anymore so that’s an income stream down, but I’m thankful for the savings that I do have. Also, I won’t be posting as often on this blog anymore (as I find that I’ve been dragging my feet a little every week). Instead of posting every single week, I’ll probably post 2 or maybe 3 times each month.

So basically, for next year, my focus will be my niche site plus the accompanying niche YouTube channel to supplement my site.

With fewer goals, I hope to make a bigger difference in my passion projects.

Are you focusing on too many things at once? What’s the one thing that you might need to focus on?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting this blog.

When I started working part-time in February 2020, I came up with a to-do-list of everything I wanted achieved by the end of the year. Many items on my list were simple, for example:

• Make it a daily habit to write.
• Start using social media for the blog.

And somewhere at the end of my rather short list, I had this one pretty unbelievable goal:

Write my first book.

This goal felt so overwhelming that I had decided to shelve it and procrastinate on it for as long as possible. My plan was to write short blog posts for a few months until I built up enough momentum to tackle an entire book sometime nearer the end of the year.

But one thing led to another, and I finished the book over a few weeks in March and April 2020, learning a lot in the process.

So, here are some important lessons that I learned from it.

1. Sometimes, ideas come to you when you least expect it.

After I started working part-time, I wrote rather aimlessly for a few weeks. I just babbled on about my own personal financial journey, when I planned to retire, how much I made in dividend interest, financial mistakes I had made in the past, amongst other similar topics.

More often than not, I found myself struggling to put thoughts into words, and to continuously come up with great topics to write about.

However, the more I persevered, the easier writing became. To keep myself disciplined, I met up with a particularly enthusiastic entrepreneur friend of mine on every free day that I had, and we worked together by hot-desking.

One day, while I was staring across her office, an idea suddenly hit me – “Become Rich on a Modest Salary”. I have no idea where it came from, but it hit me out of nowhere.

After deciding that “becoming rich” felt like incredibly spammy clickbait, I decided to go with “Become a Millionaire and Retire Early on a Modest Salary”.

I immediately got to work outlining a blog post, which I planned to be no more than 3,000 words.

At the halfway mark, I found myself already at 4,000 words. I tried to cut down the number of words, but to no avail; there was no way to fit all of this into a single blog post.

Since I couldn’t make it shorter, I decided to make it longer. And this began my book-writing adventure.

2. It’s possible to finish a first draft of a book in about 1 month.

I started writing my book on 2 March 2020, and I completed my final words of the first draft by 8 April 2020. Altogether, it took me 1 month and 1 week (or 5.5 weeks).

Here’s how much time I invested into the book’s first draft each week:

• Week 1: 22 hours
• Week 2: 26 hours
• Week 3: 16 hours
• Week 4: 22 hours
• Week 5: 25 hours
• Week 6: 14 hours
• Total: 125 hours

And here’s how many words I wrote for the first draft each week:

• Week 1: 9,835 words (Completed chapters 1A and 1B)
• Week 2: 12,082 words (Completed chapters 2A and 2B, started on chapter 3A)
• Week 3: 5,962 words (Completed chapters 3A and 3B)
• Week 4: 9,202 words (Completed chapters 4A and 4B)
• Week 5: 9,726 words (Completed chapter 5A, wrote half of chapter 5B)
• Week 6: 6,098 words (Completed chapter 5B and introduction)
• Total: 52,905 words

Granted, a lot of the book was about personal experience and my personal journey, which made it infinitely easier to write. However, I still find it quite intriguing that I was able to get a fair amount of writing done on top of my part-time office job and tutoring side hustle.

3. It’s easier to get into the flow state when you have a very specific objective.

The reason I was able to finish the entire 53,000-word first draft of the book in about 1 month was because I was in a flow state for most of my days.

Before I started writing the book, I actually planned the entire outline, down to each chapter and sub-chapter. Here’s what Chapter 1A looked like after being broken down into sub-chapters.

• Chapter 1A: Earn a $50,000 Gross Salary
  • Sub-Chapter 1: How Much is Too Little for a Salary?
  • Sub-Chapter 2: Why Aim for a $50,000 Gross Annual Salary?
  • Sub-Chapter 3: What to Expect from a Job Paying a $50,000 Salary
  • Sub-Chapter 4: Should You Ever Work Part-Time or Take a Mini-Retirement?
  • Sub-Chapter 5: How to Make the Most of Your Salary
  • Sub-Chapter 6: How to Make the Most of Your Time Outside the Office
• For more information on every single chapter and sub-chapter in the book, please click on this link right here.

I made sure that the entire outline had a logical flow to it, and then I just started writing.

I was in a flow state and particularly productive most days because I didn’t have to wake up and wonder what I was going to write about. Instead, I had a very specific pre-planned objective, for example, to finish 3 sub-chapters each day. I grab the sub-chapter’s topic, and then I just write.

There was no need to waste any time or mental bandwidth making decisions on what topic to write about, so I could spend all of it on cranking out words.

4. Writing a book is a wonderful way to form a writing habit.

From my personal experience, writing a book really forced me to sit my normally-lazy ass down and get stuff done.

I managed to make things easier for myself by pre-planning all my content, and then working in a flow state for the entire month.

After the entire month (or rather, 5.5 weeks) of writing my first draft, I got used to writing a fair number of words each week.

While I used to struggle with writing even just 2,000 words per week, now I can do 10,000 words each week without too much trouble.

Writing a book will push you out of your comfort zone, and make you do things that you normally wouldn’t do. After a while, what used to make you uncomfortable becomes your new normal.

5. It’s all about small daily actions.

At the beginning of this year, if you had asked me whether I could finish the first draft of a 269-page book within a month or so, I would have laughed and told you that’s crazy.

“269 pages? No thanks.”

However, fortunately for me, I started first by writing a blog post on the topic, which became extremely long, which I then turned into a book. I had never set out to write a 269-page book. I just wrote a few pages each day, every day, which accumulated and became that 269-page monster that I’m shocked to even have completed.

Just like how $1 million is made $1 at a time, a 269-page book is written just 1 page at a time.

Have you written a book before, and what lessons did you learn? Or is writing a book something you plan to do in the future?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting this blog. 

In January 2020, I spent a lot of time considering and negotiating a proper part-time arrangement for myself. Thankfully, my proposal was approved, and I started working part time from February onwards.

Although I still don’t enjoy the nature of my job, and quitting still crosses my mind on bad days, I’m very thankful for the fact that I can:

• Work just 3 days a week in an office job; and
• Work from home.

Time Flies When You’re Contented

Last year, in 2019, I pushed myself to endure 70 hours a week of corporate work, side hustling, and commuting. Sometimes, this would extend to 75, or even 80 hours. As a result, I was miserable.

Time seemed to crawl, and I found myself constantly wishing that time would pass faster.

I even had to resort to little rituals of crossing out days on my calendars and counting down the days to the end of the year.

This is a 100-Yen (US$1) calendar that I bought from Daiso Japan. It made my year a lot less miserable.

I admit that I had 3 different calendars to cross out days with – one at home, one at my office, and one on my laptop. (Crossing out the days just felt that good. Sometimes it felt like the only good moment of my day.)

Looking back, I realise that this was extremely silly, but I’m grateful for having learnt that lesson.

Now, in 2020, time seems to fly. The combination of a 3-day corporate workweek and the work from home arrangement has put me in a pretty awesome position – I get to spend a lot of time writing about things I love, while not having to worry about how to pay my monthly bills.

These days, I actually look forward to starting my mornings off with a little writing.

And even when I have bad workdays, I take comfort in the fact that I don’t have a long way to go before the weekend arrives. It’s great, really.

The only problem with time passing so quickly is that I don’t have enough time each day to get what I want done. For example, I planned to do these regular “Part-Time Work” updates every 2 months, but it’s already been more than 5 months and I’m barely getting started on my first.

Oops.

So, Where Did All My Time Go?

Work (Part-Time Office Job and Side Hustling)

I still lose a lot of time each week to my office job and my tutoring side hustling. On an average week, I can expect to work anywhere between 30 to 40 hours a week. Although this doesn’t seem little, it’s still a lot less than I used to work.

I don’t enjoy my office job and tutoring, but I’m still holding onto them for this year. If I lose one of my active sources of income, I still have the other to make ends meet.

Passion Projects (Music and Languages)

When I first moved from full-time to part-time work, I imagined having boatloads of time to work on all my passion projects. I had dreamt of using the majority of my time to work on my writing, while spending some time on other projects like music and language studies.

Well, 5 months have gone by and I haven’t had the time to even touch my drum set or my Japanese language studies books. I do take about 5-10 minutes a day to learn Mandarin on Duolingo, but it feels so negligible.

This was me in Japan, shopping and researching for JLPT (Japanese-Language Proficiency Test) books. I bought them and still haven’t used them. 

Spending Time with Loved Ones

A major change between 2019 and 2020 is that I get to spend more time with loved ones now. At the beginning of the year, I managed to spend more time with my girlfriend. We had a blast cooking, eating out, and visiting cool places like Universal Studios Singapore.

Unfortunately, the COVID-19 happened, which resulted in a lockdown and then subsequent easing of measures (but still with restrictions in place). It’s been a bit hard to spend a lot of time with her apart from Skyping and gaming together (as we don’t live together). Although this is fun, it can’t replace physical interaction and making new memories together. Hopefully though, this might change in the near future.

On the bright side, I have been able to spend lots of time with my family, especially my siblings. We’ve been watching lots of TV shows and movies, and playing lots of Nintendo Switch.

We’ve already beat almost all the levels on Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros, Kirby Star Allies, Super Mario Party, and Overcooked. No thanks to me, of course (I’m a terrible gamer), but it’s still a fun time.

I honestly don’t know how much time I have left with my family (if my parents react badly to me moving out, they might cut off contact with me), so I try not to take any of it for granted.

A Brief Summary

Although my life hasn’t changed too much since 2019, choosing to earn less in 2020 has seen a marked improvement in my level of happiness. I’ve gotten rid of some of the things that I hate the most:

• Too much unfulfilling work;
• Commuting; and
• Office politics.

And I’ve replaced them with the things that make me happy:

• Spending time with loved ones; and
• Writing.

Going Forward: July to December 2020

While there are plenty of other passion projects that I would love to pursue in my lifetime, I don’t think I can get much done other than writing for the rest of the year.

Apart from this blog, I’ve also recently decided to start a separate niche site. So these 2 sites already take up a lot of my time (especially because I’m not quite proficient at writing and blogging). I am looking forward to seeing where I could go from here by the end of the year.

In addition, I still plan to spend time with loved ones, and I don’t plan to quit my job yet.

As far as I can see, the rest of the year isn’t going to change much.

And honestly, I’m happy with that.

How was your first half of 2020?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting this blog. 

Post #1

Post #2

Post #3

Post #4

Post #5

Post #6

Post #7

And that’s all 7 posts for this week. I read so many wonderful ones over the week, and it was difficult choosing just 7, so I’ll just keep on reading and writing these “7 Lessons” posts. ?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting this blog.

At the beginning of 2020, I decided to transition from full-time work to part-time work. This has greatly increased the amount of time I have on hand, and I’d like to channel some of it into personal development on a daily basis.

I’ve since decided to take note of the best personal finance article I read each day, along with 1 single lesson that I’ve learnt from it.

Everything I learn will be compiled into a blog post every week, so it can hopefully provide you with some value too. (Admittedly, this is also to help me, since I learn best when I write.)

If this provides any benefit to you, let me know. If you have any ideas on how to improve these round-up posts, please let me know as well.

Post #1

Blog Post: A Dummies Guide to Investing in Ireland-Domiciled S&P 500 ETFs, by Seedly.

Lesson #1 – There are Ireland-domiciled ETFs where dividends are automatically reinvested back into the fund, instead of being distributed to shareholders. This will help circumvent the 30% withholding tax that Singaporeans have to pay on their dividends from these ETFs.

My Thoughts:

Many thanks to Calvin for recommending this article. I love how we are able to circumvent the withholding tax, and how Singapore doesn’t impose capital gains tax. This ensures that we are able to reap maximum investment returns after accounting for foreign exchange risks and expense ratios (which are low anyway for Vanguard ETFs).

Post #2

Blog Post: How to Invest in Bitcoin? A Simple Beginner’s Guide (My Bitcoin Strategy Revealed!), by My Money Wizard.

Lesson #2 – Bitcoin’s limited supply makes it a deflationary asset (where inflation causes Bitcoin to become more valuable). As the government prints more money, leading to inflation, some of that money will most certainly be ploughed into Bitcoin by investors. This might lead to Bitcoin acting like gold, another limited commodity.

My Thoughts:

An awesome analysis on Bitcoin, and I can see the potential in investing in Bitcoin. That being said, it’s hard to put my money where my mouth is, so I’m probably not going to be investing in Bitcoin yet.

Post #3

Blog Post: Is a Recession Really the Best Time to Start a Business?, by David Sax on Medium.

Lesson #3 – “There’s never a good time to start a business, just as there is never a bad time to start a business”. After all, many companies were founded during downturns, such as GE, Disney and Fedex. Starting a business is about acknowledging risks, embracing uncertainty and believing in your own ability to make things work.

My Thoughts:

The positive attitude of everyone mentioned in the article was uplifting, something we can use more of in a time like this. I feel inspired by the determination that these entrepreneurs have to make things work. I’m certain that it is indeed possible to start a business during a downturn if you keep overheads as little as possible by starting small. As time passes, you build up.

Post #4

Blog Post: The Person’s Financial Ethic We Should Care Most About Is Our Own, by Becoming Minimalist.

Lesson #4 – We are often quick to judge others, usually those who have more than us, on their financial decisions. We often think that it’s wrong for others to “have that much money”, to “have that many houses”, to “not give more money away to charity”. We think of these people as greedy, or selfish, whereas what we should care about is only our own financial decisions.

My Thoughts:

Although I’ve sometimes felt this way about others who have more, I’ve never thought much about it, apart from feeling upset or angry. Ultimately, it’s not for me to say whether these people are greedy or selfish; what I should care about is my own financial decisions.

Post #5

Blog Post: Is Now the Time to Convert USD to CAD?, by Modern Fimily.

Lesson #5 – The current COVID-19 crisis and the steep drop in oil prices has resulted in the steep devaluation of the Canadian dollar, so it might be a good time to buy Canadian dollars. The U.S. dollar has been holding up because there are a lack of good alternatives, and the world is dependent on the U.S. dollar.

My Thoughts:

Reading this blog post made me realise that I might be able to buy ETFs in Canadian dollars, rather than U.S. dollars. Considering that the Singapore dollar and the Canadian dollar are almost on par now, it would be a lot less “painful” to make the exchange into Canadian dollars, rather than U.S. dollars. Not sure if this is possible, but something to find out.

Post #6

Blog Post: The Science of Developing Self-Control in Life, by Darius Foroux.

Lesson #6 – The basic idea of entropy is that everything inside a system usually moves toward disorder. In humans, this entropy usually occurs so slowly we don’t notice anything on a daily basis. That’s why we don’t feel any urgency to resist this entropy. Despite this, we need self-control in our daily lives. Self-control can be fostered by having a useful purpose, setting long-term goals and minimising stress.

My Thoughts:

I’ve heard about the concept of entropy before, but never really slowed down to think about the impact on my own life. I particularly enjoyed the tips to resist entropy, and I think one of them has just inspired a new blog post idea ?

Post #7

Blog Post: Can Money Buy Happiness?, by Wallet Wise Guy.

Lesson #7 – Money can’t buy happiness, in the strict sense that using money to buy things won’t make you happy. But not having money is likely to lead to not having freedom, which is going to keep you from being happy.  

My Thoughts:

Not having money will keep you in a job you might hate, stuck in the rat race, doing the same thing each day. So though money can’t buy things that will make you happy, you still need money to buy your own freedom.

And that’s all 7 posts for this week. I read so many wonderful ones over the week, and it was difficult choosing just 7, so I’ll just keep on reading and writing these “7 Lessons” posts. ?

Thank you for reading!

At the beginning of 2020, I decided to transition from full-time work to part-time work. This has greatly increased the amount of time I have on hand, and I’d like to channel some of it into personal development on a daily basis.

I’ve since decided to take note of the best personal finance article I read each day, along with 1 single lesson that I’ve learnt from it.

Everything I learn will be compiled into a blog post every week, so it can hopefully provide you with some value too. (Admittedly, this is also to help me, since I learn best when I write.)

If this provides any benefit to you, let me know. If you have any ideas on how to improve these round-up posts, please let me know as well.

Post #1

Blog Post: The Million-Dollar Price Tag of Being a Stay-at-Home Parent, by Costa Rica FIRE.

Lesson #1 – When deciding to take time off to care for young children, consider the long-term impact (such as the growth factor in salary, delayed career progression and career plateaus), in addition to the immediate cost savings (such as transportation and day care).

My Thoughts:

As I never really had much of a career (I’ve mostly been in dead-end jobs), I didn’t think about the long-term impact on my career when deciding to go from full-time to part-time to take care of my children in the future. If I ever find a career that I like/love, this will definitely be a consideration.

I think that in addition to cost savings, there’s the non-monetary benefit of staying home to care for children. It’s meaningful and fulfilling, and since children are the most influenced during their younger days, I would love to be able to care for them during these days. It’s time that we can never get back.

Post #2

Blog Post: Our Pandemic Portfolio: How are Our Investments Doing?, by Millennial Revolution.

Lesson #2 – Dividend yield was affected adversely during the financial crisis of 2008, as large corporations that typically pay such dividends were impacted negatively. On the other hand, this present recession impacts small non-dividend-paying companies the most, whereas large corporations continued operations without too much of a hitch. As such, it is not likely that a sharp and sustained dividend yield drop will occur during this period.

My Thoughts:

This was particularly interesting, as one of my retirement strategies is also to live off dividend yield, without drawing down on the capital. It’s inspiring to see that Kristy and Bryce’s portfolio will still yield their expected $35,000 for this year, despite everything else that’s happening in the world. This shows that their yield shield is resilient, and a very useful retirement tool to decreasing the chances of running out of money during retirement.

Post #3

Blog Post: How to Keep Compounding when the Market Won’t, by Mr Tako Escapes.

Lesson #3 – Although cutting dividends is a decent strategy to conserve cash, businesses that do so tend to be weaker, with cash flow problems, and go on to under-perform other stocks. To keep compounding, reinvest in stocks that maintain pay-outs without wrecking their balance sheet.

My Thoughts:

Since I have a few individual stocks, this is something I have to keep in mind. From the looks of it, I don’t think my dividends are getting cut for 2020, which is definitely a good sign.

Post #4

Blog Post: The Trade-Offs of Going Part Time, by Accidental FIRE.

Lesson #4 – 2 important trade-offs of going part-time include being marginalised and having less external validation (less professional prestige) at work.

My Thoughts:

Apart from my salary and benefits, I really gave other consequences much thought, including being marginalised and having less external validation. I have found that this is true though, because at work people do treat me like I’m less important now that I’m “only a part-time worker”. Thankfully, I’ve never loved my job, so these things aren’t that important to me. But if I do find another job that I could potentially like, these are pretty damn important things to think about.

Post #5

Blog Post: Life is Not a Buffet, by Emily Guy Birken.

Lesson #5 – When we envy what we don’t have, which someone else has, we home in only on that single missing piece in our lives, wishing we could have the good stuff without considering the difficult times that the other person has gone through. When you’re feeling envious, ask yourself – “would you really prefer to have all of the other person’s problems, weaknesses, and tribulations just because of the one thing they have that you don’t?” This might help you realise that the comparison was never fair in the first place. In addition, doing so will help you to realise what you will miss in your own life, which you’ve forgotten to be grateful for.

My Thoughts:

Since I don’t make a lot of money, and I struggled a lot with my parents over the past few years, I find myself constantly envious of people who seem to “have it financially easier” than me. It’s never an easy emotion to process, but this blog post was incredibly helpful.

Post #6

Blog Post: 18 Ways To Make Use Of The Extra Time On Your Hands, by Darius Foroux.

Lesson #6 – Squeeze naps in during the day, if you don’t sleep at least 8-9 hours at night. This requires a mindset change though: Instead of spending free time on your phone, grab a quick nap.

My Thoughts:

Whenever I had free time in the past, I would always watch a video or do stupid things on my phone. Nowadays, whenever I schedule a break in between sessions of work, I just take a nap. ? Even a 15-minute session of just shutting my eyes really helps me. The mindset shift was a little challenging though, but it’s now a habit (I think).

Post #7

Blog Post: Why are ECs located so far out?, by CNA Lifestyle.

Lesson #7 – Executive Condominiums (government-subsidised condos in Singapore) are typically 10 to 20% cheaper than regular condos. To ensure this, the land cost component cannot be too high, and remote areas (that are far away from city and town centres) typically satisfy this condition. In addition, the demographic for these executive condos are less likely to rely on private transportation than dwellers in public housing, so more assessable areas are reserved for public housing.

My Thoughts:

(Not really a blog post, but an engaging article nonetheless.) This is interesting because my girlfriend is currently looking to buy an apartment in an executive condo. There are a few benefits if we get this, instead of a private condo, which are:

• Appreciation from privatisation;
• Appreciation from further development in the area; and
• Grants available to eligible buyers.

For a condo, executive ones are much more affordable. Considering that we aren’t eligible for public housing, this might be a good option to keep in mind.

And that’s all 7 posts for this week. I read so many wonderful ones over the week, and it was difficult choosing just 7, so I’ll just keep on reading and writing these “7 Lessons” posts. ?

Thank you for reading!

At the beginning of 2020, I decided to transition from full-time work to part-time work. This has greatly increased the amount of time I have on hand, and I’d like to channel some of it into personal development on a daily basis.

I’ve since decided to take note of the best personal finance article I read each day, along with 1 single lesson that I’ve learnt from it.

Everything I learn will be compiled into a blog post every week, so it can hopefully provide you with some value too. (Admittedly, this is also to help me, since I learn best when I write.)

If this provides any benefit to you, let me know. If you have any ideas on how to improve these round-up posts, please let me know as well.

Post #1

Blog Post: Reader Case Study: Investing for FIRE in Malaysia, by Millennial Revolution.

Lesson #1 – Malaysians (and also Singaporeans) are able to circumvent withholding tax on U.S.-based ETFs, by buying Ireland-based ETFs.

My Thoughts:

I currently use Standard Chartered Bank as my brokerage firm to buy U.S.-based ETFs. I currently own some VOO, VTI and VXUS units. In each quarter of the year that I receive dividends, a 30% withholding tax will be imposed. That’s quite a hefty amount.

As such, the recommendation is to open an account with Interactive Brokers, “a US-based low-cost brokerage firm that is special in that it allows non-US residents to open up an account”. After checking, I realised Singapore is on their list of approved countries.

After which, I’m to invest in an “Ireland-domicilied UCITS ETFs that track the indexes”. According to various such as this and this, I should be able to receive an exemption on these dividends, as long as certain conditions are met. (Time to read up more!)

Post #2

Blog Post: Life changing economic theories, applied to personal finance, by the Woke Salaryman.

Lesson #2 – Having money can help us to make better decisions. Having money enables us to have a longer-term mindset, instead of a short-term yet detrimental mindset.

My Thoughts:

With money, we can buy better-quality products, like $50 boots versus $10 boots (this was the example given in the blog post).

With money, we can choose to quit our jobs to chase our dreams even if these dreams can’t afford us an income for the first few years (long-term mindset), instead of working for a pay-check at a job we hate, just so that we can cover this month’s bills (short-term mindset).

Because of money, I had the luxury of transitioning from full-time work to part-time work in early 2020, as full-time work in a job that I despised was hurting my mental health more than I cared to admit. Since I’m currently working part-time, I get to write on most days, even though it doesn’t pay me a cent. I’m hoping that this writing habit and this blog turns into something I can monetise one day, and I’ll keep working at it till it does (long-term mindset), rather than stay in a job I hate, which makes me more anxious by the day (short-term mindset).

Post #3

Blog Post: Do You Need to Own A House to Retire Early?, by Strong Money Australia.

Lesson #3 – One of the benefits of owing a house is having access to very low cost debt, as banks are willing to lend amounts at cheap interest rates, as long as there is a residential property as security. This low cost debt can be used for investment opportunities.

My Thoughts:

In Singapore, mortgage interest rates are currently lower than 2% per annum, which is an incredible interest rate. Should I ever be fortunate enough to afford a house in Singapore in the future, at such interest rates, I’d much rather invest than pay off the house. In fact, I think I might pay as little as I can, for as long as I can.

Post #4

Blog Post: I Found My Dream Job And It Pays $225 A Year, by A Purple Life.

Lesson #4 – The lack of compensation that comes with blogging may help in lessening perfectionism.

My Thoughts:

There were so many cool points brought up by Purple in this post, but Lesson #4 really got me thinking. Like her, I’m a perfectionist as well, but I’ve never experienced an area in my life where perfectionism didn’t haunt me. At work, I’m constantly check my work till it drives me batty. And with blogging, I got so affected by my lousy writing back in 2018, that I stopped blogging for more than a year. Seems like I’d rather put out nothing, than put out something bad. Since I’ve started blogging again in 2020, hopefully that’ll change.

It’s going to be more than a decade until I reach early retirement, and until then, I wouldn’t know very much what it feels like to be less of a perfectionist because of the lack of compensation. But I think that I can understand where she’s coming from, and here’s hoping that my perfectionist tendencies change when I reach early retirement too. ?

Post #5

Blog Post: Make Your Obsession With Money Temporary, by Trip of a Lifestyle.

Lesson #5 – Zero in on your expenses, identify the fat, trim it, form new and improved frugal habits, and then zoom out by no longer tracking your money so meticulously.

My Thoughts:

This post really resonated with me, as I’ve been meticulously tracking my expenses and money for the past 5 years or so. Sometimes, I get worried about when my bills are due. Other times, I get worried because I’ve busted my budget for the month. I spend hours each month just managing my money, and as Steven aptly wrote in this post, that’s a pretty miserable existence.

At the moment, I’m financially insecure when it comes to my future income, as I’ll probably be losing all of my income by the end of the year. However, I’m hopeful that I would soon be able to picking up online freelancing jobs and work remotely. Until the point in time where I have a more stable job, I might not be able to let go of tracking my money meticulously. But this will definitely be something to keep in mind when that happens.

Post #6

Blog Post: Kindly Stop Saying The Efficient Market Hypothesis is Dead, by The Deep Dish.

Lesson #6 – The Warren Buffet Halo Effect occurs when Berkshire Hathaway invests in a stock, causing everyone else to invest in that stock too. This drives the price of the stock up. In other words, Warren Buffet’s success is now a “self-fulfilling prophecy”.

My Thoughts:

As I’m almost a complete novice to investing, there was so much to learn from this article alone. But what interested me the most was to learn about the Warren Buffet Halo Effect, as well as the fact that Berkshire Hathaway has underperformed for the last decade. This blew my mind, as I had always known Warren Buffet to be an investing legend and wanted to mirror his stock picks as well.

Post #7

Blog Post: Routine, freedom, and the 1996 NBA Draft, by City Frugal.

Lesson #7 – Routine is essential for lasting success, and this can be done by establishing a morning routine, journaling and sleeping well.

My Thoughts:

Morning Routine – I agree that a morning routine is essential for lasting success .When I first started working part time at the beginning of 2020, I was all over the place, and got very little writing done even though I was working less. I then decided to work out first thing in the morning and take a cold shower after. Then, I would sit down and do some work. Although it’s not always easy to do hours of work in the morning, I can attest to the fact that it’s significantly easier.

Journaling – I don’t journal, but from the benefits that everyone raves about, maybe it’s time to start.

Sleeping – Frankly, I’m quite a crappy sleeper, but as I write this I think about how I had stayed up past midnight last night to shop online and watch Netflix shows (face palm). I should probably cut that out. After all, as David said in the post, I won’t be missing much.

And that’s all 7 posts for this week. I read so many wonderful ones over the week, and it was difficult choosing just 7, so I’ll just keep on reading and writing these “7 Lessons” posts.

Thank you for reading!