Financial Independence!

I have achieved financial freedoooom!

Freedom 35 has become financially independent

After 12 years of saving and investing I have finally reached financial independence!

This means the passive income generated from my investment portfolio is enough to pay for all my current and future living expenses. It’s not about spending more money on things. It’s about spending more time on the things that money can’t buy!

In my first ever blog post I questioned if freedom 35 was even possible for me. After 851 more posts I now know!

Financial independence triumph

Wow. This is unreal. I would like to thank everyone who has taken the time to read my blog, especially those who have been following me since the early days. You know who you are. 😉 I certainly wouldn’t be here today without all your support and encouragement. You guys rock! You have all done plenty. It means a lot. 😎

I will be sharing all my financial numbers below for transparency and accountability.

 

What’s my secret to financial independence?

Everyone’s path to financial freedom is unique. In my case I have to give credit to these 5 key reasons.

  1. Adopt an abundance mindset instead of a scarcity mindset.

    I learned this from reading lots of self development books & watching motivational and introspective YouTube videos. I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to have a positive outlook and growth mentality. There are no problems in life. Only possibilities for growth.

    Rather than sitting on the sidelines because the markets may crash, I choose to invest anyway despite the risks because I focus on the potential gains rather than the losses.

  2. Low interest rates.

    Nearly all of my financial strategies have thrived on cheap money. Low interest rates boost stock and real estate prices. Thank you, Bank of Canada! 🍁 Policy makers would rather devalue the currency than let financial markets crash. That’s why real interest rates are negative right now. This trend has created a great deal of moral hazard and social divide. And it appears interest rates will continue to stay low for a very long time.

  3. Understand how to value investments.

    As an opponent of the Efficient Market Hypothesis I prefer to buy underpriced individual stocks rather than the entire market.

    Diversification is great for protecting wealth. But concentration is more effective for building wealth. 😉 By finding and buying undervalued assets I have made tremendous gains in stocks, farmland, and urban real estate.

  4. Invest with other people’s money.

    Without borrowing any money to invest it would probably take me 36 years or longer to become financially independent. But leverage has allowed me to cut that time down to 12 years. Assets produce wealth. Leverage gives me the ability to grow my assets and multiply my wealth. As long as interest rates stay low leverage will continue to be instrumental in my financial plans. 🙂

  5. Copy the best of what others have already figured out. 

    Financial success depends more on the methods and principles you practice than how hard you try. Good strategies create wealth. Great strategies create even more wealth. All the strategies I use have already been vetted and proven to work by highly successful people. I have gained invaluable knowledge by learning from these experts in their specific realms of the financial world:

    •Real estate (Graham Stephan)
    •Leverage (Robert Kiyosaki)
    •Risk management (Ray Dalio, James Rickards)
    •Macro economic trends (Peter Schiff, Raoul Pal)
    •Farmland (Jim Rogers)
    •Financial markets (Warren Buffett, Peter Lynch, Jeffrey Gundlach.)

    I’ve been shadowing these experts and others like them for years – reading their books, studying their next moves, watching their interviews. There’s no reason for me to reinvent the wheel. These smart individuals have already written the indispensable playbook to prosperity. They have generously shared their abundant wisdom with the world. I simply copied their mental models and behaviors.

 

Jump directly to….

 

————————————————–

Financial independence 2 years ahead of schedule

I was initially aiming to reach FI in 2022 when I turn 35. I was on track to realize this blog’s ultimate raison d’etre. But then something unexpected happened which forced me to change my plan. 😮

As you know earlier this year the stock market experienced a big sell-off, which gave me a major case of FOMO.😖 Not wanting to miss out on bargain prices I purchase over $100,000 worth of dividend stocks in March. My dividend yield on cost was over 6% on these new purchases. I still remember the excitement of buying TD Bank shares and see it jump nearly 18% the very next day.

Warren Buffett famously suggested to be “greedy when others are fearful.” So I followed his advice. I bought when others were selling, and I held when others were buying. As a result my passive income in 2020 soared by over $7,000/year – fast tracking my progress.

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Net worth update as of August 2020

Assets:
Cash = $21,000
Non-registered accounts:
↳ Canadian stocks & bonds = $267,000
.U.S. stocks = $159,000
.European stocks = $19,000
Retirement (RRSP) = $166,000
Tax free savings account (TFSA) = $135,000
Peer-2-peer Lending = $36,000
Principal residence = $331,000 (assessed land value)
Rental property = $450,000 (2020 purchase price)
Total = $1,584,000

Liabilities:
Home mortgage = $181,000
Rental property mortgage = $312,000
Margin loan = $22,000
Total = $515,000

Net Worth:
Assets – Liabilities = $1,069,000

tracking net worth over time

 

Here is a snapshot of all my stocks and bonds on August 10, 2020.

TFSA                                RRSP                                 Margin                              Cash

                       

Altogether I have about $800,000 of liquid financial assets generating $30,380 of passive income. This represents a 3.8% annual rate of return in cash. The typical Canadian requires $756,000 to retire on, according to the Financial Post.

—————————–

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My 12 year journey to financial independence

I’ve been privileged enough to pick up new income streams over the years. Today I am making 3 times as much total income as when my career first began!

Here are some details for context:
  • 2008 – Graduated college. Started working full time as a graphic designer and tutoring part time. Living in my parent’s basement to save money.
  • 2009 – Bought a condo & moved out on my own. Used my $13,000 savings as a down payment (94% leverage).
  • 2010 – Aggressively saved 30% of my income to put into dividend growth stocks using 50% leverage.
  • 2011 – Continued to save and invest while keeping an eye on my spending.
  • 2012 – Gathered some savings to buy some farmland and used 87% leverage.
  • 2013 – Bought some more farmland using 89% leverage. Rented my land to farmers. Cash flow negative.
  • 2014 – Began doing some freelance graphic design work. Started to invest in mortgage securities which produce passive income. And began to exchange a small percentage of my salary for precious metals.
  • 2015 – Focusing on growing a fixed income portfolio to balance out my heavy holdings in equity.
  • 2016 – Started peer-2-peer lending. Income from dividends and interest reached $10,000/year.
  • 2017 – Purchased some cryptocurrencies. Sold near the end of the year. Put profits into dividend stocks.
  • 2018 – Continued to build up a diversified portfolio of uncorrelated assets.
  • 2019 – Sold all farmland and realized a 268% return on investment. Proceeds to be received in early 2020.
  • 2020 – Used $135,000 from selling the farm as a down payment for a rental apartment. Used 70% leverage. It’s cash flow positive. 🙂 Invested the remaining $120,000 cash into the stock market in March. Decided to stop freelance work. My financial assets have grown to 25x my annual expenses.

As you can see I do not mind using leverage when I believe the odds of profitability are high.

 

Current asset allocation

I have designed my portfolio to withstand future economic shocks. Here’s a pie chart of my holdings by asset class.

It’s important to be properly diversified. Most of my holdings such as stocks and real estate are inflation resistant so if there’s a major currency devaluation my purchasing power will be protected. All fiat currencies lose value over time. In ancient civilizations people used spices as currency. As the old saying goes: thyme is money. 😉

 

The road less traveled

As long time readers would know, I often disagree with widely accepted personal finance tenets. It’s hard to use traditional thinking to achieve extraordinary results. This is when having a hipster mentality can really pay off.
The financial markets have always rewarded investors for liking something before it was cool. 😎

That’s why I got into FAANG stocks (FB, AMZN, AAPL, NFLX, GOOG) pretty early. By the time the mainstream catches on to an idea it’s already too late to make outsized returns on it.

Vindication

I think “bad debt” doesn’t actually exist. I buy gold, bitcoin, and like to pick individual stocks instead of holding index funds. Plus I often try to time the markets. All these ideas fly in the face of mainstream financial advice.

Not surprisingly I have received my fair share of criticism over the years. Here are some Facebook comments regarding my writing.

You can read more of these comments here.

The most common financial sin I’m accused of committing is using too much debt to invest. But my debt-to-income ratio is at a comfortable 450% today, much lower than before. And in hindsight I’m convinced that aggressively growing my asset column even at the expense of borrowing money was the correct thing to do. Fortune sides with those who take calculated risks.

Using leverage simply makes practical sense. My average cost to borrow money has been below 3% annually. But my investments have generally returned 10% to 15% annually depending on the asset class. For example, here’s a look at my non-leveraged TD TFSA portfolio. It has earned 14.57% annualized ROI over the last 5 years – outperforming major stock market indexes. 😉

Investing in what you know often pays the biggest dividends

Borrowing to invest doesn’t have to be risky as I’ve written in the past. In fact within the first two paragraphs of this older blog post I explain how leverage can even reduce investment risk for earning high returns.

 

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My passive income and expenses

One advantage of blogging anonymously is I can share all my financial details without the risk of being stalked in real life. Here is a snapshot of my yearly passive income and budget. I will break down these line items in detail further below.

Annual income from passive investments:
Dividends = $19,044
Interest = $10,616
Net rental cash flow = $720
Total income = $30,380

Annual living expenses:
Mortgage payments = $9,490
Condo fees = $3,642
Utilities = $2,015
Groceries = $3,000
Transportation = $1,800
Property tax and home insurance = $1,793
Interest from margin debt = $330
Miscellaneous spending = $3,600
Buffer = $4,200
Total expense = $29,870

Annual surplus
Income – expense = $510

 

Breaking down my passive income

This is the nitty gritty on all my passive income sources.

Dividends = $19,044/year

My stock portfolio is worth about $600,000. It holds mostly dividend growth stocks. The average portfolio yield is 3.2%.

This is the bread and butter of my passive income strategy. I have been consistently borrowing money on margin to buy dividend stocks since 2010. I would typically buy $20,000 to $30,000 of new dividend growth stocks a year. But as mentioned earlier 2020 has been an anomaly.

Dividend income can be a great help in reaching financial independence

 

Interest = $10,616

My fixed income portfolio holds about $140,000 worth of interest producing assets. These investments tend to produce the best results when held long term. That’s why I haven’t lost interest in them. 😎

  • Bonds – I own a range of bonds from high yield to investment grade. Current bond portfolio is worth about $66,000.
    Annual income = $3,119
  • MICs – Mortgage funds I’ve accumulated over the years. I have Antrim MIC units valued at $24,000 and a variety of public MICs valued at $14,500.
    Annual income = $3,020
  • Lending Loop – I have a $36,400 invested in this P2P platform. The expected return is 12.3% net of fees.
    Annual income = $4,477

 

Net rental cash flow

I purchased a rental property earlier this year. I expect it to produce 15% annualized ROI over time. But the cash flow is not great right now only earning $720/year. Here is a summary.

Money coming in:
Rent = $1800
Total income: $1800

Money going out:
Mortgage = $1400
Strata fee = $185
Property tax = $120
Homeowner insurance = $35
Total expenses: $1740

Monthly cash flow = $60

 

So altogether I’m earning $30,380 from my investments. Income tax is negligible if I quit my job as I’ll explain later.

 

Breaking down my annual expenses

Here is my comprehensive spending budget. 🙂 The total cost comes to $29,870 per year.

Mortgage payments = $9,490

My mortgage interest rate is currently 1.62%. The monthly payment works out to $790.87 – which is very affordable. I bought my home in 2009 and tried to pay down the mortgage as slowly as possible. 🙂 This is why after 11 years of servicing my mortgage the balance is still 84% of the initial borrowed amount.

 

Condo fees = $3,642

Strata fees are $303.50 per month. This pays for my share of the building’s caretaker, management expenses, upkeep, and contingency reserve fund.

 

Utilities = $2,015

  • Heating/electricity – My electric or hydro bill is around $40/month.
  • Phone – I use Freedom mobile as my phone carrier. The plan I have is called Freedom 35 – funny enough. 😏 It’s $35 a month for unlimited calling/texting and 5GB of data. With tax and fees it’s around $39/month.
  • Internet – My internet bill is $88.90/month.

Here are some typical transactions in my TD chequing account. From top to bottom: Part time job pay, government rental supplement, remaining rental income from tenant, full time job pay, condo fees, mortgage payment, bank fee rebate, bank fee, hydro bill.

 

Groceries = $3,000

I typically spend about $250 a month on groceries. This is in line with the average for the city of Vancouver. I visit discount produce markets where food is often 50% cheaper than large grocery chains.

 

Transportation = $1,800

I drive a 13 year old Toyota. The insurance is $1500/year. I use it mostly for shopping so I have put about 2,000 KM on it over the last year. It’s very cheap to operate and maintain. I always keep a pack of gum in the glove compartment. When people ask what kind I say it’s in mint condition. Here’s a photo of my car.

 

Property tax and home insurance = $1,793

My property tax is $1332/year after applying the home owner’s grant. My home insurance policy premium costs $461 a year and covers the basics.  It’s not much but it’s enough.

Interest from margin debt = $330

With roughly $22,000 of debt in my margin account I pay $27.50/month based on the current margin rates. It’s such a privilege to be able to borrow money at 1.5% these days.

Miscellaneous spending = $3,600

I budget $300 a month for eating out, clothes, books, toiletries, entertainment such as my Netflix subscription, and anything else that I may decide to spend money on. 🙂 Most of the time I don’t even spend all of the $300.

Buffer = $4,200

I like to have a buffer built into my budget in case I overspend in one of the other categories. This $350/month buffer should be adequate to catch any impulse purchases or small unexpected expenses. Any savings left over not used by the buffer will be rolled into my emergency fund.

 

Additional safety

Just having a strategic budget may not be enough to maintain financial independence. I already have a large buffer that represents 14% of my total spending. But what about emergencies and costly unforeseen expenses? This is where my 3 stage safety net comes in.

  1. Emergency fund. I have $21,000 saved in cash – enough to cover 8 months of living expenses.
  2. Precious metals. I have been accumulating physical gold and silver since 2012. This is my second line of financial defence. My collection is worth over $35,000 today which I could sell in pieces for immediate cash.
  3. Pension funds. I hold funds through my current and past employer matching RRSP programs. These defined contribution plans have a combined value of $45,000 today – here’s one example. I do not include these funds in my net worth calculations because I can’t readily access the money. If I want to actually spend any of it I have to first transfer the funds to my financial institution and then make a withdrawal. I won’t use the money in these funds unless absolutely necessary.

So with these 3 levels of protection I feel confident that my financial freedom is safe and secure. 😀

 

What about taxes?

Canadians are taxed based on income, not wealth. If I don’t make any active income from work then my income tax for 2020 would be just $190 based purely on my passive income from investments.

The main reason for my low income tax rate is thanks to asset location planning. This strategy turns my $30K of passive income into less than $15K of taxable income.

  • Dividends – The majority of my dividends are eligible for the Canada dividend tax credit. So they will have an effective tax rate of 0% if I don’t make any active income.
  • Interest – All my interest producing assets like bonds and mortgage funds are either in my TFSA (tax free) or RRSP (tax deferred.)
  • Rent – I can write off expenses related to my rental property. This lowers my taxable rental income to less than $10,000/year from what I actually collect in gross rent, which is $21,600/year.

But here’s the twist. Assuming I stop working entirely I would qualify for low income government assistance programs. At the end of the day I would actually pay negative taxes – and receive about $1,400 in net equalization transfers. 😮

 

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Additional measures to keep in mind

Becoming financially independent doesn’t mean I’m immune to black swan events and other financial risks. So how do I disaster proof my finances?

I use stress test scenarios to help me manage unpredictable risks. These are tools that define, quantify, and warn me of any dangers to my financial situation. I first introduced them in 2014 to help me sleep better at night. Right now all of my stress test risks are comfortably sitting in the greens. This means there is no immediate threat to my finances at this time.

I will revisit my stress tests once or twice a year to keep an eye on the various risk factors.

 

Future proofing my financial freedom

My fiancé and I have talked about moving in together in the near future. Luckily she is quite financially savvy. She bought a rental property several years ago. This was before we met. She recently sold per property and has six figures in savings today. She is frugal like myself. If we were to live together in my 2 bedroom condo we could combine our finances.

With our joint assets we could easily generate enough passive income to fund both our lives. This means she could retire immediately as well. I would be the primary money manager of our household, but we would make major decisions together.

 

Retire sooner vs later

For now my partner and I have both decided to continue working for another year and then revisit our options in 2021. I’m currently making about $70K a year from my full time job. Her income is around $50K a year.

Technically we could live off our passive incomes after she moves in with me, and then save 100% of our salaries! Just knowing that we can both afford to retire at any time and not have to worry about income ever again is the real win.

Family planning

We both want to become parents eventually, but no timeline or specifics have been discussed yet. An article from National Bank estimates it will cost $6,400 per year to raise a child in Canada – assuming no childcare costs. Luckily for low income households the government will provide about $7,000 a year of subsidies and tax credit per child until he or she becomes an adult. This government benefit will cover the entire cost of raising children. Woot!

Long term security

If I ever need additional spending money in the future I can liquidate my collection of silver and gold bullion in a pinch. I could also sell my investment property to unlock some capital. There is currently $135,000 of equity sitting in there. And if I don’t touch my work pension funds then in 20 years they should be worth over $120,000. That should be enough for Liquid Jr’s college tuition.

It’s reassuring to know I will have a lot of options to support a growing family. No matter what happens I will never have to rely on employment income ever again! And that to me is priceless. 😀

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What this milestone means for Freedom 35 Blog 

The name of this blog won’t change. But now that I’ve achieved my long term financial goal I want to try something new moving forward. If you want to help me out please take this poll to give me some ideas.

 

Taking a break

I’m going to take a break from blogging to gather my thoughts and make a transition with my finances.

I don’t know when I will return from hiatus. In the meantime you can come say hi to me on Twitter @Liquid_f35 or post a comment below. Feel free to subscribe via email if you haven’t already so you won’t miss any new blog posts when I come back.

Thanks for joining me on this incredible journey. Hope you all stay well and prosperous! 😀

Liquid

 

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tawcan
08/10/2020 8:51 am

Congrats Liquid! Know we know who can buy us a round next time there’s a blogger meet up hehe. 🙂 :p

Lindsay
Lindsay
08/10/2020 8:58 am

Congratulations! 🙂

Investing Pursuits
08/10/2020 9:14 am

Congrats on reaching financial freedom!

I would not go public with identity as your rental property is not in a corporation. Renters could sue you for anything.

Drama_sc
Drama_sc
08/10/2020 9:48 am

After following you since 2013 or so, happy to see you’ve reached FI so quickly. Congrats!

Some guy
Some guy
08/10/2020 11:36 am

Hey congrats on becoming FI. I love your blog and I have been lurking for years. I just notice you you are paying way to much for internet with Shaw. There is a bunch of small internet companies that use Shaw/ telus’s lines for way cheaper internet in the lower mainland. Check out Lightspeed internet they are based out of Burnaby and could knock your bill down about 40$

someguy69
someguy69
11/02/2020 11:45 am
Reply to  Some guy

I was going to comment the same thing, switching to Lightspeed is a no-brainer! Here in another lovely Canadian city I am getting the advertised speed at half the price as Shaw, with no commitment! Congrats though, I’ve been following the blog for a while and am stoked to see you have been successful earlier than even expected!

D_rock
D_rock
08/10/2020 12:28 pm

Congrats! You deserve it! I’ve been reading your blog for a few years and always look forward to your posts. Looking forward to what comes next.

Matt
Matt
08/10/2020 12:54 pm

Congrats! I’ve been following you for many years. I think I originally saw your blog in the globe and mail. It’s nice to see that you accomplished your goal!

TheBrain
TheBrain
08/10/2020 2:40 pm

Congrats on a great achievement! I’ve only followed you for a few years, but you’ve been an inspiration. Enjoy your success!!!

devgato
devgato
08/10/2020 4:27 pm

Congratulation, Liquid!
I’ve been reading your blob for a few years now. This is such an amazing achievement, and a great inspiration and motivation for me to focus on my own finance stuff.

Hope you have a great time, and hope to hear from you soon again for more financial insights (and jokes)

RandyG
RandyG
08/10/2020 4:34 pm

Congrats, but don’t quit your day job even though you might want to. Hang on as long as you can and be a bit more liberal with your spending. Buy some things that are luxuries as a reward for continuing working a bit longer. The risks might be greater in the future than you think they are. So sock away some extra money as a margin of safety.

JohnsonMcJay
JohnsonMcJay
08/10/2020 7:39 pm

Congratulations! I have always enjoyed your blog for its contrarian approach that has been very thought provoking.

GYM
GYM
08/10/2020 10:54 pm

WOOOOW the detail, lol!!! This is like meticulously planned, like you’ve been planning for this day for 12 years. Even down to a picture of your Toyota. Amazing, congratulations- reaching FIRE on a non-six figure income. Ahh, so you have it planned well all along, you WILL qualify for the CCB, haha!!

GYM
GYM
08/10/2020 10:59 pm

Also I am sad that it is your last net worth update 🙁

Dalton
Dalton
08/10/2020 11:12 pm

Congrats on reaching financial freedom! All your hard work has paid off. I wonder what you have planned next.

QuestionsUnanswered
QuestionsUnanswered
08/10/2020 11:43 pm

Congrats. Would’ve thought you were a dad already given the jokes.
And definitely post more memes, they add alot of ahem…value.

nobodywillobserve
nobodywillobserve
08/11/2020 12:13 am

Terrible what low rates have done. I wish the government or anyone would have warned me that they woul do this forever, complete fucking regular people, people who save, people who do not lever up. Cautious people lose.

I would not consider to be “free” with much less that 5 million though.

PaulC
PaulC
08/11/2020 6:15 am

Congrats on achieving FI! I’m a bit older than you, but in a similar situation where I am contemplating retirement in 2-3 years. I admire your style and honestly I don’t think I would have the stomach for some of your financial moves. With two kids near college age, I tend to be more conservative even though I know I may not grow my portfolio as fast. Anyway, enjoy life and your hiatus. My advice would be to try something totally different, at least for 4-6 months or a year. In my opinion, that does give you new perspective even if or when you decide to go come back.

Cheers.

immi
immi
08/11/2020 6:51 am

Huge congrats!! Well done on an amazing achievement. Thank you for taking us on this journey!

rich_not_so_rich
rich_not_so_rich
08/11/2020 7:16 am

Nicely done!!! It seems to me you should take the next year and half off since you had originally targeted and planned for FI in 2022… (you have arrived to your destination early… go ahead and enjoy the journey a bit more.

I have always been intrigued by your leveraged road map and it has worked well for you. I’ve probably been reading and following you for about 8 years. I have learned lots of insight from your… but I have put into practice NONE of it. (Oh to think where I could be today if I had only used leverage.)

However, I’m doing acceptable to me plan. I crossed the $1.2M mark this year and I only have a remaining $28K mortgage on a rental property. (I realized the value of cheap money, so I have neglected to pay that off.)

cheers to you!!!

Chrissy @ Eat Sleep Breathe FI
08/11/2020 7:19 am

Awesome! Congrats Liquid! I’m so excited and happy for you. The success is well-deserved.

PS Your mean comments posts were a nice balm for me to read today. I did an AMA over the weekend and got my first taste of mean comments. People can be so rude and nasty.

I like the way you deal with it. Thanks for sharing.

Jason
Jason
08/11/2020 2:17 pm

Congrats on hitting FI.
Personally I would keep going. Keeping filling your TFSA and RRSP each year, perhaps be a bit more conservative in investing.

Eventually you’ll want a new vehicle, upgrade to a larger house , save for a wedding, take some overseas trips, child care costs…etc

You have FI money but not quite at FU or FATFIRE money (this isn’t a knock on you)

Keep doing what you are doing!

Devin Forbes
Devin Forbes
08/11/2020 11:07 pm

“Something else” – You didn’t have “Continue blogging about random financial stuff” as an option.

Khan
Khan
08/12/2020 3:19 pm

Congrats Liquid! I came across your blog while researching on SolarShare back in 2017, and I have stuck around since then. It was fun reading your posts and I also got to learn a lot. Thank you for sharing your experiences, congratulations on your success and I wish you all the best for the future! Take care 🙂

AlW
AlW
08/12/2020 5:50 pm

I saw the long post and read the headline and instantly knew you were going to be out of the blogging game. First off – congratulations! You did it! I think its a great idea to take time for yourself and get your thoughts straight. If I could offer some personal insight: you’re now financially secure you could retire and hang it up – but at what cost?? Who wants your level of talent on the sidelines? How will the world and economy benefit from that? They don’t bench Micheal Jordan unless they’re worried he’ll get hurt or the game is a blow out. So that’s what you should do – continue to stay in the workforce but pick your participation level! If you’re going to burn out or the stress gets too high dial it back, if the game means nothing anymore as in you’ve lost the love for the work or you don’t find it interesting – bench yourself. But stay sharp and in shape for the next game (opportunity). My wife doesn’t make major financial earthquake decisions in our house very often, but it reminds me of a conversation I had with her about 18-24 months ago.… Read more »

Sam
Sam
08/13/2020 10:42 am

Congrats! I have been following your blog for over 2 years. I am happy to see you achieved this big milestone. Hope you can continue writing financial related blogs.

aldur1
aldur1
08/13/2020 2:02 pm

Congrats on all your success. However it feels like you got lucky with some of your investments. You purport to adopt a value investment philosophy, but in the same post admit to later on investing out of FOMO.

As you know earlier this year the stock market experienced a big sell-off, which gave me a major case of FOMO.😖 Not wanting to miss out on bargain prices I purchase over $100,000 worth of dividend stocks in March. My dividend yield on cost was over 6% on these new purchases. I still remember the excitement of buying TD Bank shares and see it jump nearly 18% the very next day.

Jon
Jon
08/30/2020 2:01 pm
Reply to  aldur1

I don’t think you understand the context of “FOMO” here. Buying near the bottom is exactly what a value investor aims to do.

Phil
08/14/2020 8:39 am

Congratulations on a well earned milestone in life. I wish continued success in your new goals, although we both know it really has nothing to do with wishing, but rather planning and enacting said plan – Cheers *klink*

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Gruff403
Gruff403
08/15/2020 5:11 pm

Well done! Totally agree that debt to income ratio is overblown hype in the media. What truly matters is debt servicing cost and debt to asset ratio. You are in wonderful shape with lots of options. Cheers

Tyler
Tyler
08/17/2020 2:41 pm

Congrats Liquid!

ShouldhaveLeveragedlikeLiquid
ShouldhaveLeveragedlikeLiquid
08/18/2020 6:29 pm

This was wicked to read, and pretty inspirational you are able to do this in Vancouver on a moderate salary. Also from here, sounds like I’m a year older than you, higher salary and lower net-worth because I’m not using enough leverage! Congrats my dude! Don’t know how I stumbled across your blog, but have been a visitor since 2013. Hope you keep on going for the fun of it, as it’s one of the few personal finance/FI blogs with real original content and dad jokes.

Curmudgeon
Curmudgeon
08/22/2020 4:56 pm

Congrats. I find it weird you like to refer to debt as leverage. It’s debt plain and simple. You do not truly have freedom, financial or otherwise, until you have no debt.

Alex
Alex
08/26/2020 6:44 pm

Congrats!! Been following for a long time, great work! I would love to see you continue posting as you have, random financial information, and how your personal story is evolving. Curious to see if you will both continue working full time and investing more.

I agree with one of the previous commenters, you have FI money but I can’t see it being enough in the future when/if you want a bigger house, newer car, travel? Not everyone wants those things tho and thats totally understandable! Congrats again and i really hope you keep blogging!

Alex
Alex
09/04/2020 7:09 pm

Excelent Liquid, well done, congratulations and thank you for sharing the journey.

Fred
09/06/2020 7:09 am

Congrats liquid! Sounds like a great journey. If you go public about who you are you can never take that back. As for other things to do you could write a book or even look to monetize your blog some. No matter what you do I think you should set a new goal to work towards as it always feel great to accomplish your goals!

Kathleen
Kathleen
09/19/2020 5:09 pm

Wow, congratulations! I’ve just discovered your blog within the past week and am already learning so much about new ideas and new strategies. That’s saying a lot since there is already so much FI content out there that I’ve been binging on for 3.5 years. Really appreciate all the info on here, can’t wait to dive in more!

Bindu
09/22/2020 5:30 am

Congratulations! You made it!!!

Jesse
Jesse
11/14/2020 5:33 pm

Here’s probably a dumb question, but something I don’t understand…

Let’s say you are have Dividends paying you $30k/year. Your living expenses are $30k/year. Great.

But, when a company pays you a dividend, it typically takes place inside your brokerage account. Often you can set it to automatically reinvest any dividends to buying more stock.

If you’re not doing that, how are you getting these dividends payments into your bank account to then use to pay for your expenses?

Does that make sense? I’ve always wondered how people have this setup so that they’re planning to “live off” the dividends they make.

I get dividends too, but it just auto-reinvests for now.

Sid Bitters
Sid Bitters
11/23/2020 11:32 am
Reply to  Jesse

He trades through td and just has to transfer from his trading account to bank account. He will probably pay tax on his rrsp dividends and cash account dividends.

Paul
Paul
11/29/2020 8:18 pm

Congratulations Liquid. I have followed your blog for some time and it’s great to see young people strive for financial independence at such an early stage in their life. All the best on your new adventures.

Nanon
Nanon
12/14/2020 12:50 am

Hey hey, as a mean commenter featured prominently on “Part 1”, you haven’t gotten killed by a downturn yet — good job! It took me a long time to come around and accept the idea that these interest rates were sticking around for a while. From what I recall, you did deleverage a bit in response to the early criticism.

Easily the most impressive part of what you’ve pulled off is doing it all on fairly modest employment income. It’s easy for people to dismiss stories like this when they come from someone with ludicrously high employment income, whether those be doctors, surgeons, a couple of well-paid tech workers, etc.

(Therefore a much more interesting story than my investments/savings!)

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[…] in 2020 I conducted an audience survey. The results? Readers of this blog suggested I should start making finance videos. So I did, lol. […]

Moe (Moementum Finance)
01/25/2022 6:10 am

I really appreciate your transparency and sharing your journewy, Liquid. I am so happy I have found your blog and follow your contents. It is so inspiring to see how you managed to reach FI at such a young age when you were just 33. Amazing! Question for you: For your margin account where you borrow money to invest (leverage), do you deduct the interest on your borrowing from your taxes since you are borrowing to invest?

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[…] Financial Independence! […]

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[…] Financial Independence! […]

Investimi
01/31/2023 12:15 am

Wow, this is so inspiring!
Thank you for the value you shared in this post. I definitely need to take some notes 😀