financial independence

I've been meaning to write a new article for ages now, but it just didn't happen. Often, I was busy, lazy or just didn't know what to write about. An article has to be a meaningful so that even people who don't know me like to read it. This article is going to somewhat of a 'potpourri', a blend of different issues that have kept me busy lately. Of course, I'm also going to talk about finance for a bit, because that's basically the whole reason I started this blog. I hope you like it. Leave a comment if you feel like it.

Ever since the Corona pandemic made the financial markets crash around the world, people were asking me about my investments. Apparently, other people were more concerned about my money than I was. When I first started with financial independence I was reading a lot of blogs and books on the subject.

In the past years I've read several different articles on the topic of 'renting or buying a house'. What is better or wiser? This interests me, because I currently live in a very small house and I would love to add some space to my living conditions. But at what cost and is it worth it? Just about all the articles I've read so far all talk about the financial side of things and although this is a very important part of it, it sure isn't a decisive one. I've done some thinking and here's my view on the matter.

One of the main reasons I want to become financially free is to get rid of 'the need to work'. Don't get me wrong. I like to work, but only because it's fun and not because I need to pay the bills or have an interesting career I can impress others with.

Today is the 15th of March, meaning it is my 'peildatum', the day I check all the places where I have some money or investments and record them in my spreadsheet. I also make a little graph to make my "progress" visible. I usually like doing this, but this time I dreaded the moment I actually had to look at the numbers and see what damage the corona virus did to my investments. So, far I lost quite a bit on my investments, but not as much as I expected. However, the end is not in sight so I expect more losses in the coming months.

The corona virus, a.k.a. Sars-Cov2, has spread around the world rapidly causing a lot of problems. Sadly many people lost their lives, many more are sick and it caused a global financial crisis. Even though I think there are too many people in the world I still think it's sad that many people died. Imagine loosing a loved one to this virus. Markets were already struggling a bit with the situation, but in the last week the global markets crashed, big time! I even received an email from my broker about it.

A couple of days ago I went to the grocery store to do some shopping. There was insufficient food in our refrigerator and we felt like eating curry that night. It was just another ordinary typical Dutch day in Utrecht. It was februari, so it was a cold, grey and slightly depressing. When I was almost at the store I noticed a middle-aged man standing outside on the sidewalk talking on his phone. It sounded like he was in difficult discussion with someone on the other end, possibly business related.

I've got my basic plan in place already. Make money, invest, quit my job. Of course, there's a lot more to it than that, but you get the idea. But what to do when I reach this glorious day of being able to quit my current job? I do have a lot of idea's, but no global plan. That means that there will be an enormous void after I no longer need to go to work. That's pretty scary, I can tell you.

For well over 6 years now, I've been reading books and blogs on financial independence, because I wanted to escape my current office job and do something that actually makes me happy. It was my believe I needed a plan, enough financial backup and courage. These books and blogs help me get (and keep) motivated on reaching this goal. They offer tips and information on how to change your lifestyle and take the step, which always turns out easier than first believed. An office-less lifestyle comes in many forms and everybody has his/her own way of doing this.

I an earlier post about my fitness I wrote about my personal fitness and that I was doing regular exercises. I also wondered if I could keep this exercise schedule up in the winter. The winter in The Netherlands is usually dark, cold and depressing. That kind of weather will greatly influence my motivation to do my exercises and keep fit. We had a lousy summer this year with some good days (even three heatwaves), but mostly the temperatures were way below the long year average.