Jim @ Route To Retire

Panama Vacation – Part 1 – Nueva Gorgona and Anton Valley

18 Comments / Travel and Vacation, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Panama / /

We finally made the trip I’ve been waiting for… our Panama vacation!  And guess what – it was awesome! Because there’s a lot to cover, I thought I’d break this up into a couple posts.  This first post will cover the first half of our trip and the second post will cover the second half – easy enough, right?  🙂 If you’ve been following my adventures, you know that I’ve been doing a lot of digging to determine if Panama […]

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Financial Regrets That Slowed My Path to FIRE

Financial Regrets That Slowed My Path to FIRE

24 Comments / General Thoughts, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Real Estate / /

Financial regrets, I’ve had a few… As I guy in my early forties, I sometimes take a moment here and there to reflect on how my path in life has gone.  I don’t dwell – I just try to look back at my mistakes and learn from them to make for a better future. And maybe the “regrets” part of “financial regrets” is a little excessive.  If you’re a regular follower of my blog, you know that we’ve recently surpassed the million-dollar net worth mark. We’re

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The Lazy Man’s Guide to Fitness

14 Comments / Health and Fitness, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE) / /

I hate exercise and fitness. You know how some people talk about how running or a good workout makes them feel refreshed and invigorated? Well, I’m not that guy.  I despise knowing I have to do it, I hate the actual exercise, and when I’m done, I’m just glad it’s over. If you’re a guy or gal who’s on top of your fitness goals, this post probably isn’t going to be up your alley.   If I hate fitness, why do anything? Well,

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Another Reason Why Working for Yourself is a Smart Idea...

Another Reason Why Working for Yourself is a Smart Idea…

27 Comments / Self-Employment, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Kids / /

We all know that working for yourself has a lot of benefits that you can’t get from working for someone else.  The ability to better control your company’s destiny, the independence and freedom you can gain, and the flexibility in hours are just a few of the possibilities that might be gained. However, I was thinking recently about another major benefit that working for yourself can provide.  But what fun would that be to just share it outright with you? A personal anecdote would

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An Open Letter to My Daughter

An Open Letter to My Daughter

10 Comments / Kids, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Motivation / /

An Open Letter to My Daughter My father passed away when I was around the age my daughter is now.  That’s made me think over the years that, should something ever happen to me, I’d like to know that I was able to pass on some of what I’ve learned. With that, I decided to write a letter to my daughter with some of my thoughts. I consider this a work in progress.  There’s ultimately too much information to share at

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Why I Like Overdrawing My Checking Account

Why I Like Overdrawing My Checking Account

14 Comments / Saving, Debt, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Investments / /

Once upon I time, a young man we’ll randomly call “Jim” was in college and barely had a dollar to his name… Ok, fine – that young man was me – dang it, you ruin everything!  Anyway, like a good number of college students, overdrawing my checking account wasn’t too uncommon. In fact, it actually wasn’t uncommon for me to blow out my balance on a periodic basis for a year or so after graduating college as well. Eventually, though, I started to

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My Fantasy Week When I’m Financially Free

16 Comments / General Thoughts, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Motivation / /

Most of us who are working to become financially free, spend a lot of our days daydreaming what it would actually be like to be financially free. I think the initial dream for a lot of us is to just sit on the beach all day sipping piña coladas – mmm, that does sound good! But, once the dream starts to become more real, it’s pretty likely that the piña coladas are only going to be a small part of the plan. In all actuality,

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The Secret Ingredient to Making Money With Real Estate Rentals

The Secret Ingredient to Making Money With Real Estate Rentals

18 Comments / Real Estate, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE) / /

Let’s be honest, the idea of making money with real estate is intriguing.  Even if you haven’t gotten into the real estate game, you likely know or have heard that rental properties can be a great investment. There are some great advantages to owning rental property, but is there really a secret ingredient to making money with real estate rentals? There’s definitely an essential secret sauce, but here’s the deal – it’s not really that much of a secret.  In fact, you’ve probably heard it

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What I've Learned About Blogging Over the Last Two Years

What I’ve Learned About Blogging Over the Last Two Years

50 Comments / General Thoughts, Blogging, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Self-Employment / /

I started the Route to Retire site in May of 2015 and quickly learned that blogging is an interesting endeavor.  Like most new bloggers, for the first few months, I would just write and publish and wonder “is anyone even out there?” The analytics showed a nibble here and there, but really… nothing. It took a number of months, but eventually, the traffic started to grow.  The comments on my posts began to slowly trickle in – and that was the most exciting part. Now,

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Cutting Expenses is Great But...

Cutting Expenses is Great, But Here’s the Problem…

22 Comments / Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Self-Employment / /

In an effort to help in cutting expenses, I just changed our cell phone provider.  Here in the part of Ohio where I live, Verizon is the logical choice for a phone provider as they are the most prominent and basically lack any dead spots. I’ve been with them since the beginning – from GTE Wireless, to the transition to Alltel, to the transition to Verizon.  It just made sense.  However, although the pricing is Ok, it’s not great. Last week, I just

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