Jim @ Route To Retire, Author at Route to Retire

Why is Financial Independence Such an Uphill Battle?

10 Comments / Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), General Thoughts, Saving / Jim @ Route To Retire / September 20, 2016

I spend a lot of my time every day focusing on my path to financial independence. I have a game plan that I feel even more confident about now that I got a second opinion. But that doesn’t stop me from looking for ways to expedite the process. I’m constantly educating myself by listening to podcasts relating to personal finance and real estate. And I’m reading every book I can get my hands on related to those topics as well as closely […]

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The Quest to Trim the Fat and Simplify Life

16 Comments / Motivation, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Saving / Jim @ Route To Retire / September 13, 2016

For most of us in a first-world country, it’s almost natural in an unsettling way for us to accumulate crap. Not only do we have junk we don’t need (although we think we do when we buy it), we also spend money needlessly on things we think will simplify our lives. The problem is that most of the time we buy something – be it a product or a service – with the intent of it making life easier or better,

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My Experience with a Certified Financial Planner

20 Comments / Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Investments, Saving, Taxes and Financial Planning / Jim @ Route To Retire / September 6, 2016

Recently, I decided that I wanted a second opinion on my game plan. Although I’m pretty confident on how to make things work, I decided that this is important enough to warrant bringing in someone else to look everything over and give some unbiased input. So I recently hired a certified financial planner. I thought this would be a great opportunity to take you through the process from start to finish to give you a better idea if this is something that you

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Protecting Yourself When Buying Rental Property

18 Comments / Real Estate, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Self-Employment / Jim @ Route To Retire / August 30, 2016

When I bought my first house back in 2003, I had plans to live there for a couple of years, fix it up, and then turn it into a rental property. The idea sounded simple enough, but I ran into a lot of headaches along the way. I knew location was important, but I didn’t know where I should be looking. I also didn’t know how to properly determine cash flow and ROI (return on investment). And I didn’t take into consideration

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What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?

17 Comments / Kids, Education, General Thoughts / Jim @ Route To Retire / August 23, 2016

I recently asked my 6-year old daughter “what do you want to be when you grow up?” She answered back that said she wants to buy duplexes. That’s my girl! Now, before you start chastising me for trying to force my daughter to be something she doesn’t want to when she grows up, let me explain. When I grow up… When I was young, I had my sights set on being an artist for Disney. I had a pretty good knack for drawing and that just

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It’s Not How Much You Make, It’s How Much You Keep

22 Comments / Saving, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Motivation / Jim @ Route To Retire / August 16, 2016

As I was going through college, I had my mind set on getting rich. I envisioned a good job that paid a ton of dough. After all, the more money you make, the richer you are, right? Fresh out of college though, I wasn’t building savings, I was chasing the money to have and to spend in the present day. And I did alright. While I was still in school, I was working at Walmart. I started out with it being

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Is It Possible to Reach Financial Independence with Kids?

33 Comments / Kids, Education, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE) / Jim @ Route To Retire / August 9, 2016

When I set out on this journey toward financial independence, I knew I had some work to do. I started out with around $30k of credit card debt and didn’t know anything worthwhile on how to make it happen. I even bought into one of those late night real estate scams on how to get rich. I wasted some of my hard-earned money late in my college years thinking that was the way to go… it wasn’t. Eventually, I got on track. I read as many books as I

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Do I Cut Back on My Roth to Reach FI Sooner?

23 Comments / Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), General Thoughts, Investments, Real Estate, Saving / Jim @ Route To Retire / August 2, 2016

As some of you know, I’ve been a little bummed lately with my countdown to financial independence (FI) and early retirement being a ways out. Although I have a plan to retire before my 50th birthday, I just feel like this is too far out. Every day that I spend at work is one less day that I get to spend with my daughter. Granted, this is the summer when she’s not in school, but it’s tough regardless (which I’m sure it

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If You Need Money, You’ll Always Work for Less…

28 Comments / Motivation, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Real Estate, Self-Employment / Jim @ Route To Retire / July 26, 2016

I’m a big fan of satellite radio. I’m also a big Howard Stern fan. Years ago, when Howard went to satellite radio, I bought the lifetime package for Sirius satellite radio for about $400. I definitely got a number of good years out that deal. Eventually though, Sirius made my life difficult. Back in 2009, I bought a new Chevy Malibu which had XM radio. As some of you may know, there was a Sirius XM merger years ago so that should be all good, right?

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It’s Time to Step-Up Your Game!

16 Comments / Saving, Debt, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Investments, Motivation / Jim @ Route To Retire / July 19, 2016

Hey everyone, it’s time to talk about something that most of us out there know, but not enough of us are talking about. And with that, I’m referring to retirement savings. Although this is a site focused on financial freedom and early retirement, the fact is that most of us out there have a slim shot at either one of these. I almost threw up when I learned on The Motley Fool that the average American’s 401(k) balance is $72,383. And even worse,

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