Spending Archives - Route to Retire

This Bad-@#$ Expenses Spreadsheet is My Gift to You

I’m super excited about a new expenses spreadsheet I’ve been working on that I think you’re gonna love. And this ain’t just any old expenses spreadsheet – it’s focused on your recurring expenses. If you’re like me, you’re familiar with those times when you make a big purchase and have buyer’s remorse shortly after. It happens. But those are the easy cases – it’s a one-time purchase and it’s staring you right in the face. The tougher problems to solve are those random costs that occur on a periodic basis (every few weeks, monthly, quarterly, yearly, etc.) that are much harder to keep an eye on. We all have expenses or subscriptions that we signed up for and – meh,

Choose FI: Your Blueprint to Financial Independence

I don’t normally write book reviews on this blog, but I’m making an exception for the new Choose FI book. I was expecting my opinion to sway one way with the book but my impression after reading it went in a completely different direction. Chris Mamula is the author of Choose FI: Your Blueprint to Financial Independence (along with coauthors Brad Barrett and Jonathan Mendonsa). If you’re not familiar with Chris, he retired in 2017 at the young age of 41 (beat me by two years!). He also spends a lot of time writing at the Can I Retire Yet? site. I met Chris at the FinCon conference in 2017 – such a nice guy! We didn’t get a chance

Solving the World’s Problems… Starting with Mine!

When it comes to solving the world’s problems, I’m the man. I’ve got it all handled. Call me “Mr. Fix-It”! Ok, maybe that’s far from true. I’m not solving the world’s problems at all. In fact, I sometimes struggle to handle my own problems. But, I’m good at adapting and actually enjoy change. I have an engineer’s/programmer’s mindset and like to logically find an optimal solution to problems. And now that we’re living in Panama, I get to push my problem-solving to a different level. We live in a small town in the mountains called Boquete. There’s no Walmart, Target, or Home Depot here. The closest counterpart I’ve got is a small discount store called Novedades La Reyna and a

What the Hell Is Going On with Our Living Expenses?!

Boy, this has been one helluva rollercoaster lately. Our living expenses have been all over the map this year. We’ve had a ton of abnormal spending (both more and less) throughout the year. The biggest factors for this were: Preparing for our big move Enjoying our July adventure Living in Texas with family for most of August Now living in Panama For a guy with control issues, this is throwing me off a little. The roller coaster ride we’ve been on this summer is just about wrapping up, but we’re still not running a normal budget right now. It’s been so crazy with so many unknowns that I’m struggling to project what our living expenses are finally going to settle

Flexible Travel Can Yield Huge Benefits

One of the facets of early retirement I was looking forward to the most was flexible travel. I knew that we’d be able to save some money by not having to be so rigid in our plans. I didn’t realize the extent of how beneficial it could be though. We’ve been retired for less than eight months now and what we’re already experiencing is awesome! Between cheaper flights, hotels, and cruises, the price is definitely right. Then you throw in that the destinations are generally less crowded and that makes things even better. Mix in a little more hassle-free travel along the way like smaller lines through security screenings and life becomes a real winner! Vacations step up their game

Were We Spending Too Much in July? You Tell Me…

Our July adventure is officially over and now I’m wondering if we were spending too much throughout the month. As most of you already know, we’re moving to Panama later this month. When we booked our flight earlier this year, my wife, Lisa, wanted to wait until the end of summer to fly out so we could go on vacation with her side of the family first. Because of that, we were running a month-to-month lease on our apartment for the last few months. Well, Lisa had a brilliant thought to end our lease a month early and use that money to spend the month of July as vagabonds floating around the country. The idea was that without the cost

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