Note 2: On my Twitter, I asked for personal advice on what to do regarding hitting $3 million. You see the whole chat thread on Twitter. There’s a lot of great advice from the brilliant people in the finance community. I was expecting troll replies or people calling me cop out for not FIRE-ing even though hubby and I both are not fully ready for all reasons besides money. But what came was a good consensus of all the concerns and “what-ifs” we had, which made me feel less crazy for thinking we’re not ready.

Note 3: We’re kicking up our fat/FIRE goal to $5 million for now. Our original goal was $3 million (liquid) but with insane inflation, we don’t feel right to retire in our early 30s. We’re also planning to have more kids someday (woo~), so we need to up that number. We also forgot to include AGING parents in that original FIRE goal. Lastly, we decided to stay in our HCOL area. We really LOVE living in the Pacific Northwest and it’s well worth grinding it out here than move anywhere else cheaper.

Note 4: I wish we had a 7 figure business or have super high sports stars salaries, but nope! We’re just the neighbor’s next door. And I find our wealth journey is more of a testament to the good old way of wealth building all of which was mentioned in, you guessed it my favorite PF book, The Millionaire’s Next Door.

OK now let’s start!

~

Are you curious about fatFIRE? I’ve always wondered how wealth builds over time. We’re creatures of pattern so we naturally look for benchmarks. Anything to keep on track of a dream FIRE lifestyle. That’s why I wanted to share this post with some half-baked lessons sprinkled in.

First of all, I’m pretty darn sure we’re not the only ones who have recently hit the 3rd million now. I know there are other 30-somethings-year-olds out there in the FIRE community with lots more $$$ now. I mean it has been a few years, and I know at least a few readers who had similar (if not better!) savings, earnings, and investments than us.

Secondly, I didn’t want to share this milestone initially because it seemed a little inappropriate, given we’re still in a pandemic. But damn this 3rd million came and left already, and we’re still struggling with the same health pandemic a year later. So what the hell, new normal.

The pandemic was one main reason why I completely skipped over the $2 million net worth update/milestone on this blog. Although our 2nd million was special too I didn’t feel like I was allowed to talk about it when a health pandemic started. Plus we had our hands full with a newborn, and newborns amidst a global pandemic definitely didn’t come with instructions.

And the last thing I wanted to clarify: nothing major happened to change wealth or accumulation.

No rich uncle died. We didn’t take up any crazy investment strategy. We didn’t get an income boost. I freaking wish!! We’re losers.

In fact, new baby coming, I naturally had to give up my Airbnb side hustle. Plus only 1 of my web businesses had the scalable success I originally hoped for.

For another 9 months, I took 100% time off to soak in pregnant-happy, stress-free self-care. I had a stellar, normal pregnancy. Yes some morning sickness, swollen feet, very mild stretch marks but otherwise, everything went awesomely. I encourage all the hard-working ladies to take a break, and have a posh, spoil me babe pregnancy! Do it for your baby and body at least!

After my glorious pregnancy and awesomeeee birth/labor experience, the shit show started. Newborns are little shits. I didn’t like her for the first 3 months. I took 6 months off unplanned. Our daughter had colic and she was classified as failure to thrive (underweight). We had to call up every specialist and order doctor scans to figure out if it’s something or not. Is it just her genetics or does she have some rare disease where she can’t eat or gain weight? Nothing ever came from the tests, scans, or blood draws. Soooo I mean my husband’s skinny even though I’ve seen him eat 4 lbs of ice cream in one sitting……..(Lol, it was a contest for a free t-shirt.)

Anyways, I did little work for over a year thanks to pregnancy and baby. My husband definitely ramped down on his work output too. He’s putting in just a bit above 30 hour weeks. So trust me, income DID NOT explain the 3rd million.

This points to the first observable that’s glaringly obvious:

Want to master your finances effortlessly?

1. Sign up with your email to download our free Google Sheet budget template.

2. Sign up with Personal Capital and use their automatic Net Worth Tracker for free. Personal Capital is a free financial service platform that helps you analyze your financial health all on one simple & secure account. This was a huge step up from the tedious dance we did before where we had to manually log in to our financial accounts (all 19 of them) individually.

1. The First Million *IS* the Hardest

After we became millionaires in 2018, I lost a good chunk of my interest in sharing our net worth publically. I mean, we already hit a big milestone, and it will be a while before we get to 2 million so why keep tracking it monthly? Isn’t it more to life? Of course, there is.

Due to our busy schedules and general desire to enjoy life rather than count the dough, we stopped paying close attention until one day…whoop, third mil. We know it’s “only” 3 million; plenty of rich people and families have 20 million, 200 million, so much more – especially in Silicon Valley! We’re not super smart or overly ambitious people so the stock market pulled most of the weight.

When they said the first million was the hardest, they were RIGHT. Here’s the broad overview of our money timeline so far:

• June 2010: $0
• Nov 2018: $1,000,000
• Feb 2020: $2,000,000
• July 2021: $3,000,000

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• How To Make a Roll of Paper Towels Last Embarrassingly Long

2. Earnings Matters…ish?

Income totally matters…for the first million.

Suddenly in a blink, 2 million, then another blink, 3rd million. Income is definitely not the driving force behind this. It helped, but nah, no way, it’s only been less than 4 years!!!!!!

Your salary is going to be the main driving force for that first million…and you know…not having kids or blowing your money on a new boat. Our daughter was a hard second job. Ugh! It wasn’t just money spent on her but the cost of the time (time is money) put into having and raising a baby.

For women thinking of mommyhood someday: save the money first, then have as many kids as you want! Easier that way and you get the best of both worlds. That’s our plan haha.

It’s pretty unfair the responsibility falls harder on women but just how it is. Hedge your bets with an awesome husband, like mine. He’s doing I say 60% of the childcare duties as I’m studying part-time. That’s just how he is, nothing to do with me, he’s a people pleaser/caretaker type.

We took a lot of time off in the past 2 years. ZERO regrets. We bonded like a family should and family ALWAYS comes first. If our income dropped, we didn’t notice any impact at all on the net worth or our “lifestyle.”

We still pay 100% of our taxes and max out those employer-match charity donations every year. P.S. donations come automatically out of pay, and we don’t take that money out of our monthly budget.

3. It’s Totally Outside of Our Control

We don’t have much cash sitting on hand anymore. Besides the house, all else is riding in a theoretical market. No safe, no valuables, no jewelry, no boat, NO physical assets. We drive a used car (market value not included in net worth.)

This net worth growth….just numbers on a screen….has nothing to do with us nor how wealthy or not we feel. 2020 was a dark time fiscally for tons of people. I think American populists have a strong point. There is something very off-balance about the system in this country and it will come to a head eventually.

Anyway, this net worth growth has nothing to do with us; it’s interesting to see the stark contrast though. My husband and I are NORMAL PEOPLE.

Unfortunately, we are not stock market (or even regular) geniuses, didn’t make crazy money, and I assure you, most of the wealth at this point is outside of our control. We just check every few months and go ok, cool, is monies + or -.

Then we go back to enjoying a boring, family life minus money anxiety.

4. Focusing on What We Can Know

Years ago, we would have been happy with $3 million. After we became parents we shifted our attention from money and work to our (FTT) baby.

$3 mil liquid, our original FIRE figure would have us driving off into the sunset and laying on a hammock in Waikiki forever, we assumed. Now with baby girl added to the pack, we realize how restrictive FIRE can be with very young children. I don’t know the plan right now. It’s not much to do with money, it’s the unknown.

If we couldn’t have kids…I want to go to Vegas and never wake up before 7 AM again! FIRE may not be for us as we’re not SINKs or DINKS. We are traditional on that front: we have dependents young and old. Going solo is not a privilege we have as a family. We will always aim for early retirement but probably not when we’re in our early and mid 30s.

Also, I very, very much want to make sure our baby will be covered for all of her life too. She will go to a top-quality school…she has a caring sweet father….full insurance…involved parents with tons of free time for her…an amazing neighborhood in a bustling vibrant and safe city………..um………..literally everything I didn’t have growing up. I’m a little jealous of her!

Think of it!!! loads of opportunity…summer camps, international travel, holidays, dance n’ art classes, STEM classes, private tutors, bedtime stories, hugs, an actual bed frame…I don’t know, just everything I didn’t have growing up. I’ll shut up now before I start weeping.

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BaristaFI and regular FI won’t be enough in our expensive city, especially if we have more kids. Kicking the fatFIRE figure to $5 million is a good plan for now based on 33x expenses (check out this Retire Early Simulator).

We want to maintain 80% time at work (if we can get it permanently) but otherwise, nothing is changing. We don’t hate our jobs that much yet. Plus work is a large part of our social life, and health coverage ain’t a bad thing man.

Family Expenses / Annual Budget Review for 2020

Oh maybe someone would like to look at our annual spending for the hellish, dumpster fire of 2020. We became first-time parents amidst lockdown so I can attest at least $1,000 of that total number was straight-up pointless crap for our colicky baby.

Our 2020 family spending was higher than in 2019 for reasons I will explain below.

Eating out was surprisingly low, for us. We tried to support our local restaurants but because we had a sickly newborn, I forbade my husband and myself from leaving the house. We had our meals and groceries delivered (thank GOD for Imperfect Produce deliveries, seriously.)

Medical, um, well it’s high because I gave birth in a hospital lol. The bill was $4,000 and that’s with health insurance. We hit our copay and I think it’s 10% after that.

I loved my birth experience so it was 100% worth it.

My birth was not really impacted by Covid-19, I got lucky. Boy did I get lucky.

Our hospital was discussing implementing policies…so we probably missed pandemic hospital protocols by 1 week.

I think I would have cried if pandemic protocols happened to us. I wouldn’t want to choose between hubby and doula as they did in New York City. Pushing is already tiring, imagine pushing in a mask. Poor mommies =( what a crap situation.

For mothers who gave birth in actual covid-restrictions, sister, you are a roaring lion champion of a WOMAN holy crap!

P.S. I fucking loved my birth experience!!! AHHHHHHHH!! xD I want to give birth again!! Don’t want a newborn ever, but birthing again is a hell yes! Maybe I can be a surrogate haha! I am such a good pusher, especially for a first-time birth, let me tell you, my nurses were impressed ^_^

P.P.S DOULAS ARE WORTH EVERY PENNY!!!! If you don’t get one for birth support, you are way too damn CHEAP

We also got a new roof – which was most of the $7,000 total for home maintenance in 2020. The new roof was finished in January 2020. Hopefully, with luck, this roof will last 30 years since we sprang for premium materials and frills.

Vacation….lmao, I think a lot of us got $0 for vacation in 2020.

WST = all utilities. M.I.T =mortgage and stuff.

In summary, I think without the new roof and hospital birth (totaling over $11,000) we did fairly similar to 2019 in terms of overall frugal living.

Our monthly average was $4,300-ish and total annual family spending was $51,000-ish for our family of 4 in 2020. This includes mortgage, water, sewage, internet, everything. (Actually, for the Internet we get a full refund from work, but yeah, still a pricey year.)

Little Lady Luck Likes Lily…

I wish me or my husband were more successful people, but we’re not Forbes 30 under 30 people. Just a regular couple you probably saw us checking out at Trader Joe’s today.

• We work(ed) hard; much less hard though.
• We try our best to plan for the future and practice good-enough money sense. NO kids are not a good financial decision lmao!! But we did it anyway.
• My husband had great influences and come from a very successful family. I didn’t; I come from trailer park trash man. So let’s call this a draw!
• We have a good bit of luck (but nothing remarkable as if we had $300 million dineros…)

We DO feel lucky though. Like the Universe really REALLLLLY sprinkled me in lucky charms….or just setting me up for a total Punk’d session. It makes up for my childhood is what I tell myself.

In terms of luck, well I don’t have hard evidence…does anyone?!…but I have very specific examples that **I personally find** odd:

1. Sold our rental property at a good time

I’ve talked about this before; selling our Airbnb rental/investment property. We nab $50k – $100k even after repairs and realtor’s cut. That was because we sold it at the second-highest peak month. The local housing market is only slightly higher now but it’s been almost 3 years since then so adjusted, we sold out at a really good time. Of course, we didn’t know it at the time, but thinking back now yes it was “lucky.”

2. Stopped Airbnb hosting a month before pandemic

Our last Airbnb rental closed before my daughter was due! We planned to close earlier because I was 8 months pregnant and chasing after guests but we had some super sweet recurrent guests who love our place and I didn’t want to say no to them.

We officially closed Airbnb in February. Right before the pandemic rocked everything in the U.S. we were able to avoid all of the negative Airbnb stuff. All of it. By 3 weeks.

Headlines like “hosts overleveraged”, “Airbnb host hardships”, “Hosts face 90% cancellations” etc.

Surreal.

I was missing doing Airbnb and then this happened and I was like…OK, OK Lily….you got out at a really good time because the next 2 years are going to suck for travel.

3. Took out $1 million before Covid-19

We took out almost 1 million dollars a week or two before Covid rocked markets. Actually, I remember it was more around $700,000 plus what we already had in cash. I was 9 months pregnant – maybe don’t listen to heavily pregnant women on investing- but it worked out OK.

I told hubby, I want this money sitting safe and out of the market when the baby comes. We also had already $250,000+ in the bank so we now had about $1 million total that was no longer actively invested.

Ballsy, don’t I know it.

OHHH right my other reason/argument to hubby was I wanted to start house hunting ASAP! I thought we could start house hunting 1-2 weeks after the baby comes…fuck I’m stupid. Market was heating up for spring again and I was like, hey, all cash, our baby needs a house!!!!

Didn’t work out that way, at all. I couldn’t even sit down for weeks. So much blood, so much breastmilk ugh @_@

Note 5: we didn’t touch our retirement if you’re wondering. We didn’t touch anything locked in that would cause a tax mess. My husband would never have allowed that no matter how pregnant I was!

I didn’t want my kid to be born and raised in poverty like I was. That’s the shred of logic behind my ‘whim.’

Having that money in absolute, withdrawable figures gave me peace when our kid arrives. It was money not forever going up and down in a very theoretical space.

It proved at the time of her arrival, I was on a better footing than my parents who failed to provide. The classic poor Chinese parent uses their kids as retirement plans when no child should exist to be their parent’s retirement plan. If you disagree with that, get out and don’t ever visit my blog!

My husband was understandably adamant about emptying out our 2 main brokerages on my crazy need to “prove something.” <- his exact words.

He thought I was loopy, which yes yes I am. All the blood from my brain went to my very pregnant feet LOL. But hey, you DON’T say no to your 9-month pregnant wife.

Was there a better way of doing this? Hell yes. In preparation for our first child’s birth, we decided to create a trust fund + will for her. But ugh, we got lazy putting paperwork and signing off.

So us being lazy (HIS fault!) was what got me arguing with hubby on this insane pull-out. Covid was not fully on our radar yet I do recall my husband was already home full-time. I think there was quite a lag between lockdown and the stock market?

“It’s SYMBOLIC honey!”

So out the money comes. I was scheduled to be induced a few days later. The pandemic statistics started getting scary. People were realizing it but nothing was being done yet. Our daughter came very early in the pandemic; avoiding the Covid-19 protocol rules and staff shortages to come. Thank goodness. Any later, it would have sucked.

Who wants the full almost-pandemic covid birth story? I think every mom wants to tell theirs haha…

End of Feb until about freaking May 2020….total blur. Shit show. Especially because our baby had colic and feeding problems. All family help was canceled due to Covid. No flights in, no food around, the house was a MESS. Also, I was going through some weird anxiety mood thing…not postpartum depression exactly…I think I was just tired as fuck.

I legit thought of running away to Mexico with the $950,000 when I left to walk the dog every morning LOL. Dooooon’t judge me.

We had this enormous amount of money taken out of the market and sitting in our money market while the stock market went down like 20%-30%? I am a bit embarrassed to admit we did try to time the market throwing money back in. That makes me a hypocrite yup I know. Whatever, I was out, mentally/emotionally/physically. I hate colic.

My husband took care of the actual nitty-gritty of investing it back into the now declined post-Covid market. I recall $700k went back in at a 10% dip in late March about 1 week after. The $250k in cash he dropped in slowly (timing it.) I think we caught close to the bottom of the market for $40,000 of that $250k. I did buy a couple of thousand worth of Delta airline stock myself, I still have them. Taxes were more interesting this year for my husband, oy.

We got lucky but I would not recommend us trying that again!

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Our brand of frugality is pretty typical (to a little extra strength) in the accumulation phase. My general belief is if you optimize and cultivated self-introspection so that your inner lives and inner mind are rich then whatever is on the outside matters less and less. I have always tried to pride myself on trying to be resilient and that’s because I cultivated within because my reality was bleak for a long time. If you grew up like me then you will understand that one of the “perks” of that is learning how to entertain yourself and developing a very rich inner life by closing your eyes.

The rainbow bridge of frugality varies a lot to different degrees. Our brand works for us but not for others, and there ain’t nothing wrong with that.

Not everyone is going to understand saving or intentional frugality because a good sum of people grew up accustomed to the middle-class comfort and set that as a baseline.

Being foreign-born, I was put in a different reality. It kind of reminds me of that saying, “What is normal for the spider, is chaos for the fly.”

“That’s Interesting!“

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Our Brand of Frugality

How we live our life is what I define as our brand of frugality, everyone has their own because everyone has their own comfort zone.

For us specifically,  you can check out all of our monthly budget expense and financial report here.

They say a penny saved is a penny earned, but so is a penny not spent. Then the other saying…” saving a dollar is worth more than a dollar earned.”

’cause eeek, TAXES! Especially if you’re higher on the income totem pole.

So I went back and did the rough AGI figures too which is about overall 25% for us. That represents the more realistic numbers I’m going to summarize. It is absolutely necessary to calculate the pre-tax number because…dude, there is no way anyone could fully escape the Tax Man.

Not sure if Slender Man is scarier or the Tax Man?

…well, one of them we know is definitely real so…

~

Moving onto the numbers, I went fairly conservative with my figures. I’m thinking of a good to fair case scenario using the national averages of what I can find.

Notice the first 3 highest and most flexible expenses are housing, transportation, and food. We are going to do the top down budget route!

Highest expenses first and smaller expenses for dessert, now let’s start hacking!

Housing

Our mortgage, home insurance, and extra utilities come in at about $25,000 a year. Since we host on Airbnb full-time that means we technically live for free and earn some extra money along the way too. Because we make a surplus on Airbnb from just long-term rentals, conservatively we are making more profit and covering more than mortgage etc. Like about $34,000 is the projection. That’s the most likely estimate I’m getting this year so far. But let’s just use $23,000 for simplicity sake and work from there. As a business owner with tax perks but also more taxes because I’m covering for my own FICA, SSI etc. It gets confusing fast.

It’s not all about the money, of course, we met some really cool people who love animals and Grace (our fearful dog) is much better with people now than being scared to death of them before from her crappy puppyhood.

One lovely multi-level house in picturesque Seattle pimped out to some of the friendliest people I’ve ever met from all around this blue planet:

Amount Saved = $23,000
Amount Needed to Earn = $28,750

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Transportation

We don’t own a car.

My husband gets free public transit subsidies from his employer so it currently cost him zero dollars to go to work. He doesn’t have to sit in rush hour traffic and instead he’s using that time to read about the FX market or taking a nap.

There are 2 rental car companies within a 15-minute walk from our house which gives us ample wiggle room to choose from when we do need a car for a day trip. We pay a one-time $50 fee when we need it once a month. Everything else we need is nearby within walkable distance.

Every time I tell strangers that most people think it’s because we’re ultimately broke.

Pffft hahaha, hiding ‘broke’ in America is probably the easiest thing to do right now. People don’t see how damn cheap credit is these days. I’ve consistently wondered how banks keep giving people credit so irresponsibly.

No sweat off me, I’m not anyone’s financial fairy godmother.

I digress, I’ve done the car math ten times over. Too bad not enough people do! If we get a car “justifiable” to our income then we can get an electric car like Tesla for $90,000 that is cheaper to run and lower maintenance too.

But then there is also Washington’s high auto tax for luxury purchases like Tesla. Property and auto tax is pretty high in Washington because we don’t have state tax so our property and auto make up for it.

OH, then there’s parking!! Parking space is essentially an empty space of ground with 2 adjacent verticle lines…it’s highly coveted for off-shooting reasons. Finding parking close by work is preferred because it’s safer from the break-ins that are becoming more common as you move away from clustered parking centers. That comes with an optional price tag of about $200 a month.

Then there’s the question if I needed a car myself too…is it fair that hubby gets one and I’m sitting at home with nothing but all the liabilities of pets and an elderly person? What if there was a medical emergency with my dog or my dad?

But let’s say we’re frugal even when it comes to cars and buy just one used second-hand car. Include the purchase cost of a single, used, cheap, smaller sedan gasoline car in Seattle will cost us $600+ a month for 60 months going fair on the maintenance factor, not too $$$ car, and getting the cheap gas at Costco.

The scenario of one single cheap used car with a $200 monthly parking permit and lukewarm insurance bundled with the home because that’s how they like to sell to the masses:

Amount Saved = $9,600
Amount Needed to Earn = $12,000

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Food

Hahaha, work in progress. Dining out is not something I’m uber frugal about when I know it’s possible to live off $300 and not dine out very much if at all. Groceries we have nailed under $200 but that’s because we have a biggggg budget for dining out.

Unlike many other things, I can understand how to rack up $1,000 in monthly dining out. We’ve probably done it before in our Pre-FIRE days. Sushi $65, three times a week and some pho here and chicken fried steak there…and poof the budgets gone.

If we were instructed to spend without revealing any price tags attached, trust you and me, I can pig out to double that very easily if you just let me unhinge my jaws.

Our dining out bill averages $350 a month which is not super frugal. We can make an effort to NOT dine out at all (ie. that month we lived on $300) except we don’t because it’s not worth it. The redeemable thing is we are financially sound.

I’ve made that decision before and I still stand by it fully understanding this: food is probably the biggest expense with zero possibility for future returns.

If you splurged on a nice big house in an expensive neighborhood, at least home prices pace up equally which means you’re getting some of your money back especially you owned it long enough.

If you let me free range dine out, the only thing I can turn that money into a trip is a trip to the bathroom

(Fun fact, my friend Soapy and I held a chicken nugget competitive eating contest last year in front of some of her friends. We each purchased 120 nuggets each and I ate about 60 to 70 nuggets. I don’t remember her count but I naturally killed her. Even her mom told her to never doubt a skinny bitch when it comes to eating a conspicuous amount of food.)

My guilty-food wish is to spend $1,000 a month on eating out someday. Maybe in the richest phrases of fat fire… In August, we spend about $350 on dining out so we’re “saving” $650.

I do feel a little bad about that…that’s me with self-control frugal brothers and sisters. Our grocery bill was under $200 because it was all spent on dining out haha.

I maintain eating out as the hobby…I wonder if I can talk my husband into setting tacos into entertainment…

Frugally I’m trying, seriously this is me trying, this could get a lot worse, don’t even doubt me for one single second I can eat circles around your humanly fragile appetites:

Amount Saved = $7,800
Amount Needed to Earn = $9,750

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Entertainment

Aha! My entire life prepared me for a low budget in finding the best frugal entertainment. All of my fun is going to thrift stores (hey big spender, NOT!)

After a lifetime of no money, you find very odd, unconventional obsessions…is what I’ve come to notice hah.

The average American family entertainment budget is $2,482 annually which is about $200 a month. I’m surprised it’s not more…the cable packages are pretty pricey at $100 per month for my in-law family, as I recall.

We came through with a lot of entertainment surpluses last year. In total, we spent $837 for 2017’s budgeted annual compared to an average American family at $2,482. That means we retained a $1,645 savings.

(P.S. Download Google opinion rewards so your survey credits can apply to buy whatever you want in the Google Play Store for free. That’s how we get shows, movies, books, and audiobooks in addition to the local library we use.)

If you have an odd personality, you don’t need to seek the outside world for entertainment because you KNOW you’re a true freak and not much the normies do interests you AMEN

Amount Saved = $1,645
Amount Needed to Earn = $2,056

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Connectivity

Dealing with just internet and phone here. Targeting the smaller size expenses now might not be as worth it as the big three above (food, house, transportation) but it’s about being selective with what matters for the least effort. 

My husband work often enough that he qualified have a huge portion of our $60 monthly home Internet bill waived. For simplicity, we just consider it paid for. His phone and plan are provided by work if he promises to use it for work (which he does.)

We ignored switching our phone plan out of laziness and only started last month on a lower plan.

The normal individual’s cell phone bill is $71 per month which jumped from 2009 averages. I was paying $35 for my plan which I thought was good…nope. I ignored switching our phone plan out of laziness and only started last month on a lower plan. Going forward my plan will be ⅓ of my AT&T charge with Red Pocket. Overall, it is a $20 dollar per month savings, every month going forward from now on.

For us, it’s $60 (internet) + $20 (phone) = $80 x (12 months) saved annually.

You pray and pray and pray and pray and pray for Google Fiber to come to your stupid freaking city but nooooo, Comcast and AT&T is a monopoly and we will never be freed from their greedy clutches.

Amount Saved = $960
Amount Needed to Earn = $1,200

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Personal Care + Apparel

According to the 2016 BLS results, American households spend $1,803 on apparel and $707 on other misc personal products which both total $2,510 annually.

Our personal care budget in 2017 totaled only $425 for the entire year which means we spent approximately $2,085 LESS compared to the average American household.

Fairly often, our personal care budget has come in a $0. Last month in August, our personal care budget was -$8 because I ended up returning a pair of shoes to a department store.

We choose to forgo new clothes and instead opted in for heavily discounted ThredUP and thrift store clothing. Go the home haircut route for all 3 of us and just spending time researching how to cut a style properly. Doing our own manicures…if you recall that I give my husband manicures because he likes them haha.

In terms of a gym membership, my husband uses the free gym amenities at work three times a week. I walk and dance every single day, sometimes I work out up to 3 hours which totals about 20 to 25 hours a week I’m on my feet. It’s all YouTube sponsored content and besides the huge toll I’ve done to my worn down carpets from all the friction, it’s been all for free.

Being low-maintenance and pretty hot looking people by default is frugal because we don’t have that much ugly we have to hide (OH right, Internet, this is sarcasm!!!)

Amount Saved = $2,085
Amount Needed to Earn = $2,606

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Health Care, Home Maintenance, Vacations, Vices, Pets, Utilities, Miscellaneous.

Uhhhhhh. Hm…well. Nearly every light bulb in our home is energy efficient. We have double paned windows. Our appliances are energy star efficient…blehhh nelly, OK, way too difficult to quantify what the amount we are saving here is…so let’s just brush ALL this off out of laziness.

I know we’re much much under the average for vacations, pets, vices and miscellaneous. Way, way under the average for our income level that’s for sure but useless without a solid benchmark.

*Healthcare…I have no clue. We have a good plan and hubby’s employer pays the lion share (woo~) but it’s a crapshoot to compare something like network, coverage, and copays.

*Home maintenance…uh, dude we try when we can but I don’t foresee my husband redoing our entire 3rd story roof anytime soon. I don’t think we’re super duper cost saving here when it comes to water heaters and the big scary things…so this is a wash.

*Vacation in 2017 for us was $1,035 while for the average American household spent anywhere between $1,457 to $4,000+ depending on size and where they went. We’re shaving a fat chunk off :).

*Pets…we might come very slightly under the average so it’s still a wash. Average single dog ownership is $1,500 for the first year…it was under $1,000 for us in our first year – including having Grace professionally trained by police. Then $500 is the average cost for the subsequent dog years…for us 2017 was $493 for Grace and my pet rabbit so we’re very slightly under. Still a wash.

Then there are the miscellaneous expenses…that’s a total crapshoot too for most Americans. For us, we track EVERY SINGLE PENNY and rarely use cash, so our misc are never crazy. I say we’re shaving at least $1,000 off here but no solid benchmark to put it against

The numbers of $$$ “saved” is already big enough for me to settle how much our brand of frugality can pinch even without any of these other ugly “math-y” expenses above so let’s just label it as all a wash.

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Summary + Results

So we’re saving $45,090+ a year in expenses by living our Brand of Frugality. In order for us to save that $45,090 net, we would need to bring in over $56,000 income because of the taxman.

Which is interesting because…

Category	Net	Gross
Housing	$23,000	$28,750
Transportation	$9,600	$12,000
Food	$7,800	$9,750
Entertainment	$1,645	$2,056
Connectivity	$960	$1,200
Personal Care	$2,085	$2,606
Health Care, Vacations, Vices, Pets, Utilities, Miscellaneous.	N/A	N/A	Too messy to quantify so N/A but probably $3,000 more shaved off.
Total Saved	$45,090+	$56,362+	Dude that's the MEDIAN U.S. income!!!

It’s interesting…because the overarching median household income in the United States is $56,516. That’s someone’s entire annual paycheck that we’re knocking not very far from.

HAHAHAHAHHAAH coincidence?! I love it.

It’s like we added another whole income stream by doing very little when that’s someone’s entire 9 to 5 annual salary.

What we do is what not many people can do and the majority of people don’t have the discipline or forethought to do. I’ll just point to them what was conserved, increased, sacrificed, and how we have structured our lives to streamlined financial independence to come quite a few years earlier.

[Ends post on maniacal laughter]

~

Does anyone remember that show Married…With Children? I use to watch old reruns of Married…With Children on FOX even though it was a little before my time.

I didn’t always get the jokes back then because I was still picking up English, but I understood the overall plot and tone.

It was a pretty low-brow show with simple vocabulary.

Married…With Children was sarcastic, dark, rude, sad and just downright hilarious in an “I’m going to hell for laughing” way.

Chinese television shows had nothing remotely close to this American classic!

The Bundys are a bitter, hateful and impoverished family.

The entire show series revolved around Al Bundy, a depressed shoe salesman. Peggy Bundy, a do-nothing lazy housewife with a spending problem. Kelly Bundy, the dumb blonde daughter and Bud Bundy, the loser teenage son. The premise repeatedly demonstrates how utterly pathetic all of their lives are: poor, uneducated, dirty, hopeless and…married with children.

Every single 30-minute episode highlighted how awful each character is and they only existed to make each other’s lives a living hell.

Married…With Children was revolutionary at the time of broadcast. Every other family on TV from the Brady Bunch to the Cosbys were seemingly perfect. It was completely unrealistic to the real American family.

I totally agree.

My dad was not an architect or a doctor. He was an Al Bundy. I never cared to watch a full episode of Cosby or Brady. My family was relatable to the Bundys. No Cosby nor Brady was ever being scammed or stabbed on the regular basis to keep my interest.

Can I get a “Wooooooooooah Bundy!” ;D

“That’s Interesting!“

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Financial Bundy Files

On another note, the Bundys of Married…With Children also serves very good examples of very, very bad financial lessons.

I wrote out a long list of things I observed that I believe continued to keep the Bundys poor. My husband looked over to see what I was writing and said, “Phew boy, that is going to be a loooong list.” Ha!

I didn’t have to dig far or research very hard. I mean if you wanted engineer exactly how to build wealth, just watch a few seasons of Married…With Children from the beginning and do the complete opposite of what they did.

~

1. Low Income

AL: Sure selling shoes is fun. But behind the glamour, it’s like any other minimum wage slow death.

The only source of income is from the cursed Al Bundy who works at a low-end women’s shoe store inside a cheap mall.

The gravity of which Al’s life has progressed so far downhill from his high school football days haunts him daily. He is a middle-aged, balding man working at what is essentially a Payless Shoe’s store gig meant for teenagers.

The annual salary of a shoe salesman in 2018 dollars is $36,000 (I googled it.)

It gets worst…Al is not a good salesman and his annual wage (let’s generously assume it’s $36,000) needs to support a family of 4 + dog. He is not motivated to improve his income or care to learn any in-demand skills.

In fact, his job has been demonstrated that it could be done by a chimpanzee.

2. High Spending

To be fair, it’s not just Al Bundy. Every single adult Bundys represents total financial failure.

The matriarch of the Bundy regime, Peggy Bundy, is a lazy housewife who refuses to cook or clean for her family.

She spends frivolously on her husband’s shoe man income and racks up debt that takes Al years and years to pay off.

Another large portion of her spending goes to her eating out while the rest of her family (especially Al) starves to death.

She has no understanding of personal finance and on the rare occasions she does end up forced to work to her dismay…she ends up tricked into some pyramid scheme and drives her husband into more debt.

Some of her highlighted purchases include a $5,000 statue of a Greek God…which she was able to buy with a down payment of $10.

There was also the self-portrait painting Peg commissioned of herself for $2,500 dollars…which Al upon seeing…fell out of his bedroom window in horror.

Her purchases are so idiotic that when the Bundy’s hosted a yard sale to recoup some dough they failed.

When the Bundys couldn’t sell any of the junk Peggy had bought, Al explained to Kelly and Bud the basis of the Greater Fool’s theory. Peggy is the greatest fool as she is the last idiot to buy junk with no other takers.

KELLY: You know, I can’t understand why we can’t sell of any of this junk.

AL: Well, honey, see, lawn sales are based on the Bigger Idiot Theory. You know, nothing’s so dumb that some bigger idiot won’t come along and buy, but the uh, the flaw on that theory is that eventually you get to the Head Idiot, and uh, you call her “Mom“.

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3. Unplanned Pregnancies

AL (to Kelly): Love, hate… look, we’re a family, what’s the difference?

It’s hard to say if Al and Peggy were high school sweethearts from the way they jab at each other. Peggy gave birth to Kelly right after she graduated high school on Al’s shoe man salary. This type of poor planning drove these two newly married people right into the poor house head first. Since money is always tight in the Bundy household, the kids forgo dental insurance and basic needs like heating and food.

4. Car Obsessed

Al purchased a ’65 Mustang with his neighbor and they both spent a fortune repairing it…until the cops showed up and told them that it was a stolen car. Oooopsies.

When Al got tired of pushing his ancient Dodge, he took his secret savings stash of $5,000 to put a downpayment on a brand new car at a fancy car dealership. The dealership overcharged him because…well, they’re car salesmen and he’s…Al Bundy.

But fortunately for pathetic Al…Peggy had already found his secret car stash and spent it a loooong time ago. No new car for Al but he did unknowingly buy back his old broken down car (for more than what he sold it for) thinking it was a trade up.

Recommended Reads:

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5. Loans & Dumb Ideas

What happens when you have no money but can’t curb spending? You fall for cheap and easy money! There are plenty of desperate banks who are willing to loan out money. Everything the Bundys “own” come at a much higher interest rate because they are broke.

When Al borrowed $50,000 from the bank to start his own…shoe emergency hotline (yes, a shoe emergency hotline) it failed miserably.

Al: I’m getting an idea. I’m going to re-invest in my Shoe Line. Al Bundy is not going into the gutter owing $50,000. I’m going into the gutter owing a $100,000! That’s the man you married!

Now since Al is already $50,000 in the hole, he goes out and gets another $50,000 line of credit and put it back into his shoe hotline with a series of hilariously bad 555-SHOE television commercials advertising his shoe hotline business.

It failed miserably x2.

Peggy (attempts to comfort): After all, you lost $100,000. How many men who make less than a fry cook can say they lost a $100,000?

That’s the Bundy way!

6. Criminal Behavior

We would be here all day if you wanted a full list. Off the top of my head…robbing a dead mall Santa, losing their neighbor’s house (yes – they lost an entire house), stealing from little children, dodging from paying taxes, stealing their dog’s identity to apply for a credit card (yes they really did that). That’s on top of the usual casual shoplifting, pickpocketing, breaking n’ entering, encouraging rioting, scamming, and of course the looting.

I mean the list goes on and on. This only covers the adult Bundys…

7. Get Rich Quick Schemes

Every Bundy (with the exception of a relatively clever son Bud) falls for get-rich-quick schemes. Peggy Bundy would be the biggest idiot of course. Their love of lottery scratchers and lotto powerballs come before bills and debtors. Peg loves the lottery. One time, she spent $200 buying a small prayer statue of ‘Tubro’ the Panamanian God of Money to aid her in getting rich.

8. Single Income

AL: Peg, you can stab me with knives, you can beat me with clubs, you can make me open my eyes when we’re having sex but there’s no way on earth you can make me get a second job.

During the late 1980s when Married…With Children became popular, dual-income American families were becoming more and more prevalent and accepted. The “New Era of Women” could now choose a career, a family, or both!

Or you can choose either one I guess, like Peggy Bundy.

To supplement Al Bundy’s shoe salesman income, Peggy could have helped out by getting a job. Instead, she spent the day watching Oprah on TV and eating bonbons. She could have taken the traditional homemaker role…except she spent the day watching Oprah and ignoring Bud and Kelly.

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9. Taking Advantage of Others

The moral of the story for many entrepreneurs is…there will always be enough suckers willing to hand over their hard earn money as long as you target the correct suckers. The world is crawling with them. Look how well Amway and Herbalife are doing! The Bundys not only fall for these get rich schemes, they are also responsible for starting some of these shady organizations themselves. Al was the kingpin of a psychic hotline where they sell lucky numbers and lucky days to gullible callers. When the money flooded in, Al ignores the advice of staying small. He got greedy and lost it all soon after.

10. Poor Hygiene

Not bathing, brushing, flossing, curbing foot odor…generally this is basically the fastest and easiest way to make anyone who meets you wary of your existence. Since first impressions are a big deal, especially for a sales position, it’s not hard to see why Al makes less than a “fry cook.”

11. Bundy’s “Curse” / No Hope

The Bundy Curse is a crutch or belief told most often by Al Bundy. The curse is responsible for ruining every (especially male) Bundys from being truly happy. No matter what potential skill or talent they may possess, the Bundy curse will ultimately make them into horrible failures.

Al strongly believes Peg is part of the curse that makes his life hell because she “wasn’t truly a Bundy, being so only through marriage.”

The curse seems pretty effective.

via GIPHY

It’s hard to imagine robbing a dead Santa, your son as a peeping tom, threatening to call immigration on an innocent Mexican woman, stabbing your husband with a knife fastened to a grocery cart, welcoming prison time because there will be free food…..

To clarify, this show is a COMEDY show

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12. No Education

The Bundys do not believe in education. When Kelly was a first grader, Peggy decided to bleach her hair blonde instead of helping her with her homework.

via GIPHY

Since there is no money or food at home, Kelly goes out with other men if she needed clothes or food. The lack of child rearing and general healthcare is how she developed her dumb blonde persona. Kelly has shown hidden intelligence in some instances but they were never developed or discussed to meet her potential.

Bud Bundy, the remaining male Bundy seed, is crafty and smart. But instead of developing his intelligence or building his confidence, the adult Bundys stole Bud’s scholarship money and squandered it on jet skis and big screen TVs dooming their son’s future forever from a debt-free, college experience. He will owe $25,000 dollars – in 1980s dollars – and work for the rest of his life to pay back the debt that his parents caused him.

(Once again, this is a comedy show.)

13. Bad “Investments”

The Bundys do not invest. There is no money to invest. Moreover, they don’t have money priorities. Before the electricity bill is paid off, Peg has already spent it at the hair salon. Sometimes the Bundys scam or illegal obtain a windfall. The last windfall they received was scamming their neighbor out of $2,000 for a wedding. Al pocketed the $2,000 and paid off a rental property at Lake Chicamocomico.

Unfortunately, Al learns it was a fake retirement property built on a toxic waste dump. It will be uninhabitable until the year 5 million.

AL: What’s five million years in the scheme of the life of one man?

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14. Bad Reputation

The entire neighborhood hates the Bundys. So does lower and upper Uncton England…and every single person who has had to smell them or be near them. They once took out the power of the entire neighborhood during a heatwave and decided to pander in the supermarket. They have a dilapidated house and overall rudeness that lowers the overall property value of the home.

Al was also caught on camera on the evening news for lying to a librarian. Without a single ounce of support from the overall community, it’s hard for a person to get far.

15. Lawsuits

The countless of times the Bundys have been sued by someone or they are trying to sue someone happens so often on the show series that I use both hands to count it. Even though the Bundys lose lawsuits more often than they win them (which is hardly ever) the winning plaintiffs get nothing.

What could the Bundys possibly have any more to be taken away?

There are no ramifications! WIN!

16. Not Eating

Ah, the last thing – bad nutrition I suppose but they don’t really eat period. Since the Bundys do not eat often due to their poverty, when they do get a chance to feast (almost always stealing or scamming) normal spectators are appalled.

To avoid paying for movie snacks, the Bundys wait until the concession clerks turn their back and eat as much as they can so they don’t have to pay.

Have you seen the Bundys eat?

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Summary

I came from a family similar to the Bundys so I hold solidarity there. I grew up watching this guy and then rewatching this guy.

Despite how different – completely different – my views are today to that of Mr. Bundy…Al is still my favorite All-American TV anti-hero. I’d buy him a beer any day and it would be an honor.

So take it away, Al…

AL: “So you think I’m a loser? Just because I have a stinking job that I hate, a family that doesn’t respect me, a whole city that curses the day I was born?

Well, that may mean loser to you, but let me tell you something. Every morning when I wake up, I know it’s not going to get any better until I go back to sleep again.

So I get up, have my watered down Tang and still-frozen Pop Tart, get in my car with no upholstery, no gas, and six more payments to fight traffic just for the privilege of putting cheap shoes on the cloven hooves of people like you.

I’ll never play football like I thought I would, I’ll never know the touch of a beautiful woman, and I’ll never again know the joy of driving without a bag on my head. But I’m not a loser. ‘Cause despite it all, me and every other guy who’ll never be what he wanted to be, are still out there, being what we don’t wanna be, forty hours a week, for life.

And the fact that I haven’t put a gun to my mouth, you pudding of a woman, makes me a winner!”

~

We’re all going to die someday babes. #morbid

Deathbed regrets should have more research funding. It seems like invaluable information if you take it as advice. See, I don’t see people as lacking in good advice and good direction. There are some really general golden nuggets of advice floating around that people still ignore.

Just off the top of my head:

• Spend time with your children instead of money.
• Strive to be the man you want your daughter to marry.
• Don’t take things too personally. No one thinks about you as much as you do.
• If you don’t understand basic personal finance then you’re forked.

I went to my deathbed on my 27th birthday. I asked myself who I wish I could be and what exact legacy I wanted to leave behind. I couldn’t ask my 27th-year-old self about these things because everything started with a “but.” I’m damn annoying that way.

Unfulfillment

Oh my Buddha I’m so surprised unfulfillment was #1………..not.

“I never pursued my dreams and aspirations.”

When you spend 40+ years at a 9-to-5 grind and take that as your destined reality, when exactly will you find the time and energy to pursue anything by retirement age?

“I wish I’d have traveled more.”

Yup, expected. Even if your mind is young, your body – the vessel – is tired. Plus the majority of people hate their job so if 40+ years haven’t cultivated enough apathy for work, then a tired body will.

“I wish I had children.”

I believe a person can live a full life without children – absolutely – and not everyone was meant to be a parent. A lot of people shouldn’t even be parents honestly.

From what I heard, children are intensifiers, like kitchen spices. So if you wanted a good life like you spice up a good dish…eat children…? Lol just kidding. See there’s that morbid thing again. *Thumbs up*

But seriously though, this regret is totally scary because I’ve been on and off the fence about having biological children. Maybe we should play it safe and since we’re on the fence so there wouldn’t be any regret later?

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Intrapersonal

“I wish I’d tuned the world out more.”

I can’t relate to this problem

“I wish I was content with what I have.”

Oh yay I literally just mentioned that my last post. Contentment is key because “having enough” is really a mental challenge.

“I wish I didn’t wait to start it tomorrow.” “I wish I would have kept going.”

It’s good to have dreams and aspirations even if ours might not come true. We all need something to make us look towards the sky. Otherwise, it’s going to be a boring life.

“Happiness is a choice, I wish I knew that earlier.”

Me too brother.

~

Interpersonal

“I wish I said ‘I love you’ more.”

Aw. That’s pretty easy to fix. I don’t think this will be a regret of mine, at least I hope not. I grew up in a household that never, ever say that to each other – I think it’s a Chinese thing. But now, Mr. Hippo and I said ‘I love yous’ to each other maybe 3 times a weekday and 20 times over the weekends. It wasn’t until I married Mr. Hippo that I started saying it and got into the habit of saying it. When the conversation gets quiet and there’s nothing else to say, we say it just to appreciate each other.

“I should have been the bigger person and resolved my problems.”

It seems to be popular opinion that besides saying ‘I love yous,’ you should also say sorry more often. Considering over 50% of marriages end in divorce perhaps being the bigger person and working through problems is why this is so common of a regret.

“I worked too much and never made time for my family.”

I love it when another blogger features interviews of highly salaried, highly ambitious people. A common struggle in those interviews is how they balance their career and family. I think I almost went down that path. In the end, there is rarely a good family/work split among super highly salaried employees.

That was one reason why Mr. Executive and I broke up. It’s really hard to build a relationship with a person who is dedicated to working every hour of every day. It was hard for me to imagine being married to someone like that…probably because he would be at the office 24/7.

Mr. Hippo balances out his work and home life. He is not obsessed with getting ahead, which was the middle ground I was looking for. Money isn’t much past the FI point simply because there isn’t that much one really needs.

But it’s easy to get caught up and trap yourself in financially with a big salary.

“I worked too much and never made time for my friends.”

When I was a teenager, my friends had LOADS of time but NO money. Now that a lot of us are grown and working…we have money but no time. When there is time, that is reserved for dating around so you won’t have to die alone. Boo, what farce.

“I wish I stayed in touch with friends.”

This is the regret when your spouse has already passed away and then you suddenly start wanting old friends back, old memories, your youth back. Did I get that right?

“I wish I ran with a better crowd.”

Haha, this is the deathbed version of saying “all my friends were fake and I wish I had the courage to see that I hated them.” (??)

You can’t choose your family but you can choose your friends. More importantly, you are the AVERAGE of the closest 5 people you know. <- A genius quote from my friend Valerie.

“That’s Interesting!“

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Overall Health

“I wish I’d left work at work.”

I hear this one from people when they’re still alive. When I was young, if my dad had a bad day at work, he takes it out on me because I was the one he could pick on. My husband is better. When I ask him about work, he doesn’t remember. He has already blocked it out after a hard day. It’s hard when you’ve braised in an 8+ hour bad day to not take it home with you. It is misery to-go and worst that it affects everyone around you.

“I should have saved more money for my retirement.”

I can’t believe this wasn’t #1. This was about #7 or #8 on a list of 10.

“I wish I wouldn’t have compared myself to others.”

That’s the end result when it comes to comparing yourself to the Jonesessesses too much. I think the best financial advice I’ve heard this week is when someone said they played the lotto scratchers instead of saving because he doesn’t know how his friends afford their lifestyle and he feels like he needs to keep up. And he will keep up by buying lottery tickets and eventually winning the lottery one day to balance out the money he has lost.

Of course, the correct reply to that was…”Do you want to win the lottery? Start investing.”

“I wish I took better care of my body.”

Alright well, this is pretty self-explanatory and not surprising at all. Health brings us a freedom that we don’t realize we have until we’ve lost it.

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Hey Wallflowers!

 “I should have spoken my mind instead of holding back and resenting things.”

I am honest to all heavens deliriously lucky…no, wait, WE are ALL deliriously lucky to live in at least a Western country. Free speech, religion and not fearing to have your head chopped off by an imperial whackjob.

“I wish I had more confidence in myself.”

Yup, this is a one. I’m glad I learned how to be confident slowly with each year I’ve grown. I think I came a long way from being a shy devious 8th-grader.

“Not having the courage to live truthfully.”

I knew everyone had skeletons in their closet. This sentence is bloated with that.

It’s hard being honest with yourself. I think many of these deathbed people were born around the 1940s or 1950s? Times were different back then. They had a problem with women voting back then. Going online and finding your community was not possible back then. It was much harder so there is no reason for others now to repeat it now.

I love these deathbed regrets because they’re SUCH obvious issues we have dealt with in our current lives. The struggle of meeting our potential, balancing work with play, and dealing with interpersonal relationships. I do not want to carry any more of these to the grave.

Yes, I know this is morbid (people keep telling me that for some reason) but don’t be afraid of death! Listen to more black metal music! Let’s start a conversation! What is a potential regret that you can catch yourself from?

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Frugal isn’t just an activity or an adjective!

But frugal living just doesn’t sound as cool as being an all-black turtleneck wearing minimalist…nor is frugality marketed to the masses with much finesse. Understandable there’s no profit in selling frugality, ha!

But I do question why frugality isn’t considered a lifestyle in a definitive sense.

I kind of have a theory though: it’s because sometimes people don’t get it, can’t do it, get too caught up, or do it wrong.

It’s so pointless to micro-measure frugality too. That’s why I stopped doing the frugal win and frugal fail posts. I slowly realized that they were counterproductive to the main message I was trying to vibe out.

(Not that there’s anything wrong with frugal posts! I like reading Tread Lightly, Retire Early’s frugal friday series personally because it’s a diary peek into her life.)

But I do feel bad when other frugal blogger pals like Gen Y Money, Laurie 3-Year, Ms. FAF among lots of others (even my readers!) say on their expense report and such that they didn’t curb their spending on so-and-so category while douchebag that owns and write on The Frugal Gene is spending half that somehow etc, burn that witch.

(OK, no one said ‘burn that witch’ but I presume that was not far off hahaha.)

I hate it when good, smart, money-savvy people beat themselves up for not being frugal when they’re already living the frugal lifestyle to their comfort level, harnessing a great mindset in abundance, and saving a great portion of their income already.

Why crumple upon yourself up! Cheer on goddammit – you already got this!!!

It shouldn’t be a $ race to the bottom in the first place.

Plus it’s probably better for the economy if there are less frugal freaks thanks to the way our haphazardous economy is set up

Being frugal should be an overreaching, all-compassing mindset and spirit first and foremost.

You Could Be Doing It Wrong

If there is NO financial danger and good money is being made, frugality is a total lifestyle choice.

You have upgraded from my parent’s brand of “frugality” which can be described more like…uhhhmmmmm POORER THAN DIRT.

It was mandatory for them and I don’t consider that frugality. There’s no better word for it besides…SURVIVAL, pure and simple. Most people are frugal as a need rather than lifestyle.

Let’s not sugar coat it, I can school y’all on that.

But if you make good money, choose to live frugally, then you’re us! Be the authentic frugal loving freaks like me and hubby! Ayyyy

If living frugal STOPS being fun YET you continue doing it then you’re doing it wrong. Like really wrong. And It needs to stop.

Save the financial recommended standard of 20% – meet your target saving goals…and go out to enjoy the day for god sakes.

That’s why frugality should be labeled and emphasized as a lifestyle CHOICE and then wrapped in a more positive way.

It’s totally OK to do trade-offs. If you cost cut across the board for the sake of saving money and only money then you’re asking for a baaaad time.

It’s like trying to live like any other lifestyle, minimalist, socialite, Hollywood celebrity etc. – if you’re not enjoying living that lifestyle...then why the heck do it?

Frugality doesn’t have to be so depressing. Frugality should be treated more like a lifestyle; something you aspire to and always a work-in-progress. No healthy lifestyle should be used to beat themselves up. Contentment is key.

Plus micro-managing frugal living is not going to save much money. You are going to burn out. It’s just pointless, pointless guilt.

Those 30-day no-spend challenges – (I did one before) – are more or less another form of yo-yo dieting but with your wallet. That’s no fun. Diets are not fun. Don’t think of a frugal lifestyle like crash dieting.

Both dieting and finance should both be about slow, pervasive, smart, lifestyle changes.

We all got our own little flavor…our own little definition…of what it is to consciously use less than what we can. Simple concept BUT lots of complexity that’s all dependent on how you think about it.

 Related Reads:

• How Much Money Does Our Frugality Save? (Spoiler: $56,000+/Year)
• Eat Ugly, Save Money? Imperfect Produce Review (+ FREE COUPON)
• Everything ‘Married…With Children’ Did That Kept Them Poor

Why I Think We Do It Right

Is this self-serving to say?

I have a lot of fun living my life the way I do even though not everything can be 100% perfect. It also happens that our life is very cost-effective even though that’s not the main point (nice frill though).

Since we do save 90% of our gross income and we’re touching $1.5 million so…logically it’s very safe to say we’ve always been happy the way we are or else we would have changed something a LONG time ago.

I notice the majority of normal humans tend to adjust their spending to their income after a raise and labels that new toy as a “need” from thenceforth.

I find that very odd.

Like…I don’t get it. Someone explain this to me in the comments. Is it normal for people…to go around collecting everything that is wrong with their life and immediately when the funds come, they spend it in order to fix or upgrade it? What was wrong with life before? Is contentment rare?

When our household income doubled itself from 2016 to 2017 and our net worth doubled itself…we didn’t change much to our bottom line. I know our lives weren’t perfect but it was hard to pinpoint what we needed without having to think about it. Since we had to think about it…that means we don’t necessarily need it as it wasn’t a dire “need.”

Oh, and when I found out what I needed…LOL hell would freeze over if money could buy it directly. Damn! So much damn! Hahahaha

I guess this mentality that I’ve hatched into this post makes me and hubby justified in why we are the way we are. I think we’re a rare breed…didn’t think we were that odd before but I realize now that we might as well be. I wish more people come forth like us and think like this.

For everyone in the vast public and real people I know personally, they are broke and they’re still spending $$ away because they want to make a problem (real, imaginary, self-imposed or otherwise) go away.

They’re spending to feel the impact today because I think they don’t know what they truly want out of life tomorrow…and that’s kinda sad.

That’s going to make our lives a little easier to breathe in and lessen the amount of tension that we all carry around too much of these days.

“That’s Interesting!“

• Panhandling: How Much Money Do Panhandlers REALLY Make?
• How To Make Money As An Instagram Influencer (Internet Fame That Pays?)
• 39 People Who Got Richer AFTER Quitting Their Day Jobs
• Can Being a “Friend-For-Rent” Really Make Extra Money?

My sideline amusement these days is browsing beautiful historic homes on the Redfin app. It’s a real estate application much like Trulia, Zillow, Realtor etc. that catalogs MLS data for home shoppers and house perverts like me. All these real estate apps have more features in common than they are different but I prefer the Redfin app a little more just because of their home estimate feature. I find their home valuation estimator to be usually within 90% correct of market value which makes the whole houseporn viewing experience more realistic for me. If you like to know the general cost of the area and care about neighborhoods with good schools then Trulia might be better.

It’s not a house shopping thing. I don’t have much of a plan except to satisfy my weird visual attraction to man’s concrete and slab designs.

“That’s Interesting!“

• Panhandling: How Much Money Do Panhandlers REALLY Make?
• How To Make Money As An Instagram Influencer (Internet Fame That Pays?)
• 39 People Who Got Richer AFTER Quitting Their Day Jobs
• Can Being a “Friend-For-Rent” Really Make Extra Money?

Minus the gross decapitated moose head, everything else here is stunning.

Ceiling beams, purrrr.

So much history, so much detail.
Tudor style with the pointy roofs.

I like big beams and I cannot lie.

An age-old guilty pleasure of mine is looking at the creative architectural designs of traditional American manors. American – because we have borrowed from others and create our own style after our own diverse history. I especially enjoy perving on classic century-old restored manors because I can better imagine the superb quality and mindfulness behind each design. I’m talking about the detail-rich, century-old Southern manor beauties you would find in places like St. Louis, Missouri.

Those historical period details are rare in the Pacific Northwest. Up here it’s the classic Craftsman and recently, an endless supply of McModern luxury condos. The McModern is a millennial refinement of the McMansion stereotype, if you believe Baby Boomers carried themselves away with the McMansion, millennials have their own version with the McModern.

These ‘McModerns’ are popping up in Seattle (and in many other large cities) like mushrooms. As I speak, less than 3 blocks away from our residence, they are building an entire city block of McModerns and they were all sold even before completion. It is a stark contrast with the rest of our neighborhood that is traditional, 1,000ish square foot, lakehouse craftsman cottages for retirees and small nuclear families. I don’t think most McModerns are ugly but after you see one, you have seen a lot of them because they lack detail while making it up in sleek stylin’ and coolness.

They go really well with IKEA design furniture and they’re loaded with huge clear windows. I can’t begin to imagine the utility bills associated with these monsters. McModerns tend to be built by “eco-friendly” builders. That makes a lot of sense. Millennials are sort of on the sobering end of the Baby Boomer’s obsession with Californian King sized everythings so you have McModerns and Tiny Homes covering the whole spectrum.

? Related Reads:

• The Hefty Financials Costs Behind Owning a McMansion
• The Confessions of a Houseporn Addict
• 30 Tried-and-True Hacks To Lower Your Electricity Bill

Houseporn doesn’t mean I don’t love my home.

It seems odd and definitely ill-fitting for someone like me who enjoy living and being frugal to profess my love for a perfectly spacious 10-foot vaulted ceiling, travertine marble, and the rich mahogany of finished Western Red Cedar wooden exposed beams but….well, I have needs! Is that odd? To me, it’s like staring at a beautiful man/woman.

But then again, let’s be real, it’s not just McModerns or McMansions. Those 1940s, 7,000 square feet, St. Louis manors would be pretty inconvenient for the modern family today too. You have to walk 2 city blocks to find the right person you’re looking for in those manors. It’s not practical either.

And yet, I end up looking at them for hours by going through each year by sold date. I’ve spent more time browsing 100-year-old refinished period pieces in St. Louis on the Redfin app than the actual city I live in. Hell, I’ve definitely spent more time browsing on the app than the ACTUAL house shopping in real life we did for the current house we live in!

Fun fact: we found our current house on the 2nd day and ended the search. When I told a friend over dinner this she proceeded to spit out her water. Our realtor said we were her speediest clients ever. The entire house search, buy and closing process from start to finish took us less than 35 days.

Believe it or not, I hate house shopping. I hate the waiting, the turmoil, the negotiation, the waiting and the heartbreak when something does go awry. Buying a house is an ordeal. You are fighting yourself and second-guessing everything, especially during inspection and negotiation.

My visual attraction to houseporn has nothing to do with a desire for ownership or house shopping.

It’s just like a relationship. Yeah, you see a spicy lookin’ Dutch craftsman as you walk down the block but it’s just for the eyes. You don’t want to live with the hot Dutch craftsman because you have a functional reliable house waiting for you to come home. Our three story ugly yet functional house brings in $50,000 a year hosting on Airbnb. What’s the craftsman going to do to keep you on different levels for guests? It won’t have a nice view from the third story balcony either.

Here is the thing:

Houseporn is a fantasy. It’s eye candy. HGTV is all unrealistic, spoonfed houseporn to the masses. Looks are important but a good house is more than just looks.

It has to be practical for your needs.

Maybe the additional converted mother-in-law unit will make the house incomplete without a garage to park in but it keeps one mother-in-law sheltered. Maybe the fence hides the exceptional garden you love to show off but it also keeps your dogs from running away.

My husband and I could afford with an 8,000 square foot lot with an L.A. party mansion style infinity pool in the yard…technically…but I don’t want to pay property tax on an 8,000-foot lot nor do I want the maintenance of a pool.

Related Reads:

• How We Handled Our First Year as Homeowners (Home Maintenance & DIYs)
• 10 DIYs For The Most Common Insect & Pest Infestation (On The Cheap)
• 30 Tried-and-True Hacks To Lower Your Electricity Bill

When buying a house, it’s not just about aesthetics.

It’s like finding a soulmate. It’s not about how incredibly attractive they are or how much you would like to be in one. McModerns and McMansions might not be fitting for those of us who would like our utility bills to be under $500 every month in winter.

No, I don’t want to move. We’re happy in the house we live in. There is nothing wrong with our house, we love it.

A person can have houseporn fantasy and it is not a reflection of their characters as a person.

Houseporn viewing does not destroy my relationship with my dormitories. In fact, I grow to love our house more and more every day.

My house is real, with scraps, smears, and the occasional “Ewww the dog is dragging her butt across the floor” remarks.

Those big mansions are imaginary and I cannot love them more than what is my real home. Our house will never be anything like my dream 100-year-old St. Louis manor because…100-year-old houses are a can of worms. Plumbing, heat, and A/C are relatively new inventions and that’s a ripe old age for a house. If we buy an old manor, we have to upkeep an old manor. They’re beautiful but they’re hiiiiiiigh maintenance.

I rather have something that will take care of me at the of the day by keeping me warm and secure even if it’s not what you call an HGTV super model home.

Our reality house fits our needs and our budget but there is nothing wrong with a fantasy about a beautiful, buxom creation occasionally. Home is home.

~

I don’t know but I’m a little ‘awww :(‘ at that number. 22,000 days seems minuscule to me. For some odd reason in my head, I clocked in a six-figure number of days I will be alive so this was a big drop. I was never stellar with math…

Real math: I will be “statistically” alive for 60 more years as a 27-year-old American woman. There are 365 days in a year and each month has about 30 days so that’s about 22,000 days in life I’ve got left.

You can guess my “pleasant” reaction when I finally lazily plugged in the numbers. That is about the average number of days I have left in this life according to the SSI calculator. It’s a rough guess-e-mate and I’m sure there are better ones out there but the point here isn’t to predict death. I never converted it days before and it’s a little depressing.

Considering half of those days for humans are allocated to sleeping, sitting in traffic, and the mandatory daily poop...I really only get about 11,000 days.

Even Charlie bear is sad! Look at that smooshy, smooshy face.

A Day in the Life

The days always go by so quickly thanks to most of us running on routines. My days have always felt short. There’s nothing particularly wrong with short days, the feeling of time passing is just a side effect of your emotions. I learned that life rule when I was 7 and my parents sent me away to school far away from home.

When I didn’t like my life before, I endured in a passive form of existence to make the time go faster. If I made it through the day, that’s a job well done because it couldn’t be forever.

I really like my kick-ass life now but the joke here is…when you’re happy, time unfairly moves much faster. A mere 22,000 days, until I’m no longer of this Earth, is a very, very scary thought now.

 Related Reads:

• 4 Profound Things I Wish I Knew Before Growing Up
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• Top 5 Financial Mistakes I’ve Made In My Early 20s

A very rough draft summary of my day goes like this:

Every morning hubby kisses a half-asleep me goodbye before he leaves for work. It’s our thing. If he doesn’t, I’m pretty sure there would be rain floods and thunder from the sky.

Sometimes I’m half awake for the kiss, sometimes I’m flushed out. I stumbled awake at 10 AM. From that until past 3 PM, I do my rounds of chores and a daily dance regime to keep fit.

Right after my last walk with the dogs, Charlie gets picked up at half past 3 PM and the rest of the day goes towards miscellaneous anything be it outdoor errands, cooking, or writing until 8 PM. Hubby comes home and we goof around and resolve using the rest of the day to sweeten each other’s existence. Then he goes to sleep around 11 PM. The last two hours when hubby is asleep, I lay in bed to finish off my side projects and/or post before passing out for a few hours.

I wake up again anytime between 2 AM to 5 AM randomly, not sure why. But it’s a good chance to catch the east coast blog action because if I don’t do it now, the rest of the day I won’t have the focus or time. Somewhere in there, I will eventually make room for classes for school when I feel like it.

(It’s a pretty chill life.)

Making It Worse

Ignore the amazing magic of compounding, I’m just putting 22,000 the number into my perspective.

*If I earned a $1 every day, I’ll only have $22,000. That’s barely enough for a house downpayment and by then I’ll be dead!

*If I earned $10 every day, it’s $220,000. That’s barely enough to buy a house (average home prices in the US is currently $300,000) with that and by then I’ll be dead!

*If I earned $100 every day (cough, after taxes) that’s $2.2 million dollars. But who cares because that’s barely enough to buy me some immortality and by then I’ll be dead!

You get the picture. Not a lot of time. And yes, this is exactly a side effect to the fact that I just turned 27 and am hating it.

(P.S. If you’re younger than me as of reading this, dude, it’s definitely harder to lose vanity pounds – the old folks weren’t lying – your metabolism bids sayonara after 25. Argh!)

 Related Reads:

• 7 Reasons You Shouldn’t Feel Embarrassed To Attend Community College
• How I Paid Off $20,000 In Student Loans Working Part-Time
• 15 Money Things Young Adults Overlook That Matter

Solutions, Man!

Solution: Write one sentence line about something defining new I learned, or did, or enjoyed doing for that day. Like a lazy man’s diary mixed with progress. What’s one sentence that defined today and made today worth it?

Easy peasy! In the end, I wouldn’t have a million things to skim through. I know I will definitely have more than 22,000 footnote worthy entries though! It should only take about 30 seconds to jot down and the upside of having these footnote memories would be huge!

I’m unhappy with how little days I have left so to ease my peevishness I needed a practical solution to make every day seem a little cooler than “oh well, there goes another day.”

But we’re all pressed for time. Who has time for long journals anymore?

This quick daily exercise would be good in preventing:

*Feeling like a lack of progress.

*Feeling like the days blend together too much.

*Dealing with mortality and aging.

*Flushing out what brings you joy/matters to you, fairly quickly.

*Like a personal goal tracker but way less demanding and makes you look at the positive every single day.

If I use a standard size 70-page college-ruled notebook that has 33 lines (trust me, I counted and looked it up to make sure) and wrote one sentence about one day on every line, at the end of my life I will have between 6 to 10 notebooks of “highlight reels.” Considering those notebooks come in a pack of 10 for $10 bucks…boy that really makes me nervous how little 22,000 days is. Eeeeek!

Recommended Reads:

• Top 14 Reasons Why Some People Don’t Save Money
• 13 Sensible Defining Characteristics Of Upper Middle Class People

Daily Entries

It could be anything from “I got married today” to “I found a penny in the subway train” as long as it was relevant to your growth, development, and can serve as a single remainder of something terrific you did on one of those remaining 22,000 days on Earth.

Every single day I wake up, I should be thankful for one thing, one action, one occurrence, one occasion, one emotion worth jotting down real quick.

This exercise is good for the big picture too. If at the last setting sun of my 22,000 days, I would be so lucky to have accomplished most big ticket thing I’ve wanted to do but I have no memories of my journey (AKA “the highlight reel”) then I would be pretty sad. The journey matters just as much as the ending so it’s important to keep some track.

*Entry Day #22000

My blog post was featured on Rockstar Finance (awesome) on my 27th birthday! Then I went to the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle where I heard for the first time…the pack howl of real wolves AND I saw a little wallaby trying to lick its own crotch (also pretty cool).

*Entry Day #21999

Took my visiting friends out to a seafood buffet because they had a ‘birthday person eats free’ deal as long as we can bring 3 other people along for my friend’s b-day. I learned how to eat a crawfish properly (without help) for the first time in my life. They’re like dense little shrimps!

*Entry Day #21998

Financial Orchid came to visit me again and we went to the mall to buy nothing (because frugality is awesome.) Then we all went out to a small divey Korean restaurant and I had the best Taiyaki (red bean fish shaped pancakes) I’ve ever eaten in my entire life. Top 5 in the best-tasting desserts of my life so far and it’s only $1 for one Taiyaki! Mmmm!

*Entry Day #21997

I got an idea to start tracking one noteworthy memory a day. I feel like my life goals are big and long so I need small little accomplishments to make me feel like “the life in between” isn’t going to waste. I’m totally in love with this idea. I haven’t decided to jot it on the blog publicly or just buy some notebooks privately.

Related: Step by Step Guide on Starting a Blog

Sometimes (most of the time) my ideas are stupid but I’m all “in here” so I can’t tell. But it’s a very low point of entry for something that might be invaluable to have down the road. I would love to be bedridden and sick at 88 with a few holographic notebooks (assuming that will be a thing) to glance through the highlights of my 22,000 days!

**UPDATE**

You can read the official first entry: Day 21,996 to Day 21,992

Concluding Thoughts

If this is a quarter life crisis then a solution of a few sentences per day is not a bad result. At least I haven’t decided on the color of my Ferarri yet

Some people find it’s effortless to look into the past and find a gem of a memory but that’s not how my brain works. I need a little kick here and there to make sure that every day is special. I need something to make me go “oh, that was a ‘worth it’ day because I was able to ________.” It calms the internal voice that’s constantly screaming at me to find meaning within and make life worthy of impact. Maybe it would be helpful for some of you out there like me?

~

How would you like to:

*Run a profitable, successful, totally set up business for free?

*Free college and job placement with all the right connections?

*Marry an heir, have some kids, and be set for life?

How about all 3? Just because you were born for being you.

Spoiled Adults

A spoiled adult is…an unpleasant sight. They can be difficult to deal with. My friend, Soaps, has a tendency to lie and does as she pleases especially when it comes to hiding things from her parents. Regardless of consequences, I remember facepalming myself on several occasions when she tells me her latest scheme to hide new debts from her mother.

Her parents aren’t monsters. Her parents are normal upper-class folks. Their goal now is to guide her to become an independent adult who will be in an OK position in life without their intervention. That’s not a huge goal or even an odd goal. Every single parent out there wants to have independent adult children.

But it’s hard. You can’t undo a childhood of enabling acts and having parents giving her everything.

“That’s Interesting!“

• Panhandling: How Much Money Do Panhandlers REALLY Make?
• How To Make Money As An Instagram Influencer (Internet Fame That Pays?)
• 39 People Who Got Richer AFTER Quitting Their Day Jobs
• Can Being a “Friend-For-Rent” Really Make Extra Money?

Jealous of a Friend

I’m not going to lie, there are some moments I’m very jealous of Soapy for her life and her parents. My childhood sucked big time compared to hers.

Now I’m just being completely honest here. I believe you can be an objective friend and support them even if there’s jealousy creeping behind some of it.

It’s kind of cathartic to know it’s human nature.

(Unless I’m the only person that has ever felt this way then I may have just self-confessed as a b*tch ?)

I resent my friend Soaps sometimes because of all the global poverty in the world and very few blessings…she was born with such a blessing.

There’s nothing wrong being born privileged to me at all. UNLESS it goes to those who waste it.

To me, that would be the ultimate sin and that’s my philosophy.

And that’s why I continue struggling every day with feeling like a lucky raindrop even though everybody can just tell me to sit back and enjoy being married to my well off Mr. Hippo.

I don’t want to be born capable of contributing to mankind but choosing to not advance or connect with mankind in any shape or form. Even worst, causing more problems and leading a life of nothing.

Yeah yeah, I’m a conventional model citizen…it’s enough to make rebel boy poet Rimbaud roll over in his grave.

~

For those of you who are new here, here is a synopsis of my friend, Soap. She is one of the many colorful characters I’ve noted from my life.

I added this portion so no one is missing a piece of the puzzle:

Soap is one of my best friends. She is also the daughter of a very affluent, multi-millionaire family. She grew up in Salt Lake City, UT. Her childhood was what one would call pure opulence and she had many privileges most people can only dream of.

Her sister is married to the wayward son of a Chinese billionaire and Soap herself…well, she is in her 30s with a drinking problem. She has terrible health and cannot hold down a stable job. At age 30, she started with $80,000 in refinanced consumer and medical debt and some unpaid taxes as well.

Although her parents can easily wipe the debt away, they think it would be better for Soaps to learn how to manage her own finances by learning to live frugally and focusing on her career and education. Both of Soap’s parents fall under what you call, the sensible rich.

Soapy’s parents immigrated to the United States from China in the 1970s. They’re open minded and highly educated (in contrast to my own immigrant parents). They educated themselves, worked very hard, and became successful engineers and then entrepreneurs within two decades. Now they want to pass on their successful international trading business but to no heir.

Soap was the only heir of choice but she repeatedly declined to learn her family’s business. Now her parents have stopped asking. To Soaps, her parental life work has no appeal what-so-ever. It is not how she wants to live her life, even at the guranteed of wealth.

Read the previous posts in Soapy’s Odessey:

• 21 Frugal Pantry Staples List on a Limited Budget
• Practical Budgets For People Bad With Money
• How To Effectively Overcome Credit Card Addiction
• 3 Signs When Frugality Isn’t Worth It & What To Do
• Why You Still Need An Emergency Fund While In Debt
• How Soapy is Geoarbitraging in China
• What Am I Doing With My Life? I Need Help With My Life.
• How To Afford $800 Shoes When You’re $100k in Debt

~

Resentment for Her Wasting Life

Because it’s my personal belief that every human is born with a capacity to contribute, it sets off a lot of contradictory feelings when one of your greatest confidants in life is set on wasting hers. Some days I feel a slight shameful resentment towards Soap. She could have it “all” in my eyes.

I care a lot about her as a friend but that doesn’t mean I have to like her crappy life choices.

The thing that knocks me the most is…she had every opportunity in the book. Why can’t she have done something with that? It’s like getting a game and playing it on Tutorial mode…and then not listening to the tutorial.

(I am super chill with my over-reaching terminology of “contributing to mankind.” If you went out and did 3 minutes of work, then you made a difference somewhere. I am not strict with that at all.)

But Soap is largely what I define as wasteful. She doesn’t work-work currently, right now, she gets paid to drink with her rich friends. The last thing she told me via messenger was:

“I just spent 17…legit…17 hours playing Candy Crush yesterday. I had to lean in the corner next to the charger port to play. I was so sleepy I just crashed. What the f*ck be my life…”

When she told me that a few nights ago, I just hit my limit.

It is just the perfect summary of everything that has happened. It is integral to why she is where she is in life. And even with her support system (including one very annoying blogger yours truly) she still manages to dig deeper without wanting to flail for survival.

That was about all of the Soap updates I could take because I was about 99.9% full of the “What Are You Doing With Your Life?” resentment meter.

I think I was mad and exhausted so I just put the phone down and decided to not speak with her until the morning.

Soaps have had a lot of chances in life to start over. She gets these chances to this day:

*Full training to inherit their trading business.

*Her family is in full financial support if she returns to college and graduate.

*Be set up with someone from their high society’s circle, marry an heir, then be a mom.

How awesome is that? Any sane person reading this would holler, “Hey those are awesome deals! Wish that was me!”  And only a small portion of people who work hard every day gets to have privileges like these for their kids.

My parents worked manual jobs to make sure we make it through the month. At the end of that 17 years in the United States, they have nothing to show for it. I would have killed for 1/16 of the opportunities the universe presented to Soap from birth.

More and more, it seems I’m just coming from an area of jealousy. Every time I talk to her, I just want to scream:

“If I had your life and set up, I would have done this and this and this. I wouldn’t continue to squander it playing phone games, watching Netflix, and daydreaming about free vacations for years on end.”

I’m sure it’s not pleasant for her to hear that because I did tell her that several times before. It drives me nuts. There’s so much potential and no drive despite her given smartness and her privilege. To me, it’s an utter waste.

Conclusion

When she got a job or right before she left to geoarbitrage in China, I was very proud of her. I would feel no resentment on her life if she allowed herself to get ahead. Because she could if she wanted to. In fact, I’m third in line behind her parents and grandparents to help her.

She was there for me when I needed her as with all good friends. I believe she’s a fantastic friend and overall a good person. But is she conventionally an independent functioning citizen? Not really…

It’s not easy to help someone who is more or less content with the bare minimum. And I think I just have to accept that. My visions in life, her parents’ vision in life for Soaps = isn’t for Soaps.

It’s not her goal. It was never her goals. She doesn’t want to own a boring business and do business things. She doesn’t want to go back to school. And she doesn’t want some set up by her parents’ and married off.

Renegade life!

She doesn’t want any of those things on the list enough to give up her freedom in life. If her freedom includes being able to play 17 hours of Candy Crush, freelancing for just enough to feed herself and pay rent and maybe some economic stimulus from her family occasionally. So be it.

When she gets older, her parents will layout plans for her after they pass so she’s taken care of. Although spoiled, she is still their child and loved. I remember about 6 months ago she told me something in passing:

“I’m pretty comfortable with my life. I work when I want to and make my $2,000 a month. I have enough to feed myself and pay rent. My life isn’t great but it’s very comfortable for the work I put in. I have friends who can take me out to lunch and my life comes with a lot of freedom. Pssh, I don’t think about debts. I pay it like I pay the rent when it comes, it’s the same thing basically.”

That’s an interesting way to think about life compared to……….every single grain of personal finance.

And that’s all she wants from life for the amount of work, that’s her ideal. Some people are OK with less as long as they can have their fun. She doesn’t mind debt. It’s just like rent to her. I don’t agree with that (nor does her mother) but you can pull a horse to water, it doesn’t mean you can make the horse drink.

That’s just…how Soap is as a person. You can’t change a person so it’s better to move past those feelings of resentment and disappointment.

Whatever resentment and jealousy I feel against a friend or someone like Soaps…well, that’s my issue. Not hers.

What would you do if you had a child like Soaps? Would you throw your hands up at this point? What would you implement or nothing at all?