In the seventh edition of personal finance audits by readers, we meet 30-year old Rohit whose early struggles led him, to start investing early in a goal-based manner. As regular readers may be aware, we publish a personal financial audit each December – this is the 2020 edition: How my retirement portfolio performed in 2020. This…

In this article, Venkat describes how an incident in a “Xerox shop” changed his outlook on financial independence and financial literacy.  Venkat, 32, changed his perspective towards personal finance when he came across the idea of FIRE – financial independence and early retirement. He then invested more than ten hours as a hobby and went on…

In the sixth edition of personal finance audits by readers, we meet Abhisek; learn how he achieved his first goal – fund his marriage 100% and use that as education and inspiration to move towards financial independence. As regular readers may be aware, we publish a personal financial audit each December – this is the…

Let us discuss a question received a few days ago: “What return should a 30-year-old investor aim for their retirement portfolio?” Retirement is assumed to be a good 25 years away. The first step of having a clear goal: Why the money is needed and when it is needed is already part of the question….

In the next edition of personal finance audits by readers, we feature an account of why Mr Tailor had to postpone his financial independence & early retirement plans by four years. As regular readers may be aware, we publish a personal financial audit each December – this is the 2020 edition: How my retirement portfolio performed…

I have been tracking the amount invested for my goals in the same Excel sheet for the last ten years (2011 to 2020). These are some lessons from the journey. This sheet is only for tracking the amount invested and not its current market value. Between 2010-11, my retirement planning cash flow projection was in…

A few days ago, we discussed the lifestyle of Santhosh a middle-class crorepati. I received three questions from young earners that can be paraphrased as, “I cannot be like Santhosh. I like to live a good life with a car and expensive smartphones. However, I feel guilty that if I continued my lifestyle, it will…

The notion of retirement has changed considerably over the years. Retirement for our parents meant a complete dependence on salary up to retirement and then complete dependence on pension afterwards. If we build a well-diversified retirement portfolio – a retirement basket as PV Subramanyam of subramoney.com would say – we can approach retirement with confidence and…

A very happy Diwali/Deepavali to all readers. In this article, I share some lessons from interacting with my friend and mentor. Getting this published took quite a bit of persuasion, and he asked that any specific references to his past be removed so that his friends/family could not identify him. Let us refer to him…

Here is why we should invest both money and time as much as possible when our parents are young and able, else it may be too late to rectify. If you are under 35, that is a young earner, then this post is for you. If you are above that age, then you are likely…

FIRE in personal finance is an acronym for “Financial Independence, Retire Early”. Stay long enough in any personal finance forum, and you would realize that there is a lot of confusion about what is FIRE and more importantly, what it is not! I requested SEBI registered fee-only investment advisor, S. R. Srinivasan (who has shared…