How I Stopped Chasing Returns and Finally Built a Goal-Based Plan

Published on / By M. Pattabiraman Twitter: @pattufreefincal

Published: March 22, 2026 at 6:00 am

I have been a follower of Freefincal for 3+ years now and have immensely benefited from Pattu sir’s articles and fellow reader stories. I wish to share my journey, which I hope will help someone just starting their financial journey. 

About this series: I am grateful to readers for sharing intimate details about their financial lives, which benefits us all. Some of the previous editions are linked at the bottom of this article. You can also access the full reader story archive.

Opinions expressed in reader stories do not necessarily represent the views of freefincal or its editors. We must appreciate multiple solutions to the money management puzzle and empathise with diverse views. Articles are typically not checked for grammar unless it is necessary to convey the right meaning and preserve the tone and emotions of the writers.

If you would like to contribute to the DIY community in this manner, send your audits to freefincal AT Gmail dot com. You can publish them anonymously if you wish.

Please note: We welcome such articles from young earners who have just started investing. See, for example, this piece by a 29-year-old: How I track financial goals without worrying about returns. We also have a “mutual fund success stories” series. See, for example, how mutual funds helped me achieve financial independence. Now, over to the reader.

I started my first job at 21 after completing my engineering at a private college in South Tamil Nadu. I lived frugally in the first few years in Chennai, sending most of my salary back home to repay my educational loan and cover home expenses. After closing the loan, I joined an MBA program by availing another loan and used the EPF balance I had accumulated in my first job for personal expenses for 2 years.

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At 26, I passed out with a decent salary, which allowed me some disposable income. I prepaid the loan by making additional payments each month. Higher salary came with higher tax, hence I started looking for tax saving options and ended up opening a demat account to invest in ELSS, as that ‘gave’ the highest return with the lowest lock-in. I invested the minimum required to fill the 80C quota.

I got married the next year, which wiped out any savings I had accumulated until then. Pressure from parents & in-laws to buy a house meant that I started looking for a flat in Bangalore with no corpus. I paid a token advance for a flat, sold some family jewels and pledged the rest to prepare for the self-contribution payment. As fate would have it, the loan was not approved because of a few legal gaps with the property that builders couldn’t address. I got back most of the token advance, luckily, and, under family pressure, invested the money from the jewels in a plot near my hometown.

I made more mistakes in the next couple of years by investing in IPOs and stocks based on colleagues’ tips. I made profits with some and losses in others. Overall, my broker consistently made money. Chasing higher returns, I also invested in the ‘last 1 yr highest return’ funds, which were often thematic, opportunities/small cap funds or the top-rated funds. I learnt about funds’ performance going through cycles only much later. 

After a gap, the family again started pressuring to invest in real estate. I started saving this time in debt funds (corporate & gilt) to create a corpus, and bought another plot at age 30. Instead, had I invested in equity during this time, I would have benefited from the post-COVID bull run.

I switched jobs in 2020, and during that time, I came across fin-influencers on social media. I watched countless videos that gave me too many ideas, I started multiple SIPs – some in index, factor-based, fof, intl funds – you name it, and I had it (portfolio had 30 MFs at one point). I did weekly SIPs to ‘average’ my cost, learnt about technical analysis, tried my hand at day trading, options/futures, etc. Thankfully, my fear of loss meant I allocated very little corpus to my trading adventures and stopped them once I realised I was wasting time and money.

After my son was born in 2021, I started researching more about long term investing and building wealth. I covered some basics, like Term insurance, health insurance for my mother & emergency fund. I stumbled upon freefincal, which helped me to understand the importance of retirement planning, asset allocation & risks. Some of Pattu sir’s videos were eye openers; his Tamil videos give the feeling of a father teaching his son. In the last 3 years, I have stopped chasing returns, consolidated my previous equity investments, and invested consistently with a goal-based plan. Here’s my audit.

Goal #1 –  Retirement/Financial Independence in 2040

Before using a retirement calculator, I assumed 1 Cr would be the dream corpus for retirement. Post calculations, factoring in moderate returns and higher inflation, I found out that I needed much more for a comfortable financial independence (~10Cr)

Reader's retirement corpus and investment growth
Reader’s retirement corpus and investment growth

Numbers have been modified to show only the growth from the 2023 base. The current corpus is 19% of the goal in present value terms. Current Equity: Debt is 55:45  (95%+ large cap (Nifty 50 index majorly) and 5% Mid/small cap). Planning to reach 60:40 in 2026.

I have been able to increase my investments aggressively thanks to job changes & above average salary hikes since COVID. I’m currently investing ~20% more than the required monthly investment. I’m not sure if I will be able to keep up the same pace in the future, but – Make hay while the sun shines!

Goal #2 – Son’s college education in 2040 (1Cr)

I had initially thought of going with a unified goal plan, but this year, I have switched to investing & tracking them separately to keep it simple. I will have to revisit the corpus required based on my son’s interests in high school. For now, I’m assuming he will do a Engg course in a private college. I have invested only in Equity MFs to date and plan to add debt from 2026.

I have also booked a flat in Bangalore now and will be moving to our own house after living on rent since childhood in 2026, which is a big milestone for my family. Overall, despite making multiple mistakes early on, I was able to get back on track thanks to course corrections along the way and increased income. 

Goal of giving back to society: Coming from a middle-class family with no ancestral wealth, I have made it this far thanks to the education I received and my mother’s support. For the last 3 years, I have been supporting a girl child through Melvin Sir’s program to give back.

Wishing you all a happy and prosperous 2026!

Reader stories published earlier:

As regular readers may know, we publish a personal financial audit each December – this is the 2024 edition: Portfolio Audit 2024: The Annual Review of My Goal-Based Investments. We asked regular readers to share how they review their investments and track financial goals.

These published audits have had a compounding effect on readers. If you would like to contribute to the DIY community in this manner, send your audits to freefincal AT Gmail. You can also publish them anonymously.