DIY investing sounds wonderfully empowering. No commissions. No advisors pushing products. No relationship manager calling every quarter with a recommendation that mysteriously happens to suit your needs. Just you, your money, and complete control. At least that’s the story we tell ourselves. The part nobody talks about is how lonely that control can become. About…
Continue reading →Last month saw the launch of NaviPlan: A Privacy-Focused Multi-asset Tracker and Goal Planner. This tool, developed by Gokul of Naviran Technologies in association with freefincal, can be used to track mutual funds, stocks, and FDs. The user can tag these to financial goals and track their progress. The tool also provides options to lower…
Continue reading →We publish a list of stocks with low volatility and momentum each month. We provide data for BSE 500 and BSE 100 stocks. Update: Starting March 2026, the screening metrics have been significantly updated (details below). There are now three different screener files available. (1) Stocks with low volatility and momentum from the BSE 100…
Continue reading →A reader asks, “What Is the Safe Spending Limit for a ₹1 Crore Retirement Corpus?” In other words, if my retirement corpus is Rs. one Crore, what should be the maximum (initial) expenses so that I can draw an inflation-indexed income? Naturally, there is no universal answer as it depends on years in retirement, inflation…
Continue reading →I was recently asked in an interview, “How can I emotionally handle long periods of poor returns in the equity markets?” – a discussion. Many readers accuse us of scaring them by stating the factually obvious: Long-term equity investment comes with no guarantees of success! So, we discuss how to stay invested in equity without worrying…
Continue reading →“Don’t burn your house to smoke out a rat.” It is an old proverb, but its relevance has never faded. Literally, it means destroying something valuable in an attempt to solve a relatively small problem. In practice, it describes situations in which the solution causes far more damage than the original issue. Recently, I was…
Continue reading →Every strong house needs a foundation before you decorate the rooms. In money, that foundation is just two things: term insurance and health insurance. They quietly hold up everything else. But here is the strange part. Nearly half of Indians still do not have term insurance, and most who have health cover have too little….
Continue reading →These are the freefincal handpicked list of mutual funds. New and old investors can use it according to their specific needs. The list, titled “PlumbLine,” has been published since September 2017 to help beginners use the freefincal robo advisor tool. Most importantly, Plumbline is a mix of my opinions, skin in the game (where I…
Continue reading →Many assume that their expenses will decrease after retirement and that they do not need as large a corpus as computed using our current lifestyle. This is a mistake. A 35-year-old once told me, “My expenses will be lower when I turn 60 because I will travel less, eat out less, etc.” There could be…
Continue reading →A friend recently asked me to review her father’s finances. He’s 75, with a liquid net worth of ₹3.5 crore, but every rupee is quietly held for the generation that comes after him. Meeting him reminded me of a story. About the author: Abhishek Kumar is part of a freefincal’s curated list of fee-only financial advisors and a fee-only…
Continue reading →Everyone instantly recognizes rental income as passive income—potentially the oldest one. Real estate has an irresistible allure, which naturally leads to inquiries about its potential use as a source of passive income, especially after retirement. We discussed how passive income is crucial to your retirement plan and how to build the ideal retirement portfolio beyond…
Continue reading →This article compares my stock portfolio with an equivalent investment in a Nifty index fund and the Nifty 100 Low Volatility 30 TR index. We post this comparison each month. Before we begin, new readers need to understand the context of these investments. Update: We recently added a new tool to the freefincal investor circle…
Continue reading →Here are some questions you need to ask before you retire early or on schedule. We also include recommendations of the freefincal robo advisor tool where relevant. 1. Do I have a strong emergency fund to handle unexpected expenses? We recommend at least 5% of the corpus. 2. Do I have a robust health insurance…
Continue reading →I once watched a client stare at his portfolio for three full minutes, certain his screen had frozen. His net worth hadn’t moved in six months. “What’s happening here?” he finally asked. It wasn’t broken. It was working exactly as designed. He had just hit the cruellest stretch of the entire wealth-building journey, which is…
Continue reading →This is a debt mutual fund screener for portfolio selection, tracking, and learning. It also includes hybrid funds that invest in bonds. It will satisfy investors seeking to invest in money market funds, banking PSU funds, and similar instruments. The credit quality of the portfolio’s bonds and the bond maturity profile can be tracked. Instead…
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