You can do this.
Flip your thinking. Saving money on coffee every day doesn’t add up as fast as eliminating your largest expense. Housing costs.
I was 40. A single dad with three kids. Inherited tons of debt (89k) in the divorce I didn’t even know existed.
I was tired of losing income to things outside of my control. After Desert Storm the Marines downsized. In 2008 I was laid off from a police department because of the recession.
I found the book Rich Dad Poor Dad and BiggerPockets and it took 6 years to reach bad debt free. Then two years to reach fi. Now I’ll never have to work again in my life. I choose to work because I love my job. But I’ll never “have” to.
I don’t live frugally. I eat out almost every day. Go to the movie theatre once a week. Drive a paid off nice truck, spend one month a year in Colombia or Thailand.
I did this by house hacking. I started by moving into an apartment and renting out my house. To make sure I could handle being a landlord. Once I decided I could, I purchased a duplex. Moved into one side and rented out the other. This almost reduced my housing costs to zero. Increasing my savings rate (by actually letting me have one) Now I have three duplexes, a fourplex and the single family house is paid off. My rental profit is more than twice my living expenses.
Now 100% of my W2 income and 50% of rental profit is saved for the next deal.
Because money from work is no longer important I was able to found a non profit that does job placement assistance. If I never found FIRE I wouldn’t be able to help the people I do for free.
I’ve been a Marine, a cop and a truck driver. These are fun jobs but they don’t pay 6 figures.
If I can do this anyone can. It just takes knowledge and a plan.
You got this.
Guest Post by Dion McNeeley
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