Personal Finance
Financial Independence is Here! My Reflections On How The Journey Began
In August 2020, Sarah and I met our financial goals. We reached “enough” and will begin forging a new path, not driven by money. The financial independence journey took me 37 years to accomplish and over half of those years I spent in the passenger seat. This post is about my early days and is dedicated to family, friends and mentors who started me down the path to financial freedom. A collage of mentors from top left to bottom right. Uncle Chuck and myself on the farm, Grandpa and I on Memorial Day, Grandma shucking corn with George, Mom [...]
2019’s Lifestyle Altering Bike vs. Ride Challenge
2019 was a lifestyle altering year where I committed to bike more than I drive. The seed was planted in 2017. We moved from the Four Corners to Houston Texas, purchased a home, flooded and re-built. Due to Hurricane Harvey it took us longer than expected to settle into a normal routine, but when we did I soon realized how much I missed the regular occurrence of outdoor adventures with nearby and active friends. It wasn’t long before my mind was racing on ideas to fill the gap. The quick and easy answer was to sacrifice family time and go [...]
The Best 2020 Cash Back Credit Card for Savers
Christmas and the gift-giving season is usually here faster than we expect. As you begin shopping for yourself and others, we want you equipped with the best credit card on the market. There are many choices for each financial lifestyle stage (borrower, spender, saver) and reward goal (cash savings, college savings, travel, debt transfers) but at HIT our focus is on savers and cash back. There is plenty of competition in the credit card market, which is a benefit to the cardholder who can seek out the best deal (or finish reading this blog post, hehe). The competition has led [...]
I Have More Than Double The Likelihood of Dying As My Wife! Should I Buy Insurance?
Death and Disability - What’s in your future and should you buy insurance? I have a 1 in 2700 chance of dying this year, and my wife’s odds are 1 in 5900. If 1 in 2700 wasn’t sobering enough, being at the luxurious age of 35 I have a 50% chance of becoming disabled for 90 days or more before turning 65. I find it easier to ignore the data and go on living with my head in the sand but in reality, I need the data to remind me of how life on earth is temporal and does not [...]
DIY Investing Is The New Norm And Here’s 10 Reasons Why
The golden age of investing is here. The internet, discount brokerages, and free index funds have brought together a trifecta of investing bliss for DIY'ers. My savings journey started 12 years ago when I retired from professional baseball and started work as an engineer. My initial thoughts as a saver was to find an expert in the field, a genuine financial advisor. Unfortunately, at the time I did not look in the right places, and the more interviews I did the sicker I felt. The research was leading me to believe financial advisors were no more than classed-up car salesmen, [...]
Fund the Roth! Now Open to All Savers
The day after our home flooded, I went back for a few essentials that did not make our initial rescue. The trip began with a friend and I sitting in traffic for 2 hours trying to cross the flooded bayou and finished with us wading through dirty water for about a mile. As we came around the last corner and I saw our home, it hit me, I had I forgotten the house keys! Sure enough, after wading through the last 100 feet of water the front door was locked; the side door was locked; the garage door was locked; and [...]