My main goal* was to build an investment and cash portfolio of $1,120,000* ($1,000,000 to retire on and $120,000 to pay off the house) in 1500 days**, starting from 1/1/2013 and ending in February of 2017. I made my goal in 2016, my 1500 Days are over, and I’ve left my job. In the interest of openness, I’ll continue to share my numbers.
2020 started out with a bang in the 1500 household. Our portfolio was up over $83,582 while the S&P 500 was down. Craziness.
Tesla was responsible for almost half of that big gain. My 168.15 shares of Tesla started the month at $424.50 and ended at $650.57 for a gain of $38,013. Craziness. I wrote a post last week about my thoughts on Tesla, so I won’t elaborate more here.
January Spending: $9,372!!!
Whoah, what a helluva way to kick off the year! Older Daughter needed braces and we paid for them upfront to save some money. They still set us back $3,763. Arrrgh!
One thought I’ve had recently is that my initial goal of retiring on a $1,000,000 was off. And by “off,” I mean too low.
When I made my $1,000,000 ($40,000 per year) goal, we hadn’t kept close track of our spending. When we did start keeping track, we discovered that we spent over $40,000 per year, even after subtracting our mortgage which we had since decided not to pay off. I found it’s the unplanned, one-time expenses that crash the budget.
Oh well, I’m glad we overshot our saving and still have income. I lose no sleep over our numbers. Thankfully FIRE life worked out way better than planned in every way including money.
Most Fun Expense
I joined a group of friends for adventures at a mountain cabin. It was a fantastic way to start the new year.
January Performance Update
Our investment portfolio (stocks, rental home, coworking space, trailer park, and other real estate deals) started the month at $2,035,040 and ended at $2,118,622 for a gain of $83,582. Add in our primary residence and our net worth now sits at $2,483,622:
2020 (as of 1/31/2020)
- Days elapsed: 31
- January gains: $83,582
Since the Start (1/1/2013)
- Days elapsed: 2586
- Gains since 1/1/2013: $1,532,579
Portfolio and Net Worth
- Investment portfolio and cash value: $2,035,040
- Net worth (primary home included!): $2,483,622
January Real Estate Income: $8,131.02
- Syndication deals: $4,000
- Rental house: $1,800
- Coworking space: $1,000
- Mortgage notes: $433.34
- Private loan #1: $541.67
- Private loan #2: $293.51
- Private loan #3: $62.50
Stock Picking
I always worry when I write posts about stocks like Tesla because I don’t want to inspire anyone to do anything crazy. I’ve done well as a stock picker, but I’ve also had a lot of luck. Buying Google in 2004 was speculative. So was buying Tesla in 2012 when it was weeks away from bankruptcy. And I’ve made some really bad moves too:
- Selling Apple about 3 years ago was a horrible mistake
- I got caught up in the DotCom insanity. I had a fund called NetNet which went from $10 to $120 before $0. I held CMGI too which went bonkers before going broke.
Index funds aren’t quite as sexy, but the strategy is solid. So, that’s where almost all new money goes now.
Just like skateboarding, index investing is not a crime.
*My goal wasn’t to have $1,120,000 at the end of 1500 days, but at any time before the day count was up. Why? It all goes back to the 4% Rule. Remember that our little friend, Mr. 4%, is nothing more than the most conservative safe withdrawal rate. Since my investment portfolio now sits at $1,550,000, I can spend about $62,000 in my first year of retirement.
**My original goal was $1,000,000 and no debt, I later raised the goal by $120,000 to $1,120,000 because I will have debt in the form of a mortgage and I firmly believe in not paying it off (LOOK at the MONEY I’m MAKING!). My compromise was to have enough money put away to cover the mortgage at the time of retirement.
***This is an affiliate link. If you sign up, the blog (me) makes some cold, hard, beautiful, cash. Personal Capital is a totally free and awesome way to keep watch over your investments. It’s worth it for the fee analyzer alone. I would never recommend anything that I don’t personally use and completely believe in, so give it a try. If you’ve already signed up through the link, please know that you are a fine person of above-average intelligence.
****My 401(k) contributions include my own, Mrs. 1500’s, and the contributions from my corporation. Self-employment with a solo 401(k) is a very powerful savings tool. I should have done this years ago.
Join the 10s who have signed up already!
Subscribing will improve your life in incredible ways*.
*Only if your life is pretty bad to begin with.
Ha, nice dude! As much as I envy successes with individual stocks like this I will not succumb. I learned my lessons back in the dotcom days and found it to be just not worth the time/stress/risk anymore.
And nice air on the board. I was doing some of that recently myself, and I shouldn’t be doing it either 😉
Dave @ Accidental FIRE recently posted…T.G.I.F. Friday: Volume 10
Ha, I got burned bad during the dotcom days. Some people never learn the lesson! 🙂
Snowboarding! My shoulder still hurts from one of the botched landings… Oof.
Every time I read your posts about Tesla, or Apple, or Amazon, or Facebook, I begin to think you’re one of those rich guys saying “Do as I say, not as I do.” 😉
I’m teasing a bit, but it’s kind of like Warren Buffett telling people to buy index funds when he never has!
Hard facts being what they are, you did very well investing in the previously mentioned tech stocks. They’re great businesses that show no signs of slowing down.
Congrats on your continued success!
Mr. Tako recently posted…Don’t Miss Out On Life’s Incredible Abundance
Thanks for the kind comments Mr. Tako! Stocks are a tricky game and I’m thankful for my success.
Awesome month! You can live off of your rental income, so the stocks are just gravy.
SWFL Financial Coaching recently posted…Put Your Tax Refund to Work
Life is good.
that cabin weekend looks like a grand time. speaking of getting old, so far this year i’ve gone 12 rounds with shingles (about 3.5 weeks total) and enjoyed one kidney stone. welcome to middle age!
i have bunch of growth stocks that have done well too. shopify and nvidia are killing it. i think we’ll sort of budget for about 10k extra/year in spending for those lumpy years with big one-time expenses. i think if you build in some slop and a little extra and resist the urge to “spend it all” in lower expense years then you’ll be ready for a rainy day. we’ll see how the plan goes.
freddy smidlap recently posted…Malevolent Missy Invests, Stock Series #6 We bought SolarEdge Technologies (SEDG)
Congratulations on Tesla. I am a huge fan of Elon as well. And he is practically my neighbor where I can drive by and watch how the combination of Tesla and Solar City will make us all greener.
In order to temper my own feelings of genius at picking Tesla I went back and analyzed my biggest losers. Bought me back to earth lol
Financial Freedom Countdown recently posted…My 4 Worst Investments And How You Can Learn From My Mistakes
“In order to temper my own feelings of genius at picking Tesla I went back and analyzed my biggest losers. Bought me back to earth lol”
Love this because I notice my own biases all the time! It’s easy to remember and acknowledge the winners. The losers don’t excite me nearly as much…
Gogogogogogo! I’m an unashamed stock picker. It has worked out. Except for like you, I was SHORT TSLA in January. Ouch.
Financial Velociraptor recently posted…Sunday Punday
“One thought I’ve had recently is that my initial goal of retiring on a $1,000,000 was off. And by “off,” I mean too low.”
I would love to see a deeper analysis of this statement. Not the math part but why you thought this would be sufficient and why it isn’t any longer. I’m really interested in learning from people who have achieved FIRE and some of there “if I did it all over again…” analysis to help those of us still on the journey.
Hey bdub!
Thanks for the feedback. I have a post coming up about mistakes and I’ll include some analysis about why $1,000,000 wasn’t enough.
I just bought another stock to add to my portfolio but seriously, that’s the last one. I’m going to stop now. I know index funds make more sense as a long term strategy, I just couldn’t resist the call of the dividends one last time. Eventually I’ll need to sell off this portfolio and put it all into the index funds.
Revanche @ A Gai Shan Life recently posted…Real Estate Investing #17: A less irritable (numbers-based) assessment
How’s your portfolio now?
Down $65,000 from it’s all-time high. Kinda disappointed as I was hoping for more of a correction.
Hey, 1500, just wondering how you’re a doin’ after the Dow just logged its worst 2-day percentage drop in two years. You okay there bud? Remember what Warren said, “Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.”
Now Maverick, no reason to get snarky. I’m in it for the long term and little gyrations (down $65,000 from my all-time high) don’t make me lose sleep. And the good news is that I’m still wearing shorts, so my personal gyrations aren’t titillating either! 🙂
But if you must know how I’m doing, I’m really disappointed. Since I’m still in the accumulation phase, I was starting to get excited that we’d have a 20% off sale instead of the 6 or 8% or whatever it was. Bah.
With that said, I don’t wish for suffering or pain on my fellow humans. I was hoping for some irrational gloom!
Whew! Glad to hear ya got it together man. Wasn’t bein’ snarky, just genuine concern dude. I don’t believe this “correction” is fully over yet. Stock prices and profits need to more clearly align. It’s better, but I’m keeping my powder dry and won’t pull the trigger on exercising the cash stash unless it dips deeper, say 10%. Keepin’ it real my man, keepin’ it REAL. Speaking of un-real, did ya see that Tesla is breaking it’s solar agreement with Panasonic at Gig-2 and is likely to screw the NY taxpayers and need to pay a penalty?
Ha, sorry to jump to conclusions then. I thought you were giving me shit!
I agree about the alignment: https://www.multpl.com/s-p-500-pe-ratio
Tesla! I thought that Panasonic was bailing? If Tesla doesn’t produce the promised jobs, they should absolutely pay a penalty, but from what I can tell, they’ve fulfilled the agreement.
For several yrs now Panasonic has been concerned that Tesla is unable to make a profit and that puts a strain on the profits for Panasonic. So Pana doesn’t want to invest in Gig-3 (China) or anywhere with Tesla including Gig-1 Nevada. Instead, Pana diversified to prismatic cells in a joint venture w/ Toyota. Making cylindrical cells at a profit is difficult at present and Tesla/Pana can’t seem to improve efficiency further. One should note that Tesla is apparently moving to “prismatic cells” for Model 3 in China with other supplier(s). My takeaway…battery construction type is finally viewed as a commodity within Tesla. Soon the entire EV will be also, well. except maybe for a few Tesla proprietary chips (big deal).
Just out of curiosity, does this mean your portfolio is down about $300,000 since tech stocks corrected even more?
Also, if you are in the accumulation phase, how much are you buying now and where do you get the extra cash from?
Thanks
It’s down about $150,000 right now. I do have a heavy concentration in tech stocks, but I also have a lot of real estate.
Accumulation! Mindy went back to work and the blog makes a little money, so we have small amounts to still invest. At the moment, we have little cash, so not much more to throw on the fire.
I’m dying to see your feb numbers and the losses on Corona virus. So far all these FIREEs didn’t see a down turn yet..it’s about time to separate the kids and the man
Whoah, don’t die! And no need to wait! Just for you, I pulled my numbers just now. Here ya’ go:
So at this moment, I’m down $37,309 from where I was on 2/1.
*yawn*
I think there may be less drama than you think. Most FIRE folks understand the market always moves upwards, but over the long-term. Short-term, the line looks more like a roller coaster.
And this drop is pretty boring so far! We’re back to where we were at the end of 2019:
Show me a 30% drop so I can buy Mr. Market at a big discount!