Is this really a problem that people have? Yes, it is. Enough money. Wow, I would have never thought I would say that my wife and I are approaching that point. Don’t get too excited yet, we still have a long way to go. But, it is weird to even think that this is an option in our lives.
Right now, we are consistently saving and investing $5,000-$7,000 a month. This is a lot of money, no matter how you present it. But things were not always this way. I want to review our current situation, how we got here, and what you can do to get to this point as well.
Before I dig into our current situation, I want to talk about how this question came up. My wife and I were talking about our current month investing. We had already invested $5,000 before our second paychecks arrived for the month. We also had another $800 coming in for rent.
I basically just blurted out “Wow, we are pretty set up for the rest of our lives, if we keep this up.” If we can just put $5,000 away for the rest of our lives, I think we would be more than okay. Keep in mind that I still am planning on starting a business when I retire, our investment portfolio will keep growing and paying us more, and we will buy a couple more rental homes. So, the money is going to keep growing and growing. So the question came up, “When is enough money… enough money?”
Current Situation. As I just said, we are currently saving $5,000 – $7,000 a month. Keeping a goal of investing $5,000 a month for the next 30 years, would put us at $7.5 million. I use this compound interest calculator to arrive at these numbers.
Okay, okay. Let’s say that I retire and decide not to do anything at all. We could only put away $2,000 a month. This would put us at $3.4 million, in 30 years.
My personal goal is to achieve $24,000 a month of passive income across 4 different cash flow blocks (retirement, business, investing, and rental income). It will take me 10 years to get to this point, mainly because of the business aspect. I would be 50 years old, have $1.5 million in the bank, and a cash flow of $24,000 a month. If I did that for 30 years, I would have $42 million. I will write it all the way out, $42,000,000.
This is when I started to ask the question again. How much is enough? And I agree it sounds a little egregious to have a nest egg of $42 million. However, the cash flow is my goal. To me, this is the ultimate test of mental agility and financial education. I am signed up for the challenge. And remember, this is passive income. Not earned income by working a job. But it wasn’t always this way for Kris and me.
How we got here. The simple answer is that we stopped living a middle-class life. Trying to pretend that we were middle class was making us poor. Two car payments, credit card debt, not micro-managing our budget, and worst of all, paying full-price for our mortgage.
We got to the point where I was making $100,000 a year and my wife was bringing in $30,000 a year. We had a $2,000 car issue and we were left scrambling to get the cash. Very embarrassing. I am embarrassed to even talk about, to be 100% honest with you.
It was an eye-opener and a situation that I never want to find myself in. And, to be honest, my wife deserves better than that. We weren’t crazy middle-class types either. But, without a spreadsheet for your budget, without cutting lots of unnecessary expenses, and without paying off our cars and keeping them, we would have always been behind the power curve.
America is just not meant for you to catch up. We learned from our ignorance and moved on. We started renting out rooms. I got a side job teaching after-hours. Most importantly, I started reading. Reading is the single most important thing that you can do to be successful in life. Well, taking action after you read is the real key. Reading without action is just a way to expand your vocabulary. We want to expand our wallets.
How can you get to this point? Easy. You just do exactly what we did. If someone does something and is successful at it, chances are you can simply repeat their actions and have the same success. I wouldn’t try to play basketball like Micheal Jordan, but you know what I mean. Luckily for you, I have been recording all of our journeys. Here is a list of resources to get you started.
Books I have read, in the order I recommend reading:
Articles I have written:
Are Limiting Beliefs Keeping You From Greatness
Taxes 101: Understand the 3 Types of Income
How We Built 13 Streams of Income
5 Creative Ways to Make Money While You Sleep
Keep the Job, Quit the Mindset
Short books I have written, so you can catch up quickly:
Passive Income Living: Use Royalties from Content Creation to become Financially-Free
Investing for Financial Freedom: A Beginner’s Guide to Creating Passive Income from Dividends
Your Time, Your Money: Use Passive Income to be Present for Your Grandkids
Financial Indpendence Magazine
In the end, the question I will ask myself is do I really need to continue to seek out my $24,000 a month passive income retirement? Yes, personally it is not about the money. Money is just a physical manifestation of my financial education and personal determination. It proves that if I can do it, anyone can do it.
I then turn the question to you? Are you where you want to be? Is working until you are 67 years old what you truly want? Is there a better way? It is completely up to you. Spending time with family and friends, living a life of comfort and style, and being totally stress-free is not a life for everyone. Some people love the misery of work, traffic, bosses, and being broke. Have fun with that. I choose to be free.
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Disclosure: I am not a financial advisor or money manager, and any knowledge is given as guidance and not direct actionable investment advice. I am an Amazon Affiliate. Please research any investment vehicles that are being considered. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it. I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
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