Dear DTA,
I don’t make a lot of money. I’m not looking to get rich. I guess I just want a little extra comfort in my life. Is there something I can do to make this happen? What’s the best thing to do?
-Michelle P.
Hi, Michelle.
Thanks for writing in. It’s great to hear from you.
I completely understand where you’re coming from.
Before retiring in my early 30s, I spent my career in the auto industry. I had a very middle-class job working at a car dealership.
So I also didn’t make a lot of money.
And I also didn’t want to get rich.
I only wanted to get independent.
I craved freedom. Ownership of my time is what mattered to me.
Of course, time costs money.
And that’s where all of the saving and investing comes in.
Please take the time to read through my Early Retirement Blueprint.
The Blueprint is a step-by-step guide.
It recounts how I went from below broke at 27 years old to financially free at 33 – on a fairly modest income.
This is a program that almost anyone can use to become fairly wealthy in life and even retire decades before most people.
Now, I understand you’re not looking to get rich.
But the steps I followed and lay out can be scaled up and down.
Everything I advocate can be scaled down and used to build a little more comfort in your life.
Regardless of how much wealth you want, the concepts remain the same.
It comes down to living below your means, making good financial choices, saving your money, and intelligently investing your excess capital for the long run.
If you do all of this, I can just about guarantee you that you’ll have some extra comfort in your life.
Money is simply a resource. Those who responsibly use this resource are rewarded in life.
If you take care of your money, your money will take care of you.
I speak from firsthand experience.
I took great care of my money for a number of years.
Now it takes great care of me.
My FIRE Fund is evidence of that.
The Fund is my real-life and real-money stock portfolio.
It generates the five-figure and growing passive dividend income I need to cover my essential expenses in life, rendering me financially independent in my 30s.
Sure, you don’t want to get rich.
You don’t mention financial independence as an aspiration in your life.
But just imagine what an extra $5,000 or so per year in income could do for you, especially if that income is being generated by a low-six-figure portfolio of high-quality stocks.
That would surely provide your life with the extra comfort you crave.
This is particularly true when considering the lifestyle tweaks you’d need to make in order to build this wealth.
What I mean is, you’d have to spend less so that you can save and invest more.
Thus, an extra $5,000/year would go even further in your life, relative to your expenses.
Consider someone who spends $50,000 annually. $5,000/year in income only covers 10% of those expenses.
But if this person is able to tweak their lifestyle and get their annual spending down to $40,000/year so that they can save and invest their way to extra comfort, an extra $5,000 in passive income suddenly covers 12.5% of those expenses.
Creating great financial habits gives each dollar in your life a bit of a boost.
And this level of extra comfort wouldn’t be that difficult to attain, Michelle.
You’d only need to give it a fraction of effort I describe in my aforementioned Blueprint.
But this effort could pay off for the rest of your life.
Getting started has never been easier.
There’s never been more information available than there is now. Much of it is totally free.
This is something you must take advantage of.
For example, fellow contributor Dave Van Knapp put together an excellent and robust series of free articles on dividend growth investing.
It’s the strategy I’ve personally used to build my wealth and achieve financial freedom so early in life.
His Dividend Growth Investing Lessons reveal what this strategy is all about, why it’s so amazing, and how to successfully implement it.
This strategy could easily be more casually approached and applied, in a way that unlocks some extra comfort in life.
Dividend growth investing involves buying equity shares in businesses that are paying growing cash dividends to their shareholders.
These growing cash dividend payments are funded from growing profit.
And the growing profit occurs because these companies are often running world-class enterprises that are adeptly providing the products and/or services the world demands.
The Dividend Champions, Contenders, and Challengers contains a treasure trove of data on more than 800 US-listed stocks that have raised their dividends each year for at least the last five consecutive years.
Once you feel ready to invest some of your savings, we’ve got you covered with some tremendous research.
I take the time every Sunday to highlight a compelling dividend growth stock investment opportunity.
These ideas are presented to the community at no charge.
Each stock undergoes a rigorous analysis and valuation before it’s introduced, and I even include opinions from professional equity analysts.
These opportunities are shared via the Undervalued Dividend Growth Stock of the Week series.
Your goal of extra comfort in your life is absolutely attainable, Michelle.
But it will require a little bit of planning and execution on your part.
Make sure to take advantage of the quality and actionable research here for you.
And get started today.
I wish you luck and success.
Jason Fieber
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Disclaimer: Jason Fieber is not a licensed financial advisor, tax professional, or stock broker. Please consult with a licensed investment professional before investing any of your money. If your money is not FDIC insured, it may decline in value. To protect the privacy of our readers, any names published in this article are under aliases. In addition, text may be edited, omitted or paraphrased for grammar or length.