I do get a kick out of excessive quotation marks (on paper or the “air” variety). A “road map” (and I’m doing air quotes here) is appropriate because it probably won’t be followed and is just some hypothetical construction to make us all feel better because there is a “plan” in place. But just because nothing ever goes to plan doesn’t mean having a plan is not important.
The plan here is to cover four key categories that are particularly pertinent to FI, which are listed below. They are all interrelated to some extent, but really start with saving some money (or paying down debt).
This gives you an idea of the types of topics that we’ll delve into and maybe, if I figure it out how to, I’ll link the following list to the tags for the articles.
- Debt and Savings
- Psychology
- Income
- Analyses / Strategies
- Investing
- Investments
- Asset Allocation
- Tax Advantaged Accounts (RRSP, TFSA, RESP, etc.)
- Living
- Insurance
- Hobbies
- Health
- FI (Financial Independence)
- Goals
- Target Amount Required
- Withdraws and Taxes
Debt and Saving
Debt and saving are polar opposites. This category is for getting started and continued tweaking throughout your life.
It covers how to get out of debt in the first place so that you can start saving money.
It covers how you go about tracking your finances. How do you create a gap between your income and your expenses so that there is money available to save? Can you increase your income? Which expenses can you decrease?
Investing
This category focuses on where to put the dollars you have saved.
Ideas of what to invest in, appropriate asset allocations, which types of accounts to use, robo-advisors, stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs, and the like.
It also dives into the cost of investing in various different ways.
Living
Once the saving and investing is humming along, you still have to enjoy your life…being happy and healthy! This includes looking into hobbies (which may help you figure out your why of FI – more on that later!) and risk management strategies / insurance to avoid things that will derail your finances in a heartbeat.
Financial Independence
This category includes how much money you actually need to fulfill your goals (and how you might figure out those goals in the first place).
Once you’ve reached FI, the work doesn’t stop…there are still a lot of moving pieces to manage and maximize the money you have saved. This includes tax minimization, risk minimization, sequence of return considerations, withdrawal plan (which account and when), etc.
I hope that gives you a more in-depth overview of the topics you will find here on Loonie Logic. If you have specific suggestions for other roads to travel, by all means, let me know!