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So the welcome series is not for you. No worries.
If you’d like to learn more about Physician on FIRE, you can visit the About Me page, check out our charitable mission, or just dive right in and see All Posts ever published here.
Cheers!
-Leif
p.s. here’s the full welcome series that you would have received via email.
I started Physician on FIRE (FIRE being an acronym for Financial Independence Retire Early) in January of 2016. It has grown into a respectable resource for high-income professionals that’s been visited by millions and enjoyed by dozens! My goals with the site are to enlighten, entertain, and educate my readers, leaving you informed and inspired.
I left my anesthesia job in August of 2019, a bit ahead of schedule, but timed perfectly with the arrival of my replacement, a young doctor with strong local ties who had been hired nearly two years before my final shift, providing for a seamless transition. I was retired from medicine at age 43.
You may love your work now, and it could bring you fulfillment indefinitely. Even so, I think financial independence is a goal everyone should have; it gives you options, leverage, and the potential for so much more.
What do you do with this thing called FI?
That’s up to you! The “RE” in the FIRE acronym suggests that you can retire early. That’s certainly an option, and it’s one I’ve sorta kinda taken. But I do have this blog, so I don’t feel 100% retired. Retired not Retired, I like to say.
There’s so much more you can do, though.
FI gives you options. It gives you leverage. You’ll have the power to walk away if you want.
When you can afford not to work at all, you can obviously afford to work less. I worked a wonderful part-time schedule for the better part of two years before calling it quits. It allowed us to slow travel internationally and get a feel for what full retirement might look like.
Perhaps you’d like to transition to a new job that pays less, do more research or teaching, or do something completely different. FI can be the launching pad for an encore career doing whatever you like. If your current job isn’t your dream job, you can try to find our create it with little or no risk.
How do you get from Point A — wherever you are now — to Point FI?
On the income side, there are so many ways to earn more money. You can improve your negotiation skills, find higher-paying jobs, find a lucrative side gig, do locum tenens work, or simply work more. Although, if your ultimate goal is to do the opposite, you may want to find a way to work smarter, not harder.
So you’re going to mind the gap, but what do you do with the money that fills that space? You’re going to invest it in a simple, manageable way. The more you feel comfortable with investing, the more you can do to optimize your finances, but an effective plan doesn’t have to be complicated.
Investing does not have to be complicated. Buying as few as three funds will give you ownership in virtually every publicly traded stock worldwide and thousands of government and corporate bonds.
I’m a DIY investor, and I provide an outline to help you become one, but I’ve also compiled a list of carefully vetted, very low-cost financial advisors. I realize not everyone wants to be their own money manager. If you do, you can find a number of excellent books and other resources to help you here.
Once you understand the basics of investing, you’re ready to move on to more advanced topics, and I’m here to help with those. This includes strategies like:
Tomorrow, I’ll talk about my favorite method of lowering taxes — one that has saved us six figures in federal income taxes in just the last few years.
The easiest way to reach me is by replying to this email. You can also find me on several social media platforms, including:
I’ve also got two Facebook groups. One for medical doctors (Physicians on FIRE) and another for all interested in FIRE on a higher budget —fatFIRE. I hope to see you there.
How does Physician on FIRE make money? I believe it’s important to be transparent. I also hope that you’ll consider using our links when you have a need for any of these services. We have referral relationships with people offering services and products I approve of, including:
Email 1
It was late fall in 2014, and I was spending way too much time studying for an anesthesiology Board recertification exam when I should have been spending my precious free time between shifts with my family. I was already wishing I wouldn’t have to take this irrelevant exam again in ten years. I started to wonder if maybe it could be avoided altogether. At the same time, I discovered the concept financial independence. I did the math, and lo and behold, I realized that nine years of hard work, saving, and investing had paid off. Paid work was now optional. I was, in a word, flabbergasted. I was not at all ready to quit work right then and there, but I wasn’t exactly living my dream life, either. My wife and I talked a lot, contemplated our future, and came to two conclusions.- One, I would enact a roughly five-year plan to transition out of medicine.
- Two, I would start a website to show others what is possible and to help them achieve financial independence for themselves.
Email 2
What exactly is financial independence? The variety we talk about represents freedom from the need for earned income of any kind to live the life you want. It means you’re done saving for retirement, and you’ve set yourself up to spend your days however you please. You can claim financial independence (FI) in one of two ways or some combination of both. Based on retirement savings, once you’ve accumulated 25x to 30x your anticipated annual spending, you’ve got enough to start out with a 3.3% to 4.0% annual withdrawal, a low enough percentage that makes it very unlikely you’ll ever run out of money (and likely that you’ll have more than you started with even decades later). You can also claim FI by virtue of having passive income that exceeds your expenses. As long as those income sources are reliable and low-risk, and they don’t take up much of your time, if any, you should have no need for active income. It’s common to use a combination. For example, if your passive income meets half of your spending needs and your retirement savings (in stocks and bonds) are 15x your annual spending, the combination would make you financially independent.
What do you do with this thing called FI?
That’s up to you! The “RE” in the FIRE acronym suggests that you can retire early. That’s certainly an option, and it’s one I’ve sorta kinda taken. But I do have this blog, so I don’t feel 100% retired. Retired not Retired, I like to say.
There’s so much more you can do, though.
FI gives you options. It gives you leverage. You’ll have the power to walk away if you want.
When you can afford not to work at all, you can obviously afford to work less. I worked a wonderful part-time schedule for the better part of two years before calling it quits. It allowed us to slow travel internationally and get a feel for what full retirement might look like.
Perhaps you’d like to transition to a new job that pays less, do more research or teaching, or do something completely different. FI can be the launching pad for an encore career doing whatever you like. If your current job isn’t your dream job, you can try to find our create it with little or no risk.
How do you get from Point A — wherever you are now — to Point FI?
Email 3
If you’ve been on “the tube” in London’s underground, you’re familiar with the term “Mind the Gap.” On the subway, you don’t want to fall into that gap between the platform and the train. The phrase takes on a different meaning in personal finance. When you “mind the gap,” it’s your job to grow the gap as widely as possible — that is, the gap between your household earning and household spending. Minding (and growing) the gap is The Key to FI. If you can learn to live on half your takehome pay (while using the rest to invest or pay off debt), you can go from broke to financially independent in about 15 years. While living on half does require some relative frugality (as compared to your peers), many high-income professionals can have a six-figure spend and six-figure savings at the same time. It just requires earning enough money, keeping taxes in check, and being intentional with your spending. On the spending side, I’ve always been a bit of a frugal physician. Here are some of the ways my family and I have chosen to spend less. If relative frugality is a non-option for you, that’s perfectly alright. It may take longer, but you can make fatFIRE your goal.
On the income side, there are so many ways to earn more money. You can improve your negotiation skills, find higher-paying jobs, find a lucrative side gig, do locum tenens work, or simply work more. Although, if your ultimate goal is to do the opposite, you may want to find a way to work smarter, not harder.
So you’re going to mind the gap, but what do you do with the money that fills that space? You’re going to invest it in a simple, manageable way. The more you feel comfortable with investing, the more you can do to optimize your finances, but an effective plan doesn’t have to be complicated.
Email 4
No one likes losing money, and in 2020, we saw our balances plummet. Stock values dropped by more than 30%. And that’s only the 3rd biggest bear market I’ve seen in my investing lifetime. The situation was uglier in 2008-2009 and 2000-2001. Yet, most of my money remains invested in stocks. Why? I’ve studied market history and I expect bear markets to come along from time to time. As long as you remain invested, and ideally continue to invest while prices are low, the market rewards you for your loyalty. Yes, you can profit from a bear market. I finished residency in 2006, and the stock market as measured by the S&P 500 (large US stocks) fell 57% from its all time high in March of 2009. Investing while the market fell, at the bottom, and during the recovery provided a nifty shortcut along my path to financial independence.
Investing does not have to be complicated. Buying as few as three funds will give you ownership in virtually every publicly traded stock worldwide and thousands of government and corporate bonds.
I’m a DIY investor, and I provide an outline to help you become one, but I’ve also compiled a list of carefully vetted, very low-cost financial advisors. I realize not everyone wants to be their own money manager. If you do, you can find a number of excellent books and other resources to help you here.
Once you understand the basics of investing, you’re ready to move on to more advanced topics, and I’m here to help with those. This includes strategies like:
Tomorrow, I’ll talk about my favorite method of lowering taxes — one that has saved us six figures in federal income taxes in just the last few years.
The easiest way to reach me is by replying to this email. You can also find me on several social media platforms, including:
I’ve also got two Facebook groups. One for medical doctors (Physicians on FIRE) and another for all interested in FIRE on a higher budget —fatFIRE. I hope to see you there.
Email 5
I’ve already told you about one of my missions — to educate, entertain, and enlighten you as you start to make rapid progress toward financial indepenence. We have a second mission — I say “we” because it doesn’t happen without you. The premise when I started the blog was that I no longer had to work for money. When I was first offered money from potential advertisers, I felt it would be disingenuous to start profiting and keeping all the money the site made. From day one, I chose to donate a substantial portion of our profits from this online venture. I do keep some — having some skin in the game keeps me focused on growing the site and the IRS makes it difficult to donate all of it in a tax-advantaged way (which results in the charity receiving more money). Over the first four-plus years, we have been able to donate over $375,000 as a result of this charitable mission. That’s huge, and, like I said, it’s only possible because of readers like you. My preferred method of giving is via a donor advised fund (DAF). The account accepts appreciated assets like mutual funds bought years ago (eliminating potential capital gains taxes). You get a tax deduction when you fund the account. You can grant the money to charities at any time in the near or distant future and the money you choose to keep in the account can be invested in a variety low-cost index funds. Readers like you have helped grow our DAF, and I’ve given you lots of opportunities to help us deplete it, as well. Hundreds of readers have chosen the recipient of $100 grants on Giving Tuesday, and one lucky reader recommended a grant of $5,000 to a charity near and dear to him as part of our $25,000 COVID-19 relief efforts. We’ve also volunteered as a family on medical mission trips, and the site now funds the annually salary of a physician we worked with in Honduras.
How does Physician on FIRE make money? I believe it’s important to be transparent. I also hope that you’ll consider using our links when you have a need for any of these services. We have referral relationships with people offering services and products I approve of, including:
- Student Loan Refinancing
- Paid Survey Opportunities
- Real Estate Investments
- True Own-Occupation Disability Insurance
- Term Life Insurance
- Physician Mortgage Loans
- Contract Review & Negotiation
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