Charting Our Path to Financial Freedom

Charting Our Path to Financial Freedom

Good morning! Today’s guest post is from Dee, a personal finance enthusiast and blogger dedicated to living a frugal lifestyle, eliminating debt, and creating multiple streams of income. She aims to inspire others to achieve their financial goals and shares her journey on her blog, Color Me Frugal.

Our journey to financial independence began in 2010. Although we had dreams before that, it was in 2010 that we clearly defined our goals and wrote them down. This was when our journey truly started because we finally understood our destination.

My husband and I have been together for over ten years, married for eight. When we first started dating, we lived in a small town near a low mountain range, which we absolutely loved. We would ride mountain bikes and hike by streams in the summer and rent snowmobiles in the winter. It was a special place for us; we got engaged at a lodge there and married in the foothills a year later.

Unfortunately, job opportunities required us to move after two years. Even after leaving, we always missed that town and those mountains. By 2010, our objective became clear: we wanted to return to those mountains, buy a piece of land near the bike trails, build a home, and raise our children there. That would be our forever home.

Just one problem stood in our way: finding work in our chosen fields in that area was challenging. While it would be easier for my husband, it was nearly impossible for me. Giving up the dream was not an option, so we decided that we needed multiple streams of income to make it happen. This way, even if I couldn’t find full-time work or my husband only worked part-time, we could still live our dream. We aimed for financial independence.

In 2010, by writing down our goal, it became real to us. We decided that purchasing rental real estate would be a good start. In April 2011, we bought our first rental property, though getting approved for a mortgage was a nightmare. Since we planned to end up in our small town near the mountains, it seemed logical to buy rental property there, even though we lived 20 hours away at the time. After extensive paperwork and phone calls, we finally got approved and closed on the property. This rental has provided us a nice cash flow since 2011. A close friend has been managing it for us, given that we don’t live there currently.

However, one rental property alone wasn’t enough for financial independence. We have been aggressively contributing to our retirement accounts, maxing out our 401(k)s and Roth IRAs every year. We’ve done some side work over the years, starting SEP IRAs and maxing those out too. Realizing our expenses needed to be far lower than our income, we cut costs drastically. For the past five years, every one of my paychecks has gone straight into our savings account, along with part of my husband’s. This savings account is used for down payments on properties. We now own three homes, two of which are rented out. We are currently working to pay off the mortgage on our present home so that when we eventually rent it out, all rental income goes straight to us rather than towards a mortgage.

The journey hasn’t always been smooth. A couple of years ago, we realized having children naturally wasn’t happening, leading to costly fertility treatments. Fortunately, our aggressive savings habits covered these expenses. We are now pursuing adoption, which is also expensive but something we eagerly anticipate. While this has slowed down our ability to buy more rental properties, it’s made us more creative in cutting expenses and exploring additional income streams, such as blogging. I’ve discovered my love for blogging, which is great because it’s something I can do anywhere, even in our cherished small town near the mountains.

While we haven’t reached financial independence or moved back to our mountains yet, we feel we’re on the right path. We don’t know how long it will take, as there are still many unknowns, such as costs related to our dream of expanding our family. But we remain hopeful, with our plans and determination intact. We will get there.