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I would like to dedicate this post to Jonathan.
My spouse and I started with nothing. We left college with debt and moved to a HCOL area in the mid 1980s. We knew nothing about money other than “if you can’t pay your credit card off each month, quit charging until it is paid off”.
We are Christians and felt called to tithe our income, so we worked up to the full 10% of gross income that is traditional. We never missed it. Even when times were hard, we were always ok. Sometimes I have no idea how, but after 40+ years I know for a fact that you can never out give God.
We never made more than $100k in a year until the last 8 years my spouse worked. We were the first generation who had to figure out our own retirment b/c the pensions changed to 401ks. We were so dumb that we didn’t understand the part about leaving money on the table if you don’t put enough in to get the company match. We had no idea how much we should put in the 401k until later. For many years we just put enough to get the match. We didn’t know you have to put in more. Our HR was not as good to help as I am sure RDQ’s was.
In the early 1990s I listened to Christian radio and found a few programs that talked about finances. I started to check out books from the library. In my studies I never came across Jonathan’s writings, believe it or not. I wish I had, it would have saved some time. I didn’t find him until HD.
We were way behind on our retirement savings. As I learned more, we did better. By 2016 I had finally found Jonathon and HD. HD was one of my favorite websites to read. I learned so much from all the writers. I used the guide to research topics I didn’t know about.
The past 10 years have been amazing for us. Everything finally “clicked”. My spouse found a well paying job that made low $100k. I didn’t waste the opportunity and used what I had learned from HD and others to play catch up. And we were able to catch up. Our net worth now is in 7 figures and we retired with dignity 21 mos ago.
We are a Humble Dollar success story. We are just regular people. I hope what I have written will encourage any others like us that even if it is late in the game, you can still get there. I so wish Jonathan was here to read my post, this is why he was so passionate about what he did. Chris
Wonderful story. I agree, it is never too late. I started over with nothing at a late age. I first read Johathan’s column at the Wall Street Journal, I’d guess it was about 1985 or so. I found his approach very straight-forward and understandable. Like you, I was delighted by my results. I could have retired earlier than I actually did.
Normr, I am glad you were able to find Jonathan before I did and that you were able to catch up too. Chris
Congratulations on a successful journey. I agree that it’s never too late. I didn’t start saving seriously until my late 30s, after I left my first husband and realized my pension didn’t have the COLA I would have expected if I were still in the UK. I was fortunate to discover Vanguard fairly early, and to have little interest in possessions and none in shopping. I was also fortunate that the mega-corp was willing to pay my pension and provide retiree medical when I reached 30 years service, even thought the benefits have been progressively reduced.
Thank you, Kathy. You are fortunate to have retiree medical. That got taken away from the younger employees like the pensions. We were mostly Medicare age at retirement. One of us was able to be on Cobra for 6 mos. C