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18 March 2022
Before we could store food properly, the best place to store surplus was in the stomachs of friends, family, and neighbours — and they'd reciprocate. Social capital is one of the most important forms…
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29 January 2021
Your balance sheet shows assets you can sell and value easily. The most important thing it omits is human capital — your own ability to generate an income over the coming decades. For most households,…
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24 April 2020
A typical balance sheet misses something important. Most households have "shadow assets" — things that can't really be liquidated but have the potential to be valuable. Speculative investments, antici…
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6 March 2020
I rarely talk numbers on this blog, which might be surprising since it's mainly about money — and I LOVE spreadsheets. Numbers change, past performance isn't future performance, and precision can make…
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18 February 2020
My wife and I joke that cafe treats and holidays are "coming out of the kids' inheritance". It's strictly true. But your children don't just inherit money when you die — they inherit memories, experie…
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14 February 2020
If you engage a financial adviser, you might think the decision will leave you better off financially. Not necessarily. I often encourage clients to spend more, or point out they can afford to earn le…
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18 October 2019
"Wealth" isn't just about money, and "success" is personal. Don't over-complicate your financial life — make it boring so the rest of your life can be interesting. Everyone has a financial plan, wheth…
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11 October 2019
I love books that swing for the fences. The Last Safe Investment is one — a personal development book with a strong financial focus. I disagree with chunks of it, and the authors strawman mainstream a…
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24 May 2019
Compound interest is magical, but there's a myopia around it. The Barefoot Investor and others lean on 10% annual returns to make the "start early or you're sunk" case — at 5% the chart looks very dif…
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12 April 2019
I have tremendous faith in resourceful people. The clients who end up in a good position, financially and otherwise, tend to be resourceful — not because they started with much, but because they can s…
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22 February 2019
Warren Buffett is endlessly quoted about investing, but his most important lesson isn't about money. In a 2001 speech at the University of Georgia he said you measure success in life by how many of th…
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16 September 2018
The most important thing to get right when investing in financial assets is asset allocation. It refers to how your funds are invested across different classes, such as shares and bonds. If you get th…
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29 March 2018
When you start building wealth, you face headwinds. It can feel like you're getting nowhere. But the headwinds eventually turn into tailwinds — and every dollar of wealth is easier to build than the l…
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1 March 2018
Some high-level financial advice for 16-year-olds, and anyone who still feels young. The biggest investment in your early adulthood is in yourself. One of the best (or worst) financial decisions you'l…
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21 December 2017
George Clooney once gave 14 of his closest friends $1 million each, in cash, in designer suitcases. It sounds bonkers. But being generous with the people who matter to you probably pays dividends if y…
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27 October 2017
Many people want to get to a position where they can "live off the interest" in retirement. It's a laudable goal, but for most people it's unrealistic, and aiming for it creates unnecessary pressure.…
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7 August 2017
Approaching 20, I asked myself a stark question: would I rather have $1 billion in the bank, or a fantastic relationship with a fantastic woman? The answer reshaped my priorities. I spent years workin…
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27 June 2017
If there's one figure to focus on when it comes to your finances, it's your net worth — assets minus liabilities. From that perspective, a dollar towards debt is the same as a dollar into savings. Rep…
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23 May 2017
My kids pulled out the Monopoly board recently and it struck me how narrow a view of commerce the game offers — buy property, collect rent, hope for capital gains, win by impoverishing everyone else.…
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12 May 2017
I'm a HUGE advocate for insurance — most working people should carry some. But I'm also a big advocate for self-insuring where you can, and a message I don't see often enough is that your insurance ne…
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5 May 2017
Money can buy happiness — we're just usually bad at spending it in ways that deliver. There's research identifying eight principles for spending in ways that actually make you happier: buy experiences…
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11 March 2017
Young professionals at the start of their careers face a genuinely different financial situation from people nearing retirement. Different circumstances, different needs, different objectives — which…
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18 September 2016
If someone asked you to calculate your net worth, you'd add up your assets, subtract your liabilities, and get a number. But for a younger person, that calculation misses the biggest asset of all: the…
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24 January 2016
Paul Graham, having sold a startup and become wealthy, started paying attention to how fortunes are actually lost. Not through excessive expenditure — it’s hard to blow a fortune on luxuries without n…