On Course to Financial Freedom--Boatschool and Beyond

Last year we did an interview with Stephanie at Poppin' Smoke and it was recently featured again as part of a "retirement alternatives" piece, "Reimagining Military Retirement: Think Outside the Box". While Poppin' Smoke is geared towards military retirees, the options presented are, in my opinion, options for anyone (with a few tweaks to step away from military lodging/travel options). As we have cruised we have met so many people from diverse professional backgrounds with widely varying budgets that have made a "seabbatical" or full-time cruising part of their plan through a variety of financial moves--selling it all to move aboard, working full-time remote, saving for a 1-2 year cruise, cruising between jobs in various ports, and more. Some friends are exploring the country in “land yachts” and others are traveling the world full-time. And we all have been called "lucky" by friends and family! It got me thinking...was it all really luck?

"Lucky" is a term that has always made me feel a little funny. I know that we are extremely fortunate to be living as we do and making memories together, but luck? I think if we had won the lottery to get here it would have been luck. How most of us got here though was through deliberate planning (and maybe a little bit of crazy). In our case, we started living with less, making asset decisions that matched our goals, and investing early on, and for a solid 10 years of pay raises in two successful careers we lived well below our means and didn't increase our standard of living with each promotion--we lived in the same little boat and Frank drove an ancient truck (which is all now apparently known as FIRE--Financial Independence Retire Early). Yes, we have my military retirement and that was certainly part of the math that got us here, but we could have gotten "here" without it, even if that meant "here" looked a little different, like cruising different areas, or with a different boat, or with a different timeline, or without so much other travel and goofing off, or...way too may branches to these options to dig into them all! But we had a "here," a goal that we deliberately moved towards.

So what's my point? I think we all have more options than we fully consider. I grew up in the era where success seemed to be tightly tied to some degree/title/family/car/paycheck metric and that's not a totally horrible thing, but I don't think it's the only thing either, or at least it's not for me. And THAT is what I want my kids to know. We want them to know that there are options, and that if they plan properly, they will have more options to choose from. Or maybe that they can do one thing and then reinvent themselves and do another without major stress. Or that they can plan a vacation or a sabbatical using passive income. Annndddd...that's why we teach them about finances as part of our homeschool journey!

Time to brag on my hubs a bit! As we began homeschooling he embarked on "Investments 101" with the kids, setting the goals of the class and designing his own curriculum. They were in 6th and 8th grades at the time and began with basic terminology, routine checks of the market, lots of Warren Buffet videos, and discussion about financial news articles around the dinner table. The trick was making it fun and therefore interesting so Frank dropped the "let's try to make some money" bit early on, perhaps earlier than a traditional curriculum would have. So part of the class involved the kids researching publicly-traded companies they were interested in and tracking them for a bit. Then we gave them the seed money for a well-timed purchase. The deal was that they needed to stick with the stock for a year, but then could keep/sell as they saw fit. Any profits were theirs to keep and we would absorb any losses. And they were off! Some mornings Trent would call out to Katreina from his bed to report that his stock (EA) was up and hers (BYND) was down...loved that they were a little competitive, but really loved that they were checking daily without our prompting! The first sale went at the 15-month point and Katreina walked away with ~70% return on investment (bought at $110.79/share, sold at $189.12/share). A few months later, Trent sold for ~35% return on investment (bought at $109.79/share, sold at $147.95). They had fun, learned a lot, and are reinvesting! Outside of the class, the kids have had their own savings and spending accounts for a few years (including their own debit cards) and have managed those with just a little oversight from the parental units. And we talk about our family's budget openly in front of them (marina expenses, travel expenses, their cell phone bills, groceries...all of it). All of this is with one goal in mind--arming the kids to have financial options and to make good choices.

Nothing grabs their attention more than seeing $$$ growth over time.

They got LOTS of finance class during a week-long blow in the Bahamas.

As Investments 102 ramps up, they will hit more of the basic terminology, tax implications, risk, fund types, and portfolio diversification. They will also dig more into personal budgets, banking (savings vs checking, FDIC, CDs, loans, how to pick a bank, etc.), and taxes. The topics are seemingly endless!

And it's never too late to start investing, whether with a financial advisor or getting out there and learning all you can. Why not let your money work for you? You can learn a bunch by reading CNBC, Seeking Alpha, Market Watch, and others. I mean, if you're willing to spend hours scrolling on Facebook or on YouTube watching other people do stuff, why not spend a little of that time learning something that will help you do the stuff you're dreaming about?

So get out there, set your goal, and reach for it! 

~Jo, 1st Mate