Just entered Early Retirement?
Well I’ve been using YNAB for just over a week now; it’s coincides with my early retirement actually. I’m an experienced budgeter (I thought) but wanted a better tool to track the ‘drawn down’ phase of our wealth management (vs the ‘accumulation phase when your striving for early retirement and/or financial independence #FIRE). Well, I was pleasantly surprised at how simple and fast this tool is to use - once set up - yet, how it provides psychological improvement even for a budgeting pro. Great job YNAB; I have NO DOUBT that had I started to used it earlier, I would have started my self-funded early retirement much quicker.
For Newbies to budgeting (or for those just wanting to get a handle on bad debt), don’t let yourself feel discouraged - it’s worth the effort and YNAB makes budgeting a breeze. The tracking that it will show you will be a 2nd benefit; such is the power of the immediate budget improvements you’ll experience. Dive in folks - the sooner the better!
(I’m looking forward to my first monthly reconciliation process in 2 week time and expect to be even more dazzled 🤩 - I can feel it in my ‘waters’)
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Congratulations and welcome to YNAB! I’ve been using this budgeting system for over 10 years and it turned my financial life around. I really don’t think there’s a better method of budgeting. It’s going to give me the option to retire early for sure. I’ll definitely be waiting as late as possible to take my social security to maximize its benefits.
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I look forward to hearing how you use it for draw down in retirement. I suppose it’s very similar to the accumulation phase other than the source of the income and how much more control you have of that income. Also, I’d imagine you’d have less savings type categories other than your true expenses such as property tax.
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Superbone thanks for the encouragement. I’m only 50 so, here in Australia my husband and I can not draw on our ‘already saved pension monies’ and the government provided ‘old age pension’ doesn’t kick in until age 67 (for our dates of birth) so, the draw downs will be from savings, direct ASX shares, managed funds and eventually investment properties (although property is a little chunkier and clunkier to liquidate). I’m trying to view those assets as my ‘new employer’ - willing to pay me a wages when I need it! 🤞 (I’ve read a bit about the benefits of delaying the pension drawdown in countries like America so, no matter where we are on this plant, everyone need to do their own bit of juggling 🤹🏻♀️; it’s best to have multiple options where possible). Best of luck in your journey to FIRE. 🔥
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Superbone Looks like I'm all 'on track', according to the toolkit. It's very satisfying and reassuring to get that confirmation though (a 2nd opinion, as they say).
5497 days of buffering; that should do me until we get to age 60 when we can turn on our own pensions (from self funded monies already held in the 'Australian Superannuation' environment).
Still, i'm keen to have YNAB as my new accountability buddy; can't be temped by too many margarita's before I get to the next goal😉!
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Welcome to the forum, and YNAB NettieFIRE ! Congratulations on your early retirement. I love that you're seeing improvements following the YNAB Method, even as an experienced budgeter.
Looking forward to hearing more about how things progress! We have a Journals section too, if that's something you'd be interested in.-
Nicole thanks for the tip on journals. It helps me negotiate the labyrinth while I’m hungry to binge info. The ‘user community’ is a great source of knowledge (and of course motivation). I’ll dive in!
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Oooh, that sounds nice! YNAB rocks. I'm glad you found it. I'm glad I started using it again last year. I have more in my savings now than I ever had in my lifetime.
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Glad to see you're happy. But this made me shudder:
NettieFIRE said:
I’m looking forward to my first monthly reconciliation process in 2 week time and expect to be even more dazzled 🤩YNAB doesn't reconcile to statements. It reconciles to the now and then. It is highly recommended to reconcile often so you have fewer transactions to filter through if something is wrong. A lot of people do it more than once a week. It takes about 5 seconds if done at the same time as checking for any missing transactions in YNAB from your bank accounts.
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Ceeses not to worry - I think I might have given you a fright due to, simply my misuse of YNAB terminology!
After a few more days under my belt now (since my very first post), I’m a little more familiar with all the YNAB terminology. I’m actually reconciling (to my bank account) DAILY 😳and can now appreciate the value in that (particularly while learning the ropes and particularly as my former budget tracking software was principally a sync method; I’m all manual entry on YNAB).
So, I guess what I was really saying was that I’m looking forward to the monthly rollover step! 🎉
My learning curve - at the moment - is steep!
Thanks for the warning anyhow ⚠️ (had the penny not dropped for me already 💥 it would have by now) 🙏🏽
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