Because planning is everything when it comes to achieving financial independence, the more you know early on, the better. One man pursuing early retirement, who opts to not go by his real name to protect his job status, recently had the opportunity to speak to college students about retiring early. He was able to share his insider knowledge and get the younger generation excited about aggressive saving.
He goes by Mr. Conservanoogan, because he and his wife (Ms. Conservanoogan) currently live in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
For Mr. Conservanoogan, the recession defined a lot of his financial picture. He started a business when he graduated college in 2006, but after the recession, the business took a significant hit and he came close to declaring bankruptcy. At the worst point following the recession, Mr. Conservanoogan’s checking account was drained and he was only able to eat using food stamps. His net worth was in the negative six figures; about -$100,000. He had no choice but to start from scratch.
“I landed a job for a fast-growing software company. Initially, I was making $35,000 as a base, plus commissions, and I had to start the process of digging myself out of a large hole,” said Mr. Conservanoogan. “This company was incredibly cut throat and had very aggressive goals. Over the course of the five years that I was there, they had extremely high turnover (usually for not hitting the goals set). I think I calculated that I had a 10% chance of keeping my job year after year, based on how many people they would hire/fire at any given point.”
Being stuck in this job is what really drew Mr. Conservanoogan to the idea of not needing to rely on work he hated:
“One of my mentors in college/the early years of my business told me that he firmly believed in the importance of ‘f*** you money,’ in that you should never let yourself be in a financial position that allows someone else to dictate your future.”
This idea kept coming back to Mr. Conservanoogan while he was working that extremely high-stress job.
“I had nine bosses in five years, and one of them (probably my longest standing one) once said ‘I literally don’t give a f*** about these people, they have no choice but to work here,’ referring to my colleagues and the fact that there were no jobs because of the recession.”
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