Net worth

One of the most difficult decisions you can make as you struggle toward financial independence is deciding between paying off the mortgage quickly or investing the excess funds instead. The water is more muddy when we see a roaring stock market for as far back as the eye can see coupled with low interest rates. The answer seems simple and obvious: pay off the mortgage as slowly as possible and invest the difference in broad market-based index funds.

You might also think people well past the mile-marker of financial independence would have an even easier choice. Once the risk of a market decline passes due to your excessive net worth, it is tempting to automatically choose the course with the greatest opportunity for maximum gain.

Your favorite accountant has struggles with the same decision: pay it off  or invest. It all came to a head recently when the topic came up on Facebook. I gave my opinion and the fur flew. Before long my inbox was stuffed with requests for a fully fleshed out explanation of my position.

A common question in the FIRE (financial independence, retire early) community involves how much money you need to retire. Before I became a card-carrying member of the community I would hear the question something short of a dozen times per year. This blog means I hear the question a lot more these days. And people still don’t believe my answer.

There is a great misperception over how much money is needed to cash a check and walk your own path. I’ve consulted with 70 year old men worried they don’t have enough to retire. In the FIRE community younger people are more interested in the same question with a different set of rules.

Social Security changes all the rules. The 4% rule is wildly off the mark because they forget two simple facts; facts we will cover right now.

There is a secret seldom spoken of by the financially independent. Those in the know can hear echoes of the secret periodically in the utterances from great financial leaders like Charlie Munger when he said the surest way to get in financial trouble is with the three Ls: liquor, ladies and leverage. Then Munger’s buddy, Warren Buffet, laughs about the comment in an interview saying Charlie was joking about the first two; it’s leverage where all the trouble lies.

Did you miss the secret? Unless you are loaded (financially, not with liquor) there is a good chance the greatest secret of wealth whistled past your left ear unnoticed.

Here is the secret for those who missed it:

Twin brothers walk into the Wealthy Accountant’s office. One brother is as smart as a whip with an IQ of 147 and a wiz with numbers. The other twin, while looking identical to his brother, is a bit short in the mental category. The less bright brother is hard working, but knows he can’t outthink his twin brother.

Which twin do you think has the greatest financial advantage? Which one is likely to become a millionaire?

Would you believe me if I told you the super-smart twin is orders of magnitude less likely to amass a financial fortune? Yet time and time again I see it in my office: smart people underperforming and average people hitting it out of the park.

Recent volatility in the stock market has people reassessing their appetite for risk. Investing in a bull market is easy as it seems the only way equities go is up.

The recent bull market has an added way of lulling people into a false sense of security. Last year many indexes never saw even a 5% pullback even once. Some didn’t see a 3% decline at any point! This is a highly unusual situation confirming for some people the stock market doesn’t test your resolve as often as it does.

In the past week we’ve had a > 5% intraday swing in the market indexes. Many individual stocks had even greater moves!

It started with a simple request for an update to my personal net worth.

Over the years I’ve been mum about the subject, only exposing myself due to the Rockstar Finance Net Worth Tracker. I’m still undecided about discussing my *exact* net worth publically. It’s really nobody’s business and is only public because I write a personal finance blog.

Thirty plus years in the tax field has exposed me to the good, bad and downright vulgar. In the early 1990s I was a top producer at a broker/dealer for several years before refocusing on the accounting end of my practice. Before I left the industry changes were underway. Fee-based asset management was gaining adherents.

The old model of commissions was experiencing the first crack in its armor. Leaving the industry didn’t leave a void in my knowledge as clients consulted with me when considering investments and reviewing their investment advisor.

Fee-based is all the rage today. Many of the original selling points from the 90s are still used today with the exception most reporting is now done digitally online. In a nutshell, people are doing all the fee-based work while still paying a fee.

The easiest way to invest in equities is with a mutual fund. The surest way to match market performance is to use index funds. Then there are times we get the urge to do things the hard way.

Of all investment classes the broad market has performed best. The stock market, for all its fits and starts, has outperformed over long periods of time without the need or risks of leverage to accomplish the goal.