Traveling money, what everybody asks about.

I've alluded to this topic in my last several posts, in different ways.
It boils down to this: How to afford to not work.

Again there are a million different answers to this question and they hinge around you as a person and your skillsets.
If you are good at saving money: Do that and then just leave when you hit your target. Clearly that is a majority technique. Retirees do this, even if it is not spelled out in the above words. They work until a certain age (the time target) and then go. I'm not a big fan of this method because most of us are battered and broken by the time we hit retirement age making world travel much more resource intensive. But I digress.

This blog is supposed to be about me, and my options, with some insights into what I have done or at least researched in hopes of helping others. Right...?

A few of my friends have done the FIRE+investment real estate. This appears to be a pretty solid option if you are a handy person or have connections in the construction trades. You also need a fairly large investment up front. The payout is that you get a much higher payback in the long run. Ref: my savings graph on the education post. Similar idea to the bottom lines only a huge dip and then a sharper return trend.
Major benefit: Good return on money. Long term potential income.
Detractors: Poor housing market in your area and lack of tenants means no income and you pay for an empty house. You need some way to play landlord remotely or pay a management company if you plan on traveling on that budget.

A more basic plan is to just be a frugal person. But you are not going to have a ton of fun doing that. You will have to change your lifestyle to make this work. Some people are lucky and just did it from the day they left the nest, lucky them as they already have it in their system. Most of us millennials are spoiled little shits that think grinding our own coffee is a drag and that not having a starbucks nearby is the end of the world. (whoops, ranting again) But I feel that it is a fairly honest evaluation of today's society in the USA. People who live a truly frugal and minimal lifestyle are frowned upon and considered weird. I don't know why, but its true.
What I find fascinating is that in other locales I don't get that feeling: When I walk to the grocery store here in Minnesota I can feel people giving me the look as I walk through my subdivision. Yet on the streets of Tamarindo or Santa Rosa Colombia nobody looked twice other than to say hello to a foreigner. weird indeed.

What does it actually cost?

This really is a trick question. There is so much variability person-to-person and situation to situation that it really is very difficult to lend advice here.

Faroutride.com has a very nice breakdown of their costs over the last two years. I think this is a good place to start for fellow USA nationals as they spent most of their first year in the USA and Canada. Why does that matter you ask?? Because, like the Euro zone, the USA is a rather expensive place to be.

If you were to travel in, say,  Thailand; the living costs should be significantly lower. typically the more touristy a location is, or easier it is to travel to, the higher the costs.

Example: When I visited Belize in 2016 their peso was worth $0.50. This meant I could buy a nice dinner for me and my girlfriend for about $20, bar tab included.

Example: When I visited Tamarindo, Costa Rica in 2020 their peso was 3500 to the dollar, but the costs were quite large, roughly equivalent to USA prices. This meant I wandered from bar to bar looking for a single dinner that would be less than $25.

So if we use FarOutRide: Their living expenses in 2018 were $32k. That is a relatively large number in my mind but also very realistic. Keep in mind that they are 2 people living in a van.

From my reading on cruisers the costs seem to float around but the $1500-2000/month number seems commonplace. That is $24k a year so it seems close enough to the vanlife number to be reasonable.

When Tula's was still living on their trawler they spent around $18k in a year. and that is not a sailboat! Somehow the first year of owning their catamaran they spent $68k...not sure where all that money came from! But again that plays into the idea that this is so wide and varied in particular situations.

I have not yet found any motorcycle overlanders that published a yearly expense or budget. I will update the blog as soon as I do!

How to afford this life?

This is such an American question. *sigh* Anyway...

In my situation I take home about $45k a year. So such a monthly budget is easily attainable. The problem is that I have to go to work 5 days a week in order to keep that money coming in. Even during this pandemic I go into the office about once a week, and I have my laptop on every weekday.

So my personal situation, today, doesn't really apply.

I think for the sake of this discussion a monthly breakdown is best: What do I spend a month and what might I change in a different situation.

The two listed sources above both check in around $3k US each month.

A couple of hours crunching my last years worth of bank statements gave me a number of $3300/mo and that is just me, in a house by myself. Clearly having a second person to split costs and increase volume discounts is an advantage. We all can't be so lucky it would seem.

Really there is not much that can be cut from the pictured lists. Yikes.

Mortgage	1137
Utilities	150
vehicle payments	559
vehicle insurance	160
groceries	219
Credit card	881
cellular	67
restaurants	128

Clearly a mortgage is my big monthly payment. I pay that amount by myself for the opportunity to live in a house.

After that I spend a shit-ton of money through my credit card, which I could further break down to other categories, but I'm tired right now.

Vehicle costs are huge as a financed land-dweller.

Then finally food. I actually spend less than I thought at only ~$350/mo on groceries and restaurants combined.

So a fairly clear answer to the opening question is: Get rid of debt. If I can achieve that I potentially remove almost $2000/mo! Of course those items would be replaced by others so it is not a strict savings but it is notable.

If I chose to drive a 20 year old honda civic instead of a Mercedes and a newer Jeep I would save probably $600/mo.

The mortgage is a little more complex. I don't like having random roommates. This makes the huge cost worth paying most of the time. Having a partner reduces this cost obviously. The other part to this is potential rental income when travelling.

Rental income.

Income from my real estate: I can likely take in $1700/mo from rental income. That is a potential for $450/mo profit. These are guesstimates from what I have seen on the market. If I can get a reliable renter in my home I can reduce the amount I need to work each month by that $450 amount. It is that easy. 

The education question. covid musings

Education.

This is such a complex topic. Which is really kind of unfortunate, in my mind. I really feel like here in the USA we have screwed up the system so badly that it no longer functions correctly.

I have an engineering background. I don't have a Bachelors of Engineering degree though. I have a Bachelors of Science degree. Seems logical to me but not to corporate 'Merica. I had to take writing and social classes, PE credits, etc. These are often left out of the modern "Bachelors of Engineering" degrees, which is a huge mistake in my opinion.

So I have a few options if I chose to pursue more education:

• Pursue another bachelors degree. This will take likely 3 years, since I have some credit to my name. This seems like a surprisingly good option as I could completely restart my career. New material and new connections to get me started in a new field. The downside is that I would be starting over my career, clean slate means lower pay and harder jobs typically. 
• Pursue a Master's degree. This will likely take about 3 years as well as I would likely work on it while still employed meaning I could only take a few classes at a time. This is a tough option because my advice to others has always been: don't bother with a masters unless you have a damn good reason to pursue it. This is not true for all professions in the USA, but in Engineering I think it is still true. I have met several people through work that have a masters degree and no experience; they are usually very hard to work with and have very poor solutions. My issue is that I don't have any background in fields that I am interested in, therefore I have very little knowledge of if a particular institution has good connections, and I have no research partner besides the nonsense most institutions list on their websites. (excessive autonomy and electrification topics. Not my intrest)
• Pursue a degree through a foreign school. This is really a subset of either of the above. So far I have looked at schooling in Australia and New Zealand. The cost is fairly high for foreigners $40k for undergrad) which is not terrible, far cheaper than non-resident at most domestic schools in the USA. The issue would be higher costs of living while attending and the likelihood of career placement afterward. In some cases placement might be easy, in some cases not so much. Lots of unknowns. 
• Something completely different. Get my pilots license. Start an apprenticeship in a machine shop. Get my PADI instructor license, or commercial diver permit. I might explore those more elsewhere. Maybe.

This is a much shorter post, likely because I am not considering it nearly as seriously as my last two posts. The outcome is not bad (another career, decent pay, etc) but I am not sure the outcome justifies the investment. That point is hard to justify but here is the basic premise:

I just turned 36. this means I would likely be 40 when I finish another degree. Right now I make $65k/year salary. (which is decent in my situation I would like to add. Probably $10k/yr less than a similar engineer)

This is a curve representing my pay if I got a 2.5% raise every year for the next 40. (which is already negated by covid-19 pandemic)

At age 65 I might be making 1.95x today's salary. $126k doesn't sound too bad.

Of course there is no guarantee. Company's go bankrupt all the time, people get fired when they become "too old" for the internal system. Health and healthcare come and go. It is a bleak outlook when you consider life in those terms.

What if I take 3 years to get another degree of similar nature to current? I would say the likely outcome is that I would get another job at the same rate after three years, so now the curve looks something like this:

Now at age 65 I am making 1.76x today's salary. $114k Not terrible but other than my personal knowledge I haven't gained any ground.

School for something different. Like an MBA. Ick. I cringe at the idea. But what if I can make $100k USD after graduation? (unlike but I needed a number)

Now things change a little: at age 65 I am making 2.27x today's salary. $120k Still having dry heaves thinking about that outcome though.

So there is an obvious flaw here: I am not taking personal well being into account. I am not taking Savings or a FIRE lifestyle into account. No bonuses or anything like that. These graphs also make the assumption that we will continue to get raises after this pandemic...which is a large stretch of the imagination right now.

So I thought "What does my savings account look like?" So I theorized a 10% of income saved per year. Then I said my "same" degree will cost me $10k/year/3 years and the "high" degree will cost me $20k/yr/3 years.

Again this is theoretical, lots of large and sweeping assumptions. This assumes that I maintain the same income while in school and that I can find a job immediately out of school.

I feel that this is a pretty clear illustration of the adage "You have to spend money to make money." Thought again; that is not justification, in my opinion, to follow any of these paths.

Post-Covid travel musing

Item: World traveler

If you have an interest in traveling and seeing the world, such as I do, you likely have already done some travel and have likely read, watched, researched others who have done more than you. The writing is on the wall: You can travel and you can do it on very little budget.

A complaint I have about sources on the internet: Why don't people like to share their numbers?

As a techncial/engineer brained person I want to know if I am in the same ball-park as other adventurers. I don't need amounts to the nearest penny, but the nearest $100 would be fine. Even to the nearest $1000.

I equate this issue with people not wanting to share their wages/salary. What do you gain by keeping that number secret? You think people will hate you because the number is so large; maybe you should consider the implications of that.

My youtube example would probably be SLV. Now I don't know Riley and Elayna, have never met them. But in all of their videos and website I know little to nothing about their background. Their first yacht was a used charter boat bought in Eastern Europe so Riley likely spent $80k USD on purchase of that boat. maybe less. I don't know.

So why does that matter? Because most people such as myself don't have that kind of cash sitting around. What did they do before becoming internet celebrities? How did they save money? how much money did they leave home with?

Don't get me wrong, it is not unique to SLV. I will say most of the sailing youtubes seem to operate this way. they have a tag line to the effect of "we started with nothing and didn't know how to sail and we traveled around the world!" Which might be technically accurate but is definitely not a complete story. They mostly have yachts that should cost in the several 100k USD range, some have large businesses that they run remotely, some are independently wealthy, etc. The common denominator, that I see at least, is that they never talk about where the money comes from or how much is going out.

Seriously the Sailing Loot podcast is about the best (besides Teddy's irritating deameanor) because he asks people for numbers. THANK YOU TEDDY! Also MJ Sailing does a monthly expense recap and Tula's Endless Summer have talked about money in a few episodes.

Okay /rant. Sorry.

What are options I have considered?

The usual millennial options. :D

The world by motorcycle.

I have been riding motorcycle for over a decade. I enjoy it and I believe it holds some unique opportunities. It is a highly minimalist option, which I am okay with. That means I get to explore some neat space saving gadgets while being an effective traveler. yay!

The costs are relatively low:

• Purchase cost of moto: Low. A new or newish adventure bike can be had for $10k USD here in the US. And I am seeing an increasing trend of people buying bikes in other countries for even lower investment cost. (Itchy Boots did just that: she bought an Indian Royal enfield for "half" of the Euro price)
• Operating costs of moto: Low. Motorcycles get good fuel economy compared to an automobile or truck. They have very few moving parts to break. Insurance is less than that of a car (in the US) in my case my motorcycle insurance is 1/3-1/4 of the cost of my car insurance.
• Modification cost: Low. Adding bits and bobs to your moto is relatively cheap. It is likely also an option while on the road: most Adv-Touring motorcycles have following all around the world and parts can be sourced or found in most major locals.

The world by car.

I have been driving cars and trucks since before I had a driving license. I used to enjoy it more before my spine decided to not always work right, but I still enjoy it in smaller amounts.

• Purchase cost of car: Medium. This can vary hugely from market to market and person to person. There are people who have driven from London to Peking or across Africa in cars that were purchased for less than $5k USD. But those folks should not be considered the "average!" I currently own a Jeep that I would feel comfortable driving most places in North America and I purchased it for $14k USD. If I were to undertake a long overland trip in said truck I would need to make large investments in maintenance and modifications. People also have spent several hundreds of thousands of dollars on custom built overland trucks with bespoke bathroom linens and 8 wheel drive...so this is a wide open point.
• Operating costs of car: Medium. Again this should probably be considered as a function of purchase cost: Higher purchase cost = higher operating and maintenance costs. For my particular case fuel would likely be the highest line item with maintenance being a close second. Far Out Ride has some numbers listed for their van life expenses, which I feel are a good indicator, at least for North America.
• Modification cost: Low. I put this as low, relative to the investment in the vehicle. This could be completely the opposite depending on the particulars. I am not interested in building out a live-in van therefore my changes would be much smaller costs. (suspensions, racks, trailers, etc)

The world by yacht.

This is an interesting one. Also many people have done it before, and are doing it today. I have lots of sailing experience but not on oceans and not in foreign waters. This lifestyle of "cruising" has a lot of appeal: no deadlines, go with the flow, etc. It also has the highest risk in terms of affordability, reliability, and longevity. 

• Purchase cost of yacht: Very High. Again this can vary hugely from case to case but I feel that for my situation investing in a ready-to-go yacht is the best option and that means a very large investment, possibly over $100k USD. Folks have sailed the world in boats that they got for free, and celebrities cruise the world in multi-million dollar megayachts. again: this is so hard to narrow down here. Perhaps I will talk more on this in a later post.
• Operating costs of yacht: Medium. This is dependent on the yacht being used and there are two aspects to consider 1)The operating costs are lower for a newer boat; systems are more efficient and it will take longer for them to reach a replacement or repair status. 2)The operating costs increase with the size of the boat. I don't have much for reference yet on this one, and it is a hotly debated topic on message boards around the internet! If we average things out the moral of the story is likely just: Big boat=big costs. Small boat=smaller costs.
• Modification cost: High. This rating is based on my own mechanical ability. I can do fiberglass and basic carpentry, as well as mechanical work. If you cannot do those your costs will be huge as you will have to pay labor rates at boat yards, extra haul-out and splash fees, etc.

So now I have written a rambling novel of a blog post. Congratulations are in order if you are still reading this! Go crack a cold beer to celebrate. :)

Covid career

Item: Career

So the background here is that I have worked for Polaris for 7 years, this month. The first almost two years as a contractor and the remainder as an employee. The first 5 years were pretty good: I got along with coworkers and the environment. But in the last few I have seen a far less ideal environment, more concern with the all mighty dollar rather than customers or employees. Also as my role has morphed over the years I get involved in more impossible politics which make me sick. Of course there are lots of aspects to this, but those are ones that are easy to put down in words.

So what are some alternatives?

Change roles at the same company.

This is probably the most easily accomplished alternative. I know people in different parts of the company that can probably get some leverage. The downside would be that I still work for the same company, so the environment would change only in the short term, and the social world of the company would remain the same: The dollar sign still wins and the customer still loses.

Don't get me wrong: Most corporate entities in the US will be like this. The advantage to changing to a new company is that it would likely take me another 5 years to really get a good grasp at their political and social situations. Not ideal but worth be realistic about it.

Moving to a new company.

Seems like what my soul needs, but not simple. Because of my very uncommon background and role, I don't have many professional connections. I have plenty of friends but they all do very different things professionally from myself. This equates to most job applications being "cold calls" to companies I have no connections at and no insights to their operations. So the likelihood of gaining said positions drops dramatically.

entrepreneurial alternative?

This one is a known option, but also a huge unknown for me personally. Do I envy the digital nomads of last months world? Yes, definitely, but I also don't a proven skillset that lends itself well to that lifestyle. The "side hustle" is not something that just springs up overnight, despite what you see on instragram. If you son't have a viable offering it is not going to amount to much. *shrug*

These are just a few options obviously.

They are also opinions and ramblings as I sit here staring out into my snowy yard and dream of warmer weather.

What does the future look like...

Wow, I have not written a post in over 1.5 years. I guess isolation seems like as good of time as any to write again.

So it is April 2020. Covid-19 is making a mess of the world right now. There are silver linings of course; like me writing this post, and getting okay sleep, not having to stress out as much about work, etc.
There is also, for me, an introspective side to this period of less work and more isolation. I have been having serious thoughts about leaving my career job and doing something else. I have been feeling this way for quite some time, but this large quantity of personal time has allowed my brain to explore these thoughts in more depth. Of course I have also been watching a ridiculous amount of youtube which also prompts a lot of daydreaming, not sure if that is good or bad...

So what is on my mind? A couple of items stand out.
-I don't like my day job any more. As a 36 year old white male, what are my options? I could go flip burgers or stock shelves anywhere probably, but what if I want to retain some dignity to my previous roles? How do I break out of the hole I have dug myself into by staying in my current role for 7 years?

-Is going back to education a feasible option? another undergraduate degree, a masters, or something foreign even? The caveat to this, of course, is that I need both money to pay for said schooling and resources to keep a roof over my head. I am very much torn on this as it is definitely a way to break into another career path but it comes at huge expense and a system reset for careers.

-Seeing the world. This is probably fueled, in a large part, by my choices of entertainment. reading and watching stories of other people up and leaving the world behind for a "grand adventure" Whether by motorcycle, truck, or boat this option seems the most volatile or risk prone. It also sounds the most satisfying!

So lets explore the mind some more!