Finance Xpress

As someone who's been writing about FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) since 2009 and actually leaving full-time work for good in 2012, it's been quite an interesting ride. For the most part, I've been lucky because the stock market and real estate market have generally trended up, except for in 2018 and 2022. 12 good […]

The post FIRE Psychology During a Stock Market and Economic Downturn appeared first on Financial Samurai.

As a parent to two young children, I am a target client for universities everywhere. So far, I have saved over $800,000 in two 529 plans to pay for universities in 9 to 12 years. I know we need to pay full freight because we are nobodies, but make above the low income limit to […]

The post American Universities Hiring H-1B Foreign Workers Seems Off appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Since 2009, I've been writing about all the ups and downs of my financial independence journey, the good and the bad. What I can clearly say is that who you partner with in life is one of the most important variables for achieving financial freedom. Get that right, and everything else gets easier. Get it […]

The post My Wife Took The Kids And Left Me – Thoughts Appreciated appeared first on Financial Samurai.

In a previous post, I debated whether it’s better to buy a home with a bigger lot or an amazing view. One key point was that unlike increasing livable square footage, it’s nearly impossible to create or improve a view. Sure, you could add a level to peek over surrounding houses. But building a 1,000-square-foot new level […]

The post How To Improve Your Home’s View With Foresight and Patience appeared first on Financial Samurai.

We all know that panicking is one of the ways investors lose money. Panic selling during the 2008–2009 global financial crisis may have put some investors into the permanent underclass. Not only did they lose money, they weren't able to benefit from the incredible recovery since. Panicking during the March 2020 lockdowns caused many people […]

The post How Panic Lost Me Money In A Non-Investment Way appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Since I started Financial Samurai in 2009, I have been on a mission to help readers achieve financial freedom sooner rather than later. And one of the core strategies I keep coming back to is encouraging readers to get neutral on real estate by first buying a primary residence. Once you have secured your primary […]

The post It Is Easier To Make Millions On A Home Than In Stocks appeared first on Financial Samurai.

One of the biggest fears workers have about retirement is losing their sense of purpose. That fear is not unfounded. It is one of the negatives of early retirement nobody likes talking about. For the first several months, maybe even a year, you may feel a little lost. The steady paycheck is gone. The camaraderie […]

The post Finding Purpose After Retirement Is Easier Than You Think appeared first on Financial Samurai.

The Fundrise venture capital product, VCX, listed on the NYSE on Thursday, March 19, 2026, to remarkable success. It had a NAV of about $19 a share, opened at around $42, briefly rocketed to $125, then closed the day at $76. That is roughly a 300% premium to NAV and far beyond what I thought […]

The post Stay Humble After a Large Investment Win: Scrub A Toilet appeared first on Financial Samurai.

At the end of 2024, a relative asked me for financial help. She was planning to leave her expensive money management firm at Goldman Sachs Asset Management, where she was being charged close to 1.5% in fees and placed in a series of esoteric GS funds that charged another 1–2%. I’m not a fan of double-dipping, so I […]

The post I Fired Myself As Money Manager And It Feels Great appeared first on Financial Samurai.

One of the biggest conundrums parents face is managing their own emotions when a stock market, real estate market, or any other risk asset takes a dive. On one hand, it's painful to watch your portfolio shrink. Every dollar you lose represents time, the most valuable commodity of all. On the other hand, there's a […]

The post A Crashing Stock Market Is Great For Our Children’s Future appeared first on Financial Samurai.

In poker, having position means you act last. And acting last is one of the most powerful advantages in the game. You can raise with nothing to push opponents into folding, call with a weaker hand without fear of getting re-raised, or simply check and do nothing when your cards are mediocre. Every option costs […]

The post Having Position Is Only Valuable If You Use It Wisely appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Due to the U.S. and Israel's bombing of Iran, oil prices temporarily shot up to $120 per barrel (WTI crude). If the Straits of Hormuz gets completely shut down, perhaps oil prices might go to $150+ a barrel. This would create a tremendous tax on consumers everywhere. With yet another increase in a core living expense, […]

The post How to Survive Higher Oil Prices After The Bombing Of Iran appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Recently, a home in the beautiful Forest Hill neighborhood of San Francisco was listed for $2.4 million. It had four bedrooms, three bathrooms, and a modest 2,250 square feet. The home had been remodeled about 15 years earlier and was squarely in the price frenzy zone. As we do with every open house, my wife […]

The post The Pain Of Selling A Home Too Soon In A Rising Market appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Robinhood is one of the most popular online brokerage firms today, especially among younger investors who actively trade. During COVID, Robinhood famously restricted trading in 13 stocks on January 28, 2021. As a result, thousands of investors were unable to buy or sell, and billions of dollars in value swung during the freeze. Robinhood does […]

The post How Robinhood’s Venture Fund Listing Could Impact Fundrise Venture appeared first on Financial Samurai.

If you never spend your investment gains, what exactly are you investing for? This question hit me hard after a year of nonstop financial management, market volatility, and real estate turnover in 2025. I had done everything “right” from an investing perspective, yet I felt deprived. So I made a new financial rule for myself: […]

The post Treat Yourself To A Luxury Expense To Make Investing Worthwhile appeared first on Financial Samurai.

All of us have three main options to profit from AI: 1) Invest in the right AI companies. 2) Work for the right AI companies. 3) Invest in real estate that will benefit from the AI boom. Investing in the right AI companies is easier said than done. The gorillas like Google, Tesla, Nvidia have […]

The post Real Estate Is The Easiest And Safest Way To Profit From AI appeared first on Financial Samurai.

In a surprise move, Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter (X) and Block (Square, Cash App), announced a mass layoff affecting about 4,000 employees out of Block’s roughly 10,000 employees. For a company that is still growing, a ~40% cut is extraordinary. As the author of the #1 severance negotiation book, How To Engineer Your Layoff, I […]

The post An Inside Look at Block’s Mass Layoff Severance Package appeared first on Financial Samurai.

After three consecutive years of double-digit returns in the S&P 500 since 2023, I decided to cut cable. The reason was simple: I’m conditioning myself to prepare for hard times by not only reducing expenses, but also freeing up time to focus. Yeah, I know. Here in America, when you make a lot of money, […]

The post Finally Cut Cable To Prepare For Harder Times Ahead appeared first on Financial Samurai.

From 2009, when I started writing about FIRE, until now, the FIRE movement has had a great run. It was born out of the 2008–2009 global financial crisis, when hundreds of thousands of people were losing their jobs. In order to cope with the sudden disruption to their economic livelihoods, the concept of FIRE was […]

The post The FIRE Movement Is So Back Thanks To AI appeared first on Financial Samurai.

In an attempt to better understand the potential discount or premium to NAV for the Fundrise Innovation Fund, I wanted to examine Pershing Square Holdings, ticker PSHZF, listed on the London Stock Exchange. Pershing Square manages over $18 billion and is run by American, Bill Ackman. Meanwhile, the fund currently trades at about a 25% […]

The post Why Pershing Square Holdings Trades At A Deep Discount To NAV appeared first on Financial Samurai.

If you want to sell a home for a potential maximum overbid, you need something rare. A tasteful remodel with permits helps. A highly functional layout helps. Being in a prime location helps even more. Beyond those three fundamentals, I strongly recommend trying to buy a home with a view and or one that sits […]

The post The Rarest Homes Have Enclosed Front And Back Yards appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Back in 2012, when I left my finance job, I worried I had made a huge mistake. The money was good. The job provided decent status. But I was exhausted by the grind. So I did what any rational person would do when faced with a single, finite life: I chose a better lifestyle. It […]

The post Becoming A Competent Investor Is A Vital Skill To Master appeared first on Financial Samurai.

One of the more entertaining aspects of financial social media is watching hyperbole get passed around like a hot potato. Almost every month, there seems to be a new label designed to classify where people supposedly stand in society. We already have poor, low income, lower middle class, middle class, DINK, HENRY, upper middle class, […]

The post Escaping The Permanent Underclass May Not Be Necessary After All appeared first on Financial Samurai.

My primary goal for this site is to help you achieve financial freedom sooner rather than later. And if you’re still on your path to financial freedom, sending your children to private grade school often works against that objective. I’ve experienced freedom from bosses, work travel, rush hour commutes, and client pressures since 2012. And […]

The post Be Careful Sabotaging Your Retirement For Private Grade School appeared first on Financial Samurai.

After Fundrise announced it plans to list the Innovation Fund on the NYSE, I decided to do some more research on how different funds trade and why float matters more than most investors realize. My main goal was to get a better idea of how the fund may trade compared to its Net Asset Value […]

The post How ETFs, Open End Mutual Funds, and Closed End Funds Actually Trade appeared first on Financial Samurai.

There’s an endless debate over whether real estate or stocks are the better asset class. I just realized the feel-good wealth effect adds another reason to lean toward real estate, which I’ll explain here. In my post about avoiding the real estate frenzy zone if you want to get the best deal, I highlighted a […]

The post Why the Feel-Good Wealth Effect From Real Estate Beats Stocks appeared first on Financial Samurai.

One of the reasons I’ve been a long-time fan and affiliate partner of Fundrise is its willingness to innovate. Since its founding in 2012, shortly after the JOBS Act opened private real estate investing to retail investors, Fundrise has consistently looked for ways to democratize access to institutional-quality investments. From launching diversified real estate funds […]

The post What Fundrise’s Innovation Fund NYSE Listing Means for Investors appeared first on Financial Samurai.

If you want to find better value when buying a house, avoid the real estate frenzy zone. The real estate frenzy zone is the price range where the largest number of buyers can compete. It generally spans from the median home price plus about 50%. This is where demand is thickest, emotions run hottest, and buyers routinely […]

The post Why the Best Real Estate Deals Exist Outside the Frenzy Zone appeared first on Financial Samurai.

I have wanted to lose 10 pounds (~6% of body weight) ever since I started Financial Samurai in 2009. I have come close, dropping five to six pounds in some years, but never quite hitting the double digit goal. As a result, for more than 16 years, I failed to accomplish something that should have […]

The post Lose Weight By Embracing Your Inner Economist and PF Nerd appeared first on Financial Samurai.

I recently realized something that completely reframed how I think about income in America: a $200,000 household income is no longer middle class. In fact, under increasing college financial aid formulas, earning up to $200,000 now qualifies as lower income or even poor. New data shows families at this income level can receive free or heavily subsidized tuition at elite […]

The post $200,000 Is Now Considered Lower Income Or Poor For Families appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Unlike most people, I love ARMs, or adjustable-rate mortgages. Adjustable-rate mortgages have helped me save over $300,000 in mortgage interest expense since 2005 compared to if I had taken out 30-year fixed-rate mortgages. Despite all the fear, uncertainty, and doubt surrounding ARMs, they have been one of the most powerful wealth-building tools in my financial […]

The post Why Letting an ARM Reset Can Be Smarter Than Refinancing appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Although I’m convinced AI will eliminate millions of jobs and leave many young graduates unemployed and disoriented, there is one surprising positive I recently discovered: AI can be a great therapist for everyday problems. I’m not talking about replacing licensed professionals. I’m talking about something far more accessible. AI can give you knowledge to make […]

The post AI Can Be A Great Therapist For Many Of Your Problems appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Well folks, after 60 agonizing days of dealing with car salespeople, test-driving far too many vehicles, visiting two auto mechanics to diagnose and fix my current car, and wasting an unhealthy amount of time on online research, I have decided not to buy a new car. I know this may disappoint everyone who generously shared […]

The post The Main Reason I Won’t Be Buying a New Car Anytime Soon appeared first on Financial Samurai.

If you are a FIRE follower, then you have likely mastered the art of saving and investing aggressively. While your neighbors and colleagues splurge on new cars, fancy vacations, and clothes, you are quietly deploying your excess cash flow into index funds, private investments, and real estate. You buy every dip. You dollar cost average […]

The post Having Kids Is The Best Way To Decumulate Wealth When FIRE appeared first on Financial Samurai.

If you want to achieve financial independence, every investment we make serves one purpose: to buy back our time. Time is infinitely more valuable than any object, experience, or luxury. Given how short our lives are, we should use our money not just to accumulate more, but to buy freedom. Once you have freedom, you can […]

The post Practice Converting Annual Investment Returns Into Time Saved appeared first on Financial Samurai.

As a FIRE parents raising two children in San Francisco, we rely heavily on our investments to remain free. If we significantly misjudge returns, we increase the probability of having to go back to work. Going back to work is not the end of the world. Ideally, however, we would like to avoid it until […]

The post Investment Outlook For Public And Private Stocks In 2026 appeared first on Financial Samurai.

By many objective measures, 2025 was a good year. Investment returns were solid. I published another bestseller in Millionaire Milestones. My kids are healthy, happy, and continuing to grow in loving environments. On paper, I should feel satisfied. But the reality is different. The downside of writing consistently, responding to hundreds of questions, managing the […]

The post New Year’s Resolutions 2026: Less Optimizing, More Living appeared first on Financial Samurai.

I’ve been aggressively buying the dip since March 2020, when I wrote How To Predict A Stock Market Bottom Like Nostradamus. My daughter was born four months earlier, and something inside me clicked, pushing me to invest aggressively for her future in an increasingly difficult world. Since then, I’ve continued to buy virtually every meaningful dip […]

The post Be Careful Buying The Dip Too Often, Too Soon appeared first on Financial Samurai.

Happy New Year 2026 everyone! With another year wrapped up, I thought I’d do a 2025 year in review so I can one day look back fondly as an old man. Overall, I give the year an A for effort, which is all I can really control. Unfortunately, the result didn’t match the effort, as […]

The post 2025 Year In Review: A For Effort, B Minus For Results appeared first on Financial Samurai.