My FIRE journey continued in 2024, though throughout the year, my FIREy efforts felt more like a total flame-out or dumpsterFIRE or perhaps more generously, I could be accused of spreading pants-on-FIRE lies about having been or purporting to have been a FIRE adherent at all. I can’t say I lived particularity FIRE-like nor did I perform much music, as is the desired main focus of my folkefire journey. But instead, I made music of another kind in that I experienced one of life’s great joys - becoming a parent - and I even managed to live a little. Would you sacrifice your FIRE pursuit for the same?

2023 FIRE Recap

The last year in review was filled with FIRE-related concessions due to one of life’s joyous events - marriage. After decades of fledgling relationships and beleaguered singleism I’d finally found my person and I liked it so I put a ring on it. In fact, several rings were part of the expenditures of the arrangement in 2023. Also included in our matrimonial pursuit - a destination wedding in Ireland and a reception for friends and family in Port Townsend. While we did receive a bit of help from family, celebrations were largely paid for with cash and made possible due to our ability to live debt-free. While these massive expenditures were decidedly not FIRE - the silver lining is that I was able to cover landmark experiences with cash, a direct result of my FIRE education, and could still net approximately $1924 in savings per month in 2023.

2024 FIRE Recap

Toward the end of 2023 my wife discovered she was pregnant and 2024 was decidedly not very FIRE either. The inception of our child wasn’t an immaculate conception, but it still held a lot of mystery, surprise and wonder for this expectant father.

One reality of parenthood in the United States in the 2020’s is that a couple cannot easily do it alone. Expectant families are staring down the double-edged sword of childcare expenses, but also housing costs - not to mention all of the baby related costs, some of which we’re still becoming acquainted with. I recognize many FIRE proponents would meet this issue at the pass and saddle up into a Euro-style 800 sq ft apartment - but that wasn’t a reality for our particular family. Mostly because my wife, though frugal and consumer-debt-free, isn’t necessarily a FIRE proponent, advocate or interested party. Suddenly our secure and affordable rental felt confining to my newly pregnant wife and the conversation went something like the following:

“My mother will need to move in with us to help out.”

“Oh really? You don’t think we can just get a babysitter or something?”

“I don’t think you’ve looked into this. Childcare is expensive. It’s like $2,500 per month for working parents.”

“What, really? Ok, that’s cool then, she can have the basement.”

“It’s dark and cold in the basement.”

“We’ll ensure she has extra blankets, a space heater and will make it real cozy.”

“You claimed the space heater never helped when you had your office down there, even when you were bundled up. Plus it’s moist and the stairs are a bit treacherous for an older woman. Do we really want to share our one bathroom with a third person?”

“I’ll work with the landlord to build out a room and maybe we can make those stairs safer.”

* * *

In fact, I did have those discussions with the landlord. We prepped a Google Sheet with extensive estimates and approximated the cost of the lumber, tools and supplies required and came up with a cost of $30,000 if we performed the work ourselves. I went to the landlord’s house and discussed the plan:

“You’ll give us the money back if you sell or if we move out, right?”

“No.”

* * *

Thus began our home buying exploration.

Together with the support of my new sister-in-law, who is one of Portland’s top real estate agents, one January morning we embarked on an ice-storm ravaged city - drove 20 minutes beyond my previously accepted eastern border, and found a large house deep in a suburban hellscape beyond the city I’d called home for 20-years - where we now reside.

I couldn’t offer more than a whimper as I saw my FIRE goals completely shredded. I took comfort in Ramit Sethi’s description of a home as a luxury investment, after all, we deserved a bit of luxury as we moved into the next phase of life. I thought about the $2,500 we wouldn’t be spending on childcare with the mother-in-law moved in, and how wonderful it’d be for both her and my son to have that time together.

Nevertheless, I went to reddit to vent concerns about murdering my FIRE plan and enjoyed relative success and encouragement from the great FIRE community there.

The contortionist act of justifying a house purchase, as performed by a FIRE enthusiast.

We bought $15,000 under asking and had them throw on a new roof. Pretty good in today’s economy. We only put 3% down - so essentially borrowed $470k at 6.5% interest. Marry the house, date the rate - they said. But what if I already know I want to dump the house in five years or less?

The loan officer told us, “you have instant equity” after their appraiser took a look. I rolled my eyes, but quickly calculated that if the value of the home rose just 4% per year in value, that’d practically offset our new insane mortgage payment.

The Redfin estimate showed we could break even if we sold today, but the Zillow estimate showed a loss. I deleted the Zillow app from my phone.

I then laughed maniacally at myself in the mirror as I continued devolving into a home owner.

I stayed up late, my face glowing from the laptop screen, performing calculations to run and re-run the numbers to determine how much the house would need to increase in value to escape with our money back. I did this again including our amortized principal payments.

None of those calculations really mattered because we’d already dedicated ourselves to a higher calling - parenthood.

The rest of the year was spent getting ready for baby. This included repairing the backyard to make it more attractive and safer for small children and environmentally friendly, including dismembering a pond and filling it in with river rock. We moved light fixtures, installed new fans, patched drywall, and put together playpens, bouncers and other baby devices.

Our son was born September 1st and thanks to Oregon’s generous Paid Leave laws, approved by voters, we were both able to take some paid time away from our jobs to welcome our son into the world. After determining that time ended too soon - we also felt a great new respect for the even more generous Paid Leave laws offered in Scandinavian countries given that my two months and her 3 months flew by in a heartbeat. And by a stroke of absolute luck - we discovered that our hospital experience was paid for by the insurance company.

FIRE Year in Review

Looking back on the year, my 10% savings rate is definitely not FIRE. I do not have a viable path forward to increase this rate as long as I remain in this house and in my current job, as we have no other areas where we want to cut.

In 2024 I also failed to max out my ROTH for the first time in five years. This pains me greatly to admit. But the point of folkefire is to cover this fund through monies acquired via the expression of my love of music (i.e. gigs) and I got what I put into it this year - not much. I have not fulfilled the folk part of the folkefire equation. I played one gig on St. Paddy’s Day and then checked out to focus on the family. I made one inquiry with a local venue and when I didn’t hear back I didn’t follow up either.

It pains me to say, but one area where I saved a lot of money was giving up on drinking beer - in solidarity with my pregnant wife.

Reaching $100k

On the plus side, I did reach my first investment goal of $100,000+ in retirement assets. Buoyed by a remarkable year for the market - this is also a year and a half later than I’d initially estimated in 2020 - but at the time I didn’t factor in a 2022 market slump, a 2023 destination wedding, 2023 reception, a $10k down payment, buying a house and having a baby in 2024 into that earlier plan. If I could pat myself on the back for a moment, this $100k milestone occurred only three and a half years after I became debt-free and just five years after my assets first totaled more than my debts. That said, my savings rate in 2024 averaged out to just over $1,500 per month.

One could split hairs and argue that I’ve diversified my investment portfolio from the S&P, QQQ and a few tech stocks - and added real estate into the mix. One could also take heart in having bought a home for $485k that Redfin now claims is worth $550k. On my good days I’ll relish in those AI-driven truths, I’ll relish in my family and my beautiful smiling baby - but I never can truly celebrate because I’m not maxing out my ROTH and I don’t have a 20, 30, 40, 50 percent savings rate.

Portland FIRE Meetup

Despite the antics of 2024 in my personal life, and my membership in the Portland Hibernian Society, II still managed to host the Portland FIRE Meetup nearly every month. Our group has grown to more than 600 people and a regular core have been showing up each month for nearly two years now. Our topics have veered on the emotional aspects of saving money, and spending money. We discuss different paths to FIRE, different seasons of FIRE, different approaches to FIRE - and each participant brings a different life context to their FIRE journey from true beginners to the those who’ve hit their FIRE goal. Some folks focus on real estate, some in ballooning their side hustle - one guy has a dividend-only strategy paired with extreme frugal living.

FIRE Year 2025

However, one thing happened when I had two months off - I felt like myself again for the first time in decades. No longer burdened by capitalism and having a corporation taking ownership of my brain for 10+ hours per day - I could allow myself to think, dream, feel creative. I could enjoy the forest when I walked my dog. I felt a lightness that I haven’t had in ages. I think I experienced freedom as a working adult - and it was glorious.

True financial freedom feels a long ways off at the moment. My math looks good for on-time retirement - but to maintain the momentum I have to return my brain capacity to the corporation from whence it was briefly leased. To afford the house and the mortgage payment and our lifestyle creep I now have to maintain a certain income threshold that was far lower a year ago.

Looking ahead to 2025 I want to maintain the light of creative fire that I experienced after my son was born. I want to continue being a great partner and a good father and a respectable son in law. I want to follow up to that local venue and start booking more gigs - especially because my ROTH IRA now depends upon it.

folkefire Financial Independence Year in review 2024