It's a bit hard to believe how quickly the time goes by, but one year ago Caroline and I started our new website, Costa Rica FIRE! It was not our first attempt at a website. We had created one previously, while I was still working my corporate job, and over time we felt the name of the site and the direction of the content just didn't fit our passions and priorities. Caroline had long been following personal finance websites and FIRE blogs, and she came to the realization that combining FIRE with our interest in real estate and travel was [...]
One of my favorite parts about owning vacation rental property in Costa Rica is that we have business reasons to visit, making our trips tax-deductible! It is also fun to experience business in another country and culture. We had just six days in Guanacaste, but we squeezed out a lot of work and play. Day 1: Sunset at Playa Brasilito The flight from New York City to Liberia is about five hours, and luckily we had a smooth, on-time journey. As with many of my flights, I passed the time watching the in-flight entertainment, in this case the Robert Redford [...]
I've been on a radical new nutritional plan (OK, a diet) for the last 5 weeks, and wanted to report back on my thoughts and impressive progress! Caroline and I in 1989 at our high school prom, in our skinny days! While I started out as a very skinny kid, over the years I've slowly gained weight. I've never considered myself obese, but definitely a couple dozen pounds heavier than would be ideal for my height, and technically in the obese zone, according to the CDC, with a BMI in the low 30's for much of 2013 through 2017. As [...]
2019 will be a major transition year for us. After 23 years of raising two kids, our younger child goes off to college in August. Caroline and I have had the year 2019 circled on our proverbial calendar for a loooong time. We've always been interested in travel but never really had the luxury of doing it, partially because my full time corporate career didn't leave a lot of room for taking vacations, and partially because we've spent the last 15 years building our real estate portfolio, prioritizing the use of our money to fund real estate investments. Over the [...]
A few years ago, I read the book, “One Word That Will Change Your Life” by Dan Britton, Jimmy Page and Jon Gordon The premise is alluringly simple, yet powerful: instead of a long list of goals and resolutions for the year, pick one word that captures the essence of what you want. Your One Word gives you focus when you need to prioritize day-to-day and make longer-term decisions. It also serves as inspiration and a reminder of what’s important for the year. My first One Word was Joy, and that was very useful in pivoting me from my natural [...]
If you want to live a more spontaneous, FIRE lifestyle even while you still have a job, then you need to negotiate for more flexibility at work. Companies will give workers more flexibility, especially when the worker fulfills a critical need. If you’re indispensable, you’re more likely to get what you ask for. Indispensability is a key trait to develop if you want flexibility at work – so you can do a digital nomad test run or stay right where you are but work from home or on a different schedule. One of my consulting clients has been with me [...]
UPDATE: The 2019 report is out, and Costa Rica remains a full democracy! It moved up in the rankings from #20 to #19 (out of 167 countries), and the total score is up to 8.13, from 8.07. Another great honor, on top of recently being named a Champion of the Earth! ====== We enjoy reading about the characteristics of Costa Rica that make it an attractive location for us to spend time in retirement, including how it has had no military for the last 70 years, and how it is consistently named as a top retirement destination. We also haven't [...]
Interested in a blank canvas commercial space for co-working or pop-up shop rentals? How about a small complex of four apartments that could make a boutique AirBNB? A breakfast café or comfort food casual eatery? These are just some of the businesses that came across my radar recently, getting my imagination spinning on brick-and-mortar business ideas in Costa Rica. Even though we’re not looking to add to our current portfolio of three vacation properties in the Tamarindo/ Langosta area, I regularly check the real estate listings (it’s nice to know what’s going on). And even though we’re planning on the [...]
Costa Rica is again on several lists as a top retirement destination: #2 by International Living #5 by Money/Time top 24 by Forbes (Forbes did not rank the 24 places against each other). In naming Costa Rica as the #2 retirement destination (behind Panama), International Living cited Costa Rica’s healthcare accessibility, abundance of outdoor activities and stable democracy. Indeed, Costa Rica abolished its military 70 years ago. …with a dozen microclimates, there is someplace for everyone to fit your personal weather preferences. Many people love the temperate “eternal spring” climate of San Jose, the capital and all the surrounding Central Valley. [...]
Like others that keep a spending diary or a food diary, I keep a time diary. I have kept a time diary for over 20 years! I started doing it because I was working in the professional services field where you had to track your time to bill your clients. You also had to calculate how much of your time was billable to clients versus non-billable (and billability was an important factor in performance reviews!). I realized how useful the time-tracking was to the company and figured it would be just as useful for my own personal business, and it [...]
