Hello friends & foes and good people of the Internet!
Here we are again. It’s been about 3 months since my last “confession”, so I thought it was time to give you guys an update on the life situation over here in little old Denmark.
I can’t really grasp the fact that we’re now entering our 2nd winter at our new location. Last winter we were living in the garden, in a small trailer. 2024 has been a bit of a blur. We moved into our renovation project in May. At this point the house was far from finished, but we wanted to get rid of the €1,333+ rent cheque that we were writing to the owners of the trailer (tiny home) every month. I realized that this was a renovation expense that I had kind of forgotten to account for, in our budget. Our actual cost for “renting” our own garden for the winter (temporary accommodation during the reno) exceeded €10,000, because we also had to pay for heating (which was electric, and the trailer had like 0 insulation!).
Before we began the renovation, we actually considered buying a tiny home/camper instead of renting one. It would have had a higher initial investment cost, but had we for example bought a cheap old(er) campervan, we would have had that now to vacation in – or we could have re-sold it, to recoup some of the money. In hindsight, I think we should have maybe followed that approach. The €10,000+ that we spent on our temporary accommodation is now a 100% sunk cost. On the other hand: had we bought some sort of temporary accommodation, we would not have had the same motivation to finish the actual house as fast as we did. So I think all in all, the choice that we made back then was probably the right one – all things considered
Anyway, it’s all in the past now! No point in crying over spilt milk. We still haven’t gotten around to finish our clothing cabinets in our bedroom or our home gym. They remain without doors, and it’s kind of starting to annoy me, so I guess the new year will see more cupboard expenses, as we will have to spend some cash on doors! Price-tag for such a venture: ~€3,000 Happy new year to me!
But then it’s almost starting to look like a complete house
We have one inside project left (besides a few trim pieces here and there still missing!) that will take some time and effort to complete. It’s the door to the boiler-room.
We made a few changes to the layout of the house during the renovation. The wife got the great idea to move the door to her office, so we could get cabinets in the hallway, and also there is a nook where you can sit to remove your shoes etc. This was a great idea, as the old (original) layout saw the two doors to our offices hit each other if they were opened at the same time!
She also got the great idea to make a custom bookcase-door to the boiler room, so we would have a “secret entryway” to the boiler room (and some extra storage in the kitchen). This was also a great idea, but we have yet to implement it! We’ve watched a couple of Youtube videos on how to do it, but it’s quite an intricate swivel- and locking mechanism, so one thing is to build the bookcase (which we have not started yet either), but making it into an actual door is a whole other ballgame. Anyway, this is one of the projects that we’ll need to finish in the new year – that and the outdoor wooden deck, which naturally my wife believes can be completed in a weekend (when in reality it’s probably going to take us a couple of months ). We’re probably going to have to take 2-3 weeks of vacation during the summer to built this. After that, we can put in my wife’s hot tub, which is something she’s been lusting after for years. I’m not a huge fan (1st is the purchase price, 2nd is the running costs), and this item is very un-FIRE like, but because of her bad back, this is something that we have chosen to prioritize, in order to improve her quality of life. Will it be installed in 2025?…Time will tell – as always, I have my doubts
Something interesting happened in November! (Besides the markets reaching another ATH!).
I got my first payout from Property #1! Unfortunately, it was not anywhere near the size that was originally planned in this project. Each investor received €4,400 in dividend from the project. The original plan of this project was to re-mortgage and payout more than 5x that! But plans change, and the banks have decided not to allow a re-mortgage. While I was a bit disappointed about this development, it actually suits me pretty well, as I simply do not trust myself with money lately! (HAHA!).
The project will continue to pay down its debt. If this continues for the next 10 years, the cashflow from this property will be 6x the current dividend payout. It’s not something I will be able to live off of, but it will be able to fund about 50% of our household budget at that point. If we choose to pay down our own home mortgage early (10 years instead of 30) like I’m currently contemplating, this would mean that we would be able to live off of 1 income in 10 years. At that point I will be 51 years old. I had kind of hoped that we wouldn’t need ANY income at that point. This is still do-able, but currently I’ve lost my ability to focus 100% on the FIRE goal, so the future is a bit fuzzy and unclear to me at this point. What we DO know though, is that in 10 years time our daughter will likely be living on her own, and we will be debt free (maybe?), and we’ll be free to live anywhere we’d like (that our wallet will allow us, of course ). This prospect excites me, and I think we will find more ways to add passive income to our wallets during the next 10 years. But who knows what’ll happen in the coming years? Perhaps our goals will change? Perhaps I will be working less hours, and thus making less money? Perhaps my wife will finally begin her own investing journey (like she’s been talking about for the past 5 years?! ) and perhaps she will strike gold!? Who knows…
For now, we’re back in black – no more red numbers in our accounts. This feels great, and I will spend the next couple of months figuring out, how to proceed on our FIRE journey. For now we’ve chosen to proceed with a 1-year flex mortgage. Our interest rate + fee (bidrag) for the coming year (2025) will be right around 3%. This is a lot more manageable than the close to 5% we’ve been paying in 2024! Thank you to the FED and the ECB for that!
Oh, I leased a new EV car (my wife got a job, so we’re back to having two cars). This has been a mixed bag of emotions for me (still not loving it). My wife wanted me to short-term lease something for the winter only, as I do like taking my e-scooter to work in the summer, but the problem with that is that the e-scooter is still a no-go when it rains. So then there’s the bike? I’m trying to convince myself that the bike is the only right FIRE-vehicle, but I’m having a tough time getting there to be honest! HAHA. I only have 7km to work, so even walking there would probably take me about 45min. But that’s 1.5 hour/day on transport. I love walking, but it doesn’t seem like the most efficient means of transport. For now, we’re a 2-car household again, but something tells me that it’s not goin to last…
My mental health is still not in great shape (neither is my physical health to be honest), but I’ve recently gotten into the habit of getting up early and using our home gym to get a workout in before the day begins. I’m hoping I can keep this habit for 2025, and I’ve also started playing some Padel Tennis with my kid This is something that we both need to work on, as she likes to go there but after 20-30mins she gets tired, so I have to use every parenting/coaching skills in my bag, to get her back on the court haha. I’m hoping this will slowly fade away over time, as she gets better and better at the game. I’d really like for her to learn, how putting in the effort can make a huge difference.
Anyway, life here is a lot better than a lot of other places on the planet, so I/we really shouldn’t be complaining. Sometimes it does help to put things in perspective and just be grateful for what you have. What we have that many other people doesn’t are options. We can afford to buy another car, and we can afford to play an expensive sport. We can afford to buy take-away food when we’re too tired to cook. We can afford to put our kid to private school, and we can afford to buy all the x-mas presents that no kid really needs. We’re lucky, and we should be very grateful for that.
I wish you all a Merry X-mas and a Happy New year.
See you next year
