Loading summary
Transcript132 lines
- [00:01]
Andrew
I remember when I needed to hire someone fast, but finding the right person quickly felt impossible. And if you've ever been there, you know how stressful this can be. That's where Indeed comes in. When it comes to hiring, Indeed is all you need. Instead of struggling to get your job post noticed, Indeed's sponsored jobs help you stand out and hire faster. Your post jumps up to the top of the page, making sure it reaches the right candidates and it makes a huge difference. Sponsored jobs on indeed get 45% more applications than non sponsored ones and there's no need to wait any longer. Speed up your hiring right now with Indeed and listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit. To get your jobs More visibility@ Indeed.com Personal Finance, just go to Indeed.com Personal Finance right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com personal finance terms and conditions apply. Hiring Indeed is all you need when you think of game day. You might not think of Wayfair, but you really should. Wayfair is the best kept secret for affordable, stylish game day finds. From outdoor tailgating gear to indoor viewing setups that feel like a stadium suite. They've got grills, patio heaters and folding chairs to take your tailgate to the next level. Or if you're hosting from home, check out recliners, TV stands, coffee tables and even barware and slow cookers for the ultimate watch party setup. What I love is that Wayfair makes it easy to find the right pieces for your space, big or small. And shipping is fast and free. Even on the big stuff, Wayfair is your trusted destination for all things game day, from coolers and grills to recliners and slow cookers. Shop, save and score today at Wayfair.com that's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R.com Wayfair every style, every Home on this episode of the Personal Finance Podcast, he quit his job at 29. Here's how Drew believes we've been taught freedom all wrong. We think freedom comes only after decades of grinding away at jobs we don't enjoy. He says it should be the other way around. Start with flexibility and start with designing a life you actually want. Then let your money serve that mission, not the other way around. In this episode, Drew reveals how he walked away from a traditional career path after building a $300,000 net worth at 29. And at 35 now, his net worth has more than doubled in the past six years and how working at McDonald's and Frontier Airlines, jobs that most people overlook, gave him more happiness than climbing the corporate ladder. He talks about the surprising reason why Coast Fire may be more fulfilling than full retirement, and how you can create a lifestyle that prioritizes meaning first and money second. But that's only half the story. Drew also believes our culture's obsession with status and titles is keeping us stuck at jobs we hate. And he's proving that it's possible to live differently, even if that means challenging what everyone else thinks success should look like. This isn't another conversation about money. It's about freedom. It's about identity, and it's about building a life on your terms, even if it means trading prestige for purpose. This episode could be a turning point for you and the way you think about work forever. Now let's welcome Drew to the Personal Finance Podcast. So, Drew, welcome to the Personal Finance Podcast.
- [03:36]
Drew
Andrew. Thank you for having me. I'm excited for our chat today. I think it's going to be a good one.
- [03:41]
Andrew
So I am really excited to have you here because I want to kind of talk through your why behind what you are currently doing. So you started to work in 2013 and you graduated with an engineering degree making $63,000 per year. But then when you started that job and you started in your career, you realized something. And I think when did you realize that you wanted to get your finances right and start to build wealth?
- [04:06]
Drew
So pretty early on after I graduated and I started working my first job and I had a consistent paycheck, I think the engineer in me wanted to optimize my money right and figure out what should I do with this money, how do I optimize this? So I started reading a few personal finance books. My favorite was I Will Teach youh to Be Rich by Ramit Sethi. I think that's a classic one, A great beginner. General overview book. Um, I got in some different blogs, some different websites. The Reddit Personal Finance Subreddit wiki is one of my favorites. And then bogleheads.org is another one of my favorites. And they're all free. And even the book is free if you get it from your library.
- [04:43]
Interviewer/Host
Right?
- [04:44]
Drew
And for those of you that don't know, Bogleheads is the community of, of, I would say fans or people that follow John Bowel, who's the founder of index funds. And you know, they follow his style of index fund investing. But once you get into a lot of these different resources, what you'll find is a lot of them Say, very similar stuff, right? You know, a lot of it is to live below your means. A lot of it is to invest in index funds, right? And then also when you look at the data, right, the data shows that it's very difficult to pick individual stocks and beat the s and P500 or beat the stock market over long periods of time. And then the last blog I got into was Mr. Money Mustache, who is another very popular one. A lot would say he's the OG of fire financial independence. Retire early, right? So I got into all of those resources and I felt like I found the most optimal way to handle my money and invest my money. And I set everything up and I automated everything, right? A lot of the things are, like I said, live below your means. You want to automate your investments, right? You want to invest as much as you can, and you want to start early and take advantage of the power of compound growth, right? So a lot of that stuff clicked for me and I just automated everything, set everything up, and I just kind of let it ride throughout my mid-20s. And to be honest, I didn't check it too often, but it was really important, I think, to get everything set up initially and do that initial learning. And that's why I feel so passionate about, about personal finance and investing education now, right? And that's why, you know, I, I, I'm, I've essentially dedicated my life to personal finance and investing education at this point, right? Making content online to help people is because I feel like I stumbled down this path when I was 23, and I know my life would look a lot different if I didn't start and automate all that at 23. And so that's why I, you know, I think it's so important to spread the wording and get this information out to as many people as possible as early as possible.
- [06:40]
Andrew
And it's funny because I think you and I are close to the same age, but Ramit was a huge, huge influence on me early on as well. And then Mr. Money Mustache, when I found him, I remember when I graduated from college, it was like I could not stop reading his stuff. It was just one of those things that I was just digesting it over and over and over again. And I remember thinking like, oh, I'm gonna start biking to work. And my wife's like, we live on like a super busy interstate. Like, you're not gonna go bike to work all the way across the interstate. And it was like one of those things, though, that I remember just going through that and I'm like, this guy is incredible. He's living on 30,000 doll, but he can do whatever he wants day in and day out. And it's such a powerful lesson when it comes to financial independence. But I remember kind of going through that process and this was in my 20s where it kind of planted a seed in my mind where this is possible. It is possible to find ways to get after financial independence where you can then, you know, have your freedom. If you do this early and often, you can find your freedom. And the coolest thing about that was, you know, in those early days, there's just so many powerful, powerful lessons of the OGs, of the financial independence movement. And I think it's really, really cool. So when you started in career, you started working as an engineer and you started to realize, hey, maybe there are some shifts I want to make. Was your ultimate goal when you started to get your finances together? Maybe, you know, you're reading Mr. Money Mustache, you're in the Bogleheads forums, you're in the personal finance forums. Was this something where you realized, I want to be financially independent as fast as I possibly can because I see these other examples of people doing this or what was your first initial goal?
- [08:05]
Drew
So initially, it definitely was not to retire as early as possible. If we rewind to my senior year of college, right, I finally got my job offer that I was going to accept. I was going to move to a new city for my job and I had to. I needed a car, right? So initially I was looking at brand new Honda Accords and Honda CR Vs, right? I ended up going with the used Honda CR V. But I remember going through that thought process of cars and I was thinking, okay, you know, I have the used Honda CR V now when I get my next promotion, I'm going to get the brand new Accord or the brand new CR V, right? And then when I get my next promotion, I'm going to get the Acura and then the BMW and then the luxury suv. And then I remember thinking the same thing with my apartments. I was like, you know, oh, yeah, one or two promotions down the road. I'm going to get that luxury apartment downtown with the big windows and the skyline view, right? And then a condo and then, and then an awesome starter home and then eventually the mansion in the suburbs. So that's how I initially was thinking when I, you know, my senior year of college, the Mr. Money mustache stuff, it definitely kind of reeled me back into, you know, not wanting all of that and not wanting to climb the Corporate ladder. But to be honest, like I said earlier, I. I automated everything when I was 23, but I wasn't thinking about money or retiring, to be honest. I was too busy partying, talking to girls, trying to have fun and enjoy my 20s. I wasn't thinking about money. And that's why I kind of just let all that automation ride for what, four or five years. And then it wasn't until I took a new job. I took my first new job at a new company after my initial job when I was 27 or 28. It was a consulting job and I was traveling a lot for work, which was fun initially, right? The points and the miles, you know, you know, the flying, all the dinners out. It was fun initially, but eventually I got tired of it quick, right? I wanted to be home. It was stressful, there were long hours. And that's when I really got back into Fire. And I was like, I cannot do this for another 35 years, right? And so I got back into the blogs and the podcasts and I started running numbers and I realized I was Coast Fire, right? Coast Fire is when you have a nest egg of investments and you essentially don't have to contribute another dollar to that nest egg and you can just let that ride and compound and grow until you reach your retirement age at, let's say 60, and you'll have enough money for retirement. So I realized I was Coast Fire. And once I realized that, man, everything just changed. I checked out of my job. All I could think about was my next move, taking that job where I really started to get stressed out and I couldn't see myself working engineering job for another 35 years. That's when I really, really started to focus on Fire. And after I ran the numbers, you know, I realized it was kind of a reality. And I think because of, you know, what I set up and learned when I was 23.
- [11:10]
Andrew
Exactly. And I think that one of the cool keys that you had there was that you set up automations early on. And I've seen so many people where they'll set up an automation like their 401k is basically an automatic automation. So a of people will kind of see this happen within their 401k where maybe they're just getting their match or they're starting to contribute money to their 401k and they don't even really know what they're doing. And then all of a sudden a couple years down the line, they look at their 401k balance that they haven't looked at. In years. And they're like, holy cow, how do I have that much in my 401k? And this is because of automation. Automation is the most powerful way to build wealth, in my opinion, because it is one of those things that removes your willpower from the equation. And so when you do this, it allows you to kind of just build wealth automatically. You don't have to think about it and you can go out and live your life. And so like you said in your 20s, you know, you're living there, you're partying, you're having fun, and you're enjoying time with friends. And then over that timeframe, you're still automatically investing your dollars overtime. So now, at the age of 35, you have a net worth of over $700,000 as we're chatting right now, and you realized, hey, I can be coast fire. And this is something that for a lot of people out there, if you've never run that calculation, it is one of my favorite calculations to run because you can all of a sudden realize, I can be so much more free with my money than I ever thought I would be able to. And so now you're sitting here with this great debt worth, and so can you kind of talk through tactically, what are the exact steps you took early on? Did you contribute to your 401k early on, or did you start to build up an emergency fund? Or what are some of the exact steps that you took so that you could get to that $700,000 net worth?
- [12:39]
Drew
I want to add one thing real quick to your automation talk. Investing is one of the few things in life that you can automate that's beneficial.
- [12:48]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [12:48]
Drew
Like, the example I like to give is if I could automate brushing my teeth and flossing twice a day, man, my teeth would be sparkling white. And they're not bad, but they're not sparkling white.
- [12:58]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [12:58]
Drew
If I could automate going to the gym, I'd have a six pack and a bigger chest.
- [13:02]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [13:02]
Drew
But I can't. Investing is one of the only things in your life that's beneficial that you can literally automate and not have to think about it almost ever again, Right?
- [13:11]
Andrew
Absolutely. And I love that too. And I think overall that is just an amazing reminder for most people. Most people in life, they want, you know, a certain amount of things. And this is the one thing that you can actually automate and not have to worry about it whatsoever. So that I think is a great point to add.
- [13:25]
Drew
Sorry. But back to your next question. So I like to think of this as three main things. The first is you have to have at least a decent income, right? Number two is you have to be able to control your expenses or at least watch your spending. And the number three is you obviously have to invest your money so it grows and it does some of the lifting for you, right? So number one, I went to Penn State University. I studied industrial engineering. That obviously helped a lot. I was able to get a good job coming out of College back in 2013. I was making $62,000 per year when I graduated college. But I always like to stress, right, especially in today's day and age. Maybe, you know, on my TikTok feed I see software engineers out in California making $300,000 and I'm like, oh my goodness, that's, you know, crazy amount of money. I, I do like to stress that, you know, it was good money, but it wasn't anything crazy, right? But at the same time as we'll get more into my story later, you know, right now I'm working at McDonald's as one of my coast fire jobs and I'm making 14 an hour, right? If you're making 14, 16, 18 bucks an hour, it's going to be tough to build wealth, right? You know, it's going to be a lot more challenging, right? So I think step one is you have to at least have a decent income. And if you don't, at least be taking some action and steps to increase your income to again, nothing. It doesn't have to be six figures, but you know, it's going to be challenging to do this at 30 grand a year, right? Number two is you got to be watching your spending. Some of the biggest things I took in my 20s were attacking the big three, as they call them, right? Your housing, your transportation, your car and your food, right? So my housing. I tried as hard as I could to live with roommates whenever I could. And I always tell people, some of the most important decisions of your life are going to be in your twenties. Whenever your lease is ending and you're about to sign your name on the line for another 12 month lease, right? It's not easy to find roommates sometimes, right? I was talking to friends of friends, friends of coworkers. I had to put a lot of effort into finding roommates. But when I did, I mean, it was potentially saving me $700 a month. And when you extrapolate that out to a whole year, that's $8,400. And that's also post tax money, right? If you look at it as pre tax salary. That's almost like a 11, $12,000 raise just by getting a roommate, putting the work to get a roommate. So that's a huge factor. I mentioned I drove a used Honda. I mean that saved me a couple hundred bucks a month, you know, 2, 3, 400 bucks a month with insurance. And then the other big thing is food, right? I would try to pack my lunches to work, I would try to cook my dinners at home. But as I mentioned, I also really did enjoy having fun in my 20s, right. And so the example I always like to give people is if you're at work, right, and your coworkers are going out to lunch, you should go with them, right? You can't put a price on building relationships, especially with coworkers networking, right? But if you're going out to lunch and buying a $20 salad and taking it back to your desk and eating it by yourself, that is a waste of money, right? No doubt. You should be packing that food to save your money, right? And that's the same thing, you know, when you're going out on the weekends, right? If you're getting doordash by yourself at home, that's probably not a good use of money. If you're going out with your friends, having a good time. Sure, why not? The last piece is investing. And one thing I'm a firm believer in is there is a framework in a roadmap that I think 95% of people can probably follow and be successful. The first piece is how to handle your money. And a lot of people will refer to or call that the order of operations with your money. The Reddit personal finance subreddit wiki has a really good roadmap. A really good order of operations to follow is from the money guys and I know they've been on your show as well. And that's following things like having a one month emergency fund to start, right? And then you probably want to get your 401k match and then you probably want to pay off your high end interest debt, which a lot of times that's credit card debt for people, right? Then you probably want to go back to your emergency fund and build it up a little higher to two or three months. And then you want to, you know, try and max out your Roth ira, max out your HSA if you can, and then go back to your 401k and max out your 401k if you can, take advantage of your tax advantage accounts and then go to a taxable brokerage, right? That order, I think, can apply to 95% of people. And then back to the investing I mentioned, there's a lot of data that shows it's very difficult to pick individual stocks and beat the S&P 500 over long periods of time. I think for 95% of people, they're going to have a lot of success. Keeping it simple, investing in index funds, ETFs, like the S&P 500, US total market funds, international total market funds.
- [18:03]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [18:03]
Drew
And even if you want to just use those target date retirement funds.
- [18:07]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [18:07]
Drew
And, you know, the life cycle target date, 2050, 2055, 2060, et cetera. For your average American that's coming home and watching Netflix and going to the gym and hanging out with friends and living their life. Right. That's a perfectly fine option. So that's kind of the three steps and kind of the framework that I followed that I think is very repeatable and led to success for me and can lead to success for a lot of people.
- [18:33]
Andrew
I agree. And I think for most people out there, you know, you can realize just by listening to Drew's story here, this is simple, but it's not easy. You got to put the systems in place and make sure that you're actually following your system going forward. And I think, you know, learning how to manage money like Drew did early on, and understanding how to make sure that you can spend your dollars on things that you value while cutting back in the areas that you don't value is so powerful. And then learning how to invest your dollars going forward is really, really important. Now, how long did it take you to get to your first 100k? And once you got to your first 100k, did you see it start to compound faster, or what did that look like?
- [19:08]
Drew
So to get my first 100k, it took me roughly three years. And you can kind of run the numbers a little bit. Essentially, when I graduated college, I was trying to max out my 401k and my Roth IRA. And for the most part, I did that even on my starting salary of $62,000. Back then, to max out your 401k, it was roughly $17,500. To max out your Roth IRA back then, in 2013, it was about $5,500. So just between both of those, I was investing $23,000 a year. And then I had a pretty good 401k match. I think it was 5%. So that was another $3,000 a year, you know, from my 401k match. So between all of that I was investing 25, $26,000 per year.
- [19:57]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [19:57]
Drew
So just in three years, you know, even if you just put in a bank, which you shouldn't do, you're going to have $75,000 right now when you account for growth from the stock market returns. That led me to roughly around three years to get my first hundred thousand dollars.
- [20:13]
Andrew
So you got your first hundred K. And we kind of talk about this all the time on this show and a lot of other people have talked about this too. But once you get to that first 100k, you kind of can feel the pressure relieve a little bit. Now it's not some magical force that just happens really quickly. But how long after your first 100k, you know, how did that compound after that, did you see the compound kind of, you know, accelerate and, or did you just kind of see it gradually grow over time?
- [20:34]
Drew
Yeah, I definitely saw some acceleration, which a lot of that is due to compound growth. But the one interesting thing as well is there are going to be ups and downs in the stock market.
- [20:44]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [20:44]
Drew
And that you do have to plan and prepare for. So I was actually going through some of my numbers and I was pretty close to hitting the $200,000 mark a year and a half after hitting the hundred thousand dollar mark. But that was right before 2018. But then in 2018, the stock market pulled back about 6, 7% and that ended up delaying me hitting that 200,000 mark for another year or so. So I ended up hitting 200,000 two and a half years after I initially hit 100,000. And then I ended up going back through the data just because I thought it would be interesting to see. And to go from 200 to 300, it took 10 months, 300 to 400 took 13 months, 400 to 500 took eight months, 500 to 600 took two years and two months again because of another pullback in 2022. And then 600 to 700 took a year and a half. And there's other variables in there like whenever I quit my engineering jobs and reduced my income. And the other variable is, you know, some home equity appreciation. But you can definitely see the compounding power and effect after reaching that first hundred thousand dollar milestone.
- [21:58]
Andrew
Absolutely. And I think showing real examples of those like yours is such a powerful message for a lot of people because most people who haven't hit that first a hundred K yet, they want to learn, hey, how long does it take me to get from some of these points? And sure, there's other variables like you said the home equity or income variables that can come into play. But it's really, really helpful to have that first hundred k as your big target mark when you get started. Because for a lot of people, realizing that your savings rate is what is going to propel you to that first 100k, it is the majority of what's going to be happening within your first one. Okay. And then all of a sudden the balance starts to shift a little bit and compound interest is going to help you out. Your money is going to start to grow more. And over that time frame, you're going to start to see a shift like Drew is now, where you can see his portfolio is compounding faster over time. And this is just the beauty of compound interest and how it actually works.
- [22:43]
Drew
Now when you go ahead, the one thing I want to add is the other thing I like to think about that is also very motivating for me and I think can be motivating for others is when you actually do the math.
- [22:55]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [22:55]
Drew
Of returns on some of these amounts of money.
- [22:58]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [22:59]
Drew
We've had a great, except for a few bad years, I think 20, 22 and 2018, we've had very good years in the stock market over the past 10 years with some years returning. There's been multiple years where returns have been 25 plus percent.
- [23:15]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [23:16]
Drew
And if you just think about the numbers, it's mind blowing. You know, at one point I had $300,000 invested and the market went up 25% that year. 25% of $300,000 is $75,000. That's by doing nothing.
- [23:30]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [23:30]
Drew
I got a 25% return on $300,000. And that's why once those numbers continue to grow, you know, that math is going to get more and more advantageous. And sometimes I think about, you know, once you get to a million invested and a year happens where there's 25% growth, it's mind bo to think about these numbers. And that's again is the beauty of compound growth.
- [23:50]
Andrew
Exactly. It's getting those dollars working as soon as possible. Because that over that timeframe, it is just so incredibly powerful. What happens as time goes on and it's really just getting started is the huge, huge thing. Now you walked away from your traditional career path and when you did that, you know, it was something where you made a couple of choices and decided, I can walk away from this career path. So what was the moment you knew you couldn't keep living that way anymore? When you were working in your engineering.
- [24:15]
Drew
Job, the biggest moment was when I hit that coast fire moment, and I realized this was a reality, right? One of the other things that also helped me walk away was understanding the value of time. So I'm a very passionate person, and at that time, I knew what I wanted to do if I could walk away.
- [24:34]
Interviewer/Host
Right?
- [24:34]
Drew
I, as I mentioned, I'm very passionate about personal finance and investing education, and I also love creating content and the creativity around it. And I've always been fascinated by content. So when I was sitting at my engineering job, my consulting job, I knew what I wanted to do, right? And I knew I could do it because I hit my coast fire number whenever I hit coast fire, and I knew I could do it. That's when I started checking out on my job and really thinking about what my next move was.
- [25:04]
Andrew
Perfect. And I think that point in time for a lot of people is learning how to have this financial education. This is why it's so powerful to have a financial education, because once you understand some of these concepts, it can be something that can absolutely change your life. You're going to have more options than you ever thought you could have just by understanding some of these concepts. Now, for most people out there, they'll go out there and they'll try to double down on earning more to retire faster. You chose freedom instead. Your choice was, I am going to choose freedom. I want to be flexible with my time and my energy and be able to do what I want day in and day out. And so when you did that, what was the reason that you did that instead of just doubling down and trying to make more money?
- [25:41]
Drew
The biggest reason was time, right? Once I hit that coast fire point and I knew my investments would eventually grow to cover my retirement, right? Time was the most important thing to me by far. It wasn't money, right? And at that point, I knew what I wanted to do with my time. I was very passionate about personal finance, investing, education, and I loved content and the creativity behind content. And I knew I wasn't meant to sit at my engineering job for another 35 years. And I wanted to pursue this dream of mine, you know, to help people with money on the Internet. And I knew when I was walking away from my engineering job that I was going to be giving up hundreds of thousands of dollars of income and also millions of dollars in the future. When I was in my 50s and 60s, because of, you know, the compound growth effect, I knew I was giving up all of that stuff and I was giving up the fancy cars and some luxurious items as well. But Time was just so much more important to me than money at that point. And I was willing to give up all that to pursue my dream in this one life that we have.
- [26:48]
Andrew
When you were leaving your job, because I think the psychology behind doing this sometimes people miss and I think the psychology is really, really important. But when you left your job, what was scarier for you? Was it leaving a stable income or was it facing the possibility of regret if you didn't do it?
- [27:03]
Drew
So regret, by far, as I mentioned, time was just such a focus for me and I didn't want to have any regrets when I was older and I was in position, right, to be able to do that. And that's why, you know, the time was just so much more important now. There were scary things whenever I was leaving my job. I think one of the scariest things is health insurance for a lot of people now back then I was a single guy. You know, I had a girlfriend who is now my wife at the time. But you know, I didn't have kids to worry about. That obviously makes it easier. But I remember doing my research online, you know, I was listening to fire podcasts, all kinds of stuff, trying to figure out the best way to do health insurance. And eventually I figured out for me the best way was to just go to the healthcare marketplace, healthcare.gov and get independent insurance that way. And I remember once I figured that out and actually went through the motions and put in my information and figured out exactly how I was going to do it, that was the last hurdle. And I remember I put in my two weeks notice the very next day once I figured that out. The other scary thing, as I mentioned, was giving up millions of dollars in the future. That was scary. But again, that was something I had accepted. And there were other scary things that I kind of made not scary, if that makes sense. I think another big thing was giving up my salary, right. I was making $92,000 a year at that point. And if I were spending $80,000 a year, right, it would have been scary to give my salary. There's no way I would have been able to do it. But back then my expenses were very low because, you know, I was trying to save and invest as much as I could and I wanted the flexibility of having low expenses. I was sharing a one bedroom apartment with my again girlfriend who's my now wife. It was $900 a month for two people. So my commitment on rent was 450amonth, maybe 500 with utilities. So I knew I could live off A lower paying job, which was my plan also, you know, it was to work at Amazon, for example, make 16 bucks an hour. But I knew I could pay for my lifestyle with that lower salary. And the other reason I was okay with giving up my engineering salary was I knew I could always go back to work.
- [29:10]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [29:10]
Drew
One of my favorite quotes is from this is at least who I heard it from is from Mindy over at BiggerPockets Money. And I remember the one podcast she mentioned, the worst case scenario is you go back to work, which is everyone else's everyday scenario or everyone else's normal scenario, right? So I know worst case scenario, I could go back and get an engineering job. Yeah, maybe I would take a few thousand dollars less of a pay cut, but worst case scenario, I just go back to work. And that's why that thinking, I think, really helped me to not be scared as well.
- [29:43]
Andrew
And I think that's such a powerful statement right there because for most people, they think they're kind of chained to their job. But like you said, the worst case scenario is you just go back. And I think for most people, they just got to realize there's more flexibility in what they're doing than they actually think there is. You know, you see all these things on TikTok now, like utilizing my free will, and people are just doing like these crazy different things. And honestly, all of us have this free will. And if you prepare enough and you keep your expenses low, just like you did, that gives you more flexibility. If you start investing your dollars early and those investments grow, that gives you even more flexibility. And so learning how to utilize personal finance so that you have more flexibility is one of the most powerful things I think that are out there. So it is just one of those amazing things that you did. This is why I love your story so much. Now, social pressure is also a real thing. How did friends, family, how did they all react to you kind of making this decision? Did you get pushback from people and, or was it something that people kind of understood what you were doing and they were receptive it.
- [30:37]
Drew
So when I told my friends, I think a lot of them were surprised. You know, I, I really hadn't talked finances with my friends ever. I mean, who does, right? So they didn't know my financial situation and so I think they were surprised that I was probably able to do this. I think they were happy for me. But to be honest, after that, we didn't really talk about it much. We would still hang out and, and have our fun, but life Went on co workers was a similar thing. So as you'll hear more of my story, you know, after I quit my first engineering job, I worked at Panda Express, I worked at Amazon, I worked at Frontier Airlines, now I work in McDonald's. I've worked at plenty of these entry level, lower paying jobs. And obviously you're talking with coworkers and they would, you know, be asking questions, we'd be conversing. I would tell them I was an engineer and I quit because it was very stressful and I wanted something where I could clock in and clock out of every day. And I think they understood right now the piece of this. That's. I think one of the craziest parts of my entire story is my family. So the first time I quit my engineering job was in 20, 25 years ago. My parents still do not know that I quit my engineering job. They think I've been working an engineering job this entire time.
- [31:48]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [31:49]
Drew
And I'm scared to tell them.
- [31:51]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [31:52]
Drew
They're very traditional. They worked until their 60s and part of it was they didn't really have as much of a choice. But I'm scared to tell them because I do not think they would react well.
- [32:05]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [32:05]
Drew
I think they would tell me I'm wasting my degree, I'm giving up a lot of stuff. They would tell me I'm being crazy. And sometimes I do think I'm crazy. But also I've made the right decisions early in my 20s to afford to give me these options. And I'm scared of how my parents would react. And so I haven't told them. Now over time, I have one sibling. My sibling has found out. I've still tried to keep it from a lot of my cousins because I don't want them to have conversations with my parents. And I have a, you know, decent social media presence now, which I'm scared all the time that one of my videos is going to pop up in one of my cousin's feeds or something.
- [32:48]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [32:49]
Drew
But yeah, that's one of the craziest parts of my story is my parents still don't know and I feel terrible, right, that I'm living a double life. But again, I just don't think they would understand. And I don't want to risk, you know, maybe damaging our relationship or I don't even know how they would react.
- [33:09]
Andrew
And I think that's one of the harder parts of the fire movement and financial independence is there's going to be people along the road that sometimes, especially when you're doing something as young as you are that sometimes just are not going to understand the entire concept. Even if you explain it to them, even if you show them the numbers and you show them the math, they're still not going to fully get it. And I think for a lot of people out there, they are or could be worried about some of those social pressures. So it's powerful for you even telling your story about that because I think it is something that we would all struggle with. There are pros and cons to everything and there are some cons when it comes to financial independence. And some of them could be social, some of them could be just fear based or psychology based. But overall, I think it's what you are doing is just setting an example for a lot of people that allows them to have that flexibility that I think is so incredibly powerful. So now you, you know, you've decided to leave and you've started all these different jobs you've had. And you mentioned, you know, Panda Express, you mentioned Amazon, Frontier Airlines, and then now currently you're working at McDonald's at the time recording this. And so over those time frames, you know, which of those jobs have been your favorite or did you like each one for a different reason?
- [34:10]
Drew
So Frontier Airlines was my favorite job by far. I've always been fascinated with the airline industry. Whenever I was traveling a lot for work, I loved flying. My wife, she used to work as a flight attendant and I would be able to use some of her benefits. I've always been fascinated by the airline industry. And so when I was looking for jobs I wanted to work at, why not work in the airline industry? I actually would love to be a flight attendant. I just have kids now and that's a tough schedule to balance everything. But I would have loved to have been a flight attendant earlier in my life. But yeah, so, you know, when I was looking for jobs to work at, why not the airline industry? And so Frontier Airlines was hiring at the airport near me and I got the job and I loved it. The aspect I love about it is you never know what you're going to get into that day, right? You never know what customers you're going to talk to. You never know what's going to happen.
- [35:00]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [35:00]
Drew
And it was stressful at times. Frontier Airlines notorious for their strict baggage policies. You know, people get upset about that and that can make the job stressful, Right? You never know when a flight's gonna get canceled and you're gonna have to tell an entire gate of passengers, you know, they're not gonna make it to their destination that day.
- [35:19]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [35:20]
Drew
So it was very stressful. But the part of the job that for me at least didn't make it stressful was that you clock out at the end of the day, leave with an absolutely clear mind, nothing to worry about. I couldn't put a price on that. After working some of these different jobs, some of the toughest jobs, I gotta say, are managers. At some of these different jobs I've worked at, like a manager at McDonald's, a manager for Frontier Airlines. You know, they're the ones that have to deal with the people management stuff.
- [35:52]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [35:52]
Drew
They're the ones that, you know, if a customer's not listening to you say and they want to talk to your manager, they're the ones that ultimately have to deal with it.
- [35:58]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [35:59]
Drew
So those are some of the toughest jobs and stressful jobs, I would say. But yeah, Frontier was the favorite job that I've had so far. The reason why I had to stop working at Frontier Airlines was my commute was 40 minutes door to door, which was a little bit long. And then it's a very cyclical business. So whenever summer's ending, flights are starting to die down. They had to cut back hours. So they were wanting me to commute to the airport for a four hour shift. And it just didn't make sense at that point.
- [36:28]
Andrew
And I think that's. Yeah, that makes sense because you have to go, you know, through the gates and all that other stuff too. There's just so much extra time commitment that is happening there for sure. Quick gut check. Could you name all your financial accounts, like your 401ks, bank accounts, investments, mortgage balances? Without logging in, most people can't. And the truth is, the lack of awareness can lead to missed opportunities and money slipping through the cracks. That's why I started using Monarch Money. It brings everything together in one clean dashboard. And it showed me exactly how much cash I had sitting idle. Helped me spot old investment accounts I'd forgotten about and made it easier to stay on top of my goals. Now I use Monarch to track our family budget, keep a pulse on our net worth, and check in weekly on our savings rate without opening five different budget apps. And Monarch was named the best budgeting app of 2025 by the Wall Street Journal. And once you try it, you'll see why. Don't let financial opportunity slip through the Cracks. Use code pfponarchmoney.com in your browser for half off your first year. That's 50% off your first year at monarchmoney.com with code pfp before I discovered Shopify, selling online felt like a constant uphill battle. But with Shopify, everything changed. It's the platform trusted by millions of businesses, including Gymshark, to grow their sales and deliver a seamless customer experience. And here's why I love Shopify. It's home to the number one checkout on the planet and their secret sauce Shop Pay, which boosts conversions by up to 50%. That means fewer abandoned carts and more sales. If you never use Shop Pay, it's absolutely amazing. Whether your customers are shopping on your website, in store, or scrolling through their feed, Shopify makes selling simple. If you're ready to grow your business, this is the platform you need. Upgrade your business and get the same checkout Gymshark uses. Sign up for your $1 per month trial period at shopify.compfp all lowercase go to shopify.compfp to upgrade your selling today. That's shopify.compfp the best money piece of advice that I ever received was Start now. Even if it's small, just get in the game. And that's exactly why I love Acorns because it makes starting easy. Acorns is the financial wellness app that helps you invest for your future, save for tomorrow and start. Spend smarter today and you can start investing automatically with just your spare change. You don't need to be a finance expert. Acorns put your money into an expert built portfolio that helps support your goals, whether that's buying a home, saving for retirement or building something for your kids. They even have a checking account that invests for you and an emergency fund that grows your money all in one easy to use app. I use Acorns and you should too. So sign up now and Acorns will boost your new account with a five dollar bonus. Investment join over 14 million all time customers who have already saved and invested over $25 billion with Acorns. Head to acorns.com pfp or download the Acorns app to get started. Paid non client endorsement compensation provides incentive to possibly promote Acorns tier 2 compensation provided investing involves risk. Acorns Advisors, LLC, ASCC registered investment advisor view important disclosures@acorns.com Here's a stat that really hits home Nearly half of American adults say they'd face a financial hardship within six months if they lost their main source of income. And if that sounds familiar, you're not alone and you've got options. That's where policygenius comes in. It helps you get life insurance quickly and easily, so your family is protected if something ever happens to you. And you can compare quotes from top insurance companies in just a few minutes. And you don't have to figure it out alone. PolicyGenius has licensed agents who guide you every step of the way. And with Policygenius, you can find life insurance policies starting at just $276 a year for $1 million in coverage. It's an easy way to protect the people you love and feel good about. The future. Secure your family's future with Policygenius. Head to Policygenius.com to compare free life insurance quotes from the top insurance companies and see how much you can save. That's policygenius.com.
- [40:33]
Drew
Now.
- [40:33]
Andrew
You're currently, at the time, recording this, you're working at McDonald's, which I think your videos are so interesting when you kind of go through the concepts of, you know, what happens at McDonald's. Even your videos where you're talking about, you know, how to place the fries properly and stuff like that. Like, my brain just loves that kind of stuff because I know they're so systematic. Has there been anything that you've learned from working at McDonald's that you can, you know, kind of apply to life and kind of talk about their systems and what you think about that?
- [40:57]
Drew
Yeah. So I've worked at a couple different chain restaurants, namely Panda Express and McDonald's. And the thing about these chain restaurants is, like you mentioned, their systems are perfect, right? I mean, they're spending millions of dollars perfecting these systems, and they're very impressive. Now, there is the people element to it, right? To making sure you're following the directions and making sure you have a good trainer and a good manager that's teaching you the systems. But the systems are very impressive, and that's also why I love working these jobs. So I went to school for industrial engineering. Industrial engineering is all about process improvement and improving systems, Right. And honestly, if I had to go back to an engineering job, I would love to go back to and be an engineer for McDonald's. That sounds at least more fun than what I was doing before, right? But as an engineer, it's so much fun for me to go into these jobs, learn the systems, and then I try to perfect the systems.
- [41:56]
Interviewer/Host
Right?
- [41:56]
Drew
I try to do everything that I can to do my job as well as possible. And each new job is like a new game, a new challenge, and it's really fun. Now, I will say the benefit of being on this financial independence journey is if I Don't like something, I have the freedom to be able to quit.
- [42:16]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [42:17]
Drew
And that's a huge benefit and one that I've taken advantage of multiple times in the past. So that's a great feeling. But it's such a rush for me to go into these new jobs and to learn something new and see the behind the scenes. And I love it and it's absolutely thrilling. And that's why I'm loving this benefit of financial independence that I can do this kind of for fun and it's exciting.
- [42:42]
Andrew
And I think that's the neat part about what you're doing too, is you have the option, hey, each time that you kind of get pulled bored at a job or you don't want to do that job anymore or something just, you know, causes you to want to leave, you can leave and go find another one that interests you more. And it may be something, you know, drastically different than even what you're doing now, but it allows you to kind of have an interesting life where you are able to kind of find new jobs that are going to, you know, fulfill you over that time frame. Now, one thing we didn't talk about is because you left your job, you know, and you're working these other jobs now, are these other jobs kind of supplementing your income? Are you living off your portfolio or are they something that is just, you know, over time you're able to kind of keep your means low enough where you can actually live off of these jobs?
- [43:20]
Drew
Yeah. So if I were a single person, which I'm not, I have a family, kids, if I were a single person, I would have the control to be able to keep my expenses low enough where I think I could at least break even from some of these different jobs. The challenging part about my life right now is that I'm married, I have two kids and my wife is a stay at home mom. And so our expenses are not cheap for a family of four.
- [43:48]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [43:48]
Drew
In Cincinnati, Ohio, we spend about 90 to $100,000 per year for our family for. And obviously I'm not making that much money from McDonald's. But the other piece of my whole journey, as I mentioned before, is also the personal finance and investing content creation piece. So that was part of my original goal when I quit was to pursue this dream of mine. I didn't pursue it for the first year or two. I just kind of got cold feet. Eventually I started. That was three years ago. Now I've built a pretty decent sized audience on social media. I'm up to roughly 170,000 followers on TikTok, roughly 45,000 on Instagram. And so I am making some money from that. This year I'm on pace to make roughly $40,000 from social media income. But between that and my McDonald's job, it's still not enough to pay my bills.
- [44:41]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [44:41]
Drew
So what I'm doing, it's definitely on the even riskier side of financial independence. I call it extreme coast fire.
- [44:50]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [44:50]
Drew
Because coast fire, you can at least cover your bills. And as I mentioned, if I were a single person, I would be able to cover my bills. But with the Family four, I can't even cover my bills. So I'm actually withdrawing money from retirement accounts to help cover that gap to pay all my bills. And I've actually withdrawn probably $80,000 from retirement accounts over the past couple years. And that's after burning through my emergency funds and my liquid Runway. So it's a lot of money that I'm giving up. But again, as I mentioned earlier, this pursuit of my dream and the value of time for me and being able to pursue my dream while I'm still young and potentially, you know, be able to work my dream job for the rest of my life, I can't put a price on that. And I'm willing to give up millions and millions of dollars to pursue this dream.
- [45:48]
Andrew
Absolutely. And I think that's the beautiful thing is like you said, you have the flexibility in place, you have anytime you can go back if you want to. And so you have that flexibility. And so it's so cool to kind of see just how you're managing some of these things because it's, it's a powerful lesson for all of us that I think again, we have more flexibility than most people think that we, we actually have. So what do you think about our obsession, you know, in this culture with, you know, status in job titles and all those different things? What do you think that reveals about us as a culture?
- [46:16]
Drew
So my favorite way to think about this comes back to my favorite question to ask people and that's how would you live your life if you won the lottery tomorrow and had a billion dollars?
- [46:26]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [46:27]
Drew
And everyone's going to answer with, you know, they're going to get a fancy mansion, fancy cars, take lavish vacations. And I would do the same thing if I won the lottery and had a billion dollars.
- [46:38]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [46:39]
Drew
But after that materialistic stuff, how would you live your day to day life? And I think 99% of people working a corporate job would quit their job. And yeah, there are some people that truly, truly love their job. And for those people that would continue working their job after they won the lottery and won a billion dollars, I think they've truly made it in life.
- [46:59]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [46:59]
Drew
You're literally working your dream job that you would do every day if you had unlimited money. So congratulations to those people. But for most of us working corporate jobs, I don't think we're in that situation.
- [47:10]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [47:11]
Drew
So when you really think about it, how would you spend your time? And I think it's a good thought exercise. But a lot of people don't realize if you're okay without some of these status symbols like the cars and the huge house and the fancy vacations, being able to pursue your dream and live, you know, do whatever you want on a day to day basis is more realistic than you think most people, and again, I was close to that as well, most people get caught up in the lifestyle inflation and the lifestyle creep and getting the nicer stuff and they end up having to work until they're 60, 65 to continue paying those bills. But that's my favorite question to ask because when you really take away the materialistic stuff and think about what actually matters like your day to day life and doing what you actually want to do with your time, I think it's a lot more realistic than you think. And it's not easy, but I think it's more realistic than a lot of people think.
- [48:06]
Andrew
Exactly. And I think for most people, again this is why I wanted to tell your story. Because I think for most people out there, when they look at this, like you said, it's not easy, but it's something where you could put a plan in place and you could start to work backwards towards that if that's something you're interested in. If you're, if you want more time freedom, you want more flexibility, you want to be able to do all these different things, you can really plan it out and actually just put those steps in place and start taking that first step. So if you saw someone out there who said, man, I love this story, this is something I'd be interested in doing and they're stuck in their 9 to 5 right now, but they don't have their 700k net worth yet, or they don't have, you know, extra income coming in from a side gig or anything like that, what would you tell them to get started?
- [48:46]
Drew
So I would tell them it's not going to be overnight, but you can make a plan and it's doable, right? Sure. You could day Trade, you could gamble, you could throw money on a parlay and you know, become a multimillionaire overnight. But those are very low percentage plays, obviously.
- [49:02]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [49:03]
Drew
The way I did it is high percentage, extremely repeatable. Again, it's not going to happen overnight, but you will without a doubt get there. If you can increase your income, live below your means and max out a 401k and a Roth IRA for 10, 20, 30 years, you're going to be very wealthy, right? So I think focus on the things you can control, like increasing your income. Maybe you're getting a promotion, maybe you're job hopping, maybe you're side hustling, right? Maybe you're do an instacart and DoorDash for two nights a week and you're making an extra 250 bucks a week, which is another thousand dollars a month.
- [49:37]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [49:38]
Drew
Which is $12,000 a year.
- [49:39]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [49:40]
Drew
That's something you can control, you know, if it's part of your plan and you want it bad enough. And then, you know, also focus on controlling your expenses, but focus on the stuff you can control. Make a plan and I think follow the highly repeatable and the high percentage way to become wealthy, which is a plan similar to mine.
- [50:00]
Andrew
Exactly. It's putting together that plan that's heads I win, tails I don't lose. And I think that's what you have. You have the flexibility again to go back to earn more. And you put it into place and took action, which I absolutely love. If you could design the perfect week right now, because right now you have some cool stuff going on. You're kind of, you know, you're, you're working on your personal finance content, your financial education, you know, you're working at McDonald's right now as well. But if you could design the perfect week for you, what would that look like?
- [50:25]
Drew
So to slightly reframe this back to my billionaire question, I sometimes feel like I'm living the life I would be as a billionaire again, just without the fancy stuff, right? But I'm doing, I'm pursuing my passion every day. You know, the McDonald's job is fun for me and the couple things I would change are I have a lot of pressure on me to monetize my social media and make money from it because like I mentioned earlier, I'm actually losing money every single month until I can increase my social media income. So my perfect week, I wouldn't have the pressure to monetize my social media and I would just be doing it for fun. And I would also Spend less time doing it. The one thing I will say is, as I'm pursuing this, essentially an entrepreneurial journey, man, I spend, I sometimes spend more time working than I did in my stressful engineering jobs. But the beauty of it is it's something that I'm building, something I'm passionate about, something I'm proud of. And it has a ton of meaning for me, you know, compared to my corporate jobs. But I would also spend a little less time working a little more time with my, my young kids while they're young. But I would still work my job at McDonald's and some of these other jobs because that is truly fun to me. Like, I truly wake up and enjoy going to my shift at McDonald's. And I would just do as minimal hours as possible, which I am doing right now. But so a lot of it is similar to what my life is right now, but definitely with some changes. And again, I think that's a benefit of financial independence.
- [51:57]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [51:57]
Drew
Is I'm pursuing these things that I want to.
- [52:00]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [52:00]
Drew
There's nothing holding me back right now. Again, I am on a Runway and eventually, if I can't make enough money from social media, yeah, I am probably gonna want to go back to an engineering to stop the burning, I guess. But like there's nothing holding me back right now. And it's kind of a cool feeling.
- [52:18]
Andrew
And I think that's. Overall, the cool thing is you designed a life that you wanted to live and your day to day is kind of what you. You'd be doing this right now, like you said, if you had a billion dollars. And I think that's really, really cool that people can think about this is you figured out what your values were and you designed your life based on those values. Which I think is what we are all trying to do in this life. It's just one of those things where you actually took action on it. I think that's absolutely amazing. So I want to shift gears here to a couple of our rapid fire questions that we ask a lot of our guests because I think this is going to be really cool to see what your some of your answers are. So if you could tell your younger self one thing, what would it be?
- [52:53]
Drew
I would say to think about what's important to you. As much as we've talked about money and jobs, the most important thing that happened to me was meeting my wife and my partner. And I actually put a lot of time and effort into dating my 20s because that's always been super important to me.
- [53:08]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [53:09]
Drew
And eventually I found the one and everything worked out. But money is just a tool, right? Life is about more than money. And if I had to make the choice right now, I would trade my entire net worth to be with my wife.
- [53:20]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [53:21]
Drew
You know, again, life is about more than money. And so I think money is just a tool. You really gotta figure out what makes you happy, what's important to you, and make sure you're accounting for that as well. But money is definitely a nice tool to help you achieve some different things.
- [53:37]
Andrew
What is the best money advice you've ever received?
- [53:40]
Drew
The biggest advice I received, and I don't know if it was advice, but it was my parents raising me frugally and stressing the importance of frugality. And I think another important thing was them not inflating my lifestyle when I was a kid and getting me used to certain things. I think by being okay with a frugal lifestyle, it's afforded me so many different options in my life that I never would have dreamed of.
- [54:03]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [54:04]
Drew
Living frugally allowed me to save and invest more money. And then living frugally now allows me to have more freedom and more options to do whatever I want to do.
- [54:13]
Interviewer/Host
Right?
- [54:13]
Drew
So I think just that being taught and learning frugality has been one of the most important things to me. Designing my life.
- [54:19]
Andrew
How do you plan on leveling up your finances this year? Or is there any plan to level up your finances this year?
- [54:25]
Drew
So that's a funny question because honestly, not really. Because one of the things that's very prominent in my story is I'm not trying to maximize my income anymore.
- [54:37]
Interviewer/Host
Right.
- [54:37]
Drew
I'm trying to maximize my time and maximize my happiness. So as far as leveling up my finances, not really. I'm just going to continue with my plan. The most important thing is I really do have to figure out a way to increase my social media income, or if not, I probably will have to go back to an engineering job at some point. I. I guess that's it.
- [54:58]
Andrew
So perfect. And then the last one is my favorite. This is one that we get some really cool answers on this from a lot of our different guests. And a lot of times they're different answers, which is interesting, but it is. What does wealth mean to you?
- [55:12]
Drew
For me, wealth means time. That means having control and freedom over your time to do what makes you happy, and also relationships to spend that time with. And then in order to have time for what makes you happy and for those relationships, you need to have money and your health. And that's why I focus so much on my money and my health, but for me, that's what wealth means to me.
- [55:31]
Andrew
I love that. And I think overall, there are so many different areas of wealth. Most people think about money, but it's really. There's so many different areas about wealth that most people have not actually thought through yet. And I think it's really powerful to do that. Well, Drew, this has been absolutely amazing. Thank you so much for coming on here and telling your story and kind of sharing some of the experiences that you have had. Where can people. People find out more about you, follow you on social media and everything else.
- [55:53]
Drew
So I'm primarily on TikTok and Instagram. My handle is @dollars with Drew. I'm also on other social media platforms with that same handle. And then if you want to contact me, the best way is probably DM me on Instagram. And I also have my email in my bios as well.
- [56:09]
Andrew
Awesome. Well, thank you so much again for coming on. We truly appreciate it. This was a blast.
- [56:13]
Drew
Andrew, thank you for having me. It's been a lot of fun chatting and sharing my story and. And good luck with everything in the future, and I wish you nothing but the best.