Don’t: FEEL PRESSURED TO INVEST IN REAL ESTATE

Kristy Shen, co-author of the upcoming Quit Like a Millionaire, forged her own path.

“My plan was to buy a house and work until I was 65 years old, like everyone else in Toronto. My husband, Bryce, and I had more than 50 percent of a down payment saved for a place, but the goalposts kept moving because the housing market kept getting more and more expensive. I was also worried about my job. I’m an engineer, and my work was getting more unstable because of outsourcing.

One of my co-workers was working 14 hours a day for three years, and he collapsed at his desk. He was back at work a week later because he had to pay his mortgage. I didn’t want to be part of this Ponzi scheme anymore: Bryce and I decided we wouldn’t buy a house. We discovered the Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) movement, broke down the math and realized that if we kept saving and investing in the stock market at the rate we already were, we could reach $1 million and could potentially retire in three years. As our portfolio grew, it gave us more and more confidence. We were 31 years old when we hit that magic number. We thought we were just going to take a year off and travel the world, but then we calculated that travelling would only cost us $40,000 a year, which was how much we were spending living in Toronto.

I’m now 36. We’ve travelled to 40 countries now, and we’re not stopping anytime soon.”