After last month’s negative savings rate, it’s time to see if we redeemed ourselves. Let’s see how our April 2021 results look like.
April 2021 results- Savings rate
In April 2021, we managed to achieve an impressive savings rate of 55.36%. I’ll explain the main reasons in the next section. Spoiler alert: it’s not because we were extra frugal. Our (weighted) average savings rate for the past 6 months, November 2020 to April 2021 is now 49.27%. So close to 50%! However, you’ll soon see why I don’t think we’ll get there next month. Regardless, anything over 40% is a win in my eyes, especially after last month’s negative savings rate.
As I mentioned last month, I think looking at a longer-term (I use 6 months) can tell you more about how you’re doing than looking at shorter periods (one month). Monthly results fluctuate too much.
What was different this month?
Let me start with the big one, I got 2 salaries this month. I can already hear your “ah, that explains it” and I’m with you. My employer pays a salary every 4 weeks rather than once a month. As there are 52 weeks in a year, that means 13 salaries a year, which means one month has to have 2 salaries. April happened to be that month.
In addition, we’re finally back from Israel. Yes, we’re now vaccinated. So the answer to “What was different this month?” is we were abroad for the whole month. While flights were paid in March (which contributed to the negative savings rate), there were still some big expenses. The biggest one, I think, is all these COVID tests. We had to pay for a test to fly to Israel and another one to fly back. Then we had to pay for 2 more tests in the UK (day 2 and day 8) and we chose to pay for another (!) test (day 5) to finish the quarantine early and be free for the long weekend with our daughter. Totally worth it (yes, I saw the weather forecast).
After all that, there was something different this month that had a much bigger financial effect on us. The market went crazy this month. VUSA (Vanguard’s GBP denominated S&P500 tracker fund) went up 4.88% (from 54.76 to 57.43) in one month, that’s a decent annual return!
April 2021 results- Net worth
In April 2021, our net worth increased by 5.98%. Now that’s an impressive number for one month. The 5.98% is made of 2 parts:
- Our actual savings increased our net worth by 1.28%
- Our investment returns increased our net worth by 4.70%
It is very clear who’s doing the heavy lifting here. As a lazy person whose dream is to live off passive income, my ego is just fine with that.

Let’s see how we’re doing on the journey to that lazy utopia and when we think we’ll get there.
Achieving FI– how far are we into our journey?
Reminder: I set our FI number (how much we need to retire) in July 2020 and update it every month for inflation (I use CPIH* index).
At the end of April 2021, our net worth is 25.56% (March 2021: 24.18%) of that number which means we’re finally over the 25% benchmark! We will celebrate before Mr Market decides he had enough celebrations. When that happens (market crash), by the way, we’ll be even happier as our money will be able to buy more shares, which means our financial future would be on sale, great for us. In general, for young people**, crashes are actually a good thing***.
The 1.38% increase in our FI journey (as a percentage of our FI number) from 24.18% to 25.56% means a real (inflation-adjusted) increase of 5.69%**** (25.56/24.18 – 1) can be broken down into these two parts:
- Our increase in net worth increased by 5.98% as mentioned above.
- The CPIH index increased by 0.27%, which decreased our real (inflation-adjusted) net worth.
When can we achieve FI (and possibly retire)?
Based on my current calculations, I and Lazy FI Mum should both be able to retire in 2030/2031 if we wish to. This is the same result as last month. The main reason is that I measure in years so it takes a BIG change to move a whole year. However, one more 5% month and I think we’ll be able to move the needle to 2029/2030.
I hope you all have an awesome long weekend and enjoy the bank holiday!
Notes:
*CPIH- “Consumer Price Inflation including owner-occupiers’ Housing costs”. As we are consumers and we do, partly, own our home- I think this is the best inflation metric for us.
**When I say young people, I mean people who have a good few years until they want to retire. The technical term is people in their “Accumulation stage”. You can read more about this here.
***Of course, assuming you don’t lose your job/business.
****The calculation in the brackets gets you to a 5.71% real net worth increase but that’s due to rounding differences. 5.69% is our actual real net worth increase for April 2021.
Hi Lady FI Dad, I love your posts and super impressed with your achievements and savings rate.
Can I ask you something? You have said ” We will celebrate before Mr Market decides he had enough celebrations. When that happens (market crash), by the way, we’ll be even happier as our money will be able to buy more shares”, does that mean you have a cash pot ready to invest if the market crashes? Or, if it crashes you’ll continue to invest monthly and buy stock cheap which helps your pot grow as the markets recover?
It took 25 years for the markets to recover after the 1929 crash, I guess as you are in the accumulation stage, your losses will be manageable and then you have long growth stage.
Great blog, thank you!
HI Claire, thank you for the kind words.
You asked a great question.
We do not have a cash pot ready for a market crash because that is market timing, which I personally don’t believe in. Our method is closer to the 2nd option you mentioned which is “continue to invest monthly…”, let me share our exact method. You might find it helpful or you might find some weaknesses/disadvantages in it, in which case- please share!
So when do we invest and how much?
I and Lazy FI Mum have an agreed amount in our current account, let’s call it X which we rarely (I want to say “never” but that’s too strong) go under. You can call X our emergency fund 🙂
As I know, roughly, our coming expenses for the month- anything over X + those coming expenses goes to investments (LISA first, then ISA). It basically means that everytime we have free cash, it gets invested. It’s not exactly dollar (or GBP) cost averaging because we end up with different amounts each month. Look at this post for example, in April we have over 50% savings rate and last month we had a negative savings rate, it doesn’t make sense for us to invest the same amount in both of these months.
Having said that, a big part of our savings is our pension contributions (employee+employer) which is the same every salary so that is 100% dollar cost averaging.
Regarding the great depression that started in 1929. If it wasn’t clear from my posts, our incomes more than covers our expenses. That means that as long as we keep our jobs, a scenario like 1929 means we will have 25 years of an ongoing sale on our financial future (the whole market was “cheap”/”discounted”/”on sale”), that’s amazing for someone in the accumulation stage! Does that mean I’ll keep working for 25 years if this happens again? absolutely not.
Have a look at these figures:
https://www.slickcharts.com/sp500/returns
Yes, if I retired at the end of 1928, I’d be in a bad position. Hopefully, I would be able to find another job if that happens. However, look at someone who retired at 1931, that person would be in an amazing position!
Basically, a crash will delay my FI date a bit but once I get to my FI number, I am free to FIRE if I choose to.
I have a future post waiting to be written about flexible withdrawals as part of the 4% rule series.
One more thing about 1929. Yes, the market crashed but inflation was negative, which made things cheaper 🙂 As my FI number is inflation adjusted, this would have offset part of the crash. You can see the figures here:
https://www.thebalance.com/u-s-inflation-rate-history-by-year-and-forecast-3306093
Hope that makes sense.
Go Go GOOOO!!!