I’m still making my way through the 2023 monthly results so here are April 2023 results. I’m aware we’re already in July 2023 but I had a few months without posting on this blog. If you want to know why, click here.
Before I share with you our April 2023 results, as I promised in July 2021, I’ll share with you what we’ve been up to the past month. After that, we can talk about the numbers.
What have we been up to this month?
As part of our April 2023 results, as usual, I’ll share personal life positives and negatives. I can’t always recall negative things which goes to show how happy I am with my life.
Personal life positives
Trying to recall what happened a few months ago is an interesting activity because it’s been so long. I used Google Maps’ timeline, Google Photos, old WhatsApp messages, and our expenses to remember what happened in April 2023. I feel like Lazy FI Detective.
Our visit to Israel
We spend most of April in Israel and had lots of fun. We saw lots of family and friends, celebrated Passover with family, enjoyed some hot weather, the beach and most importantly… ate shawarma.
I specifically want to focus on one day I spent with my dad and my kids but before that- here are some pictures from our visit to Israel.
It’s about the journey, not the destination
There was one day during our visit to Israel when my dad and I took both of my kids to see a few animals in a small petting zoo. We put the address into Google Maps, it was somewhere between 30-60 minutes walk away from our flat.
Initially, we stopped by the river for a drink of water and to look at ducks in the river. Then, we stopped at another playground for another half hour at least (and had a great time on the slides and swings). We walked slowly, and let my daughter walk (instead of sitting in the pram) whenever she wanted. We took a LONG time to get there (over 2 hours).
Once we got there, we noticed the petting zoo was gone. Maybe it was due to the construction in the area and perhaps it was gone a while ago and Google Maps hasn’t updated, I don’t really care why, do you know why?
Because we enjoyed the journey, and so did my kids. They didn’t care, they had fun along the way, looking at ducks in the river, in the playground, and just walking slowly together.
I remember the penny dropping at that moment. It’s an amazing example of how I want our FI journey (and life in general) to be. It’s not all about the destination, I don’t want (for me and my family) to suffer or feel deprived just for the FI holy grail at the end. That’s not the way I want to live my life. I want to enjoy the journey and then, even if FI isn’t all I thought it would be, I could still know that I enjoyed the journey.
As of now, I can honestly say that (probably since becoming a dad) I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. I have an amazing wife, the world’s 2 best kids, a tolerable job, and a goal. I love having a goal to aim for. Every month with a positive savings rate makes me feel like we’re progressing and I love it.
Don’t worry, once we reach FI, I’ll find another goal, I just love being on the journey towards a goal.
Jewish Holiday
During April, we had the holiday of Passover “Pesach”, which is the Jewish holiday of freedom. In this holiday we celebrate the Jewish people turning from slaves in Egypt to free people. I will spare you the obvious metaphor of our journey to financial freedom and just say that we really enjoyed celebrating Passover with our family at my aunt’s house. I think there were around 20 of us if I recall correctly but again, Lazy FI Mum will read this post so if you’re reading this, she approves of my memory.
Hotel stays
As I told you in the March 2023 results post: For her birthday (in March), Lazy FI Mum asked that in April, while we’re in Israel, we stay in a hotel (without kids) for 2 (not consecutive) nights. As I find it very hard to be away from my kids, I thought that was very fair.
I also mentioned that I can not quite count that as my gift to her and it’s now time to share why. I thought I would have an easy one because Lazy FI Mum told me exactly what she wanted so I don’t have to guess. Unfortunately, her mum had the same idea and insisted to pay for the hotel. I still owe her a birthday gift (any suggestions in the comment section would be appreciated).
Anyway, we stayed in a nice hotel in the centre of Tel Aviv with a pool on the roof. We went out on both nights and enjoyed each other’s company. If I remember correctly, we went to a movie (Lazy FI Mum’s favourite thing to do) on the first night. On our second night, we went out with a couple of friends.
It was nice spending time with Lazy FI Mum and when we live in Israel I do want to go out with her more often (after the kids fall asleep). Do I want to wake up in a different place than my kids? nope. Will this answer change once they’re teenagers? probably.
My son stood up!
In April 2023, my son stood up for the first time without holding anything! Well done baby! We were, and still are, very very proud of you.
FA Cup Semi-final
After seeing Manchester United with the Carabao Cup in Wembley back in February, the red devils played at Wembley again. This time it was the FA Cup semi-final. What were my chances of getting another free ticket (and money for food) from mystery dining? Higher than I thought apparently.
It was a great game that went into penalties but in the end, we won. It was great seeing United play (and win!) in Wembley for the second time in one season.
Personal life negatives
My son’s severe nappy rash
My son has a very severe nappy rash. It made him scream every time we changed his nappy and he even had a bit of bleeding. I knew I wasn’t about to let him suffer. Lazy FI and Mum and I got on our phones and did everything we could for him to be seen by a doctor. We tried to call the private skin doctor we took him to last time, but she was away for a week, and we weren’t about to wait a week. I don’t know why but I assumed private would be quicker, I was very wrong. After a while I called 111 and was more than positively surprised- I was shocked at how good they were.
The person that answered the phone asked me a long list of questions, which I thought would be followed with “It’s not urgent, wait and it’ll go away” or “Try and see your GP tomorrow”. Luckily, she said he has to see a doctor quickly and suggested I go to A&E, our gut feeling about the urgency was right.
She mentioned a hospital I haven’t heard of before that wasn’t the closest one to us. I told her we have a closer one but she said that in the one she mentioned, a doctor will be waiting for us and will see us straight away, so we went. I never knew you could have an appointment for A&E! but she was right, we were seen straight away by a doctor that examined him and told me exactly what to do and which creams I should buy and give my son. The rash started getting better very quickly and was gone within a few days.
Every time I hear about the horror stories from the American horror story, I thank god for the NHS. This experience made me appreciate the NHS even more. Just to clarify, I’m a big believer in capitalism and the free market. Complimenting anything that’s part of the public sector is tough for me but the NHS (and TFL) are awesome.
April 2023 results- savings rate
Our savings rate for April 2023 was 73.79%.
As a reminder, my long-term target is 50%, hoping to hit that target for 3 years in a row.
Our (weighted) average savings rate for the past 6 months is 45.57%.
Our 12-month-weighted average savings rate is 48.74%.
Finally, our YTD (since January) weighted average savings rate is 58.04%.
April results- What was different this month?
Every month something unusual happens. Sometimes it’s a one-off expense and sometimes it’s a one-off income. The fact that this happens every month amuses me but also makes it harder to analyse the savings rate and draw conclusions. That’s why I also use the 6-month, 12-month, and YTD average figures to “smooth” the data.
Anyway, what was different this month?
In short- childcare (as usual), a gift, Excel, Rental income, and holiday
Childcare costs
As you may remember, we USUALLY contribute to our children’s tax-free childcare account once every quarter (every 3 months). Both children’s contributions are in the same month. This causes a huge fluctuation in our monthly savings rates. April was a “no childcare cost” month.
However, in April 2023, my daughter’s tax-free childcare account finally/sadly ran out of money. If you remember, we started contributing to it before she started attending childcare, which built up a nice amount. Although the quarterly childcare costs are more than we contribute (plus the government top-up), it’s ok because we had money saved there in advance. That money has run out. In April 2023, we had to contribute to our daughter’s account (without a government top-up). Luckily, I don’t think we’ll face this issue due to the changes in free childcare hours announced in March 2023:
For us, that means that from April 2024, our son’s childcare will be cut by almost half, a year earlier than we planned, based on the previous rules.
A gift
We received another monetary gift (smaller than the one we received back in January). While I really am grateful, I still don’t like receiving those.
You can read about my reasoning behind it here.
Excel and rental income
As I told you in the past, we have a limited company that holds our rental property. The company’s account is not included in our net worth or savings rate. The property, however, is included at the price we originally paid for it but rental income and the property’s expenses are excluded from my calculations. When do they get included? When our company pays us dividends. In April 2023, there was enough money in the business account to justify a dividend. That income, obviously, improved our April 2023 results.
In addition, I had some private Excel lessons (that pay straight away) and I also got a payment from a client for a course I did for them a month earlier.
Holiday
As we spent the majority of April in Israel, you are probably expecting a big holiday expense but in April 2023, we actually had holiday income!
The reason is that we prepaid a big amount back in March, mainly by giving money to a relative that would cover our expenses when we’re in Israel. Funny enough, that covered all our expenses plus…
A friend of ours had some pounds left from his visit to the UK, he gave us the pounds and instead of us paying him, the relative did so those pounds are holiday income in April 2023.
I hope that makes sense to all of you.
April 2023 results- Net worth
In April 2023, our net worth increased by 1.91%. The 1.91% is made of two parts:
- Our actual savings increased our net worth by 1.80%
- Our investments increased in value, which increased our net worth by 0.11%**.
Achieving FI– how far are we on 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 2023, our net worth is 31.26% (March 2023: 30.87%) of that number.
We are still above the 30% mark and set a new record for the third month straight, beating our previous all-time-high 30.87% (March 2023). Woohoo!
Real change
The 0.39% increase in our FI journey (as a percentage of our FI number) from 30.87% to 31.26% means a real (inflation-adjusted) increase of 1.26% (31.26 / 30.87 – 1)**, which can be broken down into these two parts:
- Our nominal net worth increased by 1.91% as mentioned above.
- The CPIH index increased by 0.63%, which decreased our real (inflation-adjusted) net worth**.
As you can see, 2 factors are out of our control:
- The market performance (are our investments worth more or less this month?)
- Inflation (are things more expensive than last month?)
As these factors are out of our control- I tend to focus on our savings rate.
73.79% is just phenomenal, especially assuming we received only one salary (Lazy FI Mum will start her new job in May). This savings rate makes me even more optimistic about maybe even reaching 55% this year.
When can we achieve FI (and possibly retire)?
As I told you in the October 2021 results, calculating an FI date is not relevant for us anymore. We will move back to Israel sometime between December 2025 and August 2026. As my models are split into tax years, that means April 2026 is our relevant date.
Once we move back to Israel, I will either move to “just” teaching (no accounting) or try and keep my current job but part-time.
If anyone’s wondering if moving to Israel will help or hurt our FI journey, I present to you this article:
Tel Aviv named as world’s most expensive city to live in – BBC News.
No need to click the link, the title gives it away. Good luck to us.
In any case, we will not reach our full FI number by the time we move to Israel. Therefore, the only relevant question is…
How far into our journey to FI will we be by April 2026?
Based on my “regular” (which is more like a worst-case) scenario, we expect to be 45.57% FI by April 2026. We are still close enough to the 50% mark to make it happen. I think it’s going to be very close to that benchmark in the end.
As a reminder, this number is based on our UK level of expenses. I don’t know how expensive Israel will be. We’ll need to track our expenses for a few months there to get a better understanding. Also, I will have to learn all the little local tricks (like I learned in the UK) on how to save money, get free stuff, and reduce my tax bill.
The April 2026 model assumptions
My model assumes that only our ISAs, LISAs and pensions (essentially, our stock/equity investments) will generate an annual real return of 4%. Meanwhile, I assume our real estate and cash will retain their real value but not increase.
In addition, I assume no future income from teaching as I can’t reliably forecast how much I’ll earn from this side hustle. That means any future income from teaching will be treated as a pleasant surprise.
Another future income I ignore is my job’s annual bonus. Just like teaching, any future bonus is not guaranteed. That means that if my employer has a bad year, the bonus can potentially be 0%. My model assumes every year is such a year. Again, any bonus that does come through will be treated as a pleasant surprise.
I know these assumptions are very prudent but I prefer being prudent and positively surprised to “realistic” and having to deal with unforeseen issues.
Well, that’s our April 2023 results, have a great week everyone!
Notes
*CPIH- “Consumer Price Inflation including owner-occupiers’ Housing costs”. As we are consumers and we own our home- I think this is the best inflation metric for us. You can see the changes in the index here.
** You might get a slightly different number (by 0.01% or so). That’s due to rounding. The numbers I share are the accurate ones, the equations are so that you understand the way I calculate the numbers.
Going to Israel is at the top of my wife and I’s bucket list to visit…to see where Jesus walked would be a surreal moment no doubt.
Israel is an amazing country, you can see holy places for the 3 largest religions.
You can also see a desert and snow in the same day (if you’re up for the drive). It’s full of history and great shawarma.
However, it’s very expensive and unbelievably hot in summer so beware 🙂