It’s time for the November 2023 results.
As a reminder, since September 2023 I’ve put all the numbers upfront. That means that if you only care about the numbers (all good, not judging), you can read the tables below and move on 🙂 no more need to scroll down.
Savings rate
Monthly | 55.15% |
Past 6 months | 53.06% |
Past 12 months | 49.56% |
Year to date (since January) | 51.57% |
Net worth
Change (%) due to savings | 1.30% |
Change (%) due to market performance | 3.92% |
Total change (%) in net worth (nominal)* | 5.22% |
Inflation** | 0.08% |
Total change (%) in net worth (real) | 5.14% |
% of FI number achieved*** | 35.32% |
**Inflation decreases our real net worth. I use 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.
***Reminder- I set our FI number (how much we need to retire) in July 2020 and I update it every month for inflation.
What have we been up to this month?
As 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 in more detail.
My brother’s visit
In the October 2023 results, I shared with you that my brother, his wife, and their daughter (who live in Israel) came over. They were still around for the beginning of November and we all had lots of fun.
We also had them over for a Friday evening meal, the 3 kids sat at their own table and were adorable, they ate so nicely!
My brother really wanted to join me at a Mystery Dine to see how it works, what I check, and which questions I answer. I was able to catch a dine at a pizza place, he was very happy.
Not only did he get to see how a Mystery Dine works, but it was also a great one. Pizza dines usually have a very generous budget.


Other Mystery Dines
Besides the pizza place, I had a home delivery from Dishoom, a takeaway from Farmer J (I love their food) and a family visit to Nando’s. All in all, a great Mystery Dining month!
Other activities
Looking back at Google Photos from November 2023, I can see we had a great month! We went to the zoo, the library, and to 2 different soft plays (one even served spinach cake, which I had to try. It was good!).

Yes, this month you’re getting photos of food.
November 2023 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), holiday, electronics, and misc
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. November 2023 was a “childcare cost” month.
However, we only topped up my son’s account (woohoo! I’ve been waiting for this day).
**** Going forward, as my daughter is eligible for 30 hours free childcare, we won’t be topping her account each quarter, only on an ad hoc basis.
Holiday
My brother (the one who lives in London) was supposed to get married in Israel in October, so we booked flights to Israel. However, after the October 7th massacre, Virgin Atlantic (and many other airlines) stopped flights to Israel. That meant that the wedding was postponed to April 2024 and that we got a big refund for our flights. If you’re wondering “Don’t you now need to book new flights for April?”, you’re right, we already did in October 2023 (one results-post ago).
The refund is a “negative expense” in our November 2023 results.
On the other hand, In November 2023, we paid for the cabin (the main expense) for our next visit to Center Parcs (April 2024, just after the wedding).
As the cabin cost a lot less than the flights, the Holiday category was a “negative expense” in total.
Electronics
By November 2023, I’ve had my phone (OnePlus 7t) for almost 4 years. The problem is that OnePlus no longer provides security updates for it. Not only did it scare me (I access lots of financial info from my mobile), it also meant that some apps didn’t work anymore.
I found a great deal on what was considered the best phone at the time- Samsung 23 Ultra. I had the Samsung Note phones in the past and loved them, so I was optimistic.
It’s a pretty big expense but I use my phone A LOT (probably too much) and we can easily afford while still meeting the 50% savings rate target.
Oh yes, we also bought a microwave!
Misc
We had a few small expenses (nothing unusual) but this category is also a “negative expense” this month as our relative started paying back the loan we gave them.
When can we achieve FI (and possibly retire)?
Warning: This section is for new readers, it’s a copy-paste from last month’s results. If you’ve read any of my monthly results posts, please skip to the next section.
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 (unless I need a payslip for a mortgage).
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 46.60% 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 for us. 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
Warning: Another copy-paste section mainly for new readers.
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.
Summary
Once again, a very mixed month.
From a financial perspective, 55.15% is fantastic, especially when you consider it was a childcare month.
However, the fact that we only paid for one child is a very happy change.
In addition, we had a few weird transactions like the holiday refund, the loan refund, Center Parcs booking and the new phone. Funny enough, these 3 categories (holiday, electronics, and misc) almost netted off to zero this month.
As this was the last childcare month in the year, I remember thinking that if our YTD savings rate was over 50% (or just under), we would easily reach the 50% target for 2023 (55% was almost impossible at that stage). As you can see in the first table of this post, our YTD savings rate was 51.57%, so happy days (financially).
From a personal life perspective, it was once again very mixed.
I still remember the general atmosphere around here, and it wasn’t exactly positive, we still felt shocked and sad by the October 7th massacre and the war going on in Gaza. Despite that, we did some fun things as well (listed above), life is weird.
Well, that’s our November 2023 results, Have a great week everyone.