- Geo-arbitrageSeries · 6 of 6October 4, 2026 · 6 min read
Healthcare and early retirement abroad: what your FIRE number can't tell you
Your FIRE number can hold the cost of healthcare, but not access to it. Check who covers you, what it costs each year, and long-term care before you retire abroad.
Read → - Geo-arbitrageSeries · 5 of 6October 1, 2026 · 6 min read
The exit-tax blind spot: check before you move
Moving to a low-tax country does not erase the tax system you are leaving. Some countries tax your investment gains on the way out. Here is what to check before you move.
Read → - FIRE basicsSeries · 4 of 6September 28, 2026 · 7 min read
The real expat FIRE number: what 25× misses
How much do you need to retire abroad? Start with 25 times a year's spending, then add destination costs, healthcare, taxes, the cost of moving, later pensions, and a longer horizon.
Read → - Multi-currencySeries · 3 of 6September 25, 2026 · 7 min read
You hit your number. Which currency do you spend from?
Which currency should you spend from in retirement when your savings and your life are in different currencies? Measure in the currency you spend, live from a reserve, and refill it without timing the exchange rate.
Read → - Multi-currencySeries · 2 of 6September 22, 2026 · 7 min read
Earn in one currency, live in another: should you hedge?
Should you hedge currency risk when you earn in one currency and spend in another? Long-term stocks, bonds, and the money you will spend soon each need a different answer.
Read → - Multi-currencySeries · 1 of 6September 19, 2026 · 6 min read
Which currency should you invest in? You're asking about five different things.
Which currency should you invest in when you earn in one country and spend in another? The question hides five different currencies, and only two of them change your plan.
Read → - FIRE basicsSeptember 12, 2026 · 7 min read
Your savings rate matters more than your salary.
What is a good savings rate, and does it beat earning more? For financial independence, the share of income you keep sets your timeline, not the size of your paycheck. Here is the math, and how to raise it.
Read → - FIRE basicsSeptember 5, 2026 · 7 min read
How big should your emergency fund be? The rule of thumb has three holes.
How much should you keep in an emergency fund? Three to six months of essential expenses is the starting point. Here is what actually decides your number, whoever you are.
Read → - Geo-arbitrageAugust 27, 2026 · 6 min read
Norway's exit tax: the bill that lands when you leave
Leaving Norway can trigger a one-time tax on the unrealised gains in your investments. Under the 2025 rules, gains on shares and equity funds above a 3 million kroner deduction per person are taxed at 37.84 percent. For anyone planning to retire abroad, it is the line most FIRE plans skip. Here is how the charge works and how to size it before you go.
Read → - Net worthAugust 18, 2026 · 6 min read
Multi-currency net worth: how to get one honest number
When your money lives in more than one currency, your net worth moves on its own, and a single converted number hides whether you actually got richer. Here is how to track net worth across currencies honestly: each account in its own currency, one base, and the change inside your accounts kept separate from what exchange rates did.
Read → - FIRE basicsAugust 7, 2026 · 6 min read
Your pension doesn't count until you can touch it
A pension locked until 65 cannot pay the first years of an early retirement, though it can still make the plan work if liquid money bridges the gap. Cross-border lives add different unlock ages and tax. Here is how to count locked pensions separately so your FI date is honest.
Read → - FIRE basicsJuly 31, 2026 · 6 min read
Why single-currency FIRE calculators give expats the wrong number
Every standard FIRE calculator assumes you earn, spend, and retire in the same currency. For anyone whose life crosses borders, that assumption can put the FI number off by 30 to 60 percent. Here is where the error comes from and how to correct it.
Read → - Multi-currencyJuly 17, 2026 · 6 min read
What currency conversion actually costs you
The fee you see when you convert money is rarely the real cost. The real cost is the spread, the gap between the mid-market rate and the rate you are actually given, and it is designed to be invisible.
Read → - FIRE basicsJuly 10, 2026 · 7 min read
How long until you're financially independent?
You know your FIRE number. The next question is how long it takes to get there. The answer is set by three levers, and one of them matters far more than the size of your paycheque: your savings rate.
Read → - FIRE basicsJuly 3, 2026 · 7 min read
How to calculate your FIRE number (the honest version)
Your FIRE number is annual expenses times 25. That's the easy part, and where most calculators stop. The honest version pins down three inputs nobody agrees on: which expenses, in which currency, funded by which money.
Read → - FIRE basicsJune 30, 2026 · 8 min read
The 4% rule, for people who don't retire in America
The 4% rule was measured on a 30-year US retirement funded in one currency. Retire early, retire abroad, or hold money across currencies and at least three of its assumptions stop holding. Here's where the safe withdrawal rate breaks, and what to use instead.
Read → - FIRE basicsJune 23, 2026 · 8 min read
Types of FIRE: Coast, Barista, Lean, Fat, and the one you actually want
Coast FIRE, Barista FIRE, Lean FIRE, Fat FIRE, regular FIRE: what each one means, the number behind it, and how to tell which fits your life. A plain-language map with the math for each.
Read → - CouplesJune 16, 2026 · 7 min read
FIRE for couples in different currencies: the math nobody else does
Joint ownership splits, FX attribution, per-member FI numbers, expense share. The four math problems every couple with international finances runs into, and why most FIRE tools break on them.
Read → - CouplesJune 9, 2026 · 7 min read
Three goals. Two of you. One pile of money.
Every couple eventually wants more than one thing at once: a house, a child's education, a sabbatical, an emergency fund worth the name. The math of allocating across goals is the thing nobody teaches, and where most joint financial plans fail.
Read → - Geo-arbitrageJune 2, 2026 · 8 min read
Geo-arbitrage isn't moving cheaper. It's moving runway-aware.
The standard geo-arbitrage pitch ("move somewhere cheap, retire faster") is half right and dangerously simplified. The honest frame is runway: how many months your liquid assets carry you in any country, at that country's real cost of life. A worked example across Norway, Portugal, and Thailand.
Read → - Safety netMay 26, 2026 · 7 min read
Your emergency fund is in the wrong currency.
The "three-to-six months of expenses" rule assumes one place, one currency, one kind of emergency. For people whose lives cross borders, the currency your safety net is in matters more than the size of it.
Read → - FIRE basicsMay 19, 2026 · 8 min read
Coast FI in Norway: what your number actually is
Coast FI calculators built for the US give Norwegian savers the wrong answer. Here's why folketrygden, occupational pensions, NOK assumptions, and Norwegian inflation all reshape the math, with a worked example for a 32-year-old in Oslo.
Read → - Cash & interestMay 12, 2026 · 7 min read
When your savings account becomes a job.
Once your interest income clears a certain threshold, it stops being passive and starts being a thing you have to manage: tax, currency, rate-shopping, and the question of when a low rate is costing you more than the convenience is worth. A practical frame.
Read → - Net worthMay 5, 2026 · 7 min read
Net worth is one number. Here's the four-pillar version.
The money in your emergency fund isn't doing the same job as the money compounding toward FI. A single net-worth number hides every decision like that. Here's a framework that shows them.
Read → - Multi-currencyApril 28, 2026 · 7 min read
Your savings rate is half FX. Here's the version that isn't.
The savings rate is the single most-quoted FIRE metric and the most broken for anyone with money in more than one currency. Here's why your reported number is lying, and the three-term decomposition that tells you the truth.
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