FAQ
The questions people ask us most.
Answers to what fjordFIRE does, who it’s for, where your data goes, and how it’s built. If your question isn’t here, write to contact@fjordfire.com.
What is fjordFIRE actually trying to do for me?
Help you understand what you already have, and see how much freedom it actually buys for your life. Most finance apps are built to keep you logging in. fjordFIRE is built to be understood and then left alone. The monthly check-in, the manual entry, the lack of streak nags, the no-bank-logins stance: they all come from the same place. You should come away with a clearer picture and a quieter mind.
What does FIRE actually mean?
FIRE stands for Financial Independence, Retire Early. It's the goal of building enough invested wealth that the income from your portfolio covers your living expenses, so work becomes optional. The classic rule of thumb is the 4% rule (Trinity Study): if your portfolio is roughly 25× your annual expenses, you can withdraw ~4% a year and the money should last indefinitely. The full FIRE community has spectrum variants: Lean FI (a tighter version of your life), Fat FI (a roomier one), Coast FI (you've saved enough that compounding alone gets you there), and Barista FI (part-time work bridges the gap). fjordFIRE helps you track your progress toward any of those without the math lying, especially when your money lives across more than one currency or country.
Is fjordFIRE safe to use without giving it bank logins?
Yes. That is the entire architecture. You enter balances manually each month. We don't store bank credentials, don't ask for them, and the architecture has no path that uses them. No Plaid, no Tink, no Open Banking, no aggregator. The trade-off is intentional: a monthly ritual you sit with instead of a constant background scrape. You get a clear sense of where your money is, and there is no store of bank credentials for anyone to breach.
Do I have to live in Norway? Does it work outside Europe?
No, and yes. fjordFIRE is made in Norway but designed for globally mobile people: you can be in the US, India, Singapore, the UAE, anywhere. It supports 160+ currencies and country-level cost-of-living data for 170+ countries. For FI projections, it uses one transparent, well-sourced baseline (a 4% safe withdrawal rate on a 5% real return) rather than inventing a different rate for every country, and it adjusts for the inflation measured where you live. You can override any of these yourself if you have a stronger view.
I'm single, not a couple. Is this still for me?
Yes. The household and per-member math is there if you want it; for solo users it just shows your own numbers. Every feature works for one person: FIRE projections, safety-net runway, relocation planning, FX decomposition. The couples-specific math is a layer on top, not a requirement.
I only hold one currency. Is fjordFIRE worth it?
Yes. The cross-border features (FX attribution, multi-currency safety-net runway, relocation runway) are the headline differentiator, but the core works the same whether you hold one currency or four: four-pillar net-worth tracking, FIRE projections with Coast / Lean / Fat variants, safety-net runway math, the monthly check-in ritual, and the privacy-first architecture with no bank logins. Single-currency users get everything; the multi-currency layer stays out of the way until you need it.
How is this different from Monarch / Personal Capital / Mint / spreadsheets?
Monarch and Empower (formerly Personal Capital) are bank-aggregation tools that sync with US banks. Mint shut down in 2024. Spreadsheets work until your life gets more than one currency. fjordFIRE is built specifically for the cross-border case: real FX rates, multi-currency net worth, per-country runway, separate Protect / Growth / Retire / Move pillars instead of one number. It is not trying to replace your transaction-tracking tool; it is the layer above it.
Is there a waitlist? Is it stable?
No waitlist to sign up for. fjordFIRE is open to everyone, free. Before that it spent a few months in early access with a small group of households using it with real money across different currencies, which is how the rough edges got found and fixed. The core product is built and deployed (MFA, audit logs, AI assistant, the works), and it keeps improving; the changelog shows the pace.
Where is my data stored? How do you handle GDPR?
In the EEA: the app, its database and its backups run in the EU, as does email delivery, and two supporting services (optional Google sign-in, the bot check) are US-run and covered in the privacy notice. We are based in Norway and subject to GDPR, and the data model was built around it: export everything whenever you want, delete your account yourself and it goes immediately, or ask us and we act within 30 days. IP address and user-agent are removed from audit entries after 180 days. Rather than claim to be compliant as a blanket statement, the privacy notice sets out each right and how to use it, including how to complain to Datatilsynet if you think we have got something wrong.
Can I export my data if I leave?
Yes. Self-service JSON and CSV export from the day you sign up. Your data is yours, not hostage to your account. If you step away, your data stays as you left it and you can pick up without rebuilding anything. The one exception is the dormancy rule in the privacy notice: after three years inactive we email you, and only remove the account if we hear nothing back.
Does the AI train on my financial data?
No. The in-app AI is off until you turn it on, it runs on a European model (Mistral), and our data-processing agreement with them excludes your conversations from training, theirs as well as ours. Your chat history is kept for one reason only: so you can go back and read it. Nobody reviews it. Clear it whenever you like, or leave it and each thread deletes itself 30 days after your last message in it.
What's the catch? Why is it free?
fjordFIRE is funded out of pocket and non-commercial. We built it for our own household first, and we run it with no investors, no ads, no data sales, and no tiers; everyone gets the whole product. That is the reason it can be free: nobody is waiting on a return. It is free today, with every feature available to everyone. If that ever changes, this page will say so before anything does, and nothing gets charged without you agreeing to it.
Want in? fjordFIRE is open to everyone, free.
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