Summary
My guest today is Brandon Ganch who is better known in the FIRE community as the Mad Fientist.
Brandon is an ex-computer programmer turned blogger and podcaster who reached financial independence at the ripe old age of 34 with his wife Jill. It’s always a pleasure to speak with Brandon as one of my financial/investing heroes and someone who’s been on the scene since the early days when I first discovered the concept of FIRE.
Some of the topics we cover in today’s episode are:
- The life-changing event of becoming a parent and how FI has helped (00:07:10)
- Did Brandon really crack the Billboard Top 40 list with his debut album? (00:16:15)
- How to raise a money conscious kid (00:20:13)
- What’s life been like since Brandon quit his day job as a programmer? (00:30:03)
- Difficulties switching from portfolio accumulation to consumption (00:36:50)
- How the utility of money changes as you get older (00:40:22)
Links
- Website – Mad Fientist
- Spotify – 1=2
Fantastic podcast mate! Been listening fairly religiously for years now, but always been a hardcore lurker. Just wanted to say that I think the piece around trying out your post-FI life before you actually get there, is very sage advice. It has always been one of my concerns, what will drive me once I reach the end of the journey, because at the moment it’s the journey itself that is the driving force. I also loved Brandon’s idea of taking a previous expense, dividing it by your net worth at the time and multiplying by your current net worth to get a better understanding of the real expense to you now, thought that was fantastic.
The only other thing that came to mind while listening to you guys talk about becoming more interested in “things” (like high-quality coffee grinders!) is that I’ve always loved things and everyone always tells you that being materialistic is bad and so I’ve been trying to figure out why I like “stuff” so much. I arrived at the conclusion that really what I love is the experience of using the thing, whether it’s my drum kit, or my motorbikes, or video games, or wood working, I love buying quality, expensive products because I get a thrill from the experience of using them. So in the end it does actually come down to experiences, not just owning things. That’s my take.
By the way, I was so stoked to find out you did BJJ. Congrats again on the gold medal mate, keep doing what you’re doing.
Cheers.
What a lovely comment Scott!
I’m with ya.
I’ve gone from hardcore ‘minimalist’ to ‘buy once and buy right’ maximalist. Ironically, buying the most expensive item can actually work out cheaper in the long run. It took me a few years to accept that. I always thought paying top dollar for anything was being ripped off haha.
The comment I liked the most was Brandon having a spending goal each year and donating unspent money to charity. That kind of fits in to dieing with zero.