Around the Blogosphere

Some of my clients are surprised to learn that I don’t follow specific spending rules, like the popular 4% rule, when building out retirement income projections. My problem with spending rules stems from the fact that life doesn’t just move in a straight-line, AND we don’t have one pot of money called “retirement savings”. Indeed,…

Some personal finance topics spark polite debate. Others? They ignite full-blown identity crises. In his latest video, Ben Felix dives into three of the most emotionally charged subjects in personal finance: renting vs. owning, dividend investing, and FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early). He explains why these topics go well beyond spreadsheets – they challenge our…

I went to bed after a perfectly normal Wednesday and woke up at 3am with my heart racing. I got up, went to the bathroom, and tried to get back to sleep – tossing and turning for a few hours before getting up for good around 5:30am. I felt okay(ish) and went downstairs for an…

For years I’ve wrestled with the taxing decision of whether to pay ourselves dividends or salary (or some combination of the two). For background, my wife and I co-own and operate our corporation, which includes our financial planning business, this blog, and some freelance writing work. We’ve always paid ourselves an equal amount of dividends…

Global stocks fell sharply on Thursday and Friday after US President Donald Trump’s so-called Liberation Day tariffs went into effect. Whether the President is being deliberately obtuse about the economic upheaval these tariffs will cause, or if he’s playing chess while the rest of the world is playing checkers is anyone’s guess. What investors want…

My inbox has been flooded lately with worried investors who feel anxious about the current market environment. It seems once again we find ourselves in unprecedented times.  While the future is always uncertain, the stock market is a forward-looking machine and is constantly gathering new information to assess the outlook of individual companies and the…

It has been more than 10 years since I started offering financial planning advice – and more than five years since I quit my day job to work as an advice-only planner full-time. I have a soft spot for who I call regular Canadians with regular problems. That’s the majority of you who read this…

‘Our life is frittered away by detail… simplify, simplify.’ – Henry David Thoreau I’ve fielded all types of questions from clients and readers over the years looking for that one magic hack or some shortcut to building wealth. Usually these half-baked ideas come from a friend, relative, colleague, or an unscrupulous advisor, or a random…

I used to be a hardcore credit card rewards junkie and wrote frequently on the subject (I even had a separate blog dedicated to it!). I considered it a game, and tried to win big each year by signing up for multiple cards with massive welcome bonuses, while optimizing rewards with specific cards for everyday…

One question I’m often asked about my investment approach is when it makes sense to switch my portfolio from 100% global equities (represented by Vanguard’s All Equity ETF – VEQT) to something less risky that includes bonds and/or cash. In other words, does it make sense to switch from VEQT to VGRO to possibly VBAL…