RetireJapan

I don't have that much experience in investing and stuff but when I look around I think that the thing I'm the most proud of is to have achieved to get 2 Bachelor's degrees and one Master's degree moving alone without family help from France countryside to Paris and managed to graduate, rent an apartment etc with 0 debt.
Then moving to Japan alone without money after graduating, being able to find a job very fast, and now being able to think of investing while I was raised in a poor family. It may be because of my childhood lifestyle, but I'm now able to save approx 70% of my salary (and I do buy lot of useless stuff when I think about it...)!
I hope that I'll have a few achievements to add in a few years!^^

Realizing the "offshore pension plan" that had been sold to me as an expat in Japan was a terrible investment, taking a huge loss by terminating it and starting investing in ETFs instead.

In a way, I'm thankful for that terrible investment scheme I was hooked into. Growing suspicious of how much fees they were taking from me, and looking them up online led me to the MMM forums, and then to his blog and the sane investment advice over there.

I guess mine is consistently saving over 50% of my income for the last 3-4 years.

Getting out of the "poor people's mentality" that I grew up into (just save money instead of investing, your only income is your work, etc.) and starting investing and looking for means of passive income. This is really the step without which I could not have started.

A close second would be kicking my crook of a financial adviser out and managing my assets myself. Makes you realize how useless these people are.

StockBeard wrote: ↑Thu Jun 14, 2018 4:17 am Realizing the "offshore pension plan" that had been sold to me as an expat in Japan was a terrible investment, taking a huge loss by terminating it and starting investing in ETFs instead.

In a way, I'm thankful for that terrible investment scheme I was hooked into. Growing suspicious of how much fees they were taking from me, and looking them up online led me to the MMM forums, and then to his blog and the sane investment advice over there.

I nearly got hooked into one of them myself. Close shave...

They reckoned I should cash in my UK final salary pension in the UK and invest it overseas. Then I checked how much commission they got... “Hang on a minute,l I said. Let’s gets Brexit done and dusted and I’d rather take my turn at the exchange rate roulette wheel...”

ricardo wrote: ↑Tue Jun 19, 2018 6:27 am I nearly got hooked into one of them myself. Close shave...

They reckoned I should cash in my UK final salary pension in the UK and invest it overseas. Then I checked how much commission they got... “Hang on a minute,l I said. Let’s gets Brexit done and dusted and I’d rather take my turn at the exchange rate roulette wheel...”

via Imgflip Meme Generator

Agreed! The only downside of my final salary pension is that it has to be paid in GBP, so I’m exposed to exchange rate changes. I’m planning on a worst case scenario, which is more than enough to live on, anything better is a bonus for extra holidays and more luxuries.

My pension is also index-linked, so - for me - high inflation in the U.K. is great, especially if we continue with low inflation in Japan...

I guess when I started my small step to open investment accounts (and actually started investing)
I was very scared at first due to different mindset about money.
But my most recent job (plus RetireJapan of course) helped me in the process of shifting these and slowly build my investment portfolio.

Now I have my growing investments (MF+Stocks) + retirement account in my home country.
I had to cancel my Rakuten account due to new work conflicts but too excited to start opening account again (preferably next year)!

I am definitely a beginner with this but I guess with little steps, I can achieve financial independence too!