Flagstaff. A very small town which I happened to stop by on my way to Grand Canyon.
Itâs 108 miles to Phoenix so still convenient.
I can understand guns, but penchant for exotic animals is a bit strange to me. What kind of exotic animals do you like that are abundant in AZ?
Anyway congrats on finding a place you are happy with.
Who me? 
You are an 1) exotic and 2) animal? 
Payson is about 15,000 people and 20 or 25 minutes away. North, Sedona is 90 minutes and south Phoenix/Scottsdale/Mesa/Tempe are about 2 hours. Forty minutes or so south takes you from forest to saguaro desert.
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All I saw in my yard was elk poop. Very sanitary. No poo in public spaces.
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Reptiles. Got an Arizona black rattler down by the Verde river a few weeks ago. A bit dusty emerging from hibernation. Ebony and gold after a shed or so I hear. Love the two-toned eye.
No I was talking about finding a place that I was happy with, you bozo⌠
The big difference between small town living and big city living is the cost, in a big city people have too much money and drive up the cost of living. In small towns they have few jobs and no money. So people retiring with big city incomes and home equity can live like kings. In Tahoe the average income is $12/hr. Locals struggle. I have seen hundreds of rental applications. Most have no savings, bad credit, low unsteady incomes. So BA people can come here and retire early⌠Same for most of the US small towns.
From a quote on Quora.
Wealth is a matter of perception. Here is an interesting perspective. Basically it is not how much you earn. It is how much you spend.
â In an argument over money early in our marriage, I told my wife that she would always be poor. She took it very offensively - perhaps my delivery was also poor - but I was trying to explain that her habits would keep her poor.
Wealthy people understand that it isnât what you earn, it is what you keep.
Others have already commented on the sizable chunk the government (your âsilent partnerâ) skims off the top of your labor.
Once you get your grubby hands on your portion, you should have noticed by now that the rest of the world is trying to relieve you of the remaining portion. Whether itâs unscrupulous sales people trying to earn their own paychecks, clever marketers, outright scam artists, or just plain products and services you donât really need, our consumer society is a buffet of pitfalls and opportunities to consume your earnings.
The reason wealthy people are frugal is because the high earners who werenât frugal likely donât have money anymore.
Youâve probably heard the statistics that most people who have a windfall such as an inheritance or winning the lottery are almost always broke again within a few years. They didnât understand the principles of wealth.
Sadly, most of us arenât taught those principles, so itâs hard to cast blame. But the information is out there if you want it, especially in the Internet age.
In my own life, I have seen easily 5+ examples of people who I have known personally and intimately, who at some point in their lives earned income far above average, owned their own businesses, and/or could have been considered wealthy. Either before I met them or during the course of my time knowing them, they were broke again. Some of them borrowed money from me during that time, and one rented a room in my house.
Why? As far as I can tell, the one thing they all had in common is that they assumed their peak level of income would always continue or increase, and therefore they never saved or invested properly. In all cases, they were eventually wrong.
I started from flat broke, and in fact six figures in debt. In the same period of time that I witnessed those cases, I am out of debt and have begun to grow wealth. I am by NO means wealthy, but my trend has been steady up and to the right. The difference is that I have made a concerted effort to save as much as possible from my earnings, pay down debt, and learn and experiment with investing. I believe that, barring some unforeseen occurrence (life is full of them), I will end up wealthy, because I work hard, manage my money intelligently, and learn from my mistakes.
Rich Dad, Poor Dad (Robert Kiyosakiâs famous book) was mostly a fluff piece for one core concept: poor people purchase obligations (debt), while wealthy people purchase assets (intrinsic value and/or income producing).
Wealthy people understand that most consumer spending is essentially converting hours of their life working into money, and then taking that money and trading it for things that you donât really need or want. Or in other cases, simply not understanding where you are being screwed due to inefficiencies.
You are trading your life for money, which makes you unhappy, and then you are trying to fill that hole in your heart with products or services to regain the happiness you could have already had - when you could just try to work less and be happier in the first place. But such is the insanity of consumer culture.
Everyone has emotional triggers, things they consume that make them happy; if you have the means, of course you should indulge a bit and live a little. But most things people waste money on donât make them that happy. Couldnât you buy a pound of coffee that gives you a couple of weeks of coffee for $10, rather than spending $5 per cup at Starbucks? Is the incremental value of a slightly nicer car worth an extra $100â200/month?
Once you realize that almost all modern consumer products are traps to take your hard-earned money, set by people who understand how to free themselves from the system and become wealthy off of your backâŚ
Well, does it make sense to do anything but get a little smarter about how you spend the money for which you traded your time?
And once youâve achieved wealth, does it make sense to do anything but make sure you never slide back into a place of hourly wages, near broke desperation, and all that comes with that life circumstance?
Iâll leave you with one more thought: that a person is âwealthyâ is just a label that you are applying from you current vantage point. As you start to grow wealth, your expenses and the scope of your problems tend to become larger as well.
âMoâ money, moâ problemsâ if you will.
So a wealthy person doesnât view themselves as âout of the fireâ of life in the same way as a âworking poorâ person believes when looking up at them; they are simply playing a bigger game, with the same rules. But they understand those rules better than you do. And then many of those people will become truly wealthy at one point, which basically means your income producing assets support your desired lifestyle.
So the real question should be, given the almost certainty of remaining poor if you are not at least a bit frugal, why arenât more poor people frugal?â
My answer would be is they are poor because they are not frugalâŚ
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Oh, such a long and perfect details (even though copied) from elt1 !
3 kudos to you !!
Thatâs ok. I copied it from someone else.
Living below your means is a good basic philosophy.
Simple, easy to understand and is the key to long lasting wealth.
Same philosophy for government. As long as spending isnât controlled there will never be enough tax income.
Especially in California. Spending is out of control and taxpayers are leaving. Especially retired state employees taking their CA state tax free pension money out of state.
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Good, live below your means and let government take away your savings.
Yes, one who understands this will survive long and will reach financial independence faster!
No, government takes from income, but not from savings!
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For hanera purpose: if he moves his primary residential address to Seattle, he will not pay 9.3% CA tax from his AAPL dividends while he will be tax on rental home in California!
That is why, many retirees move out of CA state
Switzerland has a wealth taxâŚDont give CA any ideasâŚ
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They also have a VAT. So both ends of the wealth spectrum have more skin in the game.
CA already has 9% sales taxâŚhow much more tax does it needâŚFire half of the state employees, tax pensions. Get rid of HSR and all other wasteful spending and bring taxes down to the average US stateâŚ
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With prop 13 limiting property taxes and a steeply progressive tax code a debt free and dependent free retire can live quite well in CA even close to major metropolitan areas. Yes, AZ is way cheaper (did I mention the 0.12 a KwH electricity?) but really itâs more about freedom. Freedom to do as you like with your own property without having to beg permission from the local planning pinhead. Freedom to own whatever you like. Freedom of movement without getting caught up in the congestion straitjacket of the Bay Area.
But yes, cost matters. I now have a great room in a house I paid cash for. Iâve never had a great room. It looks out on the Mogollon Rim.
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