Debt & Frugality

As Didi says in the novel (Findependence Day), “There’s no point climbing the Tower of Wealth when you’re still mired in the basement of debt.” If you owe credit-card debt still charging an usurous 20% per annum, forget about building wealth: focus on eliminating that debt. And once done, focus on paying off your mortgage. As Theo says in the novel, “The foundation of financial independence is a paid-for house.”

Connectively experts on FIRE: Financial Independence Retire Early

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Deposit Photos

As we aim to do roughly every month, today’s blog on Financial Independence taps the expertise of multiple business owners and investment experts on both sides of the border gathered through Connectively in partnership with LinkedIn.

This edition looks specifically at the FIRE movement, which of course is an acronym for Financial Independence Retire Early.

The paragraph reproduced below is how we posed the question.

The subsequent replies chosen are presented almost in full, with links to the source contained in their bios at the end of each section. I’ve added subheadings to speed readers through the content I hope is relevant to them.

What is your take on the FIRE movement (Financial Independence Retire Early)? Do you prefer a different term, do you believe in the FI part but not the RE part? How early is too early to “retire?” How do you define Retirement? Full-stop never work again, or just no longer being a corporate salaried employee. Any favorite FIRE blogs or podcasts you subscribe to or recommend?

“Most FIRE folks I’ve encountered don’t actually stop working; they stop working for someone else.”

Ah, the FIRE movement: where twenty-somethings eat rice and beans for a decade so they never have to attend another Monday morning meeting. I love the “FI” part with my whole heart. Financial Independence isn’t a trend; it’s just smart adulting. Building an emergency fund, crushing high-interest debt, investing consistently: that’s timeless wisdom dressed up in a catchy acronym.

The “RE” part, though? That’s where I raise a legal eyebrow. Retiring at 32 sounds thrilling until you realize you’ve got 50+ years of healthcare costs, inflation, and “what if the market tanks in year three” anxiety ahead of you. I’ve seen too many bankruptcy filings from people who front-loaded their optimism and back-loaded their income planning. So my official stance: FI, yes. RE, only if your math is bulletproof and you have a contingency plan tighter than a loan shark’s payment schedule.

How early is too early? There’s no magic number, but if you’re retiring before you’ve stress-tested your plan against a recession, a health crisis, and at least one kid’s emergency root canal, you’re retiring on hope, not strategy. I’d rather see someone retire at 45 with a fortress of a financial plan than at 35 with a house of cards.

As for defining “retirement”, I don’t buy the full-stop-never-work-again version. Most FIRE folks I’ve encountered don’t actually stop working; they stop working for someone else. They pivot to consulting, passion projects, or that Etsy shop selling hand-painted rocks. That’s not retirement—that’s career emancipation. And frankly, that’s healthier. Purposeless days can be as damaging to your well-being as an unpaid credit card is to your credit score.

Favorite resources? I keep an eye on “ChooseFI” for community-driven inspiration and practical steps, and “Mr. Money Mustache” for someone who’ll bluntly tell you to stop buying lattes and start buying index funds. But I always tell people: read these for motivation, not gospel. Your debt situation, your state’s laws, and your risk tolerance are yours alone—no blog can litigate your specific financial life like a good advisor (or attorney) can.

Bottom line: chase Financial Independence like it’s your job. Just make sure “Retiring Early” doesn’t quietly become “Filing for Bankruptcy Early” instead. — Loretta Kilday, DebtCC Spokesperson, Debt Consolidation Care

“I prefer the term Financial Autonomy.”

Financial Independence is the ultimate risk management strategy, yet the “Retire Early” label often misdiagnoses the goal as an escape from productivity rather than an acquisition of professional autonomy.

I prefer the term Financial Autonomy because it reflects a shift in capital allocation rather than a cessation of value creation. After two decades overseeing financial strategy and delivery operations, I have found that high-performing leaders rarely want to stop contributing; they simply want to stop answering to inefficient structures. Retirement should not be defined as a full-stop end to work, but as the pivot point where professional activity is driven entirely by intellectual curiosity rather than financial necessity.

The math of independence must be approached with the same discipline as a corporate balance sheet. Many proponents of early retirement rely on withdrawal models that fail to account for long-tail risks like global healthcare inflation or currency volatility across a 50-year horizon. It is too early to step away until a portfolio has been stress-tested against at least two distinct economic cycles. True independence requires ensuring that passive cash flow exceeds lifestyle burn even during prolonged periods of market stagnation.

Durable financial planning relies on economic history and financial biographies rather than the fleeting trends of modern hustle culture. Understanding how capital markets and labor value have shifted over the last century provides a more stable framework for long-term planning. The objective is to reach a stage where you are no longer a salaried employee by obligation, but a contributor to the economy by design. Sustainable returns are not just about the balance in a brokerage account; they are about the continued growth and leverage of your human capital. — Abhishek Pareek, Founder & Director, Coders.dev

“Real freedom is being able to say no to what drains you and yes to what sustains you.”

I’ve seen too many high achievers burn out chasing Financial Independence, then realize they don’t know who they are without the hustle. The problem isn’t the FIRE framework itself, it’s that people use it to escape rather than create. They’re running from burnout instead of asking why they’re burned out in the first place.

I believe in the FI part because autonomy matters. But retiring at 35 or 40 can backfire if you haven’t figured out what actually fulfills you beyond hitting achievement metrics. I think of retirement as the freedom to choose work that aligns with your values, not necessarily stopping work altogether. Some of my most miserable clients were financially independent but spiritually empty because they’d built their entire identity around accumulation. Real freedom is being able to say no to what drains you and yes to what sustains you, whether that happens at 45 or 65. — Samka Keranovic, Founder, Drwmbs

“Financial Independence is about buying your freedom to choose.”

I love the ambition behind FIRE, but I’d reframe it slightly: Financial Independence is about buying your freedom to choose, and that’s something I think about constantly running operations at Scale By SEO.

The FI part is undeniable. When you’ve built enough cushion that a bad month doesn’t sink you, you make sharper decisions, negotiate better, and sleep easier. The RE part is where I’d push back on the label, because most people who “retire early” at 35 or 40 are really just changing what they work on, not stopping work entirely.

That’s my definition of retirement, honestly: it’s not never working again, it’s never being forced to work on something you don’t care about. Full-stop retirement sounds like a fast track to boredom for a lot of driven people. The folks I admire treat FI as leverage. They leave the salaried corporate role and pour energy into something they own, whether that’s a business, a portfolio of projects, or in my world, building free tools like our customizable QR code generator because they want to, not because payroll depends on it.

How early is too early? Whenever the math only works if nothing ever goes wrong. I apply the same logic I use with clients: we back our SEO plans with a six-month performance guarantee, continuing services for free if KPIs aren’t met, because we’d rather absorb the risk ourselves than ask a small business to bet everything on hope. That’s the FIRE mindset done right, protect the downside first, then race toward freedom. If someone at 32 has a plan that survives market crashes, health surprises, and inflation, more power to them. If it only works in a spreadsheet, they’ve built a fantasy, not a plan.

For reading and listening, I’d point people to Mr. Money Mustache for the no-nonsense math and ChooseFI for the community side of the equation. Both do a great job separating hype from substance, which is the same standard I’d hold any advice to, financial or otherwise. — Melissa Basmayor, Marketing Coordinator, Freeqrcode.ai

“The financial objective, in my view, should be freedom of choice rather than freedom from all work.”

I strongly believe in the FI part of FIRE, but I am less attached to the idea that financial independence should automatically lead to retiring as early as possible.

For me, Financial Independence means reaching the point where your decisions are no longer dictated by the next paycheck. That could mean leaving a corporate job, changing careers, starting a business, working fewer hours, or simply having enough financial security to say no to work you no longer want to do.

I therefore prefer to think of FIRE as “Financial Independence, Reclaiming Employment” rather than necessarily “Retire Early.”

I do not think there is a universal age that is too early to retire. The bigger question is what someone is retiring to. Work provides more than income: routine, social contact, intellectual challenge and a sense of usefulness. If someone reaches financial independence at 40 but removes all of those things without replacing them, early retirement may not feel as rewarding as expected.

My definition of retirement is not “never earn another dollar.” It is reaching the point where paid work becomes optional rather than compulsory.

The financial objective, in my view, should be freedom of choice rather than freedom from all work. — Cem Oner, Founder / Finance & Public Data Publisher, Hesap Cebimde

“My definition of retirement is not ‘never work again.’ It’s never being forced to work again. Huge difference.”

I’m a believer in the FI part, one hundred percent. The RE part is where I push back, and here’s why: I built Scale By SEO from scratch, and I’ve watched consistent effort compound the same way money does. Walking away from work you love at 35 to sit on a beach sounds like quitting a marathon at mile twenty because your legs feel fine.

My preferred term is “Financial independence, work on your terms.” The money buys you optionality, not an exit. It means you take a client because you want to, not because rent is due. That’s the real win.

How early is too early? There’s no magic number, but too early is when you retire from something instead of to something. If you don’t have a reason to get up in the morning that isn’t a paycheck, the money won’t fix that. I’ve watched business owners sell out and go stir-crazy within a year. Purpose doesn’t have a price target.

And my definition of retirement is not “never work again.” It’s never being forced to work again. Huge difference. I run an SEO agency out of Harlingen, Texas, and I genuinely enjoy helping small businesses, plumbers, healthcare practices, auto body shops, get found online. Would I stop doing that because a portfolio hit a number? Absolutely not. Work you choose is one of life’s great pleasures.

On resources, Mr. Money Mustache is still the best voice in the space, and his writing is funny on top of being smart.

The ChooseFI podcast is my go-to for practical tactics, and JL Collins’ “The Simple Path to Wealth” is the book I’d hand anyone starting from zero. His stock series alone is worth hours of your time.

One warning: the FIRE crowd can obsess over the math and skip the meaning. Independence is a tool. Decide what it’s for before you chase it. I’d rather be sixty and excited about my work than forty and bored on a beach. — Wayne Lowry, CEO, Scale By SEO

“Buy the freedom, skip the recliner.”

Buy the freedom, skip the recliner. That’s my FIRE philosophy in one line, and I think it’s the healthiest version of the movement.

I buy the FI part completely. Financial Independence is just margin in your life: low overhead, real savings, the ability to say no. Running a small roastery teaches you that fast. Since Craig Keel founded Equipoise Coffee in 2021, every day has been about prioritizing when resources are tight. Do we spend on another single-origin like the Ethiopian Yirgacheffe, or on brewing guides that help people make better coffee at home? Margin is what lets you make those calls from strategy instead of panic. Personal finance works the same way.

The RE part is where I’d edit the script. I prefer “financial independence” plain and simple, maybe “financial autonomy,” because “retire early” sells an ending when most people actually want a beginning. I define retirement as the point where work becomes a choice rather than an obligation. By that definition, I know plenty of “retired” people who work more passionately than any salaried employee, and plenty of employed people who retired emotionally years ago.

How early is too early? When you’ve funded decades of pure consumption with nothing you’re building toward, you’ve traded one imbalance for another. Our whole brand philosophy is balance, in the cup and in life. A coffee that’s all brightness and no body falls flat, and so does a life that’s all freedom and no purpose.
On resources, Mr. Money Mustache is the classic and still worth reading, less for the math than for the “build the life you want, then save for it” ethos. ChooseFI is a solid podcast with a wide range of guest stories worth sampling.
So if FIRE means engineering the freedom to do work you love, I’m all in. If it means never working again, that just sounds like a long, quiet fade. — Rory Keel, Owner, Equipoise Coffee

My honest take: the “FI” half matters far more than the “RE” half

My honest take: the “FI” half matters far more than the “RE” half — the math (25 times your annual expenses, per the 4% rule) doesn’t care whether financial independence means quitting work entirely or just no longer needing the paycheck, and that distinction gets lost when people fixate on “retiring early.” I’d define retirement less as “never earning another dollar” and more as your paycheck becoming optional — once a portfolio can sustain a lower, safe withdrawal without more contributions, working becomes a choice about meaning rather than survival. The lever that actually moves someone’s FIRE date isn’t income, it’s savings rate: saving 10% of your income buys roughly one year of retirement for every nine years worked, but push that to 50% and it gets close to one-for-one, a bigger shift than most raises ever deliver. I build the free FIRE and compound-interest calculators at TheSmartWealthTools.com, so I watch that one input move people’s timelines by decades more than any other number on the page. — Haggai Tzouk, Founder, TheSmartWealthTools.com

Financial Independence is real. The “retire early” part is where people lose the plot.

I’m Runbo Li, co-founder and CEO of Magic Hour. The FIRE movement gets the diagnosis right but the prescription wrong. Financial independence is real. The “retire early” part is where people lose the plot.

I watched my parents run small businesses my entire life. They never talked about retirement. They talked about freedom. Freedom to pick which problems they wanted to solve, which customers they wanted to serve, which days they wanted to work. That’s a fundamentally different orientation than “stop working as fast as possible.” Continue Reading…

David Chilton’s interview with me on his The Wealthy Barber podcast

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As those who follow me on social media may already know, financial guru David Chilton interviewed me on his popular The Wealthy Barber podcast, which dropped Tuesday on YouTube.com. You can find the full 39-minute clip here: try 1.5x speed if you’re pressed for time!

David is a good interviewer and got me to confess a few things I might not have coughed up otherwise. Mostly, we chatted about personal finance in Canada, retirement and retirement planning and — a particular concern for David — the plight of young Canadians priced out of the Canadian real estate market. This included a discussion of our own family’s situation and how the “Bank of Mum and Dad” may be enlisted to supplement down payments scraped up by some combination of TFSAs, the RRSP Home Buyers Plan and the new First Home Savings Accounts (FHSAs) that David is quite enthusiastic abøut.

Naturally we talked about Retirement. David himself is retiring at the end of this year soon after he turns 65, so he will have “beaten” me to Full Retirement by roughly eight years. I wrote about his looming Retirement recently in my MoneySense Retired Money column, which was also flagged here on Findependence Hub.

A Who’s Who of Canadian Personal Finance

I was David’s 71st interview on the podcast since he launched it two years ago: he says he plans to keep it going at least until the end of this year. As I comment in the interview, his many guests constitute a veritable “Who’s who” of Canadian personal finance, with a handful of Americans thrown in.

Glad to be part of it and to join such luminaries as Ben Felix, Preet Banerjee, Rob Carrick, Fred Vettese and many more. As David notes, a lot of his guests are younger newer voices known as “Finfluencers,” a group I also wrote about in Retired Money earlier this summer.

We also discuss other more “seasoned” financial commentators, including Bruce Cohen, Ellen Roseman, Jim Daw, Mike Grenby and other pioneers of the genre. Some of those veterans’ names came up in another Retired Money interview I did after Rob Carrick retired a year ago from his full-time job at the Globe & Mail.

The financial novels spawned by The Wealthy Barber

With an estimated 4- to 5- million copies of his books sold worldwide, it’s no surprize that Chilton’s pseudo-fiction financial format spawned many imitators. I fondly recall Jim Daw (retired from the Toronto Star) cracking a joke about the many financial novel knockoffs inspired by The Wealthy Barber. Rather than a “branch” of personal finance literature, Jim quipped in his review of my own Findependence Day that this specialized field consituted merely a “twig” of the genre.

While much of the interview was perforce about investing and retirement, good interviewer that he is David manages to coax some confessions about my own lifestyle and choices. For example, I tackled headon the fact that the title of my own similarly titled The Wealthy Boomer was not initially conceived as a ripoff of Chilton’s far more commercially successful The Wealthy Barber: that title was just a description of the possible demographic target for the book’s publisher.

We also talked about 12 Good Years, the blog that blogger Fritz Gilbert originally ran on his Retirement Manifesto blog. That article make she case that new or aspiring retirees should strive to make the best of the years between ages 60 and 72, whether for strenuous travel or demanding hobbies, physically or mentally. Continue Reading…

Vanguard Canada launches its first actively managed domestic Fixed Income ETF

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Vanguard Canada opens Toronto Stock Exchange on Sept. 9, 2026. Photo courtesy TMX Group.

Yesterday, Vanguard Investments Canada Inc. announced the launch of what it says is its first actively managed fixed-income ETF: the Vanguard Global Core-Plus Bond ETF (TSX: VCOR). VCOR began trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Wednesday (Sept.9, 2026), where Vanguard opened trading for the day (as shown on left.)

The new ETF was a major focus of one of two major presentations at Vanguard Canada’s annual Global Insights Forum, held in Toronto at the Royal York Hotel. The other was billed as Megatrends, AI and Market Implications.

In a press release, Vanguard Capital Management CIO and Global Head of Vanguard Fixed Income Group Sara Devereux described VCOR as being part of the firm’s push to make Vanguard’s specialized fixed-income capabilities accessible to more investors. She said it “combines the resources of our global investment platform, a disciplined active process, and broad diversification across fixed-income markets in a single ETF.”

It aims to provide investors and their financial advisors with an “actively managed, single-ticket fixed-income solution at a low management fee of 0.25%.” While the “core” allocation is to investment-grade bonds, it also invests in global rates, credit, and securitized markets,  along with a “plus” component that allocates to higher-yielding bonds.  Depending on markets, investors can expect allocations of between 20% and 50% for investment-grade credit; 0 to 20% U.S. treasuries/agency; 10 to 35% mortgages; 5 to 20% Emerging Markets debt and 0 to 20% high-yield corporates. The fund seeks to hedge its U.S.-dollar currency exposure back to the Canadian dollar and plans to pay monthly distributions.

Sal D’Angelo, Head of Vanguard Canada, said active ETFs have experienced significant growth in Canada and now account for roughly a third of Canadian ETF assets: “We continue to see strong advisor and investor demand for active global fixed-income solutions that offer broader diversification and access to a wider opportunity set.”

Bonds becoming more important for financial advisors as well as their clients

Dan Shaykevich/Linkedin

At the Forum on Wednesday, the new ETF was the focus of a presentation by Vanguard principal and senior portfolio manager Dan Shaykevich (pictured on right). Fixed income is once again playing a central role in investor portfolios, he said. As Canadian financial advisors prepare for CRM3 (Client Relationship Model Phase 3), it will also play a more important role for advisors too. The fund taps one of the world’s largest Fixed-Income money managers: Vanguard’s global fixed income team manages US4.2 trillion in assets under management, including C$30 billion in Canadian Bonds.  It’s supported by more than 20 portfolio managers, 35 traders, 50 credit researchers and at least eight quantitative analysts.

Generally speaking, financial advisors tend to spend more time with clients on equities than on Fixed Income, Shaykevich said, “even though Fixed Income may be 20 to 40%” of advisors’ money under management.

Marketing materials distributed at the event included an insert on Fixed Income Investing reminding investors that bonds can complement the growth potential of equities by providing stability, generating income and supporing diversification.

The insert lists several already existing Canadian Index-based Fixed Income ETFs. They include: Continue Reading…

Time for Core (Plus) Bond Portfolios Again?

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By Christy Tan and Lukasz Labedzki, Franklin Templeton Institute

(Sponsor Blog) 

Investment Implications

We see growing evidence suggesting that investors should consider moving from a short-duration bias toward core (plus) bond portfolios. This is largely predicated on the fact that valuations have become more attractive across fixed-income sectors, with all-in yields approaching compelling levels. Our guidepost remains 10-year Treasury yields near the upper end of their recent range. We continue to believe that this is a market for an active, selective approach.

Please see our sector views below.

Central banks: We have a new Federal Reserve (Fed) chair, and if we take him at his word, it feels
like a new environment has begun. The rhetoric is hawkish, reinforcing that the 2% inflation target is
by no means soft. Importantly, there’s also a strong push for no forward guidance, with the market
invited to react to incoming data as it sees fit. That likely means a higher-volatility environment and,
all else equal, a higher risk premium demanded by bond investors. As a result, all eyes are now on
the data. If the data fails to confirm moderating inflation, the market will demand Fed action. If the
data does confirm it, the market can justify a pause. In both cases, longer duration can perform
well. The risk is the Fed policymakers talking but not acting when needed: that would make the
bond market angry. We see the risk-reward of extending duration as improving and are happy to do
so at certain yield levels.

US Treasuries: Our view is that 10-year Treasury yields will remain broadly range-bound, which
means the closer they get to 4.75%, the more attractive it becomes to move into intermediate
duration. We believe it is reasonable to begin extending duration around those yield levels.

Developed markets credit: Historically elevated investment-grade bond issuance that the market
needed to absorb widened spreads from their tights to levels closer to fair value, while the broader
fundamental backdrop remains healthy. Supply should also slow in the second half of the year. In
the high-yield space, spreads have also widened somewhat. We remain biased toward higher-rated
issuers in high yield. All-in yields are attractive and provide resilience across a range of scenarios.

Emerging market (EM) debt: While it has been the best-performing fixed-income sector
year-to- date, we think it’s time to be more selective. In local-currency EM debt, Latin America
has been the top performer (as we highlighted), and we expect this to continue. As a stronger US
dollar remains a risk, in our view allocations should be balanced with US dollar-denominated EM
debt, which is less sensitive to currency moves.

Euro bonds: As mentioned previously, we believe German Bund yields (Europe’s benchmark
government bond yields) will remain broadly range-bound. They closely track expected mone-
tary policy, which has recently been driven largely by gas prices. With Bund yields above 3.1%, we
find them attractive for medium-term investors. Hedged yields for US dollar-based investors are
on par with US Treasuries, meaning there is little opportunity cost to global diversification.

Performance Snapshot

Global fixed-income performance has remained largely uninspiring this year, with the Bloomberg
Global Aggregate Index still slightly underwater. Relative performance has been stronger in
emerging market debt, particularly US dollar-denominated debt. The picture is more nuanced in
local-currency EM debt, which we discuss later. US high yield has also outperformed. Within
higher-quality fixed income, US short-duration strategies have also held up relatively well. These
are essentially the sectors we have been highlighting throughout the year.


US Treasuries

We believe benchmark 10-year Treasury yields will remain broadly range-bound, and investors should take advantage when yields are close to the upper end of that range (~4.75%). Recent history (Exhibit 2) suggests this strategy has worked well and remains our playbook for the second half of 2026.


Of course, yields could move higher, but at these levels we view the risk-reward as favorable and do not see a high risk of yields moving significantly above the recent range over the coming months. The main reason is that a lot is already priced in: the market expects more than two Fed hikes over the next 12 months,1 while the current term premium (the risk premium in bond jargon) is close to 70 basis points (bps),2 versus a recent high of around 90 bps. A meaningful move above 5% in 10-year Treasury yields would likely require a further significant repricing of both monetary policy expectations and the term premium.

The major risk is that the Fed turns more hawkish than in our base case. We acknowledge this risk, but we also think that realized hikes could, in fact, cause longer-duration bonds to catch a bid, as they would demonstrate a strong commitment to fighting inflation and could lead to a repricing of growth expectations.

For conservative mandates, we continue to view short-duration bonds as a portfolio pillar. They are highly resilient across scenarios: two-year Treasury yields would need to rise above 9% before investors started losing money, assuming a one-year investment horizon (Exhibit 3).

Developed Markets Credit

The major story in credit markets lately has been investment-grade (IG) bond supply, driven in part by hyperscaler borrowing. More than US$1.2 trillion3 of IG issuance came to market through the first six months of the year: well above historical norms (Exhibit 4). Continue Reading…

Canadian Kids picking up on their Parents’ Money Stress, new Vanguard Survey finds

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Even when parents try to shield their children from financial worries, a new study suggests kids are hearing more than parents realize.

As the cost of living continues to squeeze Canadian households, a new survey from Vanguard Canada suggests the strain isn’t confined to parents’ bank accounts; it’s also shaping how their children think and feel about money too.

The survey of just over 1,000 Canadian parents of children under 18 found that households that talk openly about money raise more financially literate kids, while households that avoid the subject may be doing more harm than good.

The Instinct to Protect backfires

Many parents try to keep financial stress away from their kids. Among parents who describe themselves as financially stressed, more than two thirds said they feel pressure to hide their worries from their children, and roughly a third said they avoid discussing money at home altogether.

But the survey suggests that instinct doesn’t work the way parents hope. Seven in ten financially stressed parents said their children overhear money conversations anyway. In fact, those children were found to be nearly five times more likely to feel anxious about money than their peers.

Sal D’Angelo, Head of Vanguard Investments Canada, said children pick up on far more than parents assume, even when adults try to keep financial matters private. He framed early financial education as key to helping the next generation build healthy money habits.

 A Literacy Gap that starts early and closes late

The survey also points to a timing problem. Households where money is discussed regularly produce children with markedly stronger grasp of core concepts like banking, debit and credit, which is nearly three times higher comprehension according to the findings.

Yet the majority of parents said substantive money conversations don’t begin until their child is between 15 and 18 years old, well after attitudes toward money have already started to form. Continue Reading…