For the first 30 or so years of working, saving and investing, you’ll be first in the mode of getting out of the hole (paying down debt), and then building your net worth (that’s wealth accumulation.). But don’t forget, wealth accumulation isn’t the ultimate goal. Decumulation is! (a separate category here at the Hub).
2023-2024 HireAHelper Moving Migration Report: Artwork by Esther Wu
By Volodymyr Kupriyanov
Special to Financial Independence Hub
When we released our last study of starting a moving labor company as a side hustle, it was a great time to get into the business. Home sales were at an all-time high, and the number of Americans who moved that year inched up for the first time in a decade.
However, after only one year, the housing market has cooled off. And even though sales of newly built homes are still up 6%, home sales as a whole aren’t as high as last year.
The cost of moving has also grown 4% in 2023 (ahead of inflation rates), and this is actually good news! It means movers’ earnings have most likely also increased. So if you’re interested in adding a side hustle to your income, starting a moving labor company is well worth considering.
Findings from 2023 Study on Moving Labor
In 2023, a typical moving company earns between US$90 and $150 per hour on average, or from $244 to $407 per move
Mover earnings in 2023 are highest in Birmingham, AL where average hourly earnings on a labor-only move reached $146
The state with the greatest demand is Mississippi, with 434 moves per moving company registered in the state
What is a Moving Labor Company, and can it work as a Side Hustle?
You can start a side hustle as a full-service mover. These are the huge van line companies, and they tend to offer the whole service package and charge significantly more. Moving labor companies are often responsible for loading, unloading, and, sometimes (though rarely), packing up people’s possessions.
Why is labor-only so profitable?
Here are a few more reasons why moving labor is a good choice for a side hustle:
You don’t require a special mover’s license in most states
No need to invest in your own truck or spend money on gas
With almost half (48%) of all moves taking place on the weekend, you can keep this side hustle alongside your main job or your studies
Fast Facts about Moving Company Earnings in 2023
Here are some estimates on moving marketplace earnings:
How much revenue do movers make per hour?
In 2023, the average amount a moving labor company earned on HireAHelper is $113 per hour (after fees). That rate is based on the service of two movers loading and unloading a customer’s belongings and does not include potential tips.
According to Forbes, local movers usually charge between $50 to $250 per hour in 2023. Continue Reading…
Investing in Artificial Intelligence: We feel it could have a huge positive potential, but watch for these risks and rewards
Deposit Photos
Artificial Intelligence (AI) only crossed the fiction-to-news barrier in recent years, after decades as a staple of Arnold Schwarzenegger films, but it’s already influencing the economy and is likely to increase its impact. We feel it could have a huge positive potential. This development has also caught the attention of many investors who are contemplating the prospects of investing in AI.
Media comments on this subject abound, as do surveys. The average person seems fascinated with AI’s potential for good, but wary of its potential for harm. You might say this resembles the atmosphere a decade or so ago when self-driving cars started appearing in the news.
In both cases, middle-of-the-roaders were in the majority. Extreme types came up with much different outlooks.
Negative observers said self-driving vehicles would lead to an economic collapse because multitudes of drivers of trucks, taxis, buses and so on would lose their jobs.
At the other end of the spectrum, a smaller extreme felt driver-less vehicles would balloon human productivity and expand wealth around the world. After all, people could do valuable work in traffic, just as well as in an office, or use the time for a nap. They looked forward to a day when owning your own car would be a needless extravagance. When you needed a lift, you’d just summon a driver-less limo on your cellphone. A little further along, new homes will be available with or without garages or parking spots. Your self-driver will be able to valet itself to a community parking lot.
Looking a little further still, your car might be able to take itself out for maintenance, service, fuel, or any number of errands. Artificial Intelligence just might speed the arrival of these advances.
However, there’s an even wider opinion spectrum on Artificial Intelligence. Rather than a booming jobless rate, the negative side foresees Armageddon: humans versus machines.
It seems conflicts of interest are playing a role, along with honest differences of opinion, in disputes over Artificial Intelligence. This reminds me of the debate over Y2K.
The Y2K debate showed there is big money in alarmism. Some of the top Y2K promoters used Y2K fears to build a following and boost their incomes from writing, consulting or public speaking. Pessimists worried needlessly about Y2K and made a lot of money. I expect the same reaction to AI.
Mainstream opinion or Al Gore on steroids?
Ratings for cable news pioneer CNN have been slumping for a decade. Coincidentally, CNN.com recently published an essay entitled: “Experts are warning AI could lead to human extinction. Are we taking it seriously enough?”
The essay begins: “Think about it for a second … The erasure of the human race from planet Earth. That is what top industry leaders are frantically sounding the alarm about … potential dangers artificial intelligence poses to the very existence of civilization.”
It passes along a warning: “… hundreds of top AI scientists, researchers, and others … voiced deep concern for the future of humanity, signing a one-sentence (italics added) open letter to the public … mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war …”
You have to give them credit for leaving climate change off the list.
Read MarcAndreessen’s essay on AI
If you’re investing in AI and Artificial Intelligence fears keep you awake at night, I’d suggest a 7,000-word remedy by Marc Andreessen, entitled, “Why AI will save the world.”
In all I’ve read about AI, this is the best comment I’ve seen. It describes AI in plain English; explains how AI can expand human intelligence; how we have used human intelligence over millennia to create today’s world. It also speculates about the gains we may see in the new era of AI. Continue Reading…
Over the last few years, discussions around personal finance have been louder – and more confusing – than ever.
Market volatility, rising interest rates, the high cost of living and global unrest have dominated headlines and made life increasingly complicated for most Canadians.
Today (October 9) is World Financial Planning Day, a time to dim the noise and focus on the basics: a financial plan, what it is and how it can help you feel financially prepared for your future. More importantly, it’s an occasion to recognize that working with a financial advisor on a personal plan has many benefits, including greater financial confidence and a higher quality of life.
A financial plan is not just an investment plan: in fact, it’s much more. An investment portfolio is certainly a component of a financial plan, but your investments don’t provide a clear direction for any life plans in the coming years. Your investments can indicate financial returns, but their value is not guaranteed at any point in time and investments alone cannot prepare you for the future.
A financial plan is a goals-based document that provides a road map for what you would like to achieve in the short- and long-term. The goals are not necessarily financial, but they need monetary support (like investment income) to be reached.
Goals within your financial plan may include:
When you want to retire, and the lifestyle you want in your golden years.
Affording major expenditures, including a home, vacations or post-secondary education for dependents.
Preparedness for untimely events, such as premature death, disability or critical illness.
Plans for your estate and the legacy you’d like to leave for your family and charities.
These goals are personal and involve answers to questions that address significant, and sometimes difficult, situations. It can be challenging to determine these responses on your own, so working with a financial planner can help you answer these questions, define your goals and create a strategy to achieve them. Your financial planner will get to know you on a personal level. Then, based on your aspirations, project what needs to happen and create a financial plan for your future. Continue Reading…
Financial Independence is the goal of everyone with a bank account, and budgeting plays a main role in achieving that.
It can be difficult to understand where to start or how to get yourself back on track.
With these valuable pieces of insight from leading industry experts, you can start your own Fnancial Independence journey.
Pay yourself first
“One essential budgeting tip for achieving financial independence is to adopt a ‘pay yourself first’ approach. This means prioritizing savings and investments by setting aside a certain portion of your income as soon as you receive it, before using it for bills, expenses, or discretionary spending. By automating savings and investments into accounts like emergency funds, retirement accounts, or other investment accounts, you’re prioritizing your financial goals and building a habit of consistently contributing toward them. Over time, this proactive approach allows your savings to grow, helps you avoid lifestyle inflation, and keeps you focused on long-term financial stability rather than short-term gratification.” – Bill Lyons, CEO of Griffin Funding
Financial independence wildly relies on smart budgeting and disciplined financial practices. One powerful strategy is to leverage your tax return, which is often a lump sum. Consider depositing your tax return directly into a separate savings account from your tax software. This strategic move creates somewhat of a safety net. This disciplined approach not only safeguards your funds but also provides a foundation for future investments or emergency expenses. Over time, this habit can contribute significantly to your financial independence.
Minimize Debt
“Minimizing your debt can help achieve financial independence, as it reduces financial burdens and frees up resources for other financial goals. When you prioritize the repayment of high-interest debts, such as credit-card debt or personal loans, individuals can save significant amounts of money on interest payments over time. This disciplined approach to debt reduction can also improve credit scores, making it easier to qualify for private financing options when purchasing a home or commercial property. Minimizing debt, individuals can strengthen their financial position and increase their chances of securing favorable terms and rates for private financing, ultimately helping them achieve their real estate ownership goals.” – Sacha Ferrandi Founder & Principal, Source Capital
“A practical budgeting method divides income into three categories: 50% for needs, 30% for wants, and 20% for savings or debt repayment. This system assists individuals in efficiently allocating their funds, ensuring they cover essential expenses such as housing, groceries, and utilities, while also setting aside money for financial goals. Wants to include discretionary spending such as entertainment and dining out. The remaining portion goes towards savings or paying off debts, contributing to long-term financial security. This budgeting approach offers a simple framework for managing finances, preventing overspending on non-essentials while prioritizing savings. It’s adaptable to different income levels, making it a balanced way to manage money.”– California Credit Union
Plan for irregular expenses
“Planning for irregular expenses is a wise budgeting strategy that can contribute to financial independence. By anticipating and setting aside funds for irregular expenses, individuals can avoid financial stress when unexpected costs arise. One effective way to allocate funds for irregular expenses is by saving a portion of your tax refund return instead of immediately spending it on unnecessary items. Exercising discipline and directing your tax refund towards an emergency fund or a dedicated savings account, you can build a financial cushion that provides peace of mind and protects you from unexpected financial setbacks. This proactive approach to budgeting ensures that you are prepared for unexpected irregular expenses and helps you maintain control over your financial well-being.”– Lisa Green-Lewis Tax Expert, Turbo Tax Continue Reading…
When it comes to stocks, index investing offers many advantages over other investment approaches. However, these advantages don’t always carry over to other asset classes. No investment style should be treated like a religion, indexing included. It pays to think through the reasons for using a given approach to investing.
Stocks
Low-cost broadly-diversified index investing in stocks offers a number of advantages over other investment approaches:
Lower costs, including MERs, trading costs within funds, and capital gains taxes
Less work for the investor
Better diversification, leading to lower-volatility losses
Choosing actively-managed mutual funds or ETFs definitely has much higher costs. For investors who just pick some actively-managed funds and stick with them, the amount of work required can be low, but more often the investor stays on the lookout for better funds, which can be a lot of work for questionable benefit. Many actively-managed funds offer decent diversification. Ironically, the best diversification comes from closet index funds that charge high fees for doing little.
Investors who pick their own stocks to hold for the long term, including dividend investors, do well on costs, but typically put in a lot of work and fail to diversify sufficiently. Those who trade stocks actively on their own tend to suffer from trading losses and poor diversification, and they put in a lot of effort for their poor results. Things get worse with options.
Despite the advantages of pure index investing in stocks, I make two exceptions. The first is that I own one ETF of U.S. small value stocks (Vanguard’s VBR) because of the history of small value stocks outperforming market averages. If this works out poorly for me, it will be because of slightly higher costs and slightly poorer diversification.
One might ask why I don’t make exceptions for other factors shown to have produced excess returns in the past. The reason is that I have little confidence that they will outperform in the future by enough to cover the higher costs of investing in them. Popularity tends to drive down future returns. The same may happen to small value stocks, but they seemed to me to offer enough promise to take the chance.
The second exception I make to pure index investing in stocks is that I tilt slowly toward bonds as the CAPE10 of the world’s stocks grows above 25. I think of this as easing up on stocks because they have risen substantially, and I have less need to take as much risk to meet my goals. It also reduces my portfolio’s risk at a time when the odds of a substantial stock market crash are elevated. But the fact that I think of this measure in terms of risk control doesn’t change the fact that I’m engaged in a modest amount of market timing.
At the CAPE10 peak in late 2021, my allocation to bonds was 7 percentage points higher than it would have been if the CAPE10 had been below 25. This might seem like a small change, but the shift of dollars from high-flying stocks to bonds got magnified when combined with my normal portfolio rebalancing.
Another thing I do as the CAPE10 of the world’s stocks exceeds 20 is to lower my future return expectations, but this doesn’t include any additional portfolio adjustments.
Bonds
It is easy to treat all bonds as a single asset class and invest in an index of all available bonds, perhaps limited to a particular country. However, I don’t see bonds this way. I see corporate bonds as a separate asset class from government bonds, because corporate bonds have the possibility of default. I prefer to invest slightly more in stocks than to chase yield in corporate bonds.
I don’t know if experts can see conditions when corporate bonds are a good bet based on their risk and the additional yield they offer. I just know that I can’t do this. I prefer my bonds to be safe and to leave the risk to my stock holdings.
I also see long-term government bonds as a different asset class from short-term government bonds (less than 5 years). Central banks are constantly manipulating the bond market through ramping up or down on their holdings of different durations of bonds. This manipulation makes me uneasy about holding risky long-term bonds.
Another reason I have for avoiding long-term bonds is inflation risk. Investment professionals are often taught that government bonds are risk-free if held to maturity. This is only true in nominal terms. My future financial obligations tend to grow with inflation. Long-term government bonds look very risky to me when I consider the uncertainty of inflation over decades. Inflation-protected bonds deal with inflation risk, but this still leaves concerns about bond market manipulation by central banks.
Once we eliminate corporate bonds and long-term government bonds, the idea of indexing doesn’t really apply. For a given duration, all government bonds in a particular country tend to all have the same yield. Owning an index of different durations of bonds from 0 to 5 years offers some diversification, but I tend not to think about this much. I buy a short-term bond ETF when it’s convenient, and just store cash in a high-interest savings account when that is convenient.
Overall, I’m not convinced that the solid thinking behind stock indexing carries over well to bond investing. There are those who carve up stocks into sub-classes they like and don’t like, just as I have done with bonds. However, my view of the resulting stock investing strategies, such as owning only some sub-classes or sector rotation, is that they are inferior to broad-based indexing of stocks. I don’t see broad-based indexing of bonds the same way.
Real estate
Owning Real-Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) is certainly less risky than owning a property or two. I’ve chosen to avoid additional real estate investments beyond the house I live in and whatever is held by the companies in my ETFs. So, I can’t say I know much about REITs. Continue Reading…
Posted By 
Posted By 
