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My Financial 20s

I got a question from one of my readers about how young people can take control of their money and their lives and she wondered about what I did successfully and what I would have changed about my twenties. It’s an excellent question! My Financial 20s: What I did right Paying off Student Loans I did quite well in my 20s financially speaking because I paid off my student loan debt as quickly as possible…

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The Canadian Financial Industry

canada banks

Last week, I met a guy who had been working for quite a few years in the Canadian financial industry, but had had enough of it. He quit, gave up a lucrative job and moved to Korea to teach English. Give me the Information! I naturally pumped him for all the information I could get, since it’s one of the options I’m considering for my move back to Canada (although by far the strongest possibility…

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Self Publishing Answers Podcast- I’m on it!

Thanks to the Self Publishing Answers podcast (episode #34) for answering my question so helpfully. It was basically about whether or not I should focus on a bigger niche or continue with the one that I’m currently in (ESL teachers). They had a ton of ideas for me but the biggest takeaway was that my major problem is that I only have 2 things to sell (The Wealthy English Teacher and How to Get a…

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The AirBnB Hosting Experiment

AirBnb Hosting: The Plan In an effort to stockpile a bit of cash for my return to Canada, I’ve decided to rent out my spare room on AirBnB for the last year that I’m in Korea and I’ve just had my first guest check in. My Spare Room I have a large 3-bedroom house, and I of course sleep in the one of the rooms, I use the other one as my walk-in closet, but…

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All the Good Stuff Comes from Leaping- Seth Godin

Seth Godin is a big guy in the Internet world and someone that I totally respect. He shares his wisdom in short snippets over on his blog and one that I read the other day was “But How Can You be Sure?” The quote I liked best was at the end, “All the good stuff comes from leaping. From doing the things that might now work.” That made me think about my life and how…

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Is it too Late to Start Investing?

I answer the question of whether or not it’s ever too late to start investing in this short video. For everything expat finance, check out Andrew Hallam’s excellent book, The Global Expatriate’s Guide to Investing: From Millionaire Teacher to Millionaire Expat.

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Why Do We Have to Work?

work

An interesting article I ran across over at Life Advancer- Humans Why Do We Have to Work? Basically, we’re brainwashed by the media into thinking the current system we have of work, work, work–consume, consume, consume is the only choice. It’s not. Living in Korea, working a kind of part-time job for the past 10 years or so has been ideal. Now, I’m ready to take it a step further when I go to Canada…

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3 Key Things to Know about Ebook Marketing

book marketing

I’ve been listening to lots of self-publishing podcasts lately including Self Publishing Questions, Self Publishing Answers and the Self Publishing Round table. I’ve been particularly focusing on marketing, after getting some advice from Pat Flynn on the Ask Pat Podcast where he answered my question about staying in the small niche I’m in or going bigger. His advice was to hit the marketing hard, since my concept is already proved with the 1 or 2…

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The Minimum Amount to Begin Investing

A short video about why I recommend people save up at least $10,000 in order to get started with ETF or dividend stock investing. For some solid investing advice, check out Steve Peasley’s book: Above Average Investing for the Average Investor. It’s one of my favorites for giving you the goods about investing, minus all the hype and fluff.

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Research First Ask Second

questions

Publishing Profits Podcast: Research First, Ask Second Today I was listening to the Publishing Profits Podcast Episode #54 with Betsy Talbot from Married with Luggage and they were talking about ridiculous people who ask them questions like this: “How do I write an Ebook?” “How can I leave everything and travel the world?” The host of the podcast has written entire books on how to write Ebooks so how could he possibly answer that question…

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Why Investing in Bonds is a Terrible Idea Right Now

A short video explaining why now (May 2015) is a terrible time to be investing in bond mutual funds or bond ETFs: For some solid advice, check out this book from Peter Lynch, one of the giants in the investing world: One Up On Wall Street: How To Use What You Already Know To Make Money In

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Giving up Good for Better

good better

Thinking about Life If you’ve been following the blog for a while, you’ll know that I’m leaving South Korea after 10 years to move to Canada which is certainly a big move. And as I ride my bike through the beautiful Korean countryside, or paddle my board in the ocean surrounding my city, I think a lot about how life here is good. Like really good. But, then I also think about how it is…

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Trading vs. Investing

trading vs. investing

A short video about trading vs. investing and which one I recommend. For some solid advice on investing from one of the greats, check out: The Little Book of Common Sense Investing by John Bogle.

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Investing Basics: Fundamental vs. Technical Analysis

fundamental vs. technical analysis

In this short video, I talk about the difference between fundamental and technical analysis and which one I like. It can be quite confusing when you’re new to the investing world, but I try to break it down for you in a simple way. If you are an English teacher abroad and are trying to figure out the personal finance thing, check out this book: The Wealthy English Teacher: Teach, Travel, and Secure Your Financial…

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Investing in Gold and Silver: a Good Choice?

gold and silver

I explain why I don’t think investing in gold and silver is the best choice in this short video, but the gist of it is that gold and silver are only worth what people are willing to pay for them. They actually have no intrinsic value of their own, unlike companies who have earnings. More personal finance for ESL teachers abroad: The Wealthy English Teacher: Teach, Travel, and Secure Your Financial Future.

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Scared of the Stock Market? You should be Scared of Inflation

inflation

I’ve recently created a series of short YouTube videos about personal finance. I hope you’ll find them helpful and if you have questions you want me to answer, or tips about how to make them better, please let me know. I’m very new to the YouTube world. Here’s the first one explaining how most people are scared of the stock market, but what they actually should be far more scared of is inflation. If you’re…

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Marketing Strategies—>Expanding Empire

marketing

Thanks for the Advice Pat Flynn Pat Flynn over at Smart Passive Income answered my question on his podcast, Ask Pat episode #324 about whether or not I should change niches since the one I’m in is so small with regards to my ebook about getting a university job in South Korea. However, on the plus side, there isn’t much competition so that’s a huge bonus. He was positive on the fact that I had…

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Responding to Negative Criticism

negative criticism

Just as I was thinking about how haters are gonna hate and how to deal with negative YouTube comments over on my playlist about getting a university job in South Korea and also negative reviews on Amazon, I heard this most helpful episode on Ask Pat (episode 325: Should I Respond to Negative Comments?). You really need to just listen to it yourself because Pat Flynn is pretty much the man, but my takeaway was…

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Haters Gonna Hate

haters gonna hate

“I’m Worried About the Haters” I was a friend’s birthday party the other day and he was talking about how he has lots of interesting stuff to share with the world, and that he would like to start a website or blog but that he was worried about haters because haters gonna hate, always. There are mean, sad, and unhappy people out there who hide behind the anonymity of the Internet and leave comments that…

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Ask Pat Podcast: I’m on it!

AskPat

I’m Really Into Pat Flynn So, I’m just going to nerd out for a quick minute here and I hope you don’t mind. I’m really into Pat Flynn over at Smart Passive Income and that’s probably kind of an understatement. I think he’s a genius in the Internet marketing world and also just an all-around nice guy who really wants to help people. I’m on Ask Pat! He started up this new podcast called Ask…

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Writing Ebooks Full Time

ebooks

You know that I’ve been considering going full-time with the online thing when I move to Canada in about a year from now, so I’ve been super-focused on drinking less and building my online empire more. And, I’ve been listening to these two podcasts (search on iTunes): Self-Publishing Questions, and Self-Publishing Answers. The both talk about what it takes to be a successful self-publisher and here are some things they mention: A Platform Having a…

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