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This week I welcomed Sarah, my lovely wife, onto the podcast.
I genuinely think she is one of the most down to earth and generous person I’ve ever met.
However, she is the first to admit she was a BIG sceptic about financial freedom and living life in a way that you want.
So if she can change her mindset in the space of a few years… anyone can!
Leaving Our Comfort Zone
We moved to Qatar to experience a new culture and lifestyle.
Since moving out here we have realised a few things:
- There are all sorts of job opportunities abroad (not just teachers).
- There are also expats who have set up their own businesses
- A lot of young families live abroad and people have their children overseas.
- Thanks to the job package, saving more money is possible (it’s EASY to spend more though!)
Mindshift change!
Educating Ourselves
As we were able to keep more money (we weren’t really earning much more on paper!) we thought we should find out more ways to make our money work for us.
This led us to take a property course after the first year working in Qatar.
The education could easily be learnt for free but it opened our eyes to making more connections with real people to create win/ win situations.
Mindshift (again!)
Networking From 3,000 Miles Away with Social Media
Even though we were now living halfway around the world this didn’t stop us from taking action every time we were back in England.
The funny thing about investing in property is that most of the work can be done online (make time online making sense again?)
Property investors don’t have to do all the work to a property themselves. It’s a case of finding good deals and managing them.
Or working with people who are doing this every day to leverage their time and experience.
Mike created a habit of messaging or using skype to talk to a property investor every day for over a year.
The power of social media!!
Related Articles:
- Why Make Time Online? Financial Independence Retire Early Blog
- Save Hours of Time with these Resources
- What I’ve Learnt from Reading Over 100 Books in the Last 3 Years
- The Secret to Earn Passive Income
- Why do People Create Blogs? These 28 Bloggers Explain Their Story
- How we Save £30,000 a Year and Travel as Teachers
Setting a Strategy
We had a 3 day mentorship in England, with an experienced property investor.
The main benefit of this is that it helped us to set goals & get clarity on our strategy.
Without a strategy investing in property is messy or impossible!
We also had a lot of fun too after working hours (keep building that network!)
Top 3 Tips
Sarah:
- There are different ways to do things. You don’t have to have “a job” to be secure.
- Knowledge is power. But Ignorance is bliss (she’s a cheeky bugger isn’t she!… knowledge is only power if you use it)
- Financial freedom IS real… Not without hard work though
Bonus: Meditation and mindfulness- Sarah uses the Calm app.
Mike:
- Systems beat Goals (using both together is even better!)
- Morning Routine (Miracle Morning: Scribing, Affirmations, Visualisation, Exercise, Reading, Silence)
- Happiness leads to success, not the other way around.
Links
Provest Holdings – Grant Robe & James Egan… our business partners are great!
Kaizen BT – Our property company
Miracle Morning– Hal Elrod
Contact me mike@maketimeonline.com (I’m not sure why but I keep forgetting to say the .com bit on the podcast!)
Action
Get this budget sheet.
Since using this our saving rate has gone from 4% to over 40% in 4 years (we now save over £30,000 a year AND travel as teachers)
Yes, our lifestyle has changed as we moved abroad but tracking this has kept us accountable for where our money is being spent.
Happiness Fact:
Spend money on experiences NOT stuff!
Leaving “The Script” Summary
As Sarah has said, “financial freedom is possible!”
We are not there (yet) but now we have a plan and clear action steps to get there.
So we know we will be there WAY before we are 40 years old (I just turned 30 in case you were wondering).
Small actions become big changes.
Check of your current financial position today and it will have a big impact in the future.
Keep changing for the better
Mike
P.S. If you have any questions or thoughts about leaving “The Script” please feel free to drop a comment below… or send me a message on WA here
