Welcome to the Firecrackers’ Journey blog. We are a family of 5 on our journey to FIRE (Financial Independence and Retire Early). Although we have already reached a FI number milestone that enables us to take a two-year break, we realized that RE was not necessarily what we were hoping for. FIRE is a journey to maximize happiness, so enjoy the ride.
Why this blog?
This blog aims to capture the various aspects of our journey to FIRE, from financial to emotional and social. Based on our learnings, we hope you will be able to avoid repeating the same mistakes we did. Explaining the rationale behind each decision might help you to take your own decisions because everyone’s situation is unique, and yours might well be different from ours. We try our best to be honest with our struggles and challenges. We hope you enjoy our blog, and we welcome your comments.
Who are we?
Papa FC is French and Mama FC is from Hong Kong, and we are food-lovers. Although we started our FI journey as DINKs, we were already planning for an enriched life with our future children. Fast forward a few years later, we are now a family of five, with three lovely and very energetic children.
Where are we?
As we have progressed towards FI, we have the luxury to choose where we want to live, and we are rather picky. Our criteria to shortlist the perfect location are relevant to our stage of life and the age of our children. While we touch on many topics, a significant part of this blog would be dedicated to featuring different places that we have visited, assessed, and/or lived. Would you believe that we visited more than 20 schools across France to find our first home after we embarked on our journey? Too many options may not be optimal, but it is always better than having none.
What do we want?
Life is precious. So we aim to make most out of it, and maximize our happiness. Everyone would have their own criteria depending on their needs and values. Here are ours that fit our lifestyle.
Safety
It is obvious, but our life and safety has much more value than any money we can have. You will be able to access many sources of information to check safety, crime and other any other metric that you can use as a proxy.
Healthcare
Being healthy is under appreciated, and recognized only when we are sick. Accessing a good and affordable healthcare system is paramount (especially when you have young kids who act as sickness magnets and love to share their germs with their siblings on a rotating basis).
Infrastructure
As adults, we really enjoy good and reliable public transportation. In Hong Kong, metro and bus lines are very dense and affordable, thus a car is not a necessity. However, with three young kids, every excursion looks like a relocation. Thus a SUV, good road infrastructure and parking capabilities are much appreciated.
Additionally, as we enjoy travels, and also cherish the visits of our families and friends, we need to be within 1hr of an Airport. And I mean a real International airport with global destinations and many airlines to choose from.
Education
One of our motivators to FIRE is to regain control of our time and spend it with our children. Although we are kind of tiger parents, we are lacking the patience for home-schooling. Nevertheless, we put great emphasis on a good education, and a healthy and stimulating learning environment. Thus we are looking for a global education, which builds good foundations for the future (reading, foreign languages and mathematics).
Weather
Nordic European countries score high on above criteria of safety, healthcare and eduction. However their weather is slightly too cold for us, at least for now. We can revisit it with global warming in a decade or two. Currently, we enjoy living where there are warm temperatures, preferably dry weather, with distinctive four seasons.
Low pollution
It is something that would not have been on my radar before living in Hong Kong. Before I was always living in an area where healthy air was ubiquitous and under-appreciated. I recall checking the pollution index in Hong Kong every morning, along with the weather, to decide the activities of the day. Should I go to the park with our daughter? Can I go for a run? Let’s pick a place with low pollution to be able to enjoy the outdoors.
Services
Although we are frugal spenders, we enjoy great services and are willing to pay for it. However, you need a place where the service industry is developed. Hong Kong, Singapore or Dubai are great places to get a nanny (fantastic when you have 3 children), get a service within the reach of your mobile phone, or get a food delivery. I regret that France is on the other extreme with scarce, average quality and/or very expensive services.
Cost of Living
It is important to estimate the cost of living in a new country. At a high level, you can check Numbeo website which offers cost of living comparison. It is an indicator but it could vary widely depending on your lifestyle. A field trip to the country will help you to check the major expenses buckets (housing, healthcare, education and groceries).
Taxes
We prefer locations with low and understandable taxes. Why low taxes when you can pay none? Because there are no free lunch and in order to benefit from some infrastructure or services, it is normal to pay for using them. Thus we are fine to pay some taxes. For example in Hong Kong, you pay moderate taxes on your income (job and rental), but no taxes on capital gains, dividends, interests, wealth tax, inheritance tax nor gift tax. Moreover, filling your taxes is straightforward and doesn’t take much time. On the other side of the spectrum, there is France which taxes nearly everything at various tax rates. You can still enjoy some tax shelter schemes (AV, PEA …) to soften the impact. Finally, not to mention the amount of time consume to fill your taxes.
To our knowledge, there is no place that score top on all our criteria. We will have to compromise on some criteria. Our blog will give you some insights about the scores of places we explored. It is up to you to set your preferences in order to pick the place to live your life.
How it started?
We have a dedicated post describing how it started and the Haha Moment which triggered our FIRE journey. Please go check our post about the Genesis of our FIRE journey.
Disclaimer
This blog is for us to share our journey with you. Although we have posts on financial investment, tax optimization, and suggestions, none should be considered financial advice. As everyone says everything on the internet these days, you may want to conduct your own research and analyses before making any decision. Bon courage!
We may also discuss products or services in our posts. Although we may be affiliated with some of them, we would only endorse products and services that we have been satisfied with during our journey. Be rest assured.