Today on the FI Garage The Economist and The Accountant have a beer and get to speak with Bob Lai, who writes at Tawcan.com.

Introduction [0:40]

• Financial Epiphany (1:07)
• A family full of early retirees (1:40)
• Blog topics (2:50)

Questions for Bob

• Bob had 3 weddings that inspired 2 cookbooks (3:35)
• Why cookbooks? (5:08)
  • Bob’s first blog was a recipe blog: Three More Bites (5:30)
• Was money openly discussed in your family? (6:10)
• Did your family provide you with information about the net worth numbers needed for financial independence (7:15)
  • Focusing on Dividend income and not drawing down portfolio
• Are you focusing on dividend investing as a hedge against sequence of return risk? (8:35)
  • Riding out the financial crisis
  • Passing down dividend portfolio to kids – building a legacy
• Using logic to avoid a panic sale (11:40)
  • Father provided financial guidance during the economic downturn
• You said didn’t have an allowance growing up, are you going to give your kids an allowance? (12:53)
• In Bob’s Financial Freedom interview he talked about separating the “RE” from FIRE. Do people focus too much on the early retirement aspect of FIRE? (14:35)
  • Quitting your 9-5 to do something you enjoy
  • Retirement is not going to make you happy
  • FI is not a finish line
  • Bob’s struggle with mental health (19:03)
• Bob talks about consistently improving yourself and building relationships (20:40)
• Have you always pursued self-improvement or did FIRE push you towards self-improvement? (21:45)
  • Moving away from personal finance books towards other books. Here is Bob’s Q2 booklist including Educated: A Memoir
• The personal finance community is very supportive (24:45)
  • FinCon (26:10)
• Do you think people in the FIRE community are too conservative in quitting a job they don’t like (27:35)
  • Different terms to replace Financial Independence / Retire Early
    • Tanya Hester’s Work Optional
    • Bob’s Retirement Optional
    • The Accountant’s Financial Independence / Refocus Energy
    • Slowly Sipping Coffee’s Fully-Funded Lifestyle Chang
• Most recent Dividend update
  • Garden pictures (30:25)
  • Including dividend history in your updates (32:25)
• Bob’s final thoughts (33:55)
  • Thoughts on writing a blog
  • Bob was featured on MoneySence magazine
  • The banks are not helping anyone on the path to FIRE

How to Contact Bob

• tawcan.com
• @Tawcan on twitter