Author Archives: Ms. Miel

About Ms. Miel

Miel spends her time split between Washington, DC and Africa. She works on international relief and development projects in DRCongo, Burundi, Zimbabwe, Liberia, & Sierra Leone. Check out Miel's photos!

Miel’s Million Dollar Net Worth

Miel Net Worth One Million

This is the first time that I’ve really shared about my net worth directly on Sustainable Family Finances. I was actually one of the first finance bloggers to share their net worth publically (on my old site DINKs Finance). I’ve continuous posted about my net worth for ten years. I’ve also been featured on J Money’s Top Net Worths for Finance Bloggers on RockStar Finance, coming in at number 11 of the 180 finance bloggers who publically share their net worth.

This is also my first time posting my net worth as an individual; previously I had always posted a joint net worth, but that is no longer the case after my recent divorce. This started at $300k back in 2005 and was tracked over time to hit the Million dollar mark in 2013.

It is bold to be the first. It is also a bit scary. It also doesn’t matter how much money you have or don’t have. Yes, if you are wondering, I have been criticized for sharing. I guess it came off as bragging, even though I had considerable less than I do today. But I also feel a certain obligation to myself and know if I track my progress and create goals for myself, that I can take what I have and grow it into whatever I can dream it to be. I also hope that it is helpful for readers to see what is feasible over a decade.

My first official individual net worth comes in at $1,058,434. My ability to grow and create wealth so far has been pretty impressive. (Darcy is giving me a virtual high five…this is huge!). I’ve worked my ass off for sure. I’ve never really ever had just one job. I’ve always juggle a few different income generating activities. Being a landlord for 12 years should say enough. I started saving for retirement at $25 a month and grew that to over $300k.

Miel Hendrickson Net worth 10282015

As you can see, the more you have, the more you owe. Making money is not for sissies. Owing nearly a million dollars is not something to take lightly. Wealth comes with a great deal of responsibilities and its own set of challenges.

My net worth gives a pretty candid look at where I’m at financially. What it doesn’t show is what comes next. I’m at a space in my life where I’m looking at this question very closely. How best do I leverage what I have to create financial stability and long term wealth creation? Follow along to find out!

Cheers,

Miel

Why does divorce cost so much? Because it is worth it. (It might be a sign when your well paid marriage counselor shares this with you…)

prenup If you are part of the one third of Americans who have experienced divorce, then you clearly have your own war stories to share.

It’s going to happen [sometimes], so let this story of mine be advice that is kind of like an insurance policy. I hope you’ll never have to use it, but you’ll be glad you had it if you do.

Laws differ in every state, and are complicated by kids, real property, debts, and businesses. Mine involved all four. But an hour with an attorney was all the legal counsel I needed, while my ex chose to keep a lawyer on retainer.

It surprisingly took us about an hour to hash out the details of how we would divide our assets. Just like that, it was settled. It still took about 5 months to go through the motions and have a finalized divorce (feet dragging was at play). All the important details were sorted in what felt like record time.

It helped that we had a prenup. Though we didn’t actually divide things even close to what we had originally agreed upon, the general tenants were stood by. Rewind to a decade prior, and thankfully we had the foresight to realize that our financial lives might look very different. I read a short but helpful book on prenups, “What to do, before ‘I do'”, that was more helpful than the lawyer I paid.

The main aspects of our agreement were:

  1. Premarital assets would remain individual. (James had one rental property and I had no assets to speak of).
  2. Retirement funds would be kept as individual. (James had about $70k in retirement, but by the time we divorced, I would have triple of his retirement).
  3. Any inheritance would be kept separate. (I would have hoped not to receive any inheritance by now, but had heard a horror story of someone whose wife got the house that the husband had bought with the inheritance he had gotten when his mother died. This was just a year after her death and a few years into marriage.)
  4. No alimony. (James had seen his dad pay alimony and didn’t like the taste of it. Though in reality if we had divorced a couple of years ago, I might have been the one paying him.)
  5. Our primary residence would be split 70/30, in my favor. (This was due to expecting that I would pay for more of our household expenses as James was headed into a Ph.D. program just after we married. I would end up supporting the majority of our household expenses over a 5 year period).

When it came down to the dissolution of our marriage, our net worth would be more than a million dollars and include a variety of assets. It ended up working out that James would propose what he felt was fair, and I agreed with only a few tweaks. It looked like this:

James got our blogging business that spun off of the original DINKs Finance and $20k in cash that he would use to further build this business and build a revenue stream from.

In turn, I got all four properties (two rentals in DC, one beach cabin bought with inheritance money, and my sweet pad in NE Portland), plus all remaining joint funds that had come from the sale of our last place in DC.

We both got wanted we wanted, though in turn have the responsibility of managing complex asset portfolios. (Whoever thinks income generation is a passive sport has never had assets to manage). Despite the fact that managing them will be a source of some stress, I think I got the better deal. (As my college friend Eli put it, “In Monopoly, no one ever wins with the utilities.”)

Best advice about prenups: get one to protect yourself (even if you aren’t going to get a divorce and don’t have any assets). It may not feel romantic, but if you can’t talk frankly about finances, you probably aren’t ready for marriage. Here is my original post on prenups, at the time of writing one.

Best advice about divorce: Establish common ground and don’t sell yourself sort.

Best advice about lawyers: Use them sparingly. If we had both taken our lawyer’s advice, then things would have been much more complex, drawn out, and neither of us would have gotten what we wanted.

Best,

Miel

Game Changers

We have been a busy pair of twins lately, it seems we are competing for the most change in our lives. This summer Darcy unexpectedly moved her family out to Astoria, Oregon and I finalized my divorce after a 9 year marriage, and 23 year relationship. Big changes in our lives.

 

Moving and divorce both clearly have significant impacts on a family’s finances, so we will be sharing a series of post about the lessons we’ve learned along the way. First, a bit of the backstory.

Darcy will undoubtedly share in more detail about her move and new home, but I will start telling the story of how the Cronins made their way out to the land of the Goonies. Their family had already been planning and preparing to move within Portland, though they had initially been looking at the Irvington neighborhood in NE. In the incredibly hot Portland real estate market, this was a pretty big leap of faith. In crunching the numbers, it looked like there was about $100k gap from what they wanted, and what reality could afford. Nevertheless, they continued to plow ahead, with faith that they would land in their next dream home. Little did they know that it would be in Astoria, at a fraction of the price of what their new home would cost in Portland. All this happened in three months flat.

I took a similar leap of faith last year at this time, moving from Washington, DC to Oregon with a newborn and the possibility of a new dream job. I landed (what appeared to be) my dream job, and closed on my new home on the same day. Meanwhile, it was evident from before the move (but truthfully long before then), that my marriage to my high school sweetheart was on the rocks. Despite having a long history and several business partnerships, we had lived much of our relationship apart from each other and did not have the same dreams in life.
Luckily we were able to agree quickly on the terms of our divorce and the division of assets. Things have been amicable throughout, though divorce is never easy. Meanwhile, my thought-to-be dream job was causing more stress than my workaholic career in DC and abroad ever had. Suffice to say that being micromanaged at a small nonprofit, after having successfully managed millions of dollars and hundreds of staff in the most difficult places on earth, was not my cup of tea. On what would have been my 9th wedding anniversary, I opted to step down from my job and could not be happier than to have moved on from both. Since then, the whirlwind has continued, as I manifested my dream partner Adam and have been pursuing various entrepreneurial endeavors. I look forward to sharing more with readers along the journey.
Cheers,
Miel

What to Expect from US Dollar, Gold, and Oil in 2015?

The past 2014 will undoubtedly take its place in the history. That year risks had been growing around Ukraine and the Middle East. One of the main events was the collapse of oil prices. As early as in June, 2014 barrel cost about 115$, but in the last days of the year quotes slumped to 56$.

What shall we expect in 2015 year?

Oil market

Main reasons of oil prices collapse in 2014:

– Increase of hydrocarbons production in the USA from 9.8 to 11.5 mln barrels per day;

– Recession in countries of the European Union led to decrease in consumption and prices of hydrocarbons;

– Growth of supply in Iran planning to increase production twice and Libya’s return to the market;

Technological factor: improvement of technology of production and decrease of prime cost as the result.

Now you can witness disproportion between demand and supply – each day, it is produced for 600-700 thousand of barrels more than is required by market.

Analytics of the US investment banks assume that within two first quarters of 2015 year this index can grow up to 1,25 mln barrels per day. This factor will put a strong pressure on oil quotations so that we can see how Lows of 2008 year are refreshed. At that time, cost of Brent was 36$ per barrel.

US dollar

The main global currency was boosted by growth of the US economy which was growing with the fastest pace for the last 11 years. US department of commerce revised its GDP estimation and defined it up to 5% per annum. Such estimation was justified by a higher consumer demand and expenses of business. It was the fastest pace since 2003. It was reported earlier that US economy grew for 3.9%.

Its intensive growth in 2014 lays a solid foundation for 2015 and we can expect that the US currency will be consolidated against its major competitors.

Gold

In conclusion let’s talk about gold. Since there is no inflation risk in the USA and on the contrary, deflation presses Europe, there is no ground for traders to invest in gold: savings are not depreciated. It can make precious metals less popular and quotes of gold may get to 1100$ per ounce.

Confident growth of the US economy will support global markets through 2015, whereas low oil prices will have a positive effect for the economic growth in general.

The Financial Realities of Retirement

When you begin your first job, retirement seems so far away. It is easy to think that there are more priorities for your money than starting to save for a time so far head. Your immediate priorities may be to begin to pay off your student loan or buy your first automobile. As time goes by there is real estate then perhaps the costs of raising a family? Sometimes you might wonder whether there will ever be a time when you have a surplus at the end of each month when all your bills are paid. There is a time, however when you should sit down and think about how you are preparing for future retirement.

Set out the Picture

When you do that, you need to write down details of all your assets. It is obvious that you will include positive balances in any bank or retirement account. You may no longer have the equity in your real estate that you thought you had when the recession came along. However you need to include that equity, but it is important to be realistic. If you have investments, gold or silver or even valuable paintings you need to include these as well.

It is crucial that you take account of your financial liabilities including any personal loans, mortgages, and insurance. If you have Private Mortgage Protection (PMI) you should ask yourself whether you really need it; you certainly shouldn’t if you have paid off the bulk of your mortgage. That money could be better spent going into your retirement provisions.

Anything Obvious?

Once you have written everything down there may be some obvious courses of action. If you are carrying significant credit card balances and therefore paying a large amount of interest every month, you should be able to make savings. Today’s online lenders will listen to reasonable applications for loans. They are likely to approve an application if the applicant appears capable of making the installment payments throughout the term of the loan.

Obviously, if you earn more money each month, you will be able to put more way for the future. There are other ways to create more money by reducing your spending. You may always have had a new auto every few years. It is worth thinking whether you really need one so regularly. Indeed, used cars that have a good service record may be the answer without compromising on quality.

Urgency

The closer you are to retirement the more urgent is the need to plan. Some people are quite rightly nervous about the prospect of not working and having enough money for a comfortable life. If they have lived in the same neighborhood for years then moving out of familiar surroundings is difficult. However, there are good reasons to reduce monthly bills once regular income has dropped. A smaller home is often the answer to the problem. Some people take the view that retiring in a nicer climate makes sense. It is not always wise to pick a regular holiday destination; living in such places full-time is different. However, it is certainly worth thinking about where to live in retirement and the financial implications involved.

Just Think Things Through

Everyone looks forward to a long and happy retirement. It does cost money to live in retirement. In some ways, it can be more expensive to live after finally finishing work and retirement. It’s not quite like being on permanent holiday, but it is possible to spend more during a day in retirement than when you were working full-time. As the years go by, life expectancy has increased. It is difficult to know how much money you will need to live in your later years because you will not know how many you have got.

That is all the more reason to think about doing as much as you can during your working life to provide for those later years. There is advice available, but ultimately it is down to the individual to decide the best way forward. What is certain is that it is far better to pay off any debt that is incurring high interest than to struggle on. If that means taking out a loan and dispensing with credit cards, then so be it.