How to Refactor Your Finances – An Interview with a Programmer Who Retired at 34

On favorite languages/frameworks: Ruby on Rails, definitely. I just fell in love with it, it was so much easier to get something built that was actually robust and it didn't feel like it was just gonna break, compared to all the .NET stuff I was doing before. It just made me love programming again, and I still use it to this day. I've built all my custom Mad Fientist stuff with Ruby on Rails, and it's just so easy to put something together, deploy it to Heroku, and then you've got something that's usable. That's exactly what I did for the FI Laboratory. I just threw that together and threw it up on Heroku over a couple of weekends. I always expected to make it nicer and better, but I just never touched it and now it's got 60,000 users, and it's just absolutely crazy, and I'm still hardly paying anything: $29 a month I think.

On being extreme with finances: Personally, I'm pretty extreme. Every time I spend money, it's like the worst case scenario. So much thought process has gone into it beforehand. It's like, "Could I get it used? Could I borrow it? Do I really need it? Do I really want it?" And then, if all those things happen, then it's like, "Okay. I'll buy it." And then, I try to find it for the best price.

On the new iPhone: You don't need a new iPhone every year because, guess what? That iPhone 9 only made you happy for what, maybe a few weeks? And then, it was just a phone again until the iPhone 10 came along and you were like, "Oh, that's gonna make me happy." What's important is realizing that about yourself and looking at past purchases, thinking, "Oh, I spent a lot of money on that thing. Did it actually make me happy for very long? Could I have gotten it used instead? Did I need it at all?"

Check out some of these tips on how you can save more and manage your finances:

Create a budget plan according to how much you earn. Your budget and spending should be something that is in-line how much money that comes in regularly. A budget helps you live and experience life to the fullest without overspending. Under-budgeting yourself and your family is also no good since that would mean you are actually lowering your standard of living in some aspects.

Make sure that you are sticking to your budget plan. As I have said earlier, a budget plan helps you live life to the fullest without breaking your bank account, and in order for this to happen, you have to stick with your budget as much as possible. Keep a close track of your spending and list down every spending you make. Keep a tight leash to that madman inside you that screams buy this and that that actually do not have any important use t you.

Make an itinerary of your daily activities the night before. Having a daily to-do list helps curb your spending urges by reminding you that you are in a saving mode. Having a set routine also helps you become more productive because now, you have set tasks to do instead of thinking what other stuff you can buy.

Plan and budget your meal plans. I am one of those people who spends too much money on food. Having a set budget helps you limit your food choices. I live in the Philippines so the currency rate here is like 50 pesos is to one dollar, and that’s how much we spend on every meal excluding rice. It limits our choices to veggies and a few slices of meat most of the time, and it helped me curb my overspending habit when it comes to food. It also helped us save a lot. You do not have to eat extravagant food in order to be healthy.

*Use processes when planning an outing. We all love going out, and that means shelling out some money. Planning your outing and sticking to a budget helps you enjoy the moment and affording yourself a relaxing day without going broke