Investing

All posts in the Investing category: tips, guides and updates on personal finance and net worth.

Investing6 min read

Calculating purchasing power and real returns, and the mistake almost everyone makes

Nominal return minus inflation isn't your real return, even though it looks that way. The gap is small per year and compounds to tens of thousands over thirty years.

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Investing6 min read

Saving or investing for your child: the difference over eighteen years

At €50 a month, investing delivers €5,927 more than saving by the eighteenth birthday. Start early and the gap widens further, and there's a practical risk most parents overlook.

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Investing7 min read

Calculating rental property returns: why 5.6% is actually negative

A €300,000 property yielding €1,400 a month looks like a 5.6% return. Worked through with costs and mortgage interest, the cash flow is negative. Here's why.

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Net Worth, Investing3 min read

Building passive income: what it is and what it is not

Passive income is rarely passive. A level-headed look at the forms it takes, what they actually produce, and how to measure whether it is working.

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Security, Investing3 min read

What is PSD2, and what can an app do with your bank data?

PSD2 lets you share your bank data with an app you choose. What such an app can see, what it cannot do, and how to withdraw access.

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Investing7 min read

Dividends as income: what they are, what you need, and the figure that grows

A dividend is your share of a company's profit. For a thousand euros a month of dividend income at a 3% yield you need four hundred thousand. And there's one figure that does rise every year.

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Investing7 min read

Passive income: what it really costs, and why almost nothing is truly passive

A thousand euros a month of passive income requires three hundred thousand in capital. That's the figure missing from nearly every article on the subject, and it changes the whole question.

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Investing10 min read

Compound interest: why starting ten years earlier beats contributing three times as much

Returns on your returns. It sounds dull and it's the most powerful mechanism in your financial life, but it works more slowly than you hope and it doesn't fix what you think it fixes.

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Investing12 min read

Calculating investment returns: why you get two different answers

There are two ways to calculate your investment return, and they give different numbers. Which one you need depends on what you want to know: how your funds performed, or how you performed.

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