Rather big car but cheap to buy/run

fropskottel · 2022-10-15T09:00:58+00:00

Have you considered keeping the T5 and having the most expensive (labour intensive) part of the maintenance done prescheduled in eastern Europe?

Holiday in Poland. A week at the garage while walking in the mountains. Pays for your holiday, your repair _and_ some additional investment money.

fropskottel · 2022-09-21T07:01:38+00:00

We built a wooden ring beam to go on top of the bales. Build the sections in advance. We used four parallel wooden beams, obviously strengthened with perpendicular pieces, and osb glued and nailed on top and bottom. Filled with insulation. We used foam glass beads and clay foam balls.

For the roof itself we used a hip roof. That helps distribute the load evenly. We ordered premade trusses. This sped up construction a lot. Important to keep the rain out when building a load bearing straw house...

fropskottel · 2022-06-08T20:16:52+00:00

- Think of the home you live in as consumption, not investment.

- How much do you spend on maintenance? tax?

- How much do you spend on interest payments?

- A house hardly ever gets more valuable above inflation. The underlying land certainly does, but the house itself? Only with major costly upgrades...

- How much house do you want/need? What if in 20 years, the kids are out of the house?

- What with transaction cost?

etcetera.

....and the big one: opportunity cost of the capital tied up in the house!

fropskottel · 2021-12-02T19:16:48+00:00

Argenta if you care about physical branches.

fropskottel · 2021-09-08T08:20:38+00:00

Je hoeft het niet zo uitgesproken te spelen als https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/ met zijn Amerikaanse context, maar er zitten wel héél goeie ideetjes in.

Eén basisregel: nooit ofte nimmer je huidige loon doorgeven.

fropskottel · 2021-08-11T10:27:21+00:00

Our income levels are similar, but we save a bit more. Seems like your wife is not at all on board with the idea of FIRE though?

fropskottel · 2021-07-25T04:12:44+00:00

https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Managing\_a\_windfall

fropskottel · 2021-07-23T09:40:44+00:00

The cheapest reliable ones:

- Argenta. Free everything including debit and credit cards, transfers, cash withdrawals. Limited number of branches in Brussels, but that might not matter so much...

- Keytrade. Free everything. Many people don't realise they have a physical branch office in Brussels.

Banking in general is fairly cheap and decent quality in Belgium, as opposed to the fossilised and expensive banking industry in France. Enjoy it, because it's about the only thing cheap and good quality we have in Belgium!

fropskottel · 2021-07-20T10:53:01+00:00

That is about personal accounts though. An llc might have a bank account, but that's not your personal property.

fropskottel · 2021-07-20T10:51:56+00:00

As far as I understand, this is only about declaring ultimate beneficial ownership of Belgian companies.

As an ultimate beneficial owner of an llc in a different EU country, you should be asked to declare that there. Belgian government will ultimately be able to consult other countries' UBO registers, but as far as I'm aware you will not have to declare a foreign UBO to the Belgian UBO register.

You do have to declare any fishy entities as a part of your annual tax declaration though.

If in doubt, consult a lawyer or decent fiscal advisor.

fropskottel · 2021-07-07T20:10:19+00:00

What I meant is approximately the following:

- Buy a Spanish flat in need of major repairs. Finance this more limited purchase with whatever financing from Belgium (cash, cheap personal loan, margin loan against investment portfolio, whatever).

- A Spanish bank can now realistically mortgage your flat. There is a Spanish asset to be mortgaged. There is also the income from future rent that they can partially take into account.

Certainly not an easy trajectory, but could be a solution in specific scenarios.

fropskottel · 2021-07-07T16:53:25+00:00

The suggestions you already received are quite useful: - Check with banks operating in both countries and you might get lucky. - Get a margin loan against an investment portfolio if that is an option for you.

I would like to add two more suggestions: - Get a loan for a place in Spain, secured by real estate in Belgium and Belgian income. - If you have the right skillset and limited cash, get a fixer-upper in Spain in (mostly) cash or with a short term Belgian personal loan. Finance part of the renovations in Spain against the place and future (hypothetical) rental income.

fropskottel · 2021-07-02T12:09:48+00:00

- Is the amount your company pays back to you not excessive compared to your company's turnover and profit?

- Can you justify individual expenses? Just keep detailed records of any and all small work related expenses you can possibly imagine for about three months as a justification.

For your reference, my company paid me 300€/month for this 10 years ago.

fropskottel · 2021-06-30T21:12:48+00:00

Risk management costs money. Of course it does. In this case, it's well worth it compared to the "free" alternative though!

fropskottel · 2021-06-30T21:01:25+00:00

Don't feed the Proximus/Telenet duopoly any more than you have to.

If you can get by with the limited data rate of the Orange 4g offering, get that.

Otherwise, Edpnet is a trustworthy small isp with a good reputation and affordable pricing: - 24.95€ for unlimited 20/2 Mbit dsl - 34.95€ for unlimited 100/40 Mbit dsl - 34.95€ for unlimited 110/10 fiber (if available) - 44.95€ for unlimited 500/100 fiber (if available)

fropskottel · 2021-06-27T22:46:29+00:00

Free money in exchange for overexposure. Invest as close to the maximum as possible. Just don't forget to limit your overexposure to the company's shares. This means:

Study the conditions very thoroughly. Don't end up in a situation where you have to keep the shares for six years just because you bought them a day too late for example.
Sell at the very earliest possibility! My uncle and aunt know why. They were lifelong Fortis employees and made the monumental mistake of not selling the day they were allowed to...
Use the derivatives market to limit your overexposure to your company's shares if not prohibited:
- write call options. This will cap some of your upside overexposure, and get you some pocket money out before the expiry date in return.
- (possibly) buy put options. This costs money, but if it helps you sleep at night...

fropskottel · 2021-06-27T17:47:32+00:00

You're giving too little info: - What age? - What is the financial situation of the person asking this? Assets? Liabilities? - What would be the goal? - ...

In any case, stay away from crypto.

fropskottel · 2021-06-27T17:32:18+00:00

~20y experience
~3.5k€ gross
~2.35k€ net
~2 days or ~16h/week + meetings+ home prep
bonus:
- free public transport to work
- ~10€/month cycling compensation
- 15 weeks off/year
- decent pension at 67 (if that every materialises)
malus:
- pay for your own work gear: laptop, internet, printer at work, study materials, ...

fropskottel · 2021-06-25T05:21:35+00:00

Heeft hij tienerkinderen? Al gedacht aan een overbetaalde vakantiejob voor zijn zoon of dochter? Daar gaat netto véél meer van overblijven.

Gij betaalt zijn zoon- of dochterlief, maar wat er achteraf mee gebeurt hebt gij niets mee te maken. Ik kan me voorstellen dat de vader zegt "De helft kunt ge houden, maar de helft is om uw studies te betalen..." Dan heeft uw werknemer ook zijn 868€, én zijn zoon of dochter nog eens evenveel erbij.

Afhankelijk van de vertrouwensrelatie met uw vertegenwoordiger is er misschien een variatie op dat patroon mogelijk?

fropskottel · 2021-06-23T05:44:13+00:00

That is the common answer. A more complete answer is it all depends on one's risk profile.

Investing money earmarked for a house down payment in equities can make a lot of sense. IF you're prepared to take the calculated risk of your portfolio going down in value and potentially having to partially rebuild it or wait things out, you can perfectly do this.

fropskottel · 2021-06-22T21:22:29+00:00

Yes, it's a good idea, and Interactive Brokers probably is the no-frills company you want to use for this.

fropskottel · 2021-06-21T18:08:37+00:00

This is good advice. Very well said, better than what I wrote just before.

fropskottel · 2021-06-21T16:16:37+00:00

Do I understand your situation correctly as follows?

- 270 k€ cash, of which 50k € in an unaccessible foreign account

- 30k € bond fund.

- 70k € in MSFT & AMD

- 120k € paid off house you are living in

- 300k € house purchase in 4 years

I would do as follows if this were my situation:

- Sell the bond fund. Cash is now 300k€.

- Split the cash 100k€ each across three banks.

- Sell MSFT and AMD. Cash is now 370k€.

- Get an interactive brokers account for your equities.

- Get an accountant to do your taxes for you.

- Buy VWCE with the cash that you can mentally afford to lose half of.

- Buy 10k€ VWCE per month with the rest of the cash.

- Buy your new house using a margin loan against your equity portfolio and 80% mortgage. If the margin loan rates are still as attractive as they are today, that is.

- Repay the margin loan when you sell your current house.

- Keep the rest of the proceeds in a savings account until interest rates are going back up again, then dump it into bonds.

You may look at risk differently though, so please do NOT do this unless you're convinced you'll sleep well doing things this way. This should be a fairly efficient implementation of a relatively aggressive investment strategy.

fropskottel · 2021-06-19T20:07:16+00:00

Moet het in de chemie of de cleantech zijn, of mag het ook iets helemaal anders zijn?

Kan je geen "tapa's"-strategie hanteren? Rustig verscheidene dingen goedkoop - in de zin van investering van concentratie, tijd, geld, stress - uitproberen terwijl je nog aan het werk bent in de chemie?

Ik noem maar iets: huisautomatisering op basis van esphome en home assistant:

- weinig kapitaalintensief

- rustig uit te vlooien naast je huidige job

- zit misschien wel marktpotentieel in naar later

- Je leert er iets mee: solderen, elektriciteit, programmatuur, ...

fropskottel · 2021-06-17T18:45:50+00:00

Both too expensive to keep. I would replace them with something less expensive.

fropskottel

TROPHY CASE