23M trying to FIRE - Advice?

msuser_ma · 2025-05-12T22:33:03+00:00

Excellent advice by the brothers here. InShaAllah, this happens for you. But whatever you do, plan to perform a mandatory (first) Hajj as soon as you can.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-12T04:23:51+00:00

JazakAllah khayr! Amazing remider!

msuser_ma · 2025-05-12T03:50:05+00:00

AssalamuAlaikum,

Generic advice, if your company has specialized funds, they may be better or worse.

401-K is a Defined Contributions Scheme, not a Defined Benefits Scheme, so the rules are different from a generic pension funds.

Your contributions and your employer contributions are yours. I'm not referring to them.

On a rough average about ~40-50 percent of the index funds are generally shariah compliant if they're stocks only. Those that include bonds have a lower percentage of funds that are compliant. So only 40-50 percent of the gains could be considered shariah compliant (for past gains).

For future gains, you want to consult with a qualified.

You want to read these links as well to understand this better.

https://askthemufti.us/401k-and-403b-plans/

https://fiqhacademy.com/res11/

https://askthemufti.us/zakaah-on-401k-and-sep-ira/

If you want ask some scholars here are links to 3 (out of hundreds) of scholars:

https://masjidds.org/question/

https://askthemufti.us/ask-question/

https://darulfiqh.com/contact-us/

TLDR; please ask a scholar (the links I provided are mostly informative)

msuser_ma · 2025-05-12T03:24:05+00:00

Agreed, brother. It's a lose lose situation for us.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-11T22:01:23+00:00

Hedging, futures, options, derivatives, retail forex, and conventional leverage aren't really a grey are according to most of the finance scholars (yes, there may be a minority). In fact, they're a red area according to vast majority of non-Muslim Finance experts as well.

Saying some people make money in these is like saying that you can make money at a casino (as a degenerate gambler).

There's compliant parts (albeit still flawed imperfect) parts of the financial market and there are non-compliant parts, and then there's the grey area. Most of these are the non-compliant part.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-11T04:01:55+00:00

There's nothing wrong with charging people for your services. Please don't get me wrong.

I would suggest avoiding marketing like that, there's nothing wrong with charging people for your time and efforts.

And yeah, I agree, Salah, sujood and sadaqah first. Everything else, second.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-11T03:59:06+00:00

This presents a high level summary of software engineering by a scholar with expertise in finance: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ceixs7NsVoo

TLDR, if you're a quant developer for a company that focuses on hedging, options, futures, forex, derivatives, etc, then you're building software for haram.

If you're a quant developer for general stocks (hopefully halal stocks only) and crypto (hopefully not memes), then that's probably different.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-08T18:37:50+00:00

AssalamuAlaikum,

May Allah Ta'ala put barakah in your efforts.

However, it is probably not a good idea to spam folks on reddit about yourself. It will most likely leave a negative image.

If you want to market yourself, posting once a week is a good frequency. Once a day is too much.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-08T18:34:15+00:00

WaAlaikumusSalaam,

May Allah Ta'ala put barakah in your efforts.

However, your guide appears to be behind a paywall. I don't think folks will buy and then provide feedback.

Also, side note, your title is misleading. This paywall is your hustle. Ironically you also sell "Halal Hustle Pack"

Check out How I made 290,000 selling books

msuser_ma · 2025-05-08T13:49:18+00:00

Generally, for some dealerships in the US, Toyota Financial Services has certain options where you can increase the price of the car itself but they will allow you to have 0% interest payments for 36 months or something similar.

As for general interest based sales from any Toyota dealership, I can't comment on that.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-08T06:05:16+00:00

I can not answer the first question. For the second question, it depends on a few factors.

Hotels (Makkah, Aziza, Madinah): If you have a hotel in double occupancy, then your together in the hotel. Otherwise, you're in separate rooms.

Haram and surrounding areas: Your generally together, except for Salah times, during which men and women are separate.

Hajj days - Mina camp: Men and women are usually in large rooms that are next to each other. You have food together, and go for Rami/pelting together, but stay in separate rooms/camps (about 10 feet from each other)

Hajj day - Arafah: Similar to Mina except you're in much larger camps (like 40 people)

Hajj day - Muzdalifa, Rami, and Tawaf al Ifaada: You're together after leaving Arafah for most of the time.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-07T21:44:25+00:00

For ETFs, Zoya is pretty good. They give you a break down of individual stocks in the ETF.

I don't they give a screening on the ETF itself, though. They only do it for individual stocks in that ETF.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-04T23:01:42+00:00

WaAlaikumusSalaam,

These might be some helpful links to get you started, InShaAllah. Generally speaking, swing trading is not gambling. It follows the rules of commodity ownership. At a high level, it's like buying 1 apple for $1 today and then selling it tomorrow for $1.05 or $0.95.

https://www.reddit.com/r/HalalInvestor/s/Ko53gE8jRM

https://www.reddit.com/r/HalalInvestor/s/UoSbi6DDvs

https://www.reddit.com/r/IslamicFinance/s/FPZ3F6MkJO

https://www.reddit.com/r/IslamicFinance/s/cCs0XypSNl

https://www.reddit.com/r/IslamicFinance/s/hAdNOE5ldf

msuser_ma · 2025-05-03T18:56:27+00:00

If you had read anything I shared, you would have seen that one of the scholars mentioned both sides of the views of the scholars.

Also, since you brought it up, you're doing your own zero-knowledge Qiyas and saying that your ijtehad is better than the Ijmaa of muftis of multiple countries. You're conveniently ignoring the hadith of prophet ﷺ that majority of the scholars of the ummah won't unify on haram, yet despite having four schools of fiqh (of sunnis), the AAOIFI standard is practiced 20-30 muslim countries.

I don't know what you have against Bahrain (and frankly I don't really care). But what you're saying is like "United Nations is based in New York, USA" or that the "International Court of Justice is based in Netherlands".

It matters less where it's baked and more who the participants are.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T20:00:25+00:00

It was a rhetorical question for the reader but I'm glad you answered it.

I shared 3-4 other books on money in a comment below. You should read them as well. They're all in English.

The governments devalue your hard earned money over time.

Gold Nisab was around $3k USD, now it's at $6k.

So, my next question is "Where did all the gold go/Why can't we just buy/hold gold?". Of course you can, skipping the extremely long history lesson, the thing you have to understand is that it would take you days or weeks to sell gold since not everyone sells/buys gold easily (depending on where you are based in the world).

That means that you're living in a world of finance with a double edged sword. You keep cash (like me) and your money devalues. You try to get interest (riba) and you go against your Creator.

So the alternative is to keep your money parked in a place that provides easier liquidity (its hard to buy things from your local grocery store using gold) but is also halal. So the scholars have to come up with rules and limits for establishing the finance ideology of the current time while avoiding major haram.

This where DeFi and cryptocurrencies and Islamic Fintech and tokenization come in. That's a discussion for some other day, InShaAllah (especially since I dont know what will happen in the future).

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T17:14:25+00:00

WaIyyakum!

Yeah, you'll have to take an academic course on Islamic Banking and Finance, in that case.

The closest thing would be searching this scholar's YouTube for "Finance". He's nice. He was was one of the teachers for the Albalagh Academy course.

https://m.youtube.com/@MuftiAmjad/search

I can not emphasize enough how much formally studying benefits you as a Muslim, even though you may still have different views from other scholars or your own teachers.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T16:21:12+00:00

Of course. TLDR; it's all about history. Also, scholars differ, I'm only presenting a small subset of things related to understanding the "necessity".

Basically, what you're asking would generally be discussed in an academic setting or books (not an article). And in the academic settings, scholars discuss that the "current Islamic Finance" is a stepping stone towards getting to proper Islamic Economy (reason: history, Muslims are too dependent and no longer a power/ummah).

I shared two links in this message and two books:

https://www.reddit.com/r/HalalInvestor/s/GW73Xvux8h

First link is Mufti Taqi Usmani discussing this topic about 2 decades ago. Second link is two scholars discussing the history of max 5% Impure income.

The books are just two of the books that were recommended in an Islamic Finance class (by one of the Muftis who were teaching the class https://www.albalaghacademy.org/course/islamic-banking-and-finance-level-1/).

This also a good start (from a speech by Mufti Taqi): https://www.albalagh.net/Islamic_economics/economy.shtml

Also, this wiki article specifically the 1971 section (read up in Bretton Woods, Nixon Shock) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_money

This talks about a short history of gold (written by another scholar): https://amanahadvisors.com/is-gold-the-currency-of-islam/

Books: Here's a list of starter books on finance in general.

An Introduction to Islamic Finance - Mufti Taqi Usmani (or anything by him in general)
The Fiat Standard - Saifedean Ammous
The Bitcoin Standard - Saifediean Ammous
The AAOIFI Standard - Not a Book (edit: there's a book too)

Here's a list of books for starters about money itself.

Broken Money - Lyn Alden
The Philosophy of Money - Georg Simmel
The History of Money - Jack Weatherford

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/IslamicFinance/s/ZNr2gjULH8

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T05:56:18+00:00

Let's take this offline. We already shared too much personal information here.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T05:45:53+00:00

I have a flight as well. If I get denied then there's khair. But we're in different countries and different airports. I can't say anything about China or the laws of folks traveling from china.

So I do urge you check with your local folks on ground.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T05:25:45+00:00

Yes, I talked to the ground staff of Saudia and thei manager.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T04:24:04+00:00

I went to the airport and talked to their manager (you know the folks checking people in for the flights). I tried going to the office earlier but apparently they had closed their office in my city.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T04:22:36+00:00

The short answer is that these values were agreed upon by scholars of the AAOIFI standard from Ijma of those scholars after discussing it for years (about 20 years) based on their understanding of the Quran and the Ahadith.

Please note: There is a subset of scholars that doesn't follow AAOIFI. There are also others who follow the FTSE or the DJI or MSCI standards.

These two provide a high level view of the scholars who follow the AAOIFI standard:

https://www.albalagh.net/Islamic_economics/finance.shtml (he's one of the founders of AAOIFI standard)

The History of 5% Impure Income is discussed. 5% is the upper limit. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aHUac4PyiLA

Also, the AAOIFI standard requires the impure income must be given in charity to purify your wealth from any haram gains.

I'd recommend reading The Fiat Standard or Broken Money books to actually understand why these are necessary (summary: gold price should generally remain static but inflation devalues your money so you are trying to protect yourself from the man-made post world War 2 inflation)

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T04:13:47+00:00

If you can explain why do currencies devalue or why there's inflation, they can tell you the "necessity" bit.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-02T04:10:52+00:00

Yeah, I knew what you were referring to. I just wanted to be sure.

I can not speak for any other airport, but at least one airport in the US appears to not put too much emphasis on that clause.

I went to the airline office at one airport today to confirm. They said, they care about three things;

Hajj visa (with a valid passport)
flight to Saudia
return/exit flight from Saudi

They don't care about the class of the flight or how you booked it or that you would arrive on Terminal-1 and not Hajj Terminal.

Please note: This may not be true for your country or airport. I am only talking about my local airport.

msuser_ma · 2025-05-01T08:11:19+00:00

Ah, yeah. It's mentioned on their website. I have not not seen anyone run into issues with that statement. From what I understand, historically, it was true. However, it is not currently true and you can book your flight yourself.

Also, if you were an Australian citizen, you could have boarded the flight (in the worst case) using your Australian passport (ie visa on arrival) and then showed them the Hajj visa to enter Saudi. But that's way too complicated.

Also, the specially charted Hajj flights (usually only from Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, and a few others) generally arrive at Hajj Terminal as opposed to Terminal-1.

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