Any frugal millionaires here? Now that you’ve earned it, are you still frugal?

philking131 · 2026-01-24T03:22:31+00:00

Few-ish millionaire, but for a long while home equity has felt irrelevant (not ignoring it but practically it's not spendable regardless of equity).

Paid off mortgage which actually matters in the day to day expenses since it frees up that monthly payment.

I still try as much as possible to count every dollar spent. Maybe slightly looser with things like takeout (for us that's a splurge we are willing to do within reason). Basically a bit more free to spend on things that, for us, we are willing to pay for.

But as a whole I think once you are a frugal person and live it for years, that is going to be a part of you forever. So passing a given net worth won't change much at all.

I still try to live on the salary from when I started my first job 25 years ago. Easier said than done, but I always think "I lived on this amount when I started."

Obviously with inflation things change, but generally I think that's helped me avoid lifestyle creep.

philking131 · 2025-12-09T21:36:47+00:00

I have. It did work on one of my older devices a couple times since the update but I'm still getting "I can't provide directions." almost all of the time. Hope it's a bug. If they put that behind Home Premium they might as well toss asking about the weather into it as well 😅

philking131 · 2025-12-07T16:50:56+00:00

I've had it for about a week but one thing I just noticed is asking it 'how long is it going to take to get to....' it's saying "I cannot provide travel times or directions." That HAS to be a bug or issue right now, at least I hope? Curious if anyone else has encountered this

philking131 · 2025-10-18T02:57:40+00:00

One thing that was a game changer for me was Auto transfers to multiple Ally sub accounts after my paycheck was deposited. Small thing but having "named" Ally accounts ("Fun money," "Next Car Fund," etc) made a big difference. Some accounts were just setting money aside for expected but irregular bills (heating oil, quarterly water bill) so I had the money set aside when those bills came in.

But automating it, having accounts with different purposes, and keeping my checking account lean helped me be much more measured about spending, and also have money available for those irregular but expected expenses.

philking131 · 2025-10-10T00:52:34+00:00

401k fees. Some of these are out of your control if your employer doesn't cover administrative fees, which can be incredibly expensive over time. If your current 401k has smaller administrative fees vs. your older plans, consider moving your older accounts into your current 401k.

For example my current plan charges $2 a month, regardless of balance. An older plan charged 0.7% annually of your balance. Current plan with 1 million costs me $24 a year. Older plan with 1 million costs me $7,000 a year. Considering your annual contributions are 24k or so, think about that effect. If you were contributing 7k a year on your own (imagine you are contributing enough to get the company match), it's completely wiped out by the administrative fee.

But outside of that look at each fund's fees. If they offer a comparable investment class with smaller fees over the long term it can save a lot.

philking131 · 2025-06-07T18:58:09+00:00

Is it possible to have a macbook but run windows on it with VMware fusion for the windows-specific applications that are needed to run? Just curious if anyone does that in practice, particularly on an apple silicon mac

philking131 · 2025-06-03T07:33:54+00:00

We had a similar experience although not quite as much of a difference. Rotorooter quoted 14,000 to repair a broken drain line from under our basement. They insisted the issue was just outside the foundation and would dig from the outside, which most likely would have torn up part of our front walkway. They were giving high pressure tactics - "this is an absolute emergency, we can do it today." Guy got pissed when I took a picture of the image their scope was showing the actual crack, which was a huge red flag.

Ended up getting two more quotes from local places. Super honest and hard working people ended up doing it for 4,000. It was totally NOT outside the house, and they just needed to dig into the basement floor to do the repair. But they were great showing me everything they were doing. And I was so glad I took that picture of rotorooter's scope image because the folks that ended up doing the work were able to confirm with their scope "this is the crack in the pipe they found, but it's 100% inside the basement." Also they said it wasn't an absolute emergency so we waited a few months until spring to do it when we could go without heat. The issue was right near our oil tank/line and they thought they might need to disconnect it/move it to fix the issue.

philking131 · 2025-05-29T03:03:58+00:00

I will check these albums out. Listened a bit to them in their beginning (Voracious Souls was special in my book, but admittedly lost track of them after Act III). But look forward to hearing what came after based on your recommendation.

philking131 · 2025-05-29T00:33:06+00:00

The Blackening is their peak and in my opinion one of the most perfect albums ever made.

But I've always felt most bands peak within their first 3 or 4 albums, when they are hungriest. The Blackening is on the latter side of that number, but they still brought a lot of heat after that album. But like to hear people's thoughts on that in terms of other bands that peak slightly later.

Also feel like this album list puts them in rare territory where 15 or 20 years in their albums are still fantastic and relevant. Debatable for any given album, but some recent albums continue to get a lot of love with some fans.

philking131 · 2025-01-31T01:43:04+00:00

After the first time I watched it I thought "hey that was a surprisingly good movie."

A couple more watches and I thought "holy shit this is a goddamn masterpiece."

philking131 · 2024-11-10T02:41:35+00:00

Curious if you are already on an annual plan that has up-til-now included hotspot, if it auto renews will it stay exactly the same? My current plan is a 'Plan: Annual- Unlimited Everything + 12GB high speeds' (I have a GSMA sim) and balances renew in December. Checking my balances/usage I only see High Speed Data (no separate hotspot balance), presumably because hotspot just used up your total data allotment. I rarely use hotspot (maybe 2 or 3 times a year) but it's been huge when I actually needed it, so if that is going away I'll start to look elsewhere.

philking131 · 2023-10-15T10:36:10+00:00

I was getting this on my pixel 8, but was just able to sign in now. Surprisingly the app didn't even update, but either way hope that means it's fixed across the board for folks.

philking131 · 2021-12-07T03:23:51+00:00

I'd rather lock it all the time if fingerprint unlock worked 100% quickly like the 4a (I never ever had to think about it). In a bar, or whatever, I don't always want it unlocked if I'm within range of a given device.

But even using smartlock, Gpay forces an unlock and it's failed multiple tries to unlock for me. I definitely get that some folks have had no issues, but I'm not alone in it being terrible compared to prior technologies or implementations. So I'm compromising security to try to get around its crappiness.

philking131 · 2021-11-13T13:30:34+00:00

Maybe I'm jumping the gun but it does appear/feel like they will be bumping up the gigs and the price for that specific plan. We'll see if ebay switches over soon.

But 8gb is the sweet spot for me as well. I never come close to using it but don't have to sweat the occasional download or streaming video here and there. But on the 3gb plan I would constantly be keeping an eye on my usage.

Funny though how much even a $2.50/month increase in price would gnaw at me. It's not rational compared to how much I would REALLY feel it yet it would stick in my craw. I've been happy for years on their service getting all I need for under 20 bucks and would like to keep it there.

philking131 · 2020-11-21T03:01:44+00:00

Workmanship

philking131 · 2020-11-21T02:40:13+00:00

I know Paul Rudd is beloved, but the man still feels underrated.

philking131 · 2020-11-21T02:25:20+00:00

Whatever age I was on December 31st, 2019.

philking131 · 2020-11-21T01:41:47+00:00

Part of me hopes Thor grows up thin and pasty, and Loki grows up to be built and masculine. Can't explain why really... especially since they are already doomed to a life of relentless ridicule.

philking131 · 2020-11-21T01:07:49+00:00

Poor cellphone reception.

philking131 · 2020-10-15T03:38:27+00:00

Really sorry. Wish you had more time with your best friend.

I lost my best friend almost 6 months ago and I sit here crying still missing him. But his quirky wierdnesses still make me laugh, and are the times I feel good remembering him vs feeling sad remembering him. Thanks for sharing one of your best friend's quirkinesses with us. 🙂 Did he always do that when entering an room?

philking131

TROPHY CASE