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Financial Freedom

FOMO: Is 50 the new 30 when it comes to mortgages?

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There is news circulating in the media that talk coming out of the White House is a new mortgage product: A 50-year mortgage.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but the standard 30-year mortgage has been kicking people’s ass. The 50-year mortgage could give more people a chance to get on the property ladder as so many young folks are locked out. However, with a 50-year house payment, you could buy a home at 30 and not pay it off until you’re 80! This would mean a mortgage of this time period could become a debt trap!

Like 99% of folks choose the 30-year mortgage, which is the banks most profitable product. So imagine a 50-year mortgage. I am sure some banks would be quite eager to roll this product out tomorrow.

I hear rumblings from many financial pundits that this could have negative consequences for many Americans. There are many finance gurus that are anti-debt. The outrage from the peanut gallery is not without merit. However, let’s consider that millions of Americans are already unable to afford to buy a home due to average home prices starting at $400,000.

This blog is dedicated to financial freedom. We do not advocate for debt. However, renters net worth pails in comparison to home homeowners.

The average net worth for a homeowner is around $430,000, which is significantly higher than the average net worth of a renter, which is approximately $10,000. This means the typical homeowner is about 43 times wealthier than the typical renter, a gap that has been widening considerably since the pandemic.

The average home price in the U.S. in 2019 was approximately $383,900 for a new home and $258,000 for an existing home. As of late 2025, the median home sales price in the U.S. is approximately $415,200 to $440,000, while the average sales price is higher, generally around $512,800.

Homeowners net worth have gone up like gangbusters. Right along side with their property values. Home appreciation is going up faster than wages.

Within about five years, home prices have gone up about $150,000-$200,000!

It used to take couples 2-3 years to save up a down payment. Now some sites are reporting it could take as long as 5-10 years of saving!

What gives?! That is longer than it takes to finish a college degree. I do not want to be stuck in my parents basement for that long. I want out the basement as soon as possible.

The longer term mortgage gives people options.

Once on the property ladder, you can rent out your home or sell it for a profit. As a renter, you lack those options.

Real estate is a great way to build wealth and escape the rat race sooner. You benefit from the appreciation in the rental property or in a primary residence once the home is sold.

The 50-year mortgage allows folks to need less time to save up down payments and to get the keys in their hands quicker!

What any financially savvy person really wants is flexibility. Just because you have a 50-year contract doesn’t mean you can’t finish it in 25 years. You just plug in the numbers on a calculator to see what the payment would be on a 25-year mortgage and bam! You just cut your time in half to be in debt to the man.

Many homeowners are also fearful of selling and leaving their low fixed rate 3% mortgage rate behind.

Therefore, it is also being floated that homeowners would be allowed to transfer their old rate to the new home. Pretty sweet deal if you ask me.

A mortgage payment on a 30-year home for $1,000,000 at 7% is $7,000 with 5% down. That same mortgage plummets to $4,729 at a 3% rate.

That is a savings of $2,271 per month.

And even lower on a 50-year loan. Probably around $3,500 per month.

You could put the difference toward maxing out your 401k and Roth IRA.

Would you be willing to sign up for a 50-year home loan?

About the author

Miriam started Greenbacks Magnet in 2016 to keep a scorecard of her goal of $1M in investable assets. Armed with a Master in Management (MiM) and a calculator, she teaches readers how to achieve financial independence while also helping them learn how to smell the roses along the way. The palpable response she got from sharing her personal finance goal in a public speaking course at Georgetown University encouraged her to share her story and teach finance on her website. She invests in AI companies as artificial intelligence is the new iPhone of the moment as she likes to invest in companies that are disruptive.

Financial Independence

Is $2 million the new 401k target?

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“It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.” — Confucius 

They say if you want to reach your goals, that you should write them down.

Well, here goes.

Dear Financial Diary,

It’s a jungle out there. Inflation is up. Wages are stagnant. Paychecks are down. And taxes are always going up.

My goal is to have $1 million in investments. Within the several years I am aiming to invest 20-30 percent of my income.

I know success is the sum of small goals that are repeated daily.

Only about 3.2% of all retirees in the United States have $1 million or more in retirement accounts. And among all households with retirement accounts, about 4.7% have $1 million or more saved.

I know this is no small feat, but my dreams will not be deferred nor ignored.

I will continue to increase my contributions by 1 -2% per year.

I am to save $2,000 to $2,500 per month.

But is this enough?

I feel as if the goalpost keeps moving. Is $2 million the new goal?

How would the new goal be achieved? How hard would it be to build up $2 million in retirement savings?

Starting at zero, if you invest $10,000 per year ($833 per month), at a 10% rate of return over 31 years would put you at $2,001,377.67.

Stay focused. Any goal can be achieved with the right plan.

I started with $5 and as a teenage waitress making $2.65 an hour. Then continued to climb the corporate ladder.

My first goal was $100,000. Then my next was $250,000.

It took over a decade of diligent saving to reach $250,000. By the time I got featured on Business Insider, I had made it to $350,000.

My original goal when I started out was $500,000.

I have now blown past that. My next goal is $750,000.

Continuing to invest over the next several years in stocks like Nvidia, Google, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon as well as funds such as the VFIAX 500 index fund, I figure I can make it to $1 million in investable assets in about 1400 days.

It took half the amount of time to go from $250,000 to $500,000 as it did to make the first $250,000 to the next one.

I estimate that starting with $1M and getting a 10% return would take me 7 years to get to $2M.

I am willing to stay disciplined and sacrifice today for a better tomorrow.

I don’t need a BMW. I don’t need a 5,000 square foot house, that costs $1.2 million with a $9,000 mortgage. I don’t need $5,000 vacations.

Doing the math. This is what it would take to get to $2M.

If you start working at 25, to build a $2 million nest egg by the time you reach 72, then you have to sock away more than $5,677 per year.

If you don’t start to save until age 35, then you’ve got to sock away $11,658 a year, or more than $948 per month.

If that’s 10% of your pay, you would have to earn $116,580 a year.

That’s totally doable, but harder than if you start saving at age 25.

The biggest hurdle is if you start saving at 45. You’d have to save more than $25,000 a year to build a retirement balance of $2 million.

That would work out to saving $2,078 per month.

That would be incredibly hard to do for most workers. Therefore, I aim to start as soon as possible.

I just have to set the goal, aim, and shoot.

So keep your head down and investments up!

xoxo, Greenback Magnet

About the author

Miriam started Greenbacks Magnet in 2016 to keep a scorecard of her goal of $1M in investable assets. Armed with a Master in Management (MiM) and a calculator, she teaches readers how to achieve financial independence while also helping them learn how to smell the roses along the way. The palpable response she got from sharing her personal finance goal in a public speaking course at Georgetown University encouraged her to share her story and teach finance on her website. She invests in AI companies as artificial intelligence is the new iPhone of the moment as she likes to invest in companies that are disruptive.

Financial Freedom

Lions and Tigers and Bear Markets! Oh My!

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Good Afternoon Ladies and Gents!

October is now upon us. That means pumpkin lattes, pumpkin muffins, and pumpkin pie.

The air is crisp. And it’s also sweater weather. Time to break out those pullovers.

For those of you who grew up in the 90’s, you probably remember the yearly reruns of It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, that would come on every Halloween.

I miss those simple days.

Even though things have changed since then, some things can still remain simple. Meaning you can keep your investing simple.

I know tons of fortunes have been made in real estate. Even my home has gone up in value.

See my post on How Supergirl inspired me to buy property

However, real estate is a very active investment. I am always looking for passive income. And stocks provide the passivity I am looking for.

I didn’t spend all that time in my youth slinging hash and serving customers for nothing. I did it to buy my freedom. To say adios to corporate overlords.

And watching the government enter another day in the shutdown, just made me want to work harder to exit the rat race sooner.

Although index funds are the best way to invest, the market has been moving up and down so much it’s enough to give you whiplash!

However, please stay the course.

Jim Cramer from CNBC show Mad Money gave his listeners a reason why years ago.

Host Jim Cramer believes that there is always a bull market somewhere, you just have to keep investing to get to it.

He was homeless for about six to nine months in 1979 after a thief stole everything from his apartment, leading him to live in his car, a Ford Fairmont, spending nights parked at highway rest stops. After graduating from Harvard and working as a crime reporter, Cramer’s apartment in California was robbed, leaving him with nothing.

And as if that wasn’t enough, they also cleared out his checking account, which held the money he needed to pay rent. He ended up getting evicted. Poor guy!

He used this time to develop a consistent saving and investing discipline that he credits with helping him become a millionaire.

He decided to invest $100 per month. He said his car insurance costs that much. His rent costs that much — and I’m saving on rent. Basically, he used the money that would have gone towards the rent to invest.

Investing during hardship: Even when he was at his lowest point, Cramer continued to invest $100 a month into the Fidelity Magellan Fund. He said that this consistent investment discipline, even when he had very little, was a key factor in his becoming a millionaire.

Lessons learned: Cramer described this period as a difficult but foundational experience that instilled in him a lasting commitment to saving and investing. 

This was during his 20s.

He thinks that people in their 20s have no excuse for not putting more money into their investments — even if they think they’re broke. He says he hears from people in their 20s say they are broke all the time.

He was literally homeless! As his finances became more stable, he increased the contributions he made each month, and by the time he was 45, he had around $1.5 million. He attributes that success, in part, to starting early and consistently investing each month.

After approximately 20 years of continuous saving, Jim was a millionaire.

He says investing in the stock market is a good long-term bet.

I concur.

After hitting $500,000, I am working on my next rung on the investment ladder, which is $750,000. I estimate I can get there with consistent saving and market returns in about 2 years or 24 months.

But who’s counting.

Miriam started Greenbacks Magnet in 2016 to keep a scorecard of her goal of $1M in investable assets. Armed with a Master in Management (MiM) and a calculator, she teaches readers how to achieve financial independence while also helping them learn how to smell the roses along the way. The palpable response she got from sharing her personal finance goal in a public speaking course at Georgetown University encouraged her to share her story and teach finance on her website. She invests in AI companies as artificial intelligence is the new iPhone of the moment as she likes to invest in companies that are disruptive.

Financial Independence

Instead of trying to beat Bobby Flay let’s beat inflation

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“Everybody says, ‘I have problems overcooking steak on the grill,’ but just take it off earlier!” – Bobby Flay

That quote above sounds so simple doesn’t it. But alas, life and money are rarely that simple. Life is complex. However, I believe if you can slow down and simplify things, then you are just better off in the long run.

This post is all about beating inflation.

I previously provided a video explanation on this topic by the richest duck in the money business: Scrooge McDuck.

See my post Money Lessons I Learned from Scrooge McDuck

Before we get into our talk about inflation, let’s discuss who is Bobby Flay and why do we need to beat him?

Bobby Flay is a top rated chef in the culinary world.

Beat Bobby Flay is an American cooking competition show on the Food Network. It features various chefs competing against Bobby Flay. The show is taped in front of a live audience. Talk about being in a pressure cooker. Haha!

The goal is to be the best by competing against the best and winning.

What I like about Bobby Flay is his sheer intensity for what he does. He has a one track mind. One goal. One aim. To make the best food.

I think if more people had this type of commitment and focus when it comes to their finances, then more people would be financially secure. Financial independence is the goal. You should tailor your choices and actions on doing everything in your power to obtain that goal with steadfastness and patience.

Here are some more words of wisdom from Bobby.

“Go vegetable heavy. Reverse the psychology of your plate by making meat the side dish and vegetables the main course.” 

Basically, focus on eating healthy because health equals wealth.

Therefore, I want you to focus on investing more and spending less.

Avoid cryto scams and pyramid schemes.

Go index heavy. Reverse the psychology of your 401k by making stocks the side dish and index funds the main course.

When it comes to wealth, please just be boring. You can simply invest in index funds like the VFIAX. A return rate of 10 percent with $20,000 invested annually would make you a millionaire in 18 years. Remember that slow and steady wins the race.

However, inflation is nipping at your heels.

If there is a 3 percent inflation rate, then that would mean prices would double about every 24 years.

Since 2000, the average U.S. inflation rate has been approximately 2.55% per year, resulting in a cumulative price increase of about 87.60%. This means that a dollar in 2000 had the same purchasing power as about $1.88 in 2025. While the rate was 3.4% in 2000, it fluctuated annually, with a significant increase above 9% in 2022.

How can you beat it?

By investing of course.

The stock market has been on a tear. This is the best it has ever performed (2009-2024) in its over 200 years of existence. Investing $1,000 in stocks like Nvidia or Costco over the last 15-30 years has made many people millionaires.

Monster Beverage (MNST):
This company has demonstrated exceptional growth over 30 years, delivering a return of over 444,000%.

Nvidia (NVDA):
A tech giant, Nvidia has also seen tremendous long-term gains, with a 30-year return exceeding 372,000%.

If inflation is averaging about 2-3 percent, but stocks are averaging 10 percent or more means you are beating inflation.

Therefore, I am continuing to pour money into stocks. My goal is to have $1 million in investments. Within the next few years I am aiming to invest 20-30 percent of my income. This is well above the 10-15 percent that is recommended. What this means to me is cha-ching. It’s awesome to open up those investment statements and see more there than when you started. My interest is earning interest.

Since being featured on Business Insider last year, I have blown past $350,000 in investments. Within a little over a year, I am within mere thousands of $515,000. I won’t stop until I reach $1 million.

I may not be beating Bobby Flay any time soon, but I sure am beating inflation. Heck, I’m kicking its a$$ and taking names.

Like what you heard?

Want more?

Tweet me.

I’ll be here all week.

How this FIRE blogger got featured on Business Insider

Miriam started Greenbacks Magnet in 2016 to keep a scorecard of her goal of $1M in investable assets. Armed with a Master in Management (MiM) and a calculator, she teaches readers how to achieve financial independence while also helping them learn how to smell the roses along the way. The palpable response she got from sharing her personal finance goal in a public speaking course at Georgetown University encouraged her to share her story and teach finance on her website. She invests in AI companies as artificial intelligence is the new iPhone of the moment as she likes to invest in companies that are disruptive.

Celebrities and Money, Financial Freedom, Financial Independence, Investing

How I made it to $500,000. Checkmate!

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It was a cold summer night when I finally got home after running errands.

The fall season was fast approaching. Alas, it was the last days of summer. No more summer concerts or cookouts. It felt so sad to see it come to an end.

Was this how Belly felt in The Summer I Turned Pretty? When Cousins Beach was in the rearview mirror as she drove away. It was time to move forward and move on.

Christmas was three months away. I was trying to get all my holiday preparations organized. Christmas tree. Check. Christmas decorations. Check. Holiday travel plans. Check.

I also had another check to do. My financial checkup. It was time for my monthly fiscal health check.

The stock market had a nice bump happen within the last 30 days. I had also been investing in AI companies for months and some stocks had started to takeoff!

I figured I would piggyback off of Nvidia and invest not only in them, but some of the companies that they were investing in as well. Below is Nvidia stock portfolio.

Stocks Nvidia currently owns

Nvidia started investing in AI stocks at the end of 2023. According to its latest 13-F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which was released weeks ago, it now owns several high profile ones:

  • Applied Digital Corp (APLD), founded in 2001, which builds data centers for customers. Their position is worth $63 million as they own a 3 percent stake in the company with 7 million shares.
  • Arm Holdings (ARM), founded in 1990, which helps semiconductor companies design advanced computing chips. Their position is worth $280 million.
  • CoreWeave (CRWV): Nvidia’s biggest equity holding, this cloud computing company provides GPU-accelerated infrastructure for AI workloads. Nvidia owns 7% of CoreWeave’s Class A shares, according to filings as of June 30, 2025. This stake of approximately 24.3 million shares makes CoreWeave Nvidia’s largest equity holding, at about $900 million.
  • Nano-X Imaging (NNOX), founded in 2018, which develops AI software to improve the efficiency of medical imaging. They did own 59,000 shares. However, they sold its stake in the company in February 2025.
  • Nebius (NBIS) is a technology company that provides artificial intelligence infrastructure. Nvidia owns a minority equity stake in the company, having acquired over 1.19 million shares in late 2024. Nvidia: The Real Winner In The $19B Microsoft/Nebius Deal. It’s stake in the company was $33 million at the end of 2024.
  • Recursion Pharmaceuticals (RXRX), founded in 2013, which is using AI to transform the drug discovery process. Their position is worth $56 million as they own 7.71 million shares.
  • Serve Robotics (SERV), founded in 2017, which develops autonomous delivery robots with a focus on serving the last mile of a delivery. Their position was worth $25 million as they own 3.73 million shares. However, they sold its entire stake in Serve Robotics at the end of 2024.
  • SoundHound AI (NASDAQ: SOUN), founded in 2005, which is a leader in conversational AI technologies. The company recently paid off $200 million in debt to be able invest more in their technology. Nvidia previously had a position worth $10 million as they owned 1.73 million shares, but sold them all in late 2024 and early 2025.
  • WeRide (NASDAQ: WRD): Nvidia’s smallest position ($23.6 million) is in the autonomous car company WeRide, which is working to commercialize self-driving vehicles. Not only is WeRide backed by Nvidia, but the company also uses Nvidia GPUs and AI software in its vehicles. Nvidia is also working on autonomous driving technology.

Nvidia is currently worth over $4.2 trillion. So I figured investing in them and the same companies they put millions into was a pretty good bet! It turns out I was right. I have earned tens of thousands by doing this.

My own portfolio had gone from $375,000 to $4400,000 since my story had been featured on Business Insider and picked up on Yahoo! Finance.

I typed this amount into my retirement calculator and saw that if I continued with my 14.3 percent compound rate and investing $1,333 per month, I could have over $500,000 by May 1, 2025. I was about 500 days from having half a million in investments. This was in December 2024.

I actually hit my target in my portfolio in September 2025. Screenshot below was taken to mark the occasion.

From there, I could have $1 million in another four or five years. I would officially be a millionaire.

Looking back I had to reflect on how I got here.

This is my story.

Starting out: $0

Growing up in the 90’s, I was eager to get start working and earning my own money. As a teenager, I worked as a cell phone operator making $9 an hour. I later went on to work as a waitress for $2.65 an hour plus tips.

Standing on my feet for hours on end made me realize that this was not the career I aspired to have. Constantly being on your feet is fine and dandy when your young and paying your dues, but not in your 40’s with back problems and bad knees worn out from years of playing sports!

I could clear anywhere from $30-$50 a night working part-time at Shoney’s. If I had only been fiscally savvy back then, I would have started investing at 16. But hindsight is 20/20. I did not have the financial knowledge then that I do today. I saved $0.

However, my time would come. I would become financially literate and put all that I had learned to good use in the years to come. I job hopped quite a bit in my early 20’s while I was trying to figure out what interested me. I worked for an authorized cell phone dealer for AT&T and Nextel.

I was an administrative assistant and a receptionist for a cosmetic medical doctor. I learned from there that beauty costs a pretty penny. Literally.

I guess I will just invest in a more expensive facial cream with at least a 30spf to keep my skin healthy and youthful because Botox is expensive! I was making $12 an hour here. I couldn’t believe the amount of money women were shelling out for beauty treatments. Now I understand why Rihanna and Kylie Jenner started their beauty businesses. People still buy lipstick even in recessions!

Investing in my 20’s: $0 – $25,000+

Back in 2006, I was just getting started in the working world. I got a job working in lending for a federal credit union. I opened up a 401k asap!

I wasn’t earning much when I first started out. Around $25,000-$28,000. However, I knew I had to start somewhere. By the time they laid me off during the 2008-2009 Recession, I had at least $8,000 in my investments.

I was reading 10 books a year on personal finance at this point.

I also made a decision that I wanted to be wealthy.

I set out a goal of $1 million.

Every time I had an extra $20 bucks, I would invest it.

I paid off my expensive car loan and used that money to invest as well. I bought a SUV for $24,000 in 2003 and had negative equity of $6,000 so I owed $30,000 in auto loans! My payment was $448.65. It took until 2009 to pay this off. I have not had a car payment since.

Every birthday and holiday, I also invest money into my Roth IRA.

New job, higher retirement contributions: $50,000 – $500,000+

By 2012, I was well on my way to a millionaire in the making. I had been watching the Suze Orman show, read the Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey, the Automatic Millionaire, and hundreds of finance articles, books and blogs at this point.

I also witnessed people losing their homes and jobs. That was a scary time. I decided I would live off rice and beans if I had to in order to become financially free.

I was able to double my income from my 20’s and increase my investments.

I started with $5 and increased my contributions at one point to 25 percent of my income. Within 10 years, I went from $50,000 to $400,000 in my investment portfolio.

Instead of shopping, I would put that money into my Roth IRA. And with that job that laid me off in 2009, I invested that $8,000 in my 401k by rolling it over into a Traditional IRA and put almost every penny in Apple stock. That investment turned into over $25,000.

I then sold a portion to invest in a property and put some of the funds into buying shares of Google before the last two most recent stock splits. Alphabet’s first stock split was in March 2014, when it split 2-for-1. The 2022 split created two classes of shares: Class A (GOOGL) for shareholders with voting rights, and Class C (GOOG) for shareholders without voting rights. On July 15, 2022, Alphabet (GOOGL), the parent company of Google, executed a 20-for-1 stock split. My small investment in a few shares of GOOGL turned into hundreds of shares.

At this point, with over a 15 percent rate of return, I started earning compound interest and dividends to the tune of over $56,000 a year.

Over the last decade, I had read so many stories of celebrities going broke, I knew I had to do something different. Athletes were also going broke at a record pace. It was reported by Sports Illustrated in 2009, that most athletes went broke within 3-5 years after retirement. Here are just a few cautionary tales below.

MC Hammer

The late 1980s hitmaker filed for bankruptcy in 1996 after amassing a fortune of around $70 million. His spending included a $30 million mansion with a recording studio and an entourage of 200 people. As of 2025, it was reported his car was being repossessed and he was being sued for allegedly failing to make payments on a $100,000 Land Rover.

Toni Braxton

Toni Braxton filed for bankruptcy twice: once in 1998 and again in 2010, when she claimed debts between $10 million and $50 million.

In an interview, Braxton said her her first bankruptcy was due to a spending addiction, but that the second occurred when she canceled her self-funded Vegas show after receiving a diagnosis of microvascular angina, which causes chest pain.

The singer declared bankruptcy in 2010 after amassing $50 million in debt, including money owed on a mansion she couldn’t afford. She reportedly didn’t wisely spend the advancements her record label gave her for her albums.

Burt Reynolds

The actor declared bankruptcy in 1996 with $11.2 million in debt after an expensive divorce and extravagant lifestyle.

Michael Jackson

In 2004, his financial advisers declared that he was all but broke and would be unable to repay a $70 million loan to the Bank of America.

Teresa Giudice

Teresa and Joe Giudice were first featured on “The Real Housewives of New Jersey” in 2009, the same year they filed for bankruptcy. They claimed they were nearly $11 million in debt. In 2013, they were charged for attempting to defraud lenders and hiding income during their bankruptcy. They both served prison time.

Sonja Morgan

Teresa Giudice isn’t the only member of the “Real Housewives” family with financial issues. RHONY cast member Sonja Morgan filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2010 after divorcing her husband. She reportedly stated that she owed $19.8 million to creditors and had $13.5 million in assets.

Morgan settled her debt in 2015.

Antoine Walker

Antoine Walker amassed $108 million in his 13-year-career as a Boston Celtics player. But in 2010, he had to declare bankruptcy with $4.3 million in assets and $12.7 million in liabilities.

Two years later, Walker was debt-free. Today, he’s an advocate for financial literacy.

As you can see from above, earning millions is not a guarantee that you will not run into financial troubles. We are living in expensive times. These are the most unpredictable times I have ever seen. Where a bad medical diagnosis or divorce can bankrupt you. Fraud and Ponzi schemes are running rampant.

Forget get rich quick.

When you are not trying to get rich quick, you will get rich slow.

You have to ignore the negativity and naysayers. You need to invest in yourself through education, having healthcare and home and car insurance.

I myself decided to get a $1 million life insurance policy so in case anything ever happened to me, I would be able to leave money to my family. I went through AAA with a medical exam to get a 10 year term policy. If you are looking for some life insurance yourself, you can use this as a barometer: 25 times your expenses. Therefore, if you spend $100,000 a year, then you will want a $2.5 million dollar policy.

After seeing so many celebrities’ have tax and other financial troubles, I decided I wanted to go a different route. I keep my fixed expenses low. I spend less than I earn and always save and invest. I make sure any extra income from bonuses, second jobs, side hustles and windfalls go into my Roth IRA.

As I write this, it is was definitely a walk down financial memory lane. I set a goal and I made it! I knew that a goal without a timeline is just a dream and without a plan is just a wish. So here was my goal: 500 days to $500k. I was just 500 days or 12,000 hours from $500,000. I am five, scratch that, four and a half years away from being a millionaire. That is 1,825 days.

I am marking the days off the calendar and making sure to have fun along the way. By the time I hit send on this post, I will have crossed one more day off the calendar. Only 1,824 days left $1,000,000 and me becoming a 401k millionaire. I set the bar high. I am running toward the million dollar baton…and am reaching out to catch it.

After years of working toward this goal, there was only one thing I could say to myself.

About The Author

Miriam started Greenbacks Magnet in 2016 to keep a scorecard of her goal of $1M in investable assets. Armed with a Master in Management (MiM) and a calculator, she teaches readers how to achieve financial independence while also helping them learn how to smell the roses along the way. The palpable response she got from sharing her personal finance goal in a public speaking course at Georgetown University encouraged her to share her story and teach finance on her website. She invests in AI companies as artificial intelligence is the new iPhone of the moment as she likes to invest in companies that are disruptive.

Comics and Comic Book Reviews, Financial Independence, Retirement, Self-Made Millionaires

What would you do with $1 million dollars in your 401k?

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“Thomas Edison’s last words were “It’s very beautiful over there“. I don’t know where there is, but I believe it’s somewhere, and I hope it’s beautiful.”
― John Green, Looking for Alaska

Happy Saturday! It’s the last day of May 2025. As I write this, I am closing in on $500,000 in investments.

It made me take pause and reflect on the journey I had been on to get to that number.

The sleepless nights wondering how I was going to pay the bills and how I would afford to pay for retirement was over. Even with a return of investment of less than the stock market average of 10 percent over the last 30 years, I would still hit the $1 million nest egg milestone before I retire. So it made me think, what would I do with $1 million dollars of investments?

With that type of money, if you wanted to, you could buy a house with cash depending on where you want to live. This includes places inside and outside of the United States.

The cheapest places to buy a house in the U.S. include states like Iowa, West Virginia, and Mississippi, as well as cities like Scranton, PA, Weirton, WV, and El Paso, TX. This year, West Virginia has the cheapest homes in the country, with an average house price of $146,578. Several countries also offer affordable options for buying a house outside the US, including Colombia, The Philippines, Italy, Nicaragua, and Mexico.

I even heard Italy was letting people buy homes for $1! That’s a pretty sweet deal! Bravo, Italy. It makes me want to pack my bags and say ciao bella!

Even if staying in the U.S. is what you want, you do have options on where you live and what you do in retirement.

That is enough scratch to start a business, travel the world, start a charitable foundation for college scholarships or to help donate to meals on wheels. The possibilities are almost endless.

I may not be able to give away billions, but I sure could start a college scholarship fund for underprivileged kids with $10,000 starting capital for $500 each one towards books or other education related expenses. Maybe I could do something for medical students and start a scholarship that pays for med school application fees or supplies.

The point is that you have options. Many options. Especially, if you have a paid off home and no debt.

I remember Dave Ramsey saying that most people acquired their first million by consistently investing in their 401k’s and paying off their primary residence. In addition, the people they did a study on became millionaires from five professions: teaching, law, management, accountant, and engineering. So if your in one of those five fields, then you got a real good shot kid of being a becoming a millionaire.

Just taking stock of myself, I did pay off the personal and auto loans. Then redirected that money to my savings and investments. The auto loan was $450 and the personal loan was $333. The goal is to get to a savings rate of 50 percent . I then want to direct my attention to paying off my mortgage and having no home payment. That allows me to be in the driver’s seat of my future time after punching the clock.

So what would I do with all that free time and one million dollar nest egg? I think I will start a second career. What would I do if money was no object. Maybe voiceover acting. I was told once I had a great voice for radio! I was also once a background actor for a Hollywood movie. I could expand my creative pursuits outside of blogging.

I could teach personal finance and home economics at the local library.

I could backpack through Europe.

To be specific, I could buy a first-class ticket to London, stay at the Ritz Carlton or Savoy and have high tea while also taking in the sites of places in the Ian Fleming novels and have my martini shaken not stirred. I could visit the home towns of Jane Austen and Charles Dickens.

Maybe I will go to visit the fictional town of Stars Hollow from the show Gilmore Girls.

In the book “The Count of Monte Cristo,” Edmond Dantès (the Count of Monte Cristo) lives in several locations. He lives in Rome and Auteuil, outside of Paris. The author of the book, Alexandre Dumas, also built a mansion called Château de Monte-Cristo in the French countryside, which was a real place. Maybe, I’ll go for a looksee.

“What is the point of being alive if you don’t at least try to do something remarkable?”
― John Green, An Abundance of Katherines

The point is to have goals and have some fun. Go on adventures. Dream big. Hard work should be rewarded. It can take decades to build a million-dollar portfolio. Live a little. The most successful retirements are the ones of which people retire to something.

To quote the author John Green, “The way I figure it, everyone gets a miracle. Like, I will probably never be struck by lightening, or win a Nobel Prize, or become the dictator of a small nation in the Pacific Islands.” However, I can fly to Paris on a Monday, have high tea in London on Wednesday, and stay at the Palace in New York City like Serena van der Woodsen in Gossip Girl.

You can check out my post on the show called Money Advice from Gossip Girl.

My miracle may not have been to live next door to Margo Roth Spiegelman like the protagonist in the book Paper Towns in which the quote is borrowed from, but I still can create my own miracle. The gift of free time and financial freedom. A life that is well-lived and leisure that is earned.

So with all that said, the question you are to ask yourself, “what would you do with a million in retirement?”

Would you sail around the world?

Would you visit the Louvre in Paris, see the pyramids in Egypt?

Or maybe you would try out your Spanish language skills you learned on Babbel in Spain or Barcelona?

Or would you visit the beaches in Rio?

As for me, maybe I will visit all the places The Chipmunks went to see in the 1987 film The Chipmunk Adventure.

I could buy a Porsche 911 with cash.

I could rent out a beach house on the California coast.

I could stay at the same hotel as James Bond in Montenegro.

I could buy a season ticket to see the Yankees or the Knicks play.

I could buy a ticket to ComicCon in San Diego and go meet my favorite actors from the Marvel Comics films. (Just FYI…I got to meet Orlando Bloom aka Legolas from Lord of the Rings at a comic convention and he was an absolute gentleman!)

I could buy a front row ticket to a concert.

I could fly in to whatever city they decide to visit to get my replica Book of Shadows signed by the cast of Charmed!

Yes, I’m a comic nerd, sue me.

I even have a Betty and Veronica fridge magnet. Yes, from the Archie Comics. Maybe I’ll have a lost weekend like they did on Riverdale and dance the nite away at a club in Vegas. I might even steal Veronica Lodge’s dance moves!

I once flew in to ATL for a day just to go to Six Flags over Georgia!

I have never swam with the dolphins or run with the bulls. However, I did get to meet the iconic actor Val Kilmer and got to be in a Hollywood movie as an extra! Both were pretty cool.

I once even decided on a whim to take the train to New York on a weekday afternoon so I could sip cocktails at the Plaza Hotel.

Just know whatever it is, it will be epic!

About The Author

Miriam started Greenbacks Magnet in 2016 to keep a scorecard of her goal of $1M in investable assets. Armed with a Master in Management (MiM) and a calculator, she teaches readers how to achieve financial independence while also helping them learn how to smell the roses along the way. The palpable response she got from sharing her personal finance goal in a public speaking course at Georgetown University encouraged her to share her story and teach finance on her website. She invests in AI companies as artificial intelligence is the new iPhone of the moment as she likes to invest in companies that are disruptive.