Your Financial Dashboard
A modern airplane can't be flown without an array of instruments. Driving an automobile without a working speedometer, fuel gauge, or odometer would be ill-advised. Even a walk in the woods is safer and more enjoyable with at least a map, a watch, and perhaps a compass. Similarly, your journey to financial independence will be smoother and more efficient if you can periodically review certain key indicators: How much have you saved? How much of that is invested, and where? Is it going up or down? How risky are your investments? How much are they costing you? Just as you wouldn't drive a car without a dashboard, you need a "financial dashboard" that provides you the key information for financial decision-making, allowing you to navigate your financial life from early career to retirement, and beyond.
Here we'll identify, explain, and discuss the key indicators or metrics you should monitor -- why they matter, and how to calculate them. When we're done, you'll know everything you need to compute these simple values on your own, or identify software or an adviser to do it for you. These are the same indicators I used and refined from the time I began serious saving and investing, around age 35, until I retired financially independent, at age 50 -- surviving two major market meltdowns in the process. These measures helped me stay on course and stay off the shoals of financial disaster. They can do the same for you!