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Educator FI

Financial Independence For Educators

About Educator FI

Mission: Helping Educators Achieve Financial Independence

In a time of deep professional frustration, I started reading about personal finance and realized I’d neglected an important part of my life.  Together with my partner, I developed a plan to reach financial independence in under ten years.  We did it in just over 5!

Recognizing that educators don’t typically tend to their financial well-being, I created this site to share my experience and learning. 

Building wealth as an educator isn’t fast, but it’s possible. By understanding your money, growing your career, and making solid decisions you can make incredible financial progress – even as an educator.

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I want to help you.

About Ed

Poor kid, to broke adult, to nearly financially independent.

We started six-figures in debt and now have a seven-figure net worth and we did it all while working as public educators.

That’s the quick version, but keep reading if you want more.

How Did It Happen?

First and foremost, I’m an educator.  But I almost missed my calling.

I grew up poor, raised by a single mom.  My childhood experiences and sense of limits created an early, and unhealthy, obsession with money and constant feelings of financial insecurity. I planned to be stupid rich and pursued a career in economics – that I ended up hating.

Fortunately, I met my amazing wife (TFI) and volunteered in her classroom. I became a teacher.

We started out together as two broke teachers with a net worth of -$130,000. 

Then, we financially wasted most of a decade.  We were clueless about finances. Our lifestyle inflated – we spent as much as we earned.  Suddenly, we were approaching 40 and had little to show for it and no real plan. Our net worth was $0.

A dream purchase turned into the nightmare wake up call I needed.  I started studying personal finance and paying attention to how successful people think about money.

We got it together.  We created a financial plan and fought back against lifestyle inflation.  The years of working hard to improve our income helped us course correct quickly.

We’ve gone from being two broke teachers to reaching FIOR (financial independence optional retirement.) We can now choose to do what we want with our time – I’m walking away from my current role and TFI wants to keep teaching.   

Now, I combine my two passions of teaching and supporting educators to write about our journey and how educators can defy the myth of the poor teacher to achieve financial independence.  

I love education and supporting those who give their lives to help others learn. Too often educators give while not taking care of their own financial health. I’m hoping to change that.

Let me know if I can help you. Thanks for reading.

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