MCR FIRE meet up #3 29th November 2019

MCR FIRE meet up #3

• Venue = 10/10 – a lovely relaxed venue – food and real ales available
• Atmosphere and conversation = 10/10
• Fire fans = 10, 6 fans from September meet up
• Pints of cider = 2

A great night on Friday 29/11 at the Salutation Pub for the 3rd MCR FIRE Meet up. A great venue, the staff were really helpful in organising us a corner. It is a lovely old pub with a great atmosphere and they have the option of a great separate space to hold more intimate gatherings. It was busy but not too busy and very easy to hear conversations. There was 10 of us, 6 of us from the September meet up and 4 new friends, three P, H and J who came all the way from Wigan!

My favourite conversations….

• D from the share group and M were keen to see the meet up try out a a different approach and have presentations and talks – a more structured agenda to mix up the evening. They both said they would be willing to kick us off and share their insights and expertise.
• Great to see B and her partner D again and we had an interesting discussion on ethical lending using Credit Unions. BBC Money Box recently had a programme on Credit Unions, what they are and how they work. One thing I took away was that they need new savers to ensure they can meet lending demands. So I made a commitment at the meet up to set up a Credit Union account in the New Year to act as a separate squirreler pot for Xmas savings.
• Don’t know how we got around to talking about it but M clarified for me that I could still pay into a pension after I take my existing DB pension and benefit from tax relief. I am not aiming to hang up my working boots completely after I FIRE – I will probably still be doing some paid work – completely of my own choosing of course – so what a great idea to get a 20% boost to my investments through saving into a SIPP?
• One issue I have been mulling over is how do you get a reliable income from investments after reaching FIRE? M mentioned his use of Investment Trusts rather than Funds in his strategy to ensure a stable income from his investments due to the fact they can reserve some of the income they receive from the investments they hold, allowing them to pay these dividends out to investors during less profitable years.
• Got a couple of fund tips from P, ‘Lindsell Train Global Investment Accumulation’ and ‘Fundsmith’.

I did ask people where they heard about the meet up, most find out about it from Weenie’s blog, D’s share society of the ChooseFI Manchester FB group. So there is no one way to communicate to interested FIRE chasers, so thought it might be helpful to have a mailing list to capture all attendees details to make sure they are updated about future events. Let’s see how it goes.

Next steps / take-aways

• Research Investment Trusts, what are they, how do they compare to funds and identify if they could provide more stability in providing a reliable income from investments when I FIRE.
• Research contributing to a pension when taking a pension, confirm how it works, if there are any restrictions and how it could fit into my FIRE strategy.
• Research the fund tips and decide if I would like to invest!.
• Think about the next meet up in the new year and see if a more structured session would be of interest – in face D, Weenie and I have already been having an email exchange about the next steps.
• Set up a mailing list so that anyone who attends the meet ups, whether they are a friend of a friend, use Facebook, Twitter or read blogs are aware of future events.

And now to you …

• What were your highlights of the evening?
• When shall we meet again?
• Would you be happy coming to the Salutation again?
• Would you be interested in more structured session?