Can you believe it’s nearly the end of 2024? 🤯

It’s truly been an eventful year in business and life. I’ll be sharing my annual review with you in the next couple editions.

Today, in 5 minutes or less, you’ll learn:

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Are you financially ready for the new year?

At the end of 2023, I shared my EOY financial checklist.

This is a comprehensive checklist that anyone can use to go from feeling lost to confident in their financial plan heading into the new year. 🎉

This year, I’m going to shake it up.

In this edition, I’m going to deep dive into the financial checklist items I’m personally actioning before January 1, 2025.

Here are 5 examples of items on my list:

Let’s get into it:

In the past, while I was a full-time tech worker, I regularly saved and invested 40%+ of my income.

In 2024, as a self-employed business owner, my income fluctuated a lot depending on the month.

So I didn’t auto-invest and haven’t kept track of my investment contribution %.

My action item:

I asked myself: did I save and invest at least 30% of my annual income?

After crunching the numbers, I looked at:

This was a challenge to analyze because I don’t track my spending religiously anymore and mix finances with my wife. But I landed on a rough calculation.

At the end of the day, I invested ~35% of my take-home pay (1) this year.

On top of that, I also contributed to various sinking funds. So not too shabby.

In result:

✅ Saved and invested over 30% of my income in 2024

In 2024, my wife and I opened up a 529 savings account (for college expenses) and converted a joint business fund into a family sinking fund.

Rationale:

My action item:

Going forward, we plan to contribute more to these funds in anticipation of starting a family over the next couple years.

For 2025, I wanted to create targets based on what we value, our short-term financial situation, and long-term goals.

In result:

✅ Created targets for 2025 contributions (between me and my wife):

This is on top of what we have already saved in these accounts.

Every year, I review my asset allocation, what assets to top-up (if needed), and if I want to sell any assets for tax loss harvesting purposes.

Asset allocation is one of the most crucial factors of my investing approach.

My action item:

Overall, I’m relatively happy with my current asset allocation (with the exception of real estate):

After researching, I’m aiming to reduce my allocation to real estate from 20% to 15% over the next year for a few reasons:

As I recoup from REITs/funds, I plan to reallocate mainly into long-term equities.

In result:

✅ Rebalanced my portfolio for 2025 (reducing RE from 20% to 15%)

This is the super fun number stuff for tax nerds.

My goal here is to estimate my tax bill and identify any overlooked benefits I can take advantage of.

My action item:

For 2024, I’m reviewing various tax items like:

In result

✅ Calculated rough estimates on my 2024 tax bill
✅ Executed final adjustments to my eligible retirement contributions, S-Corp payroll, Roth conversions, and business expenses

For the past few years, I admit that life insurance (and estate planning) has been on my backburner.

However, now since my wife and I are planning on starting a family, I know that it’s time I finally kick it into gear. No more procrastination.

My action item

Given that I’m a US expat, I’m currently researching US-based life insurance plans that extend to overseas Americans.

This will require me to collect life insurance quotes, reach out on eligibility for overseas Americans, compare 2-3 options, and then pull the trigger.

In result

✅ Started researching into life insurance options using this marketplace; will close the loop in Q1 2025

Want my full EOY financial checklist?

Use this comprehensive checklist to run through your own finances.

Start 2025 with confidence:

» Download your copy here «

The EOY Financial Review is an illuminating exercise to do in December.

The best part is anyone can do it.

Here are 5 items I reviewed in my EOY review:

Want to try it yourself?

Download my EOY Financial Checklist—and give it a go before new years strikes.

You stand to gain a lot of financial clarity and confidence stepping into 2025.

🔢 Matt Levine had this amazing take on the model of Harvard Business Model. He references this Business Insider article on how the most sought-after job at Harvard, Stanford and Wharton is running a plumbing company in Jackson, Mississippi.

🧑‍🏫 Steve Meking is a 36-year-old who quit 6-figure Wall Street job—now earning $1,000 an hour from his tutoring. My takeaway: Sounds high, but depends on the subject matter. I like how he transparently shared his two income sources: a NY-based contracting firm and his private tutoring business (mainly SAT/ACT test prep).

He hired for Netflix, Uber, and Google. This was his biggest self-professed mistake.

We served nearly 90 paid students this year 🔥

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