251 | Should I Pay off the Mortgage on the Path to FI? | Brad Connects with Martin and Ayesha

<ul> <li>Martin and Ayesha are both natural savers who have been great about living below their means but lacked a real plan. Their goals are to maximize investments for retirement and finding ways to utilize dividend funds.</li> <li>After stumbling across the ChooseFI podcast, they felt like their financial independence number and retirement seemed obtainable which has helped push them to commit and make even bigger changes.</li> <li>While Martin and Ayesha had a 20-25% savings rate before finding FI, Brad commended them on what a great job they were doing. He also stressed that FI is about living a better life and having the financial security to get you there, not what your savings rate is.</li> <li>Despite the inclination to save, Ayesha always resisted the thought of meticulousness and restrictive budgets. However, she found that she could get behind the idea of focusing on spending on what they truly valued, so they began using Personal Capital as a less obtrusive method of tracking their spending and gaining insight into their habits.</li> <li>Something that Martin and Ayesha place considerable value on are experiences, particularly travel, spending time with friends and family, and being healthy. Instead of getting together at restaurants and spending money on pricey meals out, they began hosting monthly potlucks.</li> <li>Ayesha has found the website Budget Bytes to be incredibly economical when it comes to low-cost recipes and efficient for discovering uses for the ingredients she already has in her refrigerator. It's helped to cut their grocery bill to around $600 per month for their family of 4.</li> <li>Due to quarantine restrictions, Ayesha was out of work for months, which she calls a blessing in disguise. During that free time, they were able to take a deep dive into their spending and immediately saved $500. It also allowed them to slow down and spend more time with family enjoying the outdoors, playing games, and eating all three meals together.</li> <li>Following the time off from work, Ayesha