Blogging To Retirement Is A Terrible Idea

One of my biggest goals in life is to be retired (at least temporarily) by the time I decide to have children.

As you are well aware, retirement costs money.

And let me tell you, you can make a good chunk of money doing this blogging thing. It can pay way more than you need to suit your lifestyle, and the freedom it provides is incredible.

But you see, if retirement is a goal of yours like it is for me, you’ve got to do more than just run a successful blog. 

Let’s Not Delude Ourselves

Many people whole-heartedly believe that once their blog is making enough money to cover their expenses and their business’ expenses, they are ready to retire.

Unfortunately, it’s not that easy.

Blogging is so far from passive that your income will drop the week you stop working on it. It doesn’t matter how big you are, or how much you make – if you stop updating your blog, your income is going to drop. This is inevitable, and for people who do not see it coming, it is incredibly sad. Because suddenly, you’re not making enough to live off of anymore.

Now you may be thinking, ‘OK – I’ll just wait until I can afford to hire people to maintain and update the blog. Problem solved!”

Nope.

Think about what retirement means for a moment. It’s a pretty big deal. If you’re successful at it, you’ll only do it once (if that’s what you want, of course.) The problem is that many people do not plan accordingly and end up having to start over, often in a much harder position since they’ve been out of the game for so long.

Therefore, it’s really important you think things through carefully and don’t take any big chances if you do not have to.

The problem with blogging is that the income can be so volatile. It changes a lot, and there are a lot of factors that can determine your profitability.

Markets change. Industries change. You change. Any of these changes has the power to not only lower your blogging income, but wipe it out completely. That means if you’re relying solely on your blogging income to pay your bills, you have a huge problem, and no time to deal with it. Uh oh.

You Need Another Income Source

I don’t want to move too far away from blogging, but if you want to blog to retirement, there is no avoiding it. You need another income source.

You couldn’t ‘use’ another income source.

You don’t ‘want’ another income source.

You NEED another income source. Failing to build up another source of income is what causes emergencies to ruin you, and force you back out of retirement and back into work.

But not only do you need another income source, you need an income source that is reliable – an income source that you know will be there, regardless of what’s going on in your market, in your economy, and in the world.

And I’ve got to be honest with you, there are really only a few of these – stocks, bonds, and real estate.

Here’s How You Retire On Your Blogging Income

If you want to guarantee a safe retirement that lasts until you’ve passed away, you need to secure your retirement through these income sources rather than through your website.

There is a popular rule in the personal finance world called the 4% rule – this means that whatever your investment account is at the day you retire, you can withdrawal 4% of it per year, increasing each year with inflation. This is because the stock market rises on average 7% a year after accounting for inflation, so in theory your money should still actually grow during retirement.

This means to retire off of stocks and bonds, you need 25x your annual living expenses. 30x is even safer, as the 4% rule has only been discovered to have a near 100% success rate for 30-year retirements. If you want to retire early like I do, you need to save even more.

The other option is real estate, and honestly, it’s probably a good idea to do both when possible. Real estate benefits from the power of leverage – most of the money you can use to purchase your rental properties isn’t yours, which means you can acquire a lot more assets with a lot less money. Leverage makes real estate perhaps the quickest path to financial independence, but it’s also quite a bit more risky.

Anyway, the ticket to retirement is simple. Instead of inflating your lifestyle to match up with your blogging income, spend as little as you possibly can, and invest whatever leftover profits from your blog that you can into alternative investments such as stocks, bonds, or real estate. THESE are channels you can retire comfortably off of. Investing your income is what’s going to bring you early retirement.

Your blog may not always be here, but if you put your dollars to work for you, they will serve you well. And it’s incredibly powerful.

A Step-By-Step Guide

Now you know what you have to do, but how do you go about doing it?

The truth is, stepping on the path towards financial independence and early retirement is a lot easier than you probably think.

It does not require a ton of money to start, it does not require a ton of economic knowledge, and it does not require a ton of upkeep either.

I have developed a course that will take you by the hand and show you step-by-step not only how you can save as much money as possible (without noticing a difference in your quality of life) and then put that money to work for you in a safe, easy, and effective way. Using the concepts taught in this course, it is possible to retire in as little as 5 years – even if you don’t have a dime saved today!

Click Here To Learn More About My Financial Independence / Early Retirement Course!

Conclusion

I’m going to continue to blogging and building my portfolio until it comes time for me to ‘retire,’ although I highly doubt I’ll ever stop blogging completely. I just love what I’m doing too much to quit any time soon – but I will eventually have to tone it down a bit.

I’d love to hear what your plans are for retirement, and how blogging will fit into it.

And of course, I hope you join over 1000 other people who have already enrolled in my financial independence course. I’d love to have you as a student!