I am sure all of us have frugal friends. I have known X for more than 30 years. We were friends in school, army mates whilst we were serving our mandatory military service and were also colleagues in one of the firm that we worked in.

X is frugal. There is a difference between being frugal and stingy. X is not stingy. X will buy you treats as a friend and will contribute his fair share in outings. His frugal lifestyle stands out.

He buys nothing branded. He takes good care of his things and can wear free company t-shirts for a long time. He use army running shoes even after the service. They were good shoes. He sets his timer on his air conditioner so that it turns off in the middle of the night and he turns off his heater midway through his shower to save electricity. He is fit. During one of the company outings, he decided to save a few dollars taking the cab and decided to hike more than 5 km from one location to the next. He got to sightsee that way. He is one of the few friends I know who actually enjoyed airline food. He takes his family for holidays but he optimizes special internet offers to get the best offers on air tickets, hotels and entrance fees in order to get the same enjoyment for less. We can keep on going on his frugal ways.

Early in our career, we were comparing how much we could save from our salary. We had identical starting salaries. I thought I had a great achievement by saving 50% of my take home salary. He said he could save 75% of his salary. He spent little and wasted nothing. This was before we were married but this included looking after our parents.

Through his frugal ways, X bought two properties. One to stay in and the other for rental income. He paid cash for both his properties (bought at different time). He is definitely one of the few I know who didn’t take a mortgage loan. He also invested in a bunch of mutual funds.

We are all in our fifties and although X is still working, he is ready to retire anytime. He still likes what he does but he knows he no longer has to work for money. He still doesn’t have high expenses and his kids will be graduating from college soon. His only luxury is that he bought himself a nice set of wheels in recent time and paid cash for it without any loan. He knows he can always sell the car at any time if he doesn’t want to continue to pay for its upkeep. The car is to celebrate his financial independence.

Although I admire his frugality, I know it is not easy to be like him. It takes a lot of discipline. Frugality definitely help someone to retire earlier. This includes being able to invest the monthly savings early so that the investment grow over time. In this case, X used a combination of rental property and mutual funds.

Unlike X as a good example of frugality, I am sure all of us have friends who have “no concept” of saving as well. They can spend every single cent in their bank account every month and even get into the credit card trap. If they do not change their ways, they will definitely have a hard time having enough to retire on, let alone retiring early. Hopefully, this article or Tri-O Retirement Plan can help them to be more discipline.

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