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DONEGANS
  • Home
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Blog

Welcome to the Donegans' blog.  Start reading for help investing, financial independence, life style design and many mini-experiments!
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The miserly millionaire

25/3/2023

 
People can be incredible cautionary tales.  We need to learn from people that have been fabulously successful in areas of their lives.  And on the converse, we need to learn where it has gone wrong.  Find the person that has messed it all up, ask to interview them and write down everything they did so we can do the opposite!

There is gold in their failures.  There are lessons that can save you decades.  Learn from other people's mistakes so you don't have to make them yourself.  
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You can learn so much from failure and we often spend more time learning from success.  For the next 6 minutes as you read the article maybe you will learn some things you can avoid. 

This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.

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Why oh why......

11/3/2023

 
I started this blog nearly 5 years and exactly 112 articles ago.  I still can't believe I have written that much.  My original purpose was to share what I have learnt in life, to help you make progress and to challenge some of the traditional bullshit that stops us all making progress. 

Has much changed over the last 5 years?  Am I still writing the blog for the same reasons?  Do I have the same why? The same purpose?  
Alan Donegan writing his first ever blog post back in 2018 in Basingstoke
Alan writing his first ever blog post back in December 2018
Recently, Katie and I have been inspired to create a mission statement and to start thinking more broadly about our why, our purpose.  That lead us to write about travelling with purpose and about uncovering your why/purpose.  

In this article we will share our why for the blog and give you some ideas as to how you can identify your why, uncovering your purpose.  Not only that but Katie also shares why she is now joining me full-time in the blog and why we are rebranding as the Donegans not just AlanDonegan.com

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How do you wake up? Purpose

4/3/2023

 
​How do you wake up each morning?  Do you wake up full of joy and excitement ready to get on with the day, drawn from bed with a passion to make a difference and do things?

Or do you wake up, hit snooze, pull up the covers and dread getting out of bed?  Do you dread Monday mornings?  Do you get the Sunday night blues?

​How you wake up, how you feel in the morning can tell you a lot about your life and the way you are thinking about it.
The Donegans - How do you wake up in the morning?
How do you wake up in the morning? Full of beans and excited to take on the world or do you want to hide under the covers and go back to sleep?
Katie and I have discovered that purpose can be the difference between either being driven, happy and full of energy or dreading the week, wishing away the hours and praying for the weekend.

If you are praying for the weekend, if you are dreading Monday then something in your life or the way you think about your life is broken.  Use how you feel in the mornings as a barometer for your success in life.

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Travel with purpose

11/2/2023

 
Why do you travel?  Are you going to "see" the country?  Taste all the foods?  Experience the sports, beaches or activities?  Are you going to meet the locals and chat to people?  Or are you going to unwind on the beach and it doesn't matter where you actually are as long as there are margaritas, sunshine and pools?

What's your purpose for travelling?
Katie Donegan, Alan Donegan, Travelling with purpose
After 4 years of travelling around the world, Katie and I have started to work out some of the things we love most about travel.  This post shares some of our ideas and comes with a HUGE offer at the end (well we think it's pretty cool, you can judge for yourself!)  

No matter whether you travel or not, want to travel in the future or not I think this article has a message that can help you.  Read Onwards.........

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What is success?

27/1/2023

 
There seems to be a measure in western society that we are all trying to live up to.  An unseen, unagreed to yard stick that we are measured against. 

Do you have a degree?  Do you have a nice car?  Do you own your own home?  Do you have pets?  Do you have kids and are married? These are the questions society (people around us) ask to find out if we are succesful. 
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Alan in a suit? Does this mean he is succesful? Intelligent? Heaven forbid respectable??
They want to know what school (university) you went to, what car you drive, where you live?  Then last one really defines you.  Which neighbourhood, which town and what location tells us everything we need to know about you.  Do you live on the right side of the tracks, do you live in the nice side of town?

Do you measure up to societies description of success or sometimes do you feel like you don't fit in?  Don't measure up? 

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Comfort, Awareness & Possibility

15/1/2023

 
You don't know what you don't know. Someone said that to me as they were trying to sell me a training course years ago and it got me thinking as well as annoying me! What does that actually mean?

There are things I take for granted now that I didn't even know existed when I was younger let alone even thought they were possible for me to achieve!  
Alan Donegan
Alan didn't even know it was possible!
Even now at 44 there is SO much that I know I don't know about, let alone the stuff I don't know I don't know! 

​How do you know what exists, how do you know what is possible for you and how do you get comfortable having a go?

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The 3 Levers of Financial Independence

9/1/2023

 
Financial independence (FI) seems like a far off lofty goal at times.  Especially if you are struggling to make ends meet, bring in money or just survive.  However, the fundamentals of financial independence are super simple.  There are three main levers for you to pull.  All the experts out there debate endlessly about how to pull them, when to pull them and why to pull them!
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This article is designed to make financial independence as simple as possible (not easy; simple) so that you know what to do next - which lever to pull and how to make progress. 

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10 years of Rebel

19/10/2022

 
Rebel Business School (RBS) is 10 years old!  I can't believe it has been 10 years since I started RBS with Simon Paine.  Of course, it wasn't called RBS back then and the course was "marginally" different, but the key principles of debt free start up and anyone can build a business and make money are still the same 10 years later!
Alan Donegan 10 years of Rebellion
To celebrate I have a huge announcement for you at the end of the article.  It is customary to give away a gift on your birthday, isn't it?

​But first, let's back up to how Rebel Business School begun and how I went from frustrated Entrepeneur to global movement. 

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PANIC: the market has crashed

10/10/2022

 
You've seen the headlines.  The market has crashed.  Stock market plunges.  Pensions in crisis! Get out now before it is too late!

The temptation to sell when you see the value of your stocks and shares wiped out is huge! In the stock market crash during Covid in April 2020, Katie and I had £184,000 (or $244,000) wiped off the value of our portfolio.   
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What should we do?  Sell before it crashes even further?  Put it all in cash under the mattress and wait for the world to return to normal?  PANIC: read the news to get insight and feel even worse afterwards? Engage with the doomsayers predicting the end of capitalism?

Here's how Katie and I have trained ourselves to react when the market drops and why doing the opposite of what everyone else does is the route to financial success.

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Donegan Update

5/10/2022

 
Can you believe it is already October?  2022 is vanishing faster than we could have imagined!  Different to our normal life posts and finance posts this post is all about The Donegans and what we have been up to.  Read on to find out about our travels, photos, learnings and courses.  All around South America and running courses around the world!
The Donegan Update October 2022

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Should I stop investing?

2/10/2022

 
Things have gone crazy in the UK. Things have gone crazy in the world markets! Our new Prime Minister decided to give tax breaks to high income earners and borrow £50bn to do it. The pound crashed against the dollar making imports and foreign travel massively more expensive and further fuelling inflation.
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My messages, email and other channels lit up with messages of doom and gloom.  The market is down! We need to stop investing!  The £ is at an all-time low against the $! Should we halt all investments until it goes back up?  Is it different this time?  It is all going to pieces!  PANIC!

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What is in VTSAX?

24/9/2022

 
Have you ever heard the term VTSAX?  If you are in the financial independence world you probably have as it is the star of the book "The Simple Path to Wealth" by JL Collins.  It is a broad-based index fund available in America (more below on British stuff) that is one of the main vehicles people use to get to financial independence. 
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But what actually is in VTSAX?  Do you know what you are buying when you get it? Obviously, Katie got excited and created some charts and graphs to show you exactly where your money goes when you buy this legendary fund!  Read on to find out exactly what is in VTSAX!

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The biggest mistake people make when they find out about FIRE

6/8/2022

 
Have you ever found out about something and got so excited you take it to the Nth degree? Do you get super passionate and go all in?  Katie (my lovely wife) gets super excited about things and then likes to go extreme.  She started CrossFit and fell in love with it and then wanted to do it every single day, whilst still doing all the exercise she was doing before.  This lasted a few weeks and she got so exhausted she had to have several afternoons in bed!
Alan Donegan at the gym.  Pushing towards financial independence
Have you ever taken something a little bit too far?
​Katie and I started a new diet in lock down in 2020 given to us by a coach, we followed it to the letter, gave it our everything and after 12 days we had lost so much weight but I was falling asleep in the afternoons from no energy.  The diet was literally stripping me of my vitality and energy and I was falling to pieces.  katie wanted to press on, I couldn't take it and we argued.  

Sometimes we all have the tendency to take things to the extreme when we find something we are passionate about. What does this all have to do with financial independence? Some people take it to the extreme when they find out about it, alienating the people around them and sacrificing happiness. 

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The 10 biggest mistakes you can make with your money

31/7/2022

 
It is tough to manage your money and get it working for you. There are financial advisors telling you they know best, there are modern finance companies trying to persuade you to give them your money, there is pressure to get into cryptocurrency and endless opportunities to invest/spend/waste your precious hard-earned money. It takes a HUGE amount of time and energy to earn money, build businesses and get ahead, and then you have to make it work for you!
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Over the last 4 years of running Rebel Finance School, Katie and I have had the honour of helping people avoid and unwind some of these mistakes. We have seen up close and personal the damage that these things do to people's financial lives.  Some have happened to us and I am sure we will make mistakes in the future!  This article is designed to help you avoid making some of the biggest mistakes we see people  making in the world of finances!

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Wealth: Luck or Process?

15/7/2022

 
The pre-course questionnaire for the Rebel Finance School asks you what you believe about money.  Over 1,000 sign-ups for our 2022 course filled it in and one of the top beliefs they held was "Realistically, chances are I will never be wealthy!"

​I find this fascinating.  Why are you signing up to a finance course if you believe you can never be wealthy?  Maybe looking for a glimmer of hope?  Maybe looking for confirmation that it is all too complex and you were right and can give up on that dream?
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Is wealth luck or a process? Do you need to win the Lottery? Can anyone copy what Katie Donegan did to get to financial independence?
After 3 years of talking about money, running the Rebel Finance School for thousands of people, and reflecting on our journey to financial independence, I can tell you that most people believe their only routes to wealth are:

  1. Winning the lottery (slim chances but why not, it is only a few quid each month)
  2. Inheritance  (maybe great Aunt Tilda will die and leave me money)
  3. Building a business and selling it (but I can't do this as it takes money to make money)
  4. The latest get rich quick scheme (of course they convince themselves that it's legit and it'll work for them!)

Is wealth really a game of chance or can anyone do it?

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The Binman who is 50% Financially Independent

4/7/2022

 
How much does it actually cost to get to financial independence? Do you need millions in the bank? When is enough actually enough?  Do you even believe you can do it?

Most of our beliefs about what is possible or not come from society not from an internal belief of possiblity!
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​In 2016, Katie and I travelled to Ecuador to learn about financial independence and investing.  Before we got to Chautauqua (the retreat) with JL Collins, the Mad Fientist and Mr Money Mustache, we stopped at the beach a few days beforehand to relax. Mompiche, a small fishing village in North Western Ecaudor, is stunning! We were staying right on the beach and each night we sat there drinking hot chocolate, watching the waves roll in as the sun set over the bay.
Interestingly, one of the most important lessons we learned on this trip was from a surfer who was staying at the same surf shack as us. But how, exactly, did a surfing binman (garbage man) from Italy end up 50% financially independent?

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How do I calculate my savings rate?

29/6/2022

 
How much of the money you earn do you save and invest? Do you save any of the money that you earn each month? 

The average savings rate in the United Kingdom is 6%. In the USA it is 7.9%. Do you know if you are saving more or less than that?
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Do you save more money than the average person? Do you save less money than the average person? Do you know how much you’re saving?

Your savings rate is one of the key indicators of when you can retire! Knowing this number you can predict how long you have to work in paid employment. We can predict your retirement date based on this number. 

Created 11th August 2020. Updated May 31st 2022. Updated 19th June 2022

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How to track your finances

19/6/2022

 
The sun is shining with clear blue skies over Lake Chelan in East Washington State.  Katie and I are sat at Cambell's Resort where we have come for a friend's wedding.  

It is the last day of the month and you know what that means?  Month end and our monthly finance meeting!  Katie and I get excited for days beforehand and planning our monthly finance meeting! 
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One of our highlights of the month is the monthly finance meeting. Katie and I get excited days beforehand, and actively spend time planning our monthly finance meeting. We find a cool location for a wonderful breakfast or brunch, open the spreadsheet and input the numbers and work out which direction our finances are going in!

This is the exact opposite of most of the population who don't like to look at their finances at all; scared of what they might find.  Your average person uses the "bury your head in the sand strategy" to manage their finances; with an occasional peek at the current account to see if they can afford things.  

If the saying "what get's measured; gets improved" is true; then why are so many people so scared of looking at their personal finances??

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Is it risky to invest in the stock market?

15/6/2022

 
People think I am a huge risk taker.  I remember being sat in a Rebel Business School event talking about starting businesses and one of the participants said to me, "It's alright for you, Alan; you are a risk taker!"  I was shocked as this is not how I see myself.  I see myself as quite risk averse; I don't like big risks with my money, with my business or with my life.  I like to play it safe in so many ways.
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This got me thinking, "Am I a risk taker?"  What does the rest of the world see as risky that I see as the safe bet?

Do you think it is risky to start a business?  Do you think it is risky to invest in the stock market?  Do you think the safe thing to do is to get a job and stay there for the rest of your life?

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Wealthify review

25/5/2022

 
Recently we were approaching investing and finance companies looking for sponsors for the Rebel Finance School to help us reach more people and do more good in the world.  One of the companies we found was Wealthify and they seemed to have a great mission to simplify investing and help people make the most of their investments and pensions.  On the surface it looked fabulous
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We set up a call to speak to them and before we chatted we did a deep dive on their strategies and investment returns.  Katie and I were SHOCKED with what we found.  We wrote to Wealthify, cancelling the meeting. They asked for feedback, why did we cancel?  We sent the feedback and their response was "we are going to have to agree to disagree." 

Wealthify has 30,000 customers and they are out there actively marketing (in my opinion unethically) for new customers.   I decided to write an open letter to their CEO Andy Russell. 

If you have been thinking of investing with Wealthify read this first........

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How much are you worth?

24/5/2022

 
Updated: 8th June 2022

I know; you are priceless.  Just like the rest of us!  That isn't quite what I meant.  Actually there are a lot of answers to this question.  When you start a business there is a decision of what to charge (your worth), there is a self-confidence answer (self-worth) and there is a personal finance answer of your net-worth.

Can you confidently tell me you net-worth in £GBP or $USD?

Most people we ask this question to don't really know.  They start adding up, how much is my house worth? What is my car worth?
Alan Donegan pockets stuffed full of cash
Do you know your net-worth?
How do you calculate your net-worth?  The first step to change is to take a good look at where you are right now.  If you don't know your starting point it is difficult to know if the change you are creating is moving you in the right direction or not.  If you can't clearly give a £ or $ figure for your net-worth then this article will help you figure it out.

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Donegan Update May'22

17/5/2022

 
Nearly falling of a mountain, launching Rebel Finance School, visiting coffee farms to start a Rebel Coffee brand, picking a fight with the banks and so much more.  The Donegans have been busy and learning lots along the way.  

This post is rather egotistically about us (my most uncomfortable subject) and what we have learnt along the way.  If you are looking for investing or Rebel Finance School then skip this post and click there. 
Alan and Katie Donegan
The Donegans in the storm on the first day in Montevideo, Uruguay.
The picture to the right is from today outside our hotel in Montevideo, Uruguay.  We landed as a cyclone started to batter the coast of Uruguay.  Let's start at the beginning of 2022........

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Stop pushing debt on us

10/5/2022

 
When I was a young, I was forced to go to court to save my family's home from repossession.   My father had taken out loans for his business totalling £3.6M and secured them against our house.

When the business failed, he couldn’t repay the loans and the banks came after our house and took us to court. 

Trying to argue against a trained bank barrister (Mr Bond) in court was futile with a judge that had no patience with us. 
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Watching the judge's gavel come down after he ordered a repossession was the worst moment of my life.   My Mum cried, I shouted at the judge he was wrong and we were told we had 1 month to move out. 

But we appealed and I represented the family in court as we couldn’t afford a lawyer. I learned as much as I could about law, made my case and we settled getting enough back for my Mum to have somewhere to live. . 

Ever since then, I've always seen debt as a dangerous thing. I've met many other people who have suffered. Some of them have lost everything.  Debt doesn’t just harm the debtors - it hurts their family, too. 

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Guide to ESG Index funds

19/3/2022

 
When Katie and I ran the second Rebel Finance School we had over 450 people attending and one of the questions we got asked the most was about ESG funds.  Should we invest in them?  What are they?  Do you recommend them?  

Let's start with what ESG means; it stands for Environmental, Social, Governance.  The idea is that the fund is made up of companies that are more ethical, more sustainable, better for the environment and better run than other companies.

The hope is that by investing only in the ethical companies we can make the world a better place whilst creating a profit. 
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Sounds like a good idea but my biggest concern is that this leads to stock picking and therefore worse performance (profit for us) over time.  Katie and I wanted to dig into my preconceived notions and ideas to find out the truth behind ESG funds and all the hype that surrounds them!

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Building Version 1 - mini-experiments

18/3/2022

 
How do you get to version 1 of your business, product, service or project?  How do you take an idea and turn it into something real?

I have had several failed attempts at writing a book including one that lost me a job!  It has always been in my mind as a way to reach and help more people and to be able to share my message with a wider audience. 

I failed for many reasons, lack of focus, lack of time, not enjoying the editing process and more.  In the past I never pushed through to actually get version 1 of my book out into the world!
Alan Donegan pretending to read a blank note book to get a good picture for the blog
Alan looking surprised at a blank page in a Captain America Note Book
Recently an opportunity came my way that I could not pass up and I want to share it with you as well as some ideas about mini-experiments. 

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