In this report, I will share 16 Retire Early Hail Mary Passes When Time is Running Out.
My retirement nest egg dropped in half during the 2008 worldwide recession. The 2008 crash happened when I was about 49 years old. The crash happened at a terrible time for me. You see, I was expecting the nest egg to double over the next 10 years so I could retire early at age 59. But instead, my nest egg dropped in half in 2008.
So, instead of retiring early in 10 years at age 59, I was wondering if I would ever be able to retire. So I began to read about ways to save my retirement before I ran out of time. When I look back now, I think of these retirement strategies I was reading about like they were Hail Mary passes in American Football to save my retirement at the last minute.
Americans will immediately know what I am talking about, but others may need a short explanation.
In American Football, a Hail Mary Pass is a come-from-behind strategy that is used to win a game when the clock is running out. The guy with the football, or Quarter Back, takes the snap and throws the football in the air as far as possible toward the end zone.
Then everybody on his team prays to god that one of his teammates catches the ball in the end zone for the final touchdown of the game as the clock runs out. It is called the Hail Mary Pass because everyone is praying for Saint Mary to help win the game.
So a retirement Hail Mary pass is a come-from-beyond strategy to save our retirement when we are running out of time. We no longer have the time for normal investments to compound, so we are hoping a Hail Mary pass will save our retirement.
You see, if you start saving and investing in your 20s or even 30s and you don’t touch the nest egg while it grows, your savings and investments will compound over time and you won’t need to throw any hail mary passes. But when the clock is running out, you have to think of something else, so you don’t have to work until you drop dead.
But there I was at 49 years old having just watched my retirement nest egg drop in half, so I started looking around for hail mary retirement passes.
16 Retire Early Hail Mary Passes When Time is Running Out
I learned that there was essentially two different kinds of hail mary passes I could throw as time was running out. The first kind of hail mary passes reduces your cost of living so you don’t need as much money as you thought to retire. I will call those lower-your-cost-of-living hail marys.
The second kind of hail mary passes, is actions you can take that will increase your retirement income stream if you are successful at them. I will cover the lower cost of living hail mary passes first.
Lower Cost of Living Hail Marys
These lower cost-of-living Hail Marys can be mixed and matched together in various ways as needed to lower your cost of living to match your lower retirement nest egg. They are difficult because they require you to make lifestyle changes to reduce your cost of living. The four largest expenses in retirement are food, rent, healthcare, and transportation.
One. Grow Your Own Food: There are people around the world that grow their own food. That can include fruits, vegetables, and meats such as chicken for food or eggs. If you can get access to land, such as around your home or some other land, you may be able to reduce your food bill substantially by growing your own food. You can start learning about this one before you retire so your first few crops come in before you quit working.
Two. Move to Cheaper Area in Your Home Country: If you are living in a relatively expensive part of your home country, consider moving to an area where the cost of living is much lower. Often smaller towns in more remote areas have cheaper rents. They may also have more land around the dwelling that you can use to grow your own food. Plus there is lots of data online that can help you find lower cost of living areas such as published rental properties and land costs. You could even use the next idea to help you find a place that you really love by slow traveling around your home country cheaply for a few years.
Three. Van Life: During the Pandemic in the USA, thousands of Americans began traveling around the USA in small recreational vehicles and van conversions. Many spent most of the year on National Forest Lands, BLM lands, and camping grounds. The cost of living on such land is often free or much lower when compared to large urban areas. These less populated parts of the USA are also places where rents are lower. If you were to try out Van Life for a few months or years, you may locate a remote area or a small town in the USA that you love dearly. So Van Life could be a temporary solution for you that helps you find your favorite place in your home country to settle down for cheap retirement. Then you can transition from Van Life to your favorite cheap place to live in your home country.
By trying out Van Life, you could also find out that you love living Van Life. Some people decide to just keep doing it indefinitely. You might learn that you are a natural-born nomad that enjoys slow traveling around your home country. Or you could end up loving a little of both? Maybe you will slow travel for parts of each year and stay in places that you love once or twice a year for a few months each. There are no rules. You are the captain of your destiny. I have a detailed report on this idea you can see. Here is an interview I did on Van Life.
Four. Slow Travel The World in the Low Cost of Living Countries: I used this technique to save my early retirement. It is pretty simple. You just move slowly forward through the world without buying round-trip tickets. Instead of flying home between countries, you just move forward from one country to the next adjacent country in the low-cost-of-living areas of the world like SE Asia, Latin America, and eastern Europe. In each country, you spend a few weeks or a few months in each city or area that you find interesting. When you find an area you love, you stay longer. When a place is not your cup of tea, you move along sooner. I left the United States in 2007 and I have lived in and visited 67 countries so far. The overwhelming majority of that time I have spent living in countries that are substantially cheaper than my home country the United States.
As I slowly travel the world, I write reports about my favorite places to retire cheap in each country. I post them on my web page VagabondBuddha.com so other people can save time and energy learning about the world. Once I have visited everywhere on earth that I am interested in, I may start spending more time in only my favorite cities. If I really fall in love with one particular place along the way, I may settle down there in the future. That is the next technique I will discuss.
Five. Retire Cheap in Paradise Overseas: Every year, thousands of Americans, Europeans, Australians, and many other people retire outside their home country. Many are doing it just because they love experiencing new cultures, but all of them love spending less money every month since it helps them increase the chances they won’t run out of money in retirement. One day I too may settle down in one of my favorite low-cost-of-living countries overseas.
Once I have found my favorite place in the world, I may quit slow traveling, and establish a base location where I spend 9 to 10 months of every year. I will get a retirement visa and a house I love. As a minimalist, I will furnish it sparsely and settle down for a few years or maybe longer. But I will probably still travel a few months of each year since I love exploring. However, even though I will be traveling less per year, If I ever find a place I love more than my base location, then I can always pull up roots and establish that new place as my base location. There are no rules. The world is my oyster. I have hundreds of reports about all of the best places around the world along with my tricks and tips for living overseas for the last 16 years. Grab my free eBook at the end of this video and I will include a bonus video that explains all of our resources teaching how to retire cheaply in paradise overseas.
Six. Buy Cheap Land in a Remote Area and Build or Move a Mobile Home There: Another really cheap way of living I have thought about is buying some cheap land in a remote location somewhere in the world either in my home country or overseas, and building a small simple home on it or moving a small modular home onto it. In some parts of the world, foreigners can not own land. That is okay if I really love it. In that case, I would pay cash for a long-term lease (20-30 years). I would find a local attorney to write a bulletproof long-term lease with the landowner. Then I would I grow my own fruits and vegetables and other foods on the land so my living expenses would be minimal. I would put a link to the full report on this idea below.
Seven. House Sitting All Over the World: I once interviewed a couple that lives very cheaply by house-sitting all over the world. They just move from house to house taking care of the places until the owner comes back. They even shared the webpage they use to find new houses. They water plants, take care of animals and get to stay for free sometimes for months at a time. I will put a link to that interview in case you want to learn more. Essentially, they spend 10 or months of each year traveling around the world house sitting paying no rent at all in trade for taking care of someone’s house while they are out of town. Many of the places they have stayed while house-sitting where places that would be very expensive to visit if they had to pay rent. So house sitting is not limited to low-cost living parts of the world.
Eight. Elderly Care: I read an article online once about a lady that moved into an elderly couple’s house and performed daily tasks like grocery shopping, cooking, and cleaning in return for free food and a place to stay plus a small salary that she could save for her won retirement. Because all of her expenses were taken care of, she was able to save almost 100% of the small salary they were paying her.
The second kind of hail mary strategy is an action you can take that increases your retirement income stream. Now we continue at number 9 of the 16 Retire Early Hail Mary Passes When Time is Running Out.
Increased Retirement Income Hail Marys
Nine. Teach What You Love Most: Since I was a child I always knew I would travel the world one day but I thought it wouldn’t happen until retirement age. But in 2010, 2 years after the 2008 market crash, after my retirement nest egg had dropped in half, I was working remotely on my laptop slow traveling all around the world. So, by 2017, I had already lived in most of the best retire cheap in paradise locations around the world. And I really love living this way.
So I started Vagabond Buddha to teach people what I love most. I love living all over the world for much less than I thought possible. So not only do I get to live the life of my childhood dreams, but I also get paid to teach other people how to do it. My income from teaching what I love online was eventually more than I was making working remotely on my laptop for other people. So now I just travel the world and teach other people what I know about traveling the world cheaply. Plus, I have a course that teaches people how to make money online doing what they love most. So I have increased my income by teaching other people what I love most.
But slow travel and where to retire cheaply in paradise overseas is just one of the many kinds of things that people teach online. There are hundreds of things people teach how to do online and there is a good chance that what you love most can be taught online for extra money. I even have a course that teaches how to do that.
Ten. Teaching English Online: I have met many people that make money teaching English online. Since all you need is a computer or smartphone and an Internet connection, you can do this one from anywhere in the world, even in your home country. I will put links to 3 video interviews below where you can listen to people I have interviewed that are making money teaching English online. In one of the videos the interviewee explains that no college degree is even necessary and that he doesn’t even really teach anything. He just has conversations with people from all over the world online that are working on their conversational English abilities including vocabulary and pronunciation. So he just talks to people online for a few hours per day, usually on weekends and evenings. I have placed links to those interviews below. Video one. Video two. Video three.
Eleven. Working Longer: I have met many people that delayed their retirement for a few years in order to have more money in retirement. For example, I am an American. If I take my social security now at age 62, I would receive $1575 per month. But if I delay 8 years until age 70, my monthly check will automatically increase to $2727 per month. So by waiting 8 more years before taking my check, I will receive 73% more money every month. Plus, the money I am making teaching what I love online pays for all of my living expenses, so I am not suffering a reduced lifestyle at while my retirement nest egg continues to build and my social security check continues to grow. You can find out more about your social security check at https://www.ssa.gov/myaccount/.
Twelve. Become a Digital Nomad: A digital nomad is someone that works on their computer making money online while they travel the world. I have been doing that since 2007. When I left the USA in 2007, I started working as an employee for a company in India. In 2010, I quit that job because I didn’t want to sit at a desk anymore. Luckily they agreed to let me work remotely as an independent consultant, so I could travel the world with only my laptop as my office. But later, in 2018, I was able to leave that industry completely and start teaching what I love–how to retire cheaply overseas. So I was working remotely before the title digital nomad was invented.
But now there are thousands of digital nomads all over the world providing hundreds of different kinds of services for large and small companies. Such things as editing, screenplays, translation, research, writing music, search engine optimization, Internet marketing, teaching, managing projects, software engineers, lawyers, accountants, reading digital medical images, data entry administrative work, sales, surveys, and just about anything else you can imagine. My hobby income course can show you how to make money in any of these niches or you can just go to web pages like this one to find projects to work on. But eventually, you will need to build a brand so money flows to you without having to bid on project work. That is what a niche web page and Youtube channel can do for you. I teach about that in my hobby income course.
Thirteen. Selling On Amazon: Before I started teaching what I love to make money, I tried selling products on Amazon. Even though I was making money selling products on Amazon, I eventually quit. Amazon changed its rules periodically in ways that were annoying its private sellers. Then I started reading online about some of the complaints private sellers have about Amazon. Once I read what people were sharing online about Amazon, I decided I didn’t want to be in business with them anymore. If you are curious about all the reasons I quit selling on Amazon, I have a video about that also.
Fourteen. Become an Airbnb Host: In almost every country around the world that I have visited, I have met foreigners living there that have built small Airbnb businesses. They often do not even own the properties they rent out on Airbnb. They just rent apartments or small houses from the property owner, sparsely furnish the properties with used furniture, and then post them for rent on Airbnb. Because they often speak better English than the locals and because they know exactly what western foreigners want in a short-term rental, they often quickly become Superhosts on Airbnb and can charge higher rents than the local competition on Airbnb. Then as soon as they have a steady stream of income on their first Airbnb, they start a second one, then a third, etc. I have seen this over and over again all over the world. This is often as straightforward and simple as it seems, but check local laws before doing this.
Fifteen. Starting Business: Many retirees start businesses in foreign countries. They can often get a small restaurant started with much little money than at home. Some also import different kinds of food they miss from home and start selling it to other foreigners. I have also met two foreigners from Europe that started brewing beers in their home and sharing it with friends as a hobby. But then when the demand got strong, they started brewing beer and selling it to the public. Other foreigners start Scuba diving businesses, foreign language schools, surfing lessons, kiteboarding lessons, cooking schools, and tour companies to make money for overseas retirement, but do check local laws before getting started. I am including a few interviews below of foreigners that have started these kinds of businesses. Video One. Video Two. Video Three.
Now it is time for the last of the 16 Retire Early Hail Mary Passes When Time is Running Out.
Sixteen. Film Yourself Doing Your Favorite Hobby: Recently there has been an explosion in YouTubers that do their favorite hobby online while filming themselves so other people learning that hobby can save time and money learning how to do it. Many get enough views to get a monthly check from Youtube. Others, like me, also make additional money selling membership subscriptions. Just Google your favorite hobby on Youtube and you will see what I mean. Also, I will put a video below that shows you how I make up to $14,000 per month doing my hobby online.
Well, that includes my report on 16 Retire Early Hail Mary Passes When Time is Running Out. This is Dan of Vagabond Awake, the Youtube channel for VagabondBuddha.com. The world is your home, what time will you be home for dinner?