In December of 2016, I officially called it quits from full-time work. Hopefully, forever. I remember my last day vividly – I did virtually nothing that was work-related. My manager allowed me to ride out the last day on the company’s overhead budget to free up some project money, and away I went.
I took a few moments to reflect on what was happening. I had done it. Finally. After all those months of saving and investing, through all those times I would have done virtually anything to just quit that day, I made it to the end. It was surreal, but not entirely unexpected. It was cool, though.
Super cool.
Today, I sit in our little 200 square foot Airstream after spending an entire year free. Free from full-time work. No meetings. Not a single performance review. No real need for an alarm clock. I was the master of my own destiny, and I sure as hell made it count.

After one year of early retirement
If you’re wondering whether or not this whole early retirement business is all that it’s cracked up to be, then let me answer that question first.
Yes. Hell yes, it is.
It’s a remarkable feeling of control, each and every day. It didn’t take long before I forgot entirely that I didn’t have any major income coming in. That part just didn’t matter. My wife – the money master in the family – worked the budget so we were able to travel the country and have fun doing it.
I almost never got bored, but that’s also because I had set up a plan of attack. I knew what I wanted to do with myself before I quit. That’s essential. If you have no hobbies, then you probably won’t be happy sitting at home doing nothing. Doing nothing isn’t what early retirement is all about.
Here’s what kept me busy
Full-time travel – As most of you know, we sold both of our homes and travel the country for a living. Full-time. Our Airstream is our home. Yes, our only home. We pulled out of the KOA in Tucson, AZ April 1st and began our new lives of travel.
This kind of lifestyle tends to keep ya busier than normal.
The United States is a beautiful country, and our plan is to see it. Valley of Fire, Bryce Canyon, the Great Salt Lake, the Oregon Coast and the waterfalls along the Columbia River Gorge were stunning.
Idaho, actually, was WAY more beautiful than I had thought. You often hear the bigger-named states like Montana and Colorado as beautiful (and they are, at least in some areas), but Idaho surprised us a bit. It’s on our short list of where we might look to invest in property down the line.
Here are just a few of my favorite snapshots from our travels this year.




Rockstar Finance – For damn near the entire year of 2016, I worked closely with J$ as his primary technical resource. I built out the entire Rockstar Directory from scratch (with J$ delivering the vision, of course). I’m also an administrator over on the Rockstar Forums and serve as the technical dude behind the entire Rockstar system of websites. It’s been incredibly fun, and it’s amazing to me what we’ve been able to build in a relatively short time.
Big things are ahead on this front. 2018 is going to be an amazing year.
YouTube channel – My wife and I spend time running a growing YouTube channel called A Streamin’ Life. I’m the one filming the majority of the videos, and I’m also the guy who edits the videos and puts together the final product. Talking videos only take about 30 minutes to edit, but hiking and exploration videos can take hours to edit with music. It’s fun, though!
My wife is the pretty face in front of the camera, and she’s also the visionary behind the channel. She’s the one coming up with ideas for the videos, responding to comments and generally just being the face of the channel.
At over 5,500 subscribers, we are extremely excited about the possibilities of that channel and where it might go. We’ve doubled our subscriber count over the past year. It’s a sign that we’re doing something right. Lots of ideas brewin’.
I also designed a custom 2018 mini-calender that’s selling pretty well. It’s filled with the best of my photography from our travels this year. It brings in a tiny bit of income, but it was super satisfying to put together!
As you can tell, I’ve been busy, but not too busy where I’ve felt overwhelmed by the work I was doing. There is a balance that needs to be maintained throughout early retirement. The idea is to keep that buttery sweet feeling of freedom and combine it with satisfying work that makes you feel productive, accomplished and useful.
The need for income
I cannot put my finger on why, but I’ve always felt the need to maintain a little cash flow in early retirement. We don’t need the money. In fact, the market increased our net worth by around $40,000 during the summer of 2016. But still, I can’t seem to shake the feeling that we need cash flow.
Instead of fighting it, I’m embracing it. It doesn’t need to be much. A few hundred here and there takes care of that feeling for me. I switched out the ads on this blog from Google AdSense to Mediavine, which has made a drastic difference in revenue (in the neighborhood of four to five times more revenue after the switch). This blog is now at the point of producing fairly dependable income that’s not exactly chump change.
Our YouTube channel brings in some money as well, though not quite as much as the blog at the moment. As we gain subscribers and viewers, that only stands to increase. We have no plans to start affiliate marketing or accepting sponsorships on YouTube. That’s not what we want to turn the channel in to, at least at this point.
And, any IT work I do brings in a little income as well, but they are projects that I enjoy doing. It keeps my mind in the IT game a bit, too.
On average, we’ve brought in between $800 and $1,000 a month in early retirement doing things that we thoroughly enjoy. We don’t feel stressed. We don’t feel like we have a “job”. We’re working on things we enjoy, and the added cash flow is never a bad thing, especially when we have another 40 or 50 years of our lives ahead of us!
In the midst of writing this report, I tried my very best to include the negatives too. But honestly, there aren’t many. We had a tire blowout driving 70 MPH through Utah earlier in the summer. We bottomed-out our Airstream getting out of a steep slope, causing some minor damage to the rear end. But other than that, the needle has been pegged on happy.

I don’t miss my job. Like, not even close. I don’t miss anything about it, really. I’m as productive as I ever was because my interests have always lied outside of the office. That’s helped a bunch. It’s easy to keep busy.
So far, so good!
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Congrats on the outstanding year Steve!
I recently got back from a 6 month trip around the country in our 25 foot Flying Cloud Airstream. Our paths probably crossed as we were in many of the same locales. We’ll be traveling through Canada next summer and hopefully can meet you in person at a sweet boondocking site sometime. Enjoy the views from the road!
Nice! And yup, our paths probably did cross. Small world. We’d love to see more of Canada in the future too.
Ha, I like the title of the post, as if you’re boss is sitting you down for a little chat.
Huge congrats. You have some great income streams there, and as you said they’re only going to improve. But unlike a W-2 job you don’t have to constantly push to make them improve. You just sit back, enjoy the “work”, and realize that oh yeah, I also get paid a little for this!
I’m finding my side hustles to be the same. I enjoy them and want to see the money they bring in go up, but if it doesn’t, then that’s great too. They’re fun.
Thanks! And yup, definitely no W-2 jobs!
Sounds like a thoroughly successful first year living the dream! I listen to people’s conversation at work about retiring and just shake my head on the inside when I hear co-worker A tell co-worker B who is planning to retire at 55 “gosh isn’t that so early? Won’t you be bored?”
It’s absolutely sad if your JOB is the only thing that you have in your life. Dangerous, too, in my humble opinion. That’s a single point of failure! 🙂
How did I miss that you have a YouTube chanel?!? I need to got check it out! I have enjoyed following your adventure this year, I look forward to seeing what 2018 brings!
Thanks Mrs. AR! Yup, got the YouTube channel too…’cause, why not? 🙂
Your photos are incredible (I’m adding Bryce Canyon to my bucket list)! It’s great to hear that you’re loving early retirement. Hearing the positive experiences of others in the FIRE community definitely keeps me motivated as I pursue the same goal.
Thanks! Yup, definitely add Bryce Canyon. Definitely out of this world landscape. 🙂
Can’t believe it’s been a year already, wow that went fast. All about having a plan and executing it. That’s important no matter what age you retire. I often hear stories of people following their dreams/passions and money usually follows. Continued success Steve!
I know, time sure does fly. And yup, I’ve heard the very same thing.
Steve,
I’m so glad to hear that, you had a fantastic year! “Free from full-time work. No meetings. Not a single performance review.”, this is really cool. I retired 2.5 years ago from the IT field, and just love the retirement life. No regrets at all. Wish you the best for the coming year!
Thanks Helen!
Congrats on your successes in the first year! My wife and I are both retiring at the age of 50 from running our own service businesses. We joke that the only employee we want in retirement is a waiter!
I’ve got that same need for cash flow feeling so planning on building our blog & youtube channel as we start our journey across the country. Thanks for the motivation!
You’re welcome, and thanks for dropping by! I completely understand no more employees. 🙂
Congrats on your 1 year retire-versary! Our first year was less productive than yours 🙂 I spent most of it building an app for a non-profit, voluntary and travelling around the world. I loved it! Like you I feel ZERO regrets (and as you said, it’s mostly due to knowing exactly what we’ll be doing in retirement). Now that we’re past year 2, we’re busier than we were in year 1. One thing we realized that’s different in year 2 compared to year 1 is the explosive growth in community and connections you build. We ended up meeting a lot of FIRE people all over the world and at events like Chautauqua and FinCon. So you have more community and connections to look forward to 🙂 Though you probably already get lots of that from being the admin for the RockStar Forums and building out the directory. Super cool!
Looking forward to hearing more about your travels!
Thanks FIRECracker! Definitely sounds like you’re productive as well – and as long as you’re enjoying what you’re doing, that’s really all that matters. Looking forward to year #2!
I bet this is your most favorite performance review that you’ve ever done haha! Love the pics. We were damn close to Idaho this summer, we have friends that live in Dillon MT. They wanted to take us over there, maybe next time. Beautiful country though for sure. All the best Steve.
Thanks! Yup, favorite by far. We passed through Dillon I believe, though I don’t remember a lot of it. Didn’t stay for long.
Congrats on the wonderful year you’ve had Steve!
You don’t need much to be happy. It’s actually a very simple concept but many people fail to understand it. They have their big houses, big cars and huge expenses that requires them to keep working in order to afford everything they have now. But are they truly happy? I think majority of them definitely aren’t happy.
Planning your finances, being frugal and living a life where you have control over everything that you do, that’s true happiness. Glad you are enjoying it!
So very true, Terence. I had a LOT of toys in a previous life that I thought made me happy. But in the end, I still just didn’t feel like I was leading a fulfilling life. Now, though, that’s all changed…big time. 🙂
Sounds like it’s been a great year!
I think I’ll have an issue mentally getting over that “I’m no longer earning any money” hump. My solution is, once the house is paid off, ease into it by going part-time. The goal ultimately is to continue to consult ~20 hrs a week, 6 months out of the year. That leaves a TON of time for travel, and if I can get the hourly rate I THINK I can, will be more than enough to pay for our bare-bones expenses. If not totally at least pretty significantly.
Yup, going part-time is an excellent way to ease into it. In fact, you might like that situation so well that you don’t even stop working part-time. Nothing wrong with that!
That’s a great review. Nice job and keep it up.
I’m sure the 2nd year will be just as great. We should explore Idaho more. We drove to Boise once, but that’s just a tiny part of the state. Boise is pretty nice. It’s not too busy.
We thought the same thing about Boise, though it was super hot when we were there. We didn’t spend a lot of time in the city itself, though. More around Idaho Falls and Rigby.
It has been a joy following your exploits, Steve. Can’t wait to see where 2018 takes you. Keep on keepin’ on!
Us too! Appreciate the follow, my friend!
Congrats on your first year of freedom, Steve and Courtney!
Where are all the blogs from people who regret retiring early? I’ve think I’ve got a catchy acronym for them. We’ve got FIRE. They’ve got:
Retired
Early
Got
Restless
Employed
Today
Cheers!
-PoF
Hah! I absolutely love it. I wonder if a blog out there exists about regretting early retirement. I’d actually LOVE to read that perspective.
You’re killing us. You know that, right?
Yeah…I should have put that under the “Needs Improvement” section of my performance review. 😉
Yeah, right? “Empathy” comes to mind as one of the Critical Success Factors (CSF’s) you should develop to achieve your Full Business Potential of leadership within our company. Hang with me, Steve, I’ll teach you the ropes of crushing corporate Performance Reviews. Oh wait, YOU DON’T CARE anymore, do you! Only 179 days till I join you in that green pasture, looking forward to it!
Wow, Fritz – I can tell you’ve spent some time managing people! 🙂
We’ll definitely need to meet up somewhere out there. And after retirement, you won’t have any excuse for ditching me when we swing through! 😉
Congrats Steve. As someone that’s years away from FIRE, It’s inspiring to read your post RE perspective on life. Keep the updates coming.
Thanks Jason! And, will do.
A year well spent! It’s interesting how busy retirement life can be.
For a while, I also felt the need to have some kind of income. Even had dreams about needing to go back to work. It’s a big change going from “needing” a job to spending time pursuing passions regardless of cash. I’m getting more and more comfortable with it as time passes 🙂
Cheers to a good first year, and here’s to many more!
Thanks you, good sir!
Congrats Steve, glad to hear you guys are loving the early retirement life! Love how many projects you guys are plugged into and the amazing photos of your travels.
Thanks Matt. No boredom here, that’s for darn sure! Appreciate the comment about the photos. 🙂
Ahh such a grand life!!!! I feel the same way as you – even if we retire I still need some source of income/cash flow.
I think you are essentially living my bestie’s dream life, retired and traveling in something with wheels! If I sent her this post, she would probably hate me. She still hasn’t gotten over Michelle making 900k a year either when I showed her that post.
Hah! Thanks Lily. This lifestyle isn’t for everyone, but it sure does feel awfully freeing. 🙂
Congrats on your first year Steve! You guys seem really busy. Nice performance review btw!
Believe it or not, today marks my 2 year anniversary! Been at it two years now and still loving it.
Very cool! You’re a veteran compared to me. What keeps you busy, Mr. Tako?
Awesome performance review, I think you have been fulfilling this ‘job’ very successfully!
Every time I see your pictures the itch to go back to the States, but than for slow travel, is coming up again.
Although we’re not there yet on our journey, getting cashflow is our most important aspect of it. We invest only in income producing assets to shorten the time to FI, and to still have cashflow coming in once we reached it.
Bingo – definitely sounds like you’re doing it the right way. That cash flow will feel super nice after you call it quits. 🙂
Awesome recap! Hoping I can peg my happiness needle on high when I FIRE as well!
I bet you will! Have any hobbies? 😉
So cool! I’ve been hoping you would write a year of FI wrap up – another piece of evidence to give the husband that ‘hey, we can do this soon and it’s not crazy’. So thank you for that. It was great to meet you two berry picking in OR. I’m still eating the marionberry jam I made that weekend.
You’re very welcome, and yes, I remember that Oregon trip very well and meeting you. Those Marionberries were out of sight! 🙂
This is all well and good, but your TPS reports are always late and your billable hours are below the group average. It you want to receive a “meets expectations” performance review next year, you’re gonna have to do better.
Yeah, but I didn’t get the memo. Can you make sure I get another copy?
Well that was a fast year! We started talking about working together on Rockstar right before you were going to quit! In fact, we were working on the first version of the Directory over holiday break, right?
Yup, I think it was right around that time. Time flies when you’re having fun, eh? 🙂
Glad it’s going so well Steve. Stories like this definitely help make the path easier to endure.
Thanks Fervent! Awesome to hear that my story might actually be helping. 🙂
I actually found you through your work on the Rockstar Directory but hadn’t made it over here. I didn’t realize we had so much in common with you guys. My last day of full time work was October 31st, 2016 at 36. We bought an RV and spent a month traveling around in it this summer. I’ve also struggled with feeling the need for continued cash flow even if intellectually we know we don’t necessarily need it. Like you said, I need to do something with the next 40 or 50 years!
Also, Ellen was just telling me tonight that I should write an article recapping our first full year. xD
Hah! Great minds think alike, right? Very cool that you retired so young, and I know you aren’t missing anything about work either, eh?
Hey, Steve. It’s been a little over a year now for Mrs. G and I since we said goodbye to work. And to tell you the truth, we haven’t been bored one minute. In fact, on most days, we run out of hours before we run out of the things we WANT to do. And I laughed out loud when you mentioned performance reviews. I forgot all about that annoying ritual. I certainly don’t miss them as well, Anyway, glad you and Courtney had a kick-ass year. Looking forward to what adventures come your way in 2018. Cheers.
Congrats, Steve! The best performance review I’ve ever read. On to year 2, may it be even better!
Thanks Amy! Agreed, let year 2 be even better. 🙂
Congrats on your first year of early retirement!! Can’t beat going driving around this great country in an Airstream. Need to check out Bryce Canyon soon(along with Arches), that’s an awesome picture you have of Bryce.
I always forget that you guys have a YouTube channel, gonna check it out during the holidays!!
Thanks Kris. Yup, it’s been a blast thus far. Looking forward to seeing what year two brings.
I love when people live ful time and are proud and happy about it
Congrats! I love reading how it worked out with side income, even if you left with a little under what others do. Skills pay the bills!
Don’t miss work, even a little bit? Then why are you doing a performance review? Lawyered
Steve – inspiring post.
I’ve never understood the questions about “what will you do with yourself if you retire so early?”
When I hear incredulous questions like that I always wonder what the questioners are doing with themselves now.
Congratulations on your retirement!!!
These photos are AWESOME, and I had no idea beaches in Oregon could look like the Caribbean!? I am nowhere close to retirement year (only 25) but stories like yours inspire my fiancée and I everyday!
We also have the dream of one day being able to road trip across the entire country and visit every state, and see everything that each has to offer!
Great job Steve. You are living the dream. You are proof that FIRE can be achieved if you are willing to make the required sacrifices to get there. The photos look amazing.
I have always enjoyed your content on your blog and learned a fair bit along the way. I also need to say thank-you for the behind the scenes work at Rockstar Finance as I have benefited from both the directory and forums greatly. You share an honest approach to your experiences and to me that is most important.
By the way, you forgot to mention the visual transformations your blog went through on it’s look and layout as well. That was one of my favorite things from 2017 you did.
It looks like you guys have had a really great first year of retirement. I love the photos in your Etsy shop! I look forward to following your future travels.
Thanks for sharing a perspective from the other side. And excellent writing. Love and peace.
Great review of the first year on the “retirement road”, Steve! The pictures are great. I like the fact that you don’t miss the work income, that’s often the first big hurdle to cross among many who take on ER. The RV lifestyle clearly has its advantages.
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