FI WORKSHEET — 2026
What if you already earn enough
to retire?
Most people think financial independence is about earning more. Kindle teaches you it's about keeping more — and the math is simpler than anyone wants you to believe.
Your potential FI date
March 2039
at current 20% savings rate
If you raise it to 40%
July 2032
7 years sooner
* Opening in Spring 2026 · Limited to 200 students
The exit has always been there.
You just needed the arithmetic.
Financial independence is not a number. It is a threshold — the moment your money generates more than your life costs, and your labor becomes optional. Most people will never cross it. Not because they earn too little, but because no one ever showed them the arithmetic.
The financial industry profits from your confusion. It sells you complexity — managed funds with 1.2% expense ratios, whole life insurance dressed as investment, target-date funds that charge you to hold index funds inside index funds. The math of independence is brutally simple, and that simplicity is dangerous to anyone who makes money from your ignorance.
Here is the math. Spend less than you earn. Invest the difference in low-cost index funds. Wait. That's it. The only variable that matters is your savings rate — not your salary, not the market, not the economy. A household earning $65,000 and saving 40% will reach financial independence faster than a household earning $200,000 and saving 8%.
This course exists because I spent four years building these spreadsheets in the margins of my real life — between grading papers, after the kids were asleep, on lunch breaks I stopped spending at restaurants. I found my FI date. I underlined it twice. And I want to hand you the pencil.
"A household saving 40% will reach independence faster than one earning three times as much and saving 8%. The variable that matters is not income. It is the gap."
The numbers that changed everything
7.2 yrs
Average time to FI at 40% savings rate
$0
Required starting capital
4%
Safe withdrawal rate (Trinity Study)
25×
Annual expenses = your FI number
These numbers come from the Trinity Study (1998), updated by Pfau (2012) and Kitces (2020). They are not optimistic projections. They are conservative baselines.
The FI Formula
Eight chapters.
One exit.
Each module is a self-contained lesson with a worksheet, a spreadsheet template, and one homework assignment: apply it to your own numbers before moving on.
The Only Number That Matters
Savings rate arithmetic, the FI formula, and why your salary is irrelevant
↳ Start here. Do the math on your own life before reading further.
The Parable of the Latte
Why small cuts compound and how to identify your actual spending leaks
↳ Not about deprivation. About noticing what you're trading your hours for.
Index Funds Are Enough
The mechanics of VTSAX, expense ratios, and why active management loses
↳ The investment industry will fight you on this. The data won't.
The 4% Rule and Its Enemies
Safe withdrawal rates, sequence-of-returns risk, and the real failure modes
↳ The rule everyone quotes and almost no one has actually read the paper for.
Tax-Advantaged Accounts, Ranked
401(k), Roth IRA, HSA, 529 — the order of operations that minimizes your bill
↳ Your employer match is a 50–100% instant return. Read this before anything else.
The Debt Calculus
Student loans, mortgages, and when paying down debt beats investing
↳ For the software engineer with $147k in loans who keeps asking "should I pay it off?"
The Dual-Income Trap
Lifestyle inflation, childcare math, and how couples derail each other's FI
↳ Written after my daughter was born. The hardest chapter to finish.
Your FI Date
Building the spreadsheet, projecting the timeline, and making it real
↳ You will circle a number. You will underline it twice. That's the whole point.
All modules include downloadable worksheets and spreadsheet templates.
Reserve AccessNot a guru.
A math teacher
who did the homework.
Portland, OR · 2024 · Still using the same legal pad
I am not a financial advisor. I am a math teacher who did the homework.
Every number in this course is from my own spreadsheets.
I still use a legal pad. Some tools don't need upgrading.
The course costs less than one month of the lifestyle inflation I gave up.
Marcus Webb spent nine years as a high school math teacher before financial independence made his labor optional. He didn't inherit wealth, win anything, or build a business. He changed one number.
Started teaching high school math in Portland, OR
Salary: $41,200. Student debt: $68,000. Savings rate: 3%.
Discovered MMM blog on a Tuesday night
Read every post in 11 days. Built first FI spreadsheet on a legal pad.
Raised savings rate from 3% to 28%
Moved to a smaller apartment. Sold the car. Bought a used bike.
Crossed $100,000 invested
Took a photo of the Vanguard screen. Cried a little. Told no one.
Paid off the last student loan
Savings rate hit 41%. FI date moved from 2039 to 2031.
Left teaching. Began writing Kindle.
Portfolio: $287,000. Runway: 6 years to FI at current trajectory.
Projected FI date
Age 42. Optional labor. The notebook closes.
The notebook is almost ready.
Your seat isn't.
Kindle opens to 200 students in Spring 2026. Waitlist members get 48-hour early access and the founding price — locked forever.
Save My Seat
200 seats · Spring 2026 · Founding price locked
Free FI Number Calculator
The exact spreadsheet I used to find my own exit date
Not ready to commit? Start with the calculator. Enter your income, expenses, and current savings — it gives you your FI number, your projected date, and the savings rate that changes everything.
What waitlist members get
- —48-hour early access before public launch
- —Founding price — locked for life
- —Free FI Number Calculator (immediately)
- —One pre-launch worksheet: Module 01
- —Direct email access to Marcus before launch
847
On the waitlist
200
Available seats
~4 wks
Until launch
$0
To join waitlist
"You don't need a bigger salary.
You need a smaller gap."