num_pages: 256
description: The deeply personal story of why award-winning personal finance blogger Elizabeth Willard Thames abandoned a successful career in the city and embraced extreme frugality in order to create a more meaningful purpose-driven life and retire to a homestead in the woods at age thirty-two with her husband and daughter.In 2014 Elizabeth and Nate Thames were conventional 9-5 young urban professionals. But the couple had a dream to become modern-day homesteaders in rural Vermont. Determined to retire as early as possible in order to start living each dayas opposed to wishing time away working for the weekendsthey enacted a plan to save an enormous amount of money: well over seventy percent of their joint take home pay. Dubbing themselves the Frugalwoods Elizabeth began documenting their unconventional frugality and the resulting wholesale lifestyle transformation on their eponymous blog.In less than three years Elizabeth and Nate reached their goal. Today they are financially independent and living out their dream on a sixty-six-acre homestead in the woods of rural Vermont with their young daughter. While frugality makes their lifestyle possible its also what brings them peace and genuine happiness. They dont stress out about impressing people with their material possessions buying the latest gadgets or keeping up with any Joneses. In the process Elizabeth discovered the self-confidence and liberation that stems from disavowing our cultures promise that we can buy our way to the good life. Elizabeth unlocked the freedom of a life no longer beholden to the clarion call to consume ever-more products at ever-higher sums.Meet the Frugalwoods is the intriguing story of how Elizabeth and Nate realized that the mainstream path wasnt for them crafted a lifestyle of sustainable frugality and reached financial independence at age thirty-two. While not everyone wants to live in the woods or quit their jobs many of us want to have more control over our time and money and lead more meaningful simplified lives. Following their advice you too can live your best life.
language: None
title: Meet the Frugalwoods: Achieving Financial Independence Through Simple Living
publisher: Harper Business