Your coast FIRE number, with the state pension counted
Your coast FIRE number is the sum that lets you stop saving for retirement and carry on working. Count the state pension, work until it starts, and the sum shrinks.
Money stuff, for Europeans
Money is just numbers that people get upset about.
We research why, so you can get upset more accurately. No paywall, no upsell, no "course launching soon" and no "Make $12k per day!". — An owl that, technically, nobody hired.
Featured
Our best attempts.
Updated whenever we come up with something better.
Should I wait to invest? Five reasons people give
We ran 107,454 windows of European tracker-fund history since 2008. Waiting won three times in ten. Five reasons Europeans give for holding off, cross-examined: three lose, two hold up.
Does market timing work? European forecasts, marked.
Every year a Reuters poll of Europe's strategists puts a number on where the market ends up. As far as we can find, nobody keeps score. So we marked thirty-one of those poll calls. The middle one missed by 6.1%.
Your Christmas budget starts with last December's statement
Your banking app already holds what last December cost you on top of an average month. Use it to set a Christmas ceiling you can clear by the January due date without touching the emergency fund.
Lately
Browse the archive → Last few things we wrote.
05 Nov Budgeting & Saving
Your Christmas budget starts with last December's statement
10 min 31 Oct Credit & DebtWhat is buy now, pay later? Credit files and new EU rules
10 min 30 Oct Financial PurposeYour coast FIRE number, with the state pension counted
13 min 13 Oct Credit & DebtCredit card types explained: is yours really credit?
10 min 13 Oct Investing & Wealth BuildingWhat to do with spare money in Europe, and in what order
18 min 23 Sept Financial ProtectionHow to build an emergency fund for when benefits fall short
15 min 06 Sept Financial PsychologyHow shops trick you into spending more, and which of it is illegal.
14 min 05 Sept Financial ProtectionWhat insurance do you actually need: subtract before you buy
12 min 02 Sept Financial PsychologyYour stock picks were fine. The trading is what cost you
16 min 27 Aug Investing & Wealth BuildingDividend investing in Europe: is it really passive income?
13 min 25 Aug Financial ProtectionHow to spot an investment scam: check the firm, not the pitch
11 min 20 Aug Budgeting & SavingThe payday running order: what to do when you get paid
15 min The whole library, somewhat organised
No idea where to start? Normal. Start here.
Researched thoroughly. Updated when reality changes.
01 · Money Management 15 posts
Money Management
Everyday money skills: budgeting, saving, credit, tax, and the fintech tools that, on a good day, make all of it less of a chore.
Walk in → 02 · Investing & Wealth 35 posts
Investing & Wealth
Putting money to work: investing fundamentals, turning a salary into assets, and protecting what you have already managed to accumulate.
Walk in → 03 · Money Mindset 18 posts
Money Mindset
The behaviour and meaning layer: psychology, purpose, and the big transitions that reshape what money means to you.
Walk in → Tools, free, no email gate
Numbers in, answers out.
No sign-up, no optimistic defaults, and nothing you type leaves the page. The maths just runs, here, in front of you.
Money Management
Your Christmas budget starts with last December's statement
Your banking app already holds what last December cost you on top of an average month. Use it to set a Christmas ceiling you can clear by the January due date without touching the emergency fund.
What is buy now, pay later? Credit files and new EU rules
Buy now, pay later is a small loan from a provider such as Klarna or PayPal. Whether it reaches your credit file depends on the country, and often on the provider.
Credit card types explained: is yours really credit?
Your card says CREDIT, which settles less than you'd hope. Four card types, and where each one catches you out.
The payday running order: what to do when you get paid
The euro payment system shuts four days straight every Easter. Move the payments nobody else is waiting for to at least five days after payday, on a date at or below the 28th that your own bills have already cleared.
How much should you have saved by 30, 40 and 50? The European answer
One year's salary by 30, three times by 40. That rule is American, and it assumes you fund half your own retirement yourself. Most of Europe already funds more, and most countries have a free government site where you can look yours up.
How to get back on track after overspending, without starting over
The bad month cost you one month. The nine you didn't go back cost nine times more. Restart at a figure that survives December, and keep the balance.
Investing & Wealth
What to do with spare money in Europe, and in what order
Where an employer or the State tops up what you pay into a pension, the free money can be worth years of overdraft interest. Collect it before clearing expensive debt only if you keep up every minimum payment, your income looks steady, and that debt will be gone within its time limit, counted in months and shorter on a card than on an overdraft. Under Ireland's auto-enrolment, a drop in pay lowers your contribution by itself, so that alone is no reason to pause.
How to build an emergency fund for when benefits fall short
Keep must-pay bills and agreed repayments current, then build a €500 to €1,000 pot. Clear credit you can keep dipping into, like a card or an overdraft, then size your reserve.
What insurance do you actually need: subtract before you buy
Most insurance is priced above your expected loss, by design. Subtract your state, employer and savings, and only the real gap is worth a policy.
Dividend investing in Europe: is it really passive income?
Pooled across 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2022, 70.6% of European once-a-year dividend payments arrived in April, May and June. What that does to a monthly budget, and what living off it really costs.
How to spot an investment scam: check the firm, not the pitch
Two registers and a warning list. That is the check that works on an investment firm, because the pitch, the dashboard and the profit on it are all theirs.
Why don't Europeans invest in stocks? Where the money went instead
Caution gets the blame. Add up all euro-area household assets and about €66 in every €100 is property. That is the area's total, not one household's.
Money Mindset
Your coast FIRE number, with the state pension counted
Your coast FIRE number is the sum that lets you stop saving for retirement and carry on working. Count the state pension, work until it starts, and the sum shrinks.
How shops trick you into spending more, and which of it is illegal.
Consumer authorities checked 314 online traders across Black Friday 2025, and only 40% fully complied with the EU's discount rules. Other tricks here are illegal too.
Your stock picks were fine. The trading is what cost you
You picked your broker on about €4 of commission and handling. Currency conversion on a €5,000 US-share round trip is €25 (DEGIRO, September 2026).
The cost of doing nothing with your money, and what to fix first
Four money lines go stale at once: savings, tariffs, an uninvested surplus, and a pension rate you never set. Here's the ten-year bill, and what to fix first.
The hedonic treadmill: why you get used to being richer
You got the raise. The new flat. The gym upgrade. And six months later, none of it feels like anything. That is the hedonic treadmill.
Money dysmorphia and doom spending: the money anxieties the internet named
The internet named two money anxieties, money dysmorphia and doom spending. What each means, whether either is a real diagnosis, and what helps.