Choose Your Own Finance

I've worked with clients living in: Azerbaijan, Bosnia, the Netherlands, France, Switzerland, Spain, Germany, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, USA, UK, China, and Thailand.

I've worked with clients who come from: South Africa, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Mongolia, Brazil, Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, UAE, USA, Canada, India, Pakistan, Italy, France, Germany, UK, Ireland, and probably lots of others I can't remember off the top of my head.

So when I say I'm a FI coach for expats, I mean EVERYONE. Immigrants, migrant workers, global nomads. All.

Each situation is unique. There are cultural pressures, tax issues, and scattered accounts that have to be tracked down.

But the core of what I do is the same. I help you take the scary unknown mess, and turn it into an actionable roadmap to FI.

Why work with so many jurisdictions? Because people who live between countries fall through the traditional safety nets of state pensions and 401Ks.

These are the people that need a financial plan the most, and almost nobody will talk to them until they already have a million dollars saved.

How can I possibly be an expert on finance in every country on earth?

I'm not. I'm an expert on HUMANS.

AND I'm willing to say "I don't know" when I'm outside of my expertise and refer you to country-specific experts who do know.

Unassigned cash is the riskiest asset most expats own.

Why? Because they don't see the risk. 👀

All assets are risk assets: it's just that risk comes in many forms. Cash comes with both inflation risk and opportunity cost.

Notice I said "unassigned" cash. Risk can be an opportunity if it's used wisely. Purposeless cash is a liability, but purposeful cash buys short term stability.

Cash is appropriate for use in the next 12 months or so. If you're holding on to cash for something farther out than that, cash is probably not fit for purpose.

💶 Keep cash for your regular expenses: to fund your life now (These are your MONTHLY EXPENSES)

💵 Keep cash for known upcoming expenses: like holiday, school fees, or a planned medical expense (we call these SINKING FUNDS)

💷 Keep cash for unknown emergencies: like illness, death in the family, job loss (this is your EMERGENCY FUND and you need to define a target amount)

Where a lot of expats fall down, is they keep far too much cash in a vaguely defined “what if” fund without ever working out how much they actually need.

Imagine the worst that could happen. Maybe you need to evacuate your family last minute. Maybe you lose your job and need to relocate to find a new one. How much would you realistically need to get back on your feet? For most people this is somewhere between 3-6 months worth of expenses. You're not looking to fund your life for years (that's what your investments are for!), you're looking to smooth out a difficult moment.

Keeping multiples of your annual income in cash is actually riskier than just biting the bullet and buying an index fund. Cash loses value over time, even if you have the best available interest rate in a fixed deposit or high yield savings account.

FI life skill: Give every Dirham, Dollar, or Euro a clearly defined purpose.

Assign all cash to monthly expenses, sinking funds, or your emergency fund...Anything beyond that? Invest it for the long term. You'll turn a drag on your buying power into a growing asset to fund your future.

Most people avoid thinking about retirement because they assume the number is impossibly large.

It is not.

Your FI number is not a mystery. It is not something only a financial advisor can calculate. It is a straightforward formula that anyone can work out with 12 months of real spending data and a calculator.

No guessing. No estimates. Just your actual numbers.

And once you have it, everything changes.

You stop feeling like financial independence is something that happens to other people. You start seeing it as a destination with a viable pathway to it.

That shift alone is worth more than any financial product someone could sell you.

Swipe through to see exactly how the formula works, and grab my free expense tracker at cyofinance.com/resources to get started today.

Nobody taught us this in school.

And most of us grew up believing that investing was something reserved for a specific type of person. Someone with a finance degree. Someone who understood the markets. Someone who worked in a tall building in a big city.

That belief keeps more people on the sidelines than anything else.

The truth is that building long-term wealth does not require a background in finance. It does not require perfect timing. It does not require you to understand every term or follow every market movement.

It just requires a willingness to start.

With the right guidance, investing is far more accessible than the industry wants you to believe. And the earlier you begin, the less you actually have to do to get where you want to go.

You are not behind. You are not unqualified. You are just one conversation away from getting clear on your next step.

Book a free 15-min call at cyofinance.com and let's start there.

Most people skip this step entirely.

They want the investment strategy, the ETF ticker, the retirement number.

But if you don't know what your life actually costs right now, none of those answers will mean anything.

Pull up your bank statements.
Add up 12 months of spending.
That single number changes everything.

It tells you how much to save, how much to invest, and exactly how large your portfolio needs to be to never need a paycheck again.

Data comes before strategy. Always.

Book a free 15-min call at cyofinance.com and let's figure out your numbers together.