About us

Hello and Welcome to 99to1percent.com! A blog about personal finance. We are excited to have you here with us and journey together to Financial Independence.

We hope to reach readers all around the world who are interested in progress, prosperity, upward mobility, frugality, saving, investing, becoming debt free, achieving financial independence and/or early retirement.  Everyone is welcome, whether you are in the 99%, 49%, 20%, 10%, 1%, 0.1%, 0.01%…We can all learn from each other.

You can expect us to talk about everything Finance along with a little touch of humor.

Who we are

We are Tina (a.k.a Ms 99to1percent) and Max (a.k.a Mr 99to1percent). We live in the Toronto suburbs in Canada with our 1-year old Baby girl (a.k.a  Baby 99to1percent, a.k.a Baby Honey Badger, a.k.a Baby Energizer Bunny, a.k.a Baby Life of the Party, a.k.a Baby Contagious Laugh, a.k.a I can Outtalk Anyone…😊 )

Our family

We are 35 years old, and Ms 99to1percent is a CPA working in corporate finance and Mr 99to1percent is a programmer who gets to work from home in his pyjamas 😊. We also own a consulting business that we are trying to scale up in order to achieve our financial independence.

Started from the bottom

We started from the bottom and now we are here…to tell our story, inspire and learn from others. We have managed to increase our family income to around $400K/year with a networth of about $2,000,000. We are what you would consider part of the 1% but we don’t really feel or behave like it.

Even though, we like to spend a little here and there, for the most part we are frugal.  We live on about 15 to 20% of our income, about $50,000/year (2017), and we spend the rest on building our emergency fund, paying down the mortgage faster, maxing out retirement funds.

Rags to Riches

Her Story

My family came to Canada to pursue the Canadian dream when I was almost 18 years old.  The Canadian dream for us meant/still means good education, progress, prosperity and hopefully financial freedom.

We only came with a few hundred dollars in our pockets. For a year, we rented 1 small room in a triplex and sharing the washroom and kitchen with other families.  It was uncomfortable, but we had to do what we had to do.

Then we found a bigger apartment, but in a not so safe neighborhood.  We gave ourselves 5 years to graduate college and work hard so we can get out.  Some of our neighbors included:

• A phone sex operator (the stories! But let’s keep it PG)
• An alcoholic who had a crush on me and used to bring me fake flowers from the Dollar Store
• A weed smoking family who would smoke in the hallways in winter, and the smoke would come through the door and into our apartment, and I would spend the day throwing up
• An IT professional and chef who was working hard, trying to get out, but had a wife that was addicted to gambling
• A nice couple who was also going to school and working hard to get out
• A family struggling with a son allegedly in a gang

As you can see this was not an ideal neighborhood, but I worked hard and achieve a few things:

• Graduated college and university in Accounting and Finance
• Found a decent job (paying $40K but did a lot of overtime, was able to make $70K/year)
• Paid off $40,000 in student loans before even graduating (Will write about it in another article, stay tuned/sign up below to receive new post notification)
• Bought a brand-new car (mistake or not? Will write about it in another article, stay tuned/sign up below to receive new post notification)
• Bought a $240,000 decent condo in a decent neighborhood (finally!)
• Started pursuing my CPA paid for by my employer
• Built a $100,000 emergency fund

And at 29, I got blessed even more and met the love of my life Mr 99to1percent.

His Story

I also came to America to pursue the American dream.  I came with very little money, that only covered 4 months of rent and school at a community college.

I shared my first apartment we 5 other guys in a 2-bedroom apartment.  I went to community college during the day and flipped burgers, served coffee, and valet parked during the night making the minimum wage.

After I graduated, I was lucky to find a temporary job as programmer making $60,000, I was rich!!! I got rid of my dumb phone and went and splurged and bought myself an iPhone! I felt on top of the world. Later on, the client decided to hire me, which came with a promotion, a temporary transfer to Canada and a $90K salary.

Because of the big raise, I saw no problem buying a $35,000 car and putting it on the credit line.  I also travelled a lot, and without any pre-planning, hence the trips were kind of expensive. My financial advisor used to ask me where all my salary went, and I couldn’t give him an answer.

Then I met Ms 99to1percent, fell in love and decided to stay in Canada.

Our Story

During our first date, we knew that we were meant for each other. You can call it love at first date 😊.  We went out almost every night, travelled to France, Italy, NY, Miami,…Add a $20,000 engagement ring, a $40,000 wedding and a $600,000 house and upgrades, 3 years later, we were no closer to financial independence despite our high income.

Our plan

In 2015, we came up with the plan in order to achieve financial independence.

1. Pay off the $35,000 car loan/credit line -> DONE
2. Start being frugal/spend mindfully->ON TRACK
3. Increase our income->ON TRACK (Have increased it from $160K to $400K+)
4. Pay off our $500+K mortgage in 5 years -> ON TRACK
5. (By the way read the Dave Ramsey book: Total Money Makeover  (By the way, if you want the motivation to pay off your mortgage early. We are looking forward to reaching BabyStep7: Build Wealthy and Give. Dave likes to say “Live like no one else so later you can live and give like no one else”.
6. Increase our investments -> IN PROCESS
7. Achieve financial independence -> IN PROCESS

You can read more about us here:

• How We Increased Our Annual Income From $0 to $160K to $400K+
• How To Pay Off A Mortgage In 5 Years
• How we live on 15% of our income
• Joining the Million Dollar Club/Challenge and So Can You

The blog

We got the inspiration to start a personal finance blog from other personal finance bloggers such as MrMoneyMustache, Making sense of cents, Financial Samurai, ESI Money, Our next life… just to name a few.

In this blog, we will use our personal experience, education, and research to cover everything Finance along with a little touch of humor.

       This blog is for you if:

• You live paycheck to paycheck
• You are in the bottom 99% but want to be in the top 49%? Or you are in the 10% and want to be in the top 1%? Or you are in the 1% and want to be in the top 0.01%…
• You are trying to become financially independent and/or retire early
• You are a student who wants to know how to graduate with little or no debt
• You are a student who wants to know how to find a good job
• You are a couple and want to stop fighting about money or you just want to learn how to manage your money
• You a single parent who wants to know what to increase your income so you can take care of your kid(s).
• You a DINK (Dual Income, No Kids) who wants to know how to best use your money
• You have kids and what to know to manage your expenses more appropriately
• You have a mortgage and want to know how to pay it off quickly
• You want to get a mortgage/buy a house and want to know how to qualify and what to look for
• You are drowning in debt, and what to know how to become debt free
• You want to have a successful professional career but without becoming a corporate slave
• You want to learn how to be frugal/spend mindfully
• You make a lot of money but you don’t know where it goes
• You want to learn how not to keep up with the Jones
• You are the Jones, and want to change
• You were not taught how to manage your finances when you were young, but you want to teach your kids finances from the early age
• You want to learn how to be happy no matter the circumstances or situation

       Also, this blog is for you if:

• You went from rags to riches and you want to share with people how you did it
• You are an immigrant who came with nothing, but you managed to become successful
• You started from the bottom (in my Drake voice 😊) and now you are here and want to share your story
• You got your act together, and just want tell others how you do/did it
• You are a successful corporate professional but not a corporate slave, don’t brown-nose, don’t play politics, and want to share how you do it.
• You left the corporate world and retired early, and want to tell us how you did it.
• You left the corporate world and opened your own business/became your own boss and want to share how you did
• You frugal and want to teach others how to be
• You have no debt
• You are on your way to being debt free
• You have paid off your mortgage
• You have passive income
• You are financially independent.
• You are a successful investor (stock market, real estate…) and you want to share how you did it
• You have a personal finance blog

Join us

Come join us and let’s all learn from each other. This is a place of inclusivity and no judgement, where everyone is welcome.

We will be publishing twice a week on Mondays and Thursdays.  Ms 99to1percent will be doing most of the writing, and Mr 99to1percent will do a little bit of writing and will handle the complicated technical stuff 😊.

So welcome to our blog!

Do you want to learn more about us? If so, you can also read these posts:

1. About us
2. How We Increased Our Annual Income From $0 to $160K to $400K+
3. How we live on 15% of our income
4. Joining the Million Dollar Club/Challenge and So Can You
5. How To Pay Off A Mortgage In 5 Years
6. Our Biggest Money Fight and 9 Lessons Learned
7. Our 6 Financial Mistakes and 15 Lessons Learned
8. How I Paid Off My $40,000 Student Loans Before Graduating
9. The resumes that bring in $400,000+/year (Samples Provided)

Feel free to comment and share. Let us know about your dreams, goals and aspirations. We love ya and wanna get to know ya!

Do you want an easier way to manage/track your finances/investments? The Personal Capital app can help.  Do you want to start blogging? Bluehost can get you started.  Make sure to also check out other resources that we recommend such as books that have helped us get where we are.