About Me
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I’m Craig Stephens — a 48-year-old husband + Dad of three, investor, and blogger based in the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, DC.
I’ve been investing in stocks since my first investment in 1995. Shortly after, I earned a finance degree from Michigan State University.
I started publishing financial articles on RetireBeforeDad.com in 2013 under the anonymous moniker “RBD”.
In 2017, I became a (not anonymous) retirement contributor to U.S. News and World Report. My writing has been featured on dozens of websites around the internet. I’m currently a contributor to the HumbleDollar.
The name Retire Before Dad came from a goal I set in 2003, to retire one year earlier than my Dad retired (age 56). He was a high school teacher for 35 years.
At the time, I was 27, broke, and living with my parents after backpacking the world.
I wanted to retire early so I could travel full-time again.
So I returned to the most lucrative career I knew, which I thought would be the path of least resistance to early retirement.
But early in my 20-year career as a government IT consultant, I realized I would never genuinely love corporate IT consulting work.
In pursuit of early retirement, I saved and invested aggressively to build flexibility in my career and life.
As I got older, a few things became evident:
- Having a family would prevent me from traveling full-time, at least until my youngest is out of high school (2033).
- I would always struggle to be happy as a full-time employee working for someone else, no matter how good the benefits were.
- I enjoy writing, blogging, and online entrepreneurship.
In 2021, our family reached financial independence, a spreadsheet milestone. But I’ve never lost the desire to continue earning money.
Investment income streams and my wife’s modest income gave me the flexibility to leave my full-time IT career in late 2022 to be a writer.
My financial goals are not about early retirement anymore — I earn and invest for flexibility, security, and options in life.
I won’t be a full-time traveler again for some time, but I’m still building income streams so I can explore the unusual — with my family.
Read the long version: The RBD Story
Craig is a former IT professional who left his 19-year career to be a full-time finance writer. A DIY investor since 1995, he started Retire Before Dad in 2013 as a creative outlet to share his investment portfolios. Craig studied Finance at Michigan State University and lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and three children. Read more.
Favorite tools and investment services right now:
Sure Dividend — A reliable stock newsletter for DIY retirement investors. (review)
Fundrise — Simple real estate and venture capital investing for as little as $10. (review)
NewRetirement — Spreadsheets are insufficient. Get serious about planning for retirement. (review)
M1 Finance — A top online broker for long-term investors and dividend reinvestment. (review)