Welcome to the first monthly update from Naj@myleanbudget at publicgold.bn! Selamat berpuasa to all of you! As you all are aware I quit my 9-5 job working for government on 1st January 2026. So this is an update of my first month after retiring from my 9-5.
This is not to say that I am doing nothing but just that my hours are not fixed anymore and I work according to my family commitments and my energy levels. I am a Public Gold Dealer and InshaAllah a soon to be takaful agent.
Not many women talk about menopause or perimenopause in your early 40s and how it affects you. It is because of this biological change in women which makes me think that we need to plan for much earlier retirements because your energy gets so low and your moods are all over the place that it is really not convenient to also have to work a 9-5 job on top of being a mother and then having to go thru those mood swings.
I am enjoying the laid back early retired lifestyle. It’s nice to be able to take a nap when my energy is low and take a break when I need to. Sometimes I will just pop into a cafe/restaurant to grab a snack or meal. Of course I still do school runs that doesn’t change in early retirement – but at least I don’t have that guilty feeling of doing it during office hours. You know the ones at 1130-1145am to send my kid’s lunch (integrasi IYKYK) and the pick up at 3pm. When office hours are 745-1215pm and 130-430pm.
On to our financial update. January was a slow month for my finances. My net worth increased by $1,717 to end the month at $1,306,650. Of course it is to be expected since a huge chunk of my income is gone. My January income was B$5,339 which was not enough to cover our spending of $9,760 for the month. A part of the expenses was funded by the selling of some gold.
If you’re thinking over $9,760 is a lot of spending, then you are right! Keep on reading to find out how we spent so much last month.
Income
Public Gold (PG) income totaled RM10,774 around B$3,453 (rate 3.12). Public Gold income can actually be broken down into 4 income streams – Public Gold (RM10,245), PG Mall (RM440), PG Jewel (RM88) or PG Gold ATM (RM0). Most of my income comes from public gold which is purchases for gold/silver bars thru Public Gold app. Secondly, from PG Mall (kinda like shopee or lazada) which is an online retail shop for Public Gold where you can purchase gold items at retail price or non-gold items like kitchen appliances. Thirdly, PG Jewel is the subsidiary of PG that sells 999 and 916 gold jewellery. Lastly, income can sometimes also come from PG Gold ATM if gold savers registered under me happen to go to Malaysia and purchase gold/silver from PG Gold ATM.
If you would like to register for a Public Gold account and become a dealer you can WA me for more details here.
Rental income of $1,818 was deposited on 30th December 2025 for January which comes in like clockwork because it is rented to government – Alhamdulilah. It is usually every 1st of the month but if it’s a non-working day or public holiday they will deposit earlier.
Investment income totaled $68 for January. My ETFs pay dividends monthly. Full disclosure: about 92.7% of my investments are in a shariah compliant index ETF (SPUS) and around 6.2% are in a shariah compliant international ETF (SPWO). I actually don’t need any more cash right now so I reinvest the income (around USD50) thru monthly recurring subscription into a shariah compliant sector ETF (SPTE) within the Baiduri Capital platform.
Tracking my spending and my net worth was one of the ways I was able to be a millionaire at 39 and retire at age 42.
Expenses
Now let’s take a look at January expenses:
In total, we spent roughly $9,760 last month which is about $6,427 more than my target budget of $3,333 per month (or $40,000 per year). Why $40k a year, – this is because of the 4% withdrawal rate (4% of $1M is $40k) and this is my target budget yearly for retirement based on $1,000,000 retirement fund. Flights and hotels were the top two spending categories in January.
Detailed breakdown of spending:
Flights – $4,682:
The big news for our household was the purchase of flight tickets for our trip to Japan for the Term 2 school holidays in May. We are using Royal Brunei Airlines (RBA) because it’s easier for the accumulation of miles if we stick to just using one airline company – what better way than to support our national carrier too. With family membership we are able to combine mileage and get upgraded for gold. We hopefully plan to fly enough every year to be eligible to stay in gold – InshaAllah.
Hotels – $1,931:
This January I had to pay for three hotels. First hotel was B$230 for Public Gold training in KL which we call Jutawanemas Roadmap Program (JRP). Second and third hotels are for the Japan trip which totaled B$1,701. We need to secure just one more hotel for Japan but due to budget constraints I will be using February’s income to pay for that.
Housing – $1,622:
For the house we live in I pay B$978. Then I have the remaining home financing on the 3rd rental property in Kiulap of around B$644.
Training – $698:
Quite a bit of money was spent on training as well. This January I had the opportunity to take Tabung Amanah Pekerja (TAP) Retirement Planning Certification Programme (RPCP). This makes me qualified to give advice on retirement planning. This cost B$650. The remaining balance was spent on training for Public Gold – 3 months online training under my mentor Haji Hafizul Hakim (HHH) cost of RM50 (or B$16) and our monthly physical bootcamp in Brunei at a cost of B$5 (special because we AJK plus Founder Master Dealers (FMD) also).
Bought an e-book entitled Ash-Shifa Holistic and Sunnah Remedies from Tibb Al-Nabawi Revived by Aisha Dahir for around USD20.83 around B$27. It’s around 280 pages and I am embarassed to say I almost forgot I bought it if it weren’t for this update.
Automotive – $593:
I pay B$593 every month for my BYD Sealion 6 car financing. If you are thinking of getting one it is sooooo worth it.
Charity – $x:
Prefer to kind of keep this private.
Cafe/Restaurants – $150:
I am sure I spent more than $150 but for now I haven’t been really tracking closely my expenses – will try to be better next month. Restaurants we visited this month were Sushi Excapade, Friday Restaurant, Roasted Sip, HWC and ABC Eats just to name a few – do give us your recommendations if you have favourite cafes/restaurants as well.
Parking – $38
Roughly $38 I was using a mix of cash and card. Parking is not cheap in Bandar and unfortunately training for Takaful and TAPCert were all in Bandar specifically at Dar Takaful and PGGMB. So my choices of parking were Yayasan and bangunan elektrik. Love that some bandar parking can be paid online. Parking is also needed when going for appointments at RIPAS. This is also convenient as you can tap your card at the exit gate.
Gas – $24:
One tank of gas for my hybrid car. This could easily be $0 but I kind of have this fear of keeping one month old gas so I prefer to at least buy one tank of gas a month.
Mobile/Internet – $19:
Husband pays the basic Imagine Internet and my Imagine Mobile package for B$65. His one is still under DST. I regret moving but I need to finish the contract before moving to another provider. So if we go over the basic I help pay the extra. This month we got throttled early so I paid husband B$19.
Healthcare/Medical/Dental – $3:
For January we had a total of three visits to the hospital/clinic. I had to bring myself, brother and son to medical appointments so we were all above 12 years old so I had to pay the $1 registration fees. So thankful for the really low registration fees and free medical given by the government. I know outside of Brunei how expensive it can be and sometimes can even lead to medical bankruptcy.
Spending for 2026 – Year to Date
We spent roughly B$9,760 year to date for 2026. That means we still have $40,000 minus B$9,760 or B$30,240 budget left – hopefully the rest of the year will be not as high as this month because of the upcoming travel. Most of the travel expenses has been paid just one more hotel, some travel expenses like the shinkansen to Kyoto and Osaka. Need to set aside a food budget as well as a budget for Japan souvenirs. Do share you experiences budget wise for food, transport and souvenirs if you have been to Japan – would really appreciate any insight.
Net Worth: $1,306,000 (+$1,717)
Another small increase to my net worth. The expenses are rough but will do better tracking as I go along.
Although expenses was more than income this month there was still a small increase in net worth. I believe this was helped in part because of the upward revision of gold value. Gold valuation is based on BIBD gold market rates which was revised on 13 January 2026. From B$197 (for 999) and B$191 (for 916) it increased to B$227 (for 999) and B$221 (for 916). This had the effect of increasing gold asset value by B$10k.
Alhamdulilah. Not included here are some business expenses (for booth and lucky draws) and my lump sum investment of B$10k because they were funded by my last bonus.
Closing thoughts
I am sharing these updates in the hopes that readers will find it useful when planning for their own retirements and to also show perspective from the female, mother and wife’s point of view. I will also try to add more pictures to recap the month so it’s more interesting to read!
I’m looking forward to our 2026 Japan trip. It’s the first time for my family. I went solo a long time ago (like 20+ years ago) so it would be interesting to see what has changed.
Ok that’s it for me this month, gais. Thanks for reading the first in what I hope to be a long series of early retirement monthly updates. I’ll see you in February!
Any New Year’s Financial Resolutions you want to share?