Wow. That’s a lot of red! And a lot of stuff out of my control too – at least that’s somewhat comforting ;)
Can’t do much about the craziness of the market, can we? Just gotta keep pushing through w/ the plan, and doing our best to keep our heads up and workin’ toward that financial freedom!
And if you look at all those *green* areas in that pic (all 2 of them, haha…) you’ll see we’re actually aligned pretty well! My goal of killing our mortgages is perfectly on track so far, and in the next couple of days I’ll be shooting over our first $2,000 towards it :) Which, as you can see, we def. have laying around this month. One for one, baby! Only 119 more months to go! Hahahaha…
Here’s how September’s Net Worth breaks down:
CASH SAVINGS (+$2,118.05): We had a good month over at Budgets Are Sexy and my other projects this month, and the Mrs. is now back at University getting her learn on and earning some side income again. I can’t even imagine the funds we’ll have once she goes full-time! That will be all kinds of hot sauce. But hot sauce we’ll still have to wait on for another 1-2 years – harrumph.
EMERGENCY FUND ($0.00): Same ol’ $10k here month after month! We had a scare w/ Mr. Bob later on in the month, but so far we’ve been able to squeak by w/out having to dip into any of our E. Fund savings here… and hopefully it’ll stay that way for a while!
TAX FUND (-$1,855.00): We actually shot off over $5,575.00 last month in taxes, but due to the timing of my net worths here, it always looks a little funky on pay-month. I still admit this isn’t the best way to track this little category here (every month we fill it up, and ever 3 we dump it out) but right now it’ll have to do.
IRA: SEP (-$25.44): Meh. Nothing really interesting to report here. I haven’t added or taken anything out of this guy – it’s just the market doing its thang.
IRA: ROTH(s) (-$2,224.69): Same with this guy. Now that Operation Mortgage Payoff is in effect, we won’t be seeing deposits here unless we get any influx of money. I’m mainly focusing our efforts on knocking away all that ugly debt first – it’s driving me bonkers!
401(k)s: No more!! The 401(k) madness has turned into an Ultimate IRA Game ;) With the total of all funds being shown below in our new Traditional IRA accounts. Be sure to pick your winner soon!
IRA: TRADITIONAL(s) (-$12,025.08): Boooooo… but really, who’s surprised? Since we’re not adding anything more to these guys right now, the only chance we have of it growing is if the markets start behaving themselves. And I’m not holding my breath at the moment ;) I do believe that it’s just a matter of time, though, until things start picking up again, and since I invest for the long time I have no doubts we’ll be back on track once the phase passes… I’m not an expert in this arena, but I do think you have to have a lot of faith or you’re liable to go insane.
AUTOS WORTH (kbb) (-$955.00): Nothing pretty here folks, keep on moving ;) It’s not like we expect these to be going UP in value though, eh? It’s a good thing we don’t have brand new cars or I can’t imagine the amounts that would be dropping every month – bleh. Here are our current breakdowns:
- Pimp Daddy Caddy: $2,470.00
- Gas Ticklin’ Toyota: $9,870.00
HOME VALUE (Realtor) ($0.00): Still at $300k our realtor set it at last year. I actually ran into him the other day at a coffee shop, and he had a pretty interesting take on the marketplace these days. Being in the game for over 20 years I’m sure he’s seen it all! I’ll blog about it soon cuz I think y’all would enjoy it. Pretty fascinating stuff.
MORTGAGES (-$446.44): Operation Refinance continues to do it’s job! And now that Mortgage Payoff is in effect, these numbers are about to get a TON more sexier – you can bet your sweet ass on that. I didn’t get time to make my first payments on it yet, having been gone the past week w/ Love Drop and FINCON, but I look forward to hitting that “submit” button very very shortly! This will be the last time you see small numbers in this category, it’s gonna be fun! (well, as fun as fun can be when you throw away $2,000 towards debt every month, pshhh)
- 1st Mortgage: $288,438.46 – 30 year conventional @ 5.5%
- 2nd Mortgage: $61,796.27 – Maxed out HELOC @ a variable 2.8%
And that’ll wrap up September for us. Not the best monthly return, but it is what it is. It’ll take a lot more than that to rattle my financial bones, that’s for sure ;) As long as my income continues to come in so I can keep living the blog life, I’ll be smiling all the way through the madness! Can’t do anything about the economy, but I sure can get my own finances in check. And I have no doubt you all can do the same!
Anyone wanna share their net worth updates with us today?
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PS: Did I mention how excited I am to kill our mortgages?
PS: If you’re just getting started in your journey, here are a few good resources to help track your money. Doesn’t matter which route you go, just that it ends up sticking!
- The "Budget/Net Worth" spreadsheet - the colorful Excel template I personally use.
- The "Money Snapshot" spreadsheet - a simple Excel template I created for my former $$$ clients
If you're not a spreadsheet guy like me and prefer something more automated (which is fine, whatever gets you to take action!), you can try your hand with a free Empower account instead (formerly Personal Capital)
Empower is a cool tool that connects with your bank & investment accounts to give you an automated way to track your net worth. You'll get a crystal clear picture of how your spending and investments affect your financial goals (early retirement?), and it's super easy to use.
It only takes a couple minutes to set up and you can grab your free account here. They also do a lot of other cool stuff as well which my early retired friend Justin covers in our full review of Empower - check it out here: Why I Use Empower Almost Every Single Day.
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My ROTH took a huge hit too. I am getting ready to get another one. That may sound silly to some, but it makes sense for me (and most investors). :) Just wait until the market bounces back. Your net worth updates will be amazing! Hopefully, it is sooner rather than later.
I am up less than 2% this month…but that is only because of the cash I am saving NOT my investments TANKING to January 2011 levels. I wanted to hurt someone when I noticed my 401(k) is literally lower than January 18, 2011 when I started tracking. This is despite throwing hundreds at it per month. Mine:
http://www.myjourneytomillions.com/articles/october-2011-net-worth-update/
@20’s Finances – Oh yeah, I totally agree w/ pumping up your IRAs while the market’s low! Damn good time to invest :)
@Evan – That is disheartening, I know :( I didn’t even think to track it back to see what time frame it equals out too – scary! Haha… but you know what? This is a tiny tiny part of our ultimate 30-40 year game plan, so in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t really matter much. It only counts once we start pulling OUT from it ;) But I still give you permission to bitch, haha… as clearly we’re not the only ones.
Sorry about al the red but as you say not much to be done about it. My net worth has gone very slightly down as well – slightly only because I am still in a very good pension scheme (final salary one) and have no shares – all of us is in non-icome generating real estate which I have been trying to change.
There is one thing that has been bugging me though: I have noticed that people have had to change the way they think about work – it is not career but work that pays (the more the better) and income is built by a patchwrok of activities. We probably have to change very quickly the way we think about investments and generally the ways that ensure that we have income in the future – what is now is not likely to be in 20-30 years time. Any thoughts?
I’m glad you have the right attitude about all that red. There isn’t too much you can do about it – unless you take a more active approach to your investments (investing in individual companies, taking short positions, using options, etc). Just keep moving forward with your plan to get out of debt and you’ll be fine!
J$, thank you for finally giving me a purpose for those accounting classes I took in college!The reason the tax fund is funky is because you don’t also list your taxes as a liability. They’re a debt, just like your mortgage. You could handle this a few different ways. You could start the year with an estimated liability and then reduce it each month you save against it, rather than reducing it when you mail the payment. Or, you could post the amount of the liability as you save each month, then reduce both the liability and the asset when you make your quarterly payments. My recommendation is to not add the fund to your assets and also not show it as a liability. It’s just a short-term condition that really doesn’t have anything to do with your net worth over the long-term.
I must now officially apologize to my Ben Stein wannabe accounting professor for ever doubting his assertion that accounting could be exciting and fun.
Hopefully when our net worth gets to the size of yours, we can be all ‘it’s all good, whatcha gonna do about it’ with our retirement money. :-) I’m fine with it now, since we’re still getting rolling but it’s gotta get harder. Here’s our net worth post for October:
http://www.mastertheartofsaving.com/2011/10/03/net-worth-update-october-2011/
Not much but it all adds up!
My ROTH is down quiet a bit as well. I just keep telling myself stocks are on sale right now so I might as well buy in bulk. Now if only the prices didn’t keep going lower AFTER I buy them…
Bummer! Maybe you should have gotten that LED light pen. Bet you could sold that for a pretty penny ;)
@Maria Nedeva – My thoughts on that is that it’s always been work “to get paid” over career, at least w/ the younger people I know. Rarely do I come across someone that actually ENJOYS their work and really wants to do it for a living no matter if they get paid a crap ton or just enough to pay the bills. W/ the exception of my online friends, of course :) Most of you guys have your heads on straight, as well as all the people I run into at conferences/etc, but in normal everyday land I find most people work for the money, and that’s that. I’m sure it’s became even more pressing too w/ the latest rounds of economic troubles.
@Khaleef @ KNS Financial – Thanks Khaleef! And I’m def. not gonna jump in and do all that betting, haha… I’m perfectly content letting the market run itself ;) Hope to see you again before our next conference!
@Babs – Haha, you do have a point I know. I just tend to use my Net Worth as the “amount I have right now, at this given point in time” – which means I need to account for the taxes, whether I have them saved or not. But over time I’m starting to maybe think about dropping it too, and not listing it in either place, esp now that I’m getting used to seeing the “hurt” (I wanted to physically watch it build and drop so I could let it sink in that it is, indeed, REAL, but I think I’m finally okay with it :) So who knows. Maybe I’ll actually listen to you for once! Haha…
@Jen @ Master the Art of Saving – Hey, we all got problems – they just differ ;) Anyone here CAN get to the amounts I have saved up, but most people don’t want to put in the hard work for it, haha…. it’s the same thing as those celebrities who get rich and famous “over night.” They’ve actually been doing it for yeearrrrrrrrs, but only now did they get all mainstream! I don’t gear all this to you, specifically though – you guys have your head on straight – but just the others out there who wanna hate and make up excuses why they aren’t where they want to be. All you gotta do is use focus and TIME to your side, baby!
@Justin Wright – Haha, exactly. Great mentality to have though! If only we had MORE MONEY to invest in them! ;)
@Jenna, Adaptu Community Manager – Haha… are you offering? :)
Between the husband’s annual bonus coming in and our house actually going up in value on zillow (which has happened maybe three times since I started tracking a year and a half ago), our net worth is up 30g’s this month. It’s much less impressive than it sounds because that brings our net worth up to $40,000. I started tracking my net worth in June ’10 and my house has lost $100,000 in value since then, so we’re just treading water over here, trying to stop the hemorrhaging.
Well ya gotta enjoy the ups as they come in! If we can do that, it makes the lows a lot easier to deal with, eh? :)
My 401K value keeps going down… It’s so sad to look at every month. I just need to stop looking at it so often. It looks like you are doing well. Keep it up!
I do not count our prime residence as an asset. We need a place to leave. If something happens that we need to sell it, it will be a completely different ball game and financial independence is least of our problems at that time.
But thank you for concise and open discussion here. I am doing the same in my blog – just related financial statements and moves.
While the markets sucked this month, I ended the month with a 3k increase in net worth to surpass 60k for the first time. Plus, I was the recipient of a surprise 10% midyear raise yesterday, so I expect good things in the months to come.
@UltimateSmartMoney – Yeah, a lot of people have stopped watching it actually and just log in when it’s time to update their net worth or check on something. Since I do it every single month though (cuz to me, it’s all rather fascinating!), I have no choice but to see it every few weeks :) But I really like it that way – keeps me involved and learning. Even though the times where it’s up is much more exciting, haha…
@Financial Independence – Oh cool, yeah – keep up whatever works for you :) Quick question though — if you don’t count your house as your asset, how do you count your mortgage(s)? Cuz that’s a 100% true debt no matter how you look at it. (or do you guys have it paid of like rock stars?)
@Walnut – Wowwwww work it, yo! That is hotness – congrats! :)
J. Money
I do not count my mortgage. I calculated many times, and there is incentive to buy a house. It is cheaper to rent and live happily ever after.
I have to confess, I invested some money in two apartments, but I paid in full, but I do not count them as asset, either. It is a fall back scenario, to live in them. I will only count the rent I receive : -)
Historically property prices did not change much, what important is liquid assets and cash flow. I will concentrate on that. Enough playing with the properties : -) Perhaps I will buy parking lot, to make them more appealing as rentals.
Oh nice, I love it. I’d much rather go back to renting too to be honest with you, but a bit too underwater for that yet ;) Glad you found a system that works for you! Do you count investments too? Like stocks and 401k, even though their not totally liquid? I use our net worth to show all assets & liabilities over just the liquid stuff. I think as long as we’re all getting what we want out of tracking it though, we’re on the right paths. So thanks for sharing!