Intro
My large credit card debt is on purpose, so please don’t yell at me to pay it off with my cash 😉 Please see my posts on taking advantage of no fee 0% APR balance transfers for more information. In short, I’m borrowing the money for “free” and keeping it in safe investments while earning me interest. Some recent examples are my $9,000 from Citibank and $10,000 from Discover Card.
Thoughts
April was a busy month. We moved, for one thing. Thankfully we got our entire safety deposit back from our previous rental and simply rolled that over into our new one. We threw away a lot of junk and moved most of our stuff ourselves, but did pay a couple hundred dollars for some professional movers for the heavy stuff.
I moved $10,000 of our cash into my new Scottrade account, and still need to invest it. We also filed and paid our taxes, which also included contributing $2,500 into a SEP-IRA (we already maxed out our Roths earlier). Finally, the stock market was bullish in April, leaving us with a good month overall.
We are getting ever-closer to the deadline for our Mid-Term goal, which it looks like will be hard to reach. Still, we have a year and I have lots of ideas that need to be implemented! Go Go Go!!
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Big List of Free Consumer Data Reports (Credit, Rent, Work)
nearly $2,500 – thats a huge month for you – congrats!
Typo: “to pay it off my my cash.”
Fixed, thanks!
How do you compile your net worth statistics? I’m trying to find a good way to do mine, but my stats can swing a couple thousand dollars either way depending on what bills/credit cards have been paid at the time of the snapshot. I pay off all my credit cards every month, but I could have as much as $8000 on my cards at one time before I pay them off. How do you compensate for that swing?
I get a real-time snapshot of all my credit card debt and banking balances with Yodlee.
Thus, any unpaid credit card charges are already rolled into my credit card debt listed above. This keeps my snapshots accurate and also keeps me from having to log into 20 accounts every day to see any changes.
So then theoretically, your credit card vs. cash could swing just like I say mine could. That makes sense. I find it hard to really see my progress when I have such swings possible.
If you take a net worth snapshot around the same period every month, then you should get a consistent picture?
Well, you just end up as accurate as you would be if you paid for everything with cash. It doesn’t matter if I’ve paid a credit card bill or not, the net worth (assets – debts) remains correct.
Yes, and if you take a snapshot the same time each month, it should smooth out some of the swings like getting paid for your job, paying monthly bills, rent, etc.
Try http://www.networthiq.com to track your monthly networth progress, Brian!
You’ve probably addressed this before, but why do you have so much in cash savings?
Oops, answered my own question. Once you subtract out the ~30k in CC debt, you have ~16k in cash/savings, right? This is your standard emergency fund (what’s that rule of thumb, two months pay or something?)?
See Mid-Term goal link – house downpayment.
from your yodlee post:
“And I figure it’s just as likely that someone will hack into my bank’s website as Yodlee’s”
That’s the stupidest logic I’ve ever heard.
I’m using Microsoft Money 2006 to take my net-worth snapshots.
Brian,
I just take the snapshot from all my accounts on the first of each month. It all pans out as the money goes from one place to another; the balance of something will decrease and your cash will decrease to match and your earning account will increase.
Jonathan,
I don’t use Yodlee at all; I do use Microsoft Money, but not for this purpose, I actually use an Excel spreadsheet which works well.
I like to look at your site each month as it is funny. Your net worth this month is $94,279, Mine is -$90,846.56! So I have a lot to look forward to each time I read your post. My total liabilities are $112,975.02; broken down as follows:
Credit cards $18,071.33
Loan $11,927.99
Student Loan $82,425.54
Overdraft $550.16
Total Assets is $24,691.18. Trying to get some stock trades to help with the cash flow.
Your site has inspired me to keep track of my net worth and it is getting better; It increased by $5,522.33 month over month. So there is hope for me.
Ralph.
PTI is a podcast?! (Runs off to check) PTI *is* a podcast!!! Kinda miss the highlight clips though. I hope it stays free.
I won’t pay $20 for basic cable because it doesn’t include ESPN or Food Network. That’d be like paying $20,000 for a Porsche and only getting the back seat – what’s the point? 😉
Jonathan,
I want to chase some of your credit card deals but I’m waiting to settle on a new home; don’t want to damage my FICO score for my loan. How has all of this affected your score? How many cards do you actually have open and what are the limits? I understand if that’s a bit too private for the blog. Thanks.
P.S. Although I don’t see any student loans on your liabilities you might want to check out uPromise.com to save (529’s and free %age of your groceries, gas etc)for a college fund for a prospective Jonathan Jr.
Have you done any research on 529 plans? What did you find? We’re looking for one now, so I’d appreciate hearing any insight you may have.
Thanks,
Dix