Andy Hough

January Investment Income – $89.50

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My January investment income dropped slightly to $89.50 from $90.93 the month before. This was a result of the value of my IRA going down and no money being added to my investment portfolio.

It has been suggested that this is perhaps not the best way to measure my investments since it doesn’t completely reflect reality. After taking that into consideration I am going to come up with a new measurement based at least in part on my actual dividend and interest income received. I’ll still be calculating my investment income as I am now as well so that I will have a consistent measure for comparison purposes.

Disclaimer: This is not my actual investment income. To get this figure I first add up my retirement savings, emergency fund, and any other money I consider permanent savings. What the total of my savings would earn at 6% interest for a month is my monthly investment income. My goal is to get this amount to $1000 a month. If I have $1000 in monthly passive investment income I will be able to retire early.

January Income – $1805.92

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Here is a breakdown of my income for January.

Online Income

$407.62

Interest

$51.83

Stock Dividends

$20.33

Job

$971.33

Survey/Cashback

$6.67

Ebay/Selling stuff

$108.14

Bank Bonuses

$240

Total

$1805.92

January was a pretty good month for income. It was nice to see that I made almost as much from my alternative income sources as I did from my job. It will be difficult to match my alternative income total this month although I already know my online income will be up. As long as my income is a few hundred dollars more than my expenses I will be content.

January Expenses – $1148.74

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Here is a breakdown of my expenses for January.

Household

$403.79

Entertainment

$67.32

Transportation

 $138.76

Food

$115.09

Health

$67.66

Phone

$34.63

Debt

 $29.00

Laptop/printer

 $333.15

Total

$1189.40

My expenses were reasonable in January. If it weren’t for the purchase of a new laptop and printer they would have been under my goal of $1000 and I still didn’t miss that target by much.  There won’t be any large purchases in February and I expect my normal expenses to remain about the same so I should easily be under $1000 for expenses this month.

What a $360 Apartment Looks Like

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Here are a few pictures of my apartment for those who are wondering what you get for $360. The pictures were taken from my cell phone and I’m not much of a photographer but I think you will get the general idea. My apartment is two rooms if you can’t tell from the pictures. There is also a bathroom which is not pictured. Since the pictures were taken I have upgraded from a sleeping bag to a mattress. I don’t have furniture but that is by choice. This is a cheap, frugal apartment and it is all I need. If you have any questions about the apartment feel free to ask.

What Do You Spend on Food?: A Grocery Budget Experiment

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It is always interesting to me when people share their grocery budget and the foods they buy. There is a wide variety of opinions on how much is needed to buy groceries for a month. Look at the comments on my post about my food stamp experience and my follow-up post on food stamps to see some of the differing opinions.

I generally spend about $100-$120 a month on food, that includes groceries and restaurants. I don’t try especially hard to keep my food expenditure low but my preferred foods are fast-food and junk food which tend to be cheap. As an experiment at the beginning of this month I decided to not eat any meals out and eat whatever I wanted at home. After two weeks the results showed that I could eat just as bad at home as at a restaurant. Not eating out might have saved me some money but it didn’t result in me eating any healthier or losing any weight. That experiment has been abandoned and I am on to the next experiment.

For the month of February I will share with you all the foods I buy and what I pay for them. To try to keep my diet somewhat healthy I am only going to eat out once a week and not purchase any chips, cookies, candy, crackers, ice cream or soda. For me that will force a major change in diet although I suppose there are still plenty of bad foods left I could eat. I’m not going to buy any more food the rest of this month in order to reduce the amount of foods in my pantry before the experiment starts. I believe that with these changes I will spend less than $100 for food for the month and eat healthier than average or at least healthier than the average bachelor.

I would be interested in seeing what you spend on food. If you want to share leave a comment with your monthly food budget.