Expense/Income Tracking

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for July.

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July was another great month for expenses. They were once again well under my $1000 target. My expenses were higher than in June, but they were still pretty darn low.  I’ve been lucky with not big, unexpected expenses popping up the last couple of months.

I did have one car repair that cost me about $150. That was my only unusual expense for the month.  I tried to do the car repair myself, but wasn’t able to finish the job. I think I still saved a little money by buying the part and installing it before taking the car in to have the repair finished.

I’ve decided to list my student loan expense separately since it will throw off my monthly numbers. In July I paid $450 towards my student loan.

This month my transportation expense should go down since I hopefully won’t have another car repair. I’m guessing my food and entertainment expense will go up a little. I might have an increased medical expense due to having a doctor’s appointment. That will depend on how much I have to pay out of pocket. I think I should have a good chance of keeping my expenses under $1000 once again.

How was your month?

In order to keep track of my financial progress or lack of progress I have decided to calculate my net worth a few times a year.

My net worth as of 07/1/2017 is as follows.

Assets
Cash – $7676
IRA – $26,364
Roth IRA – $1623
Solo 401k – $1097
Car/Stuff – $3500

Liabilities
Student Loan – $114,398
Credit Card – $6935

Net Worth = $-81,073 

My net worth declined a little over $1100  last month. A decrease was expected since I had very little income while on sabbatical from my full-time job.  All of my investment accounts declined slightly as well.  My student loan balance increased slightly despite making a $500 payment during the month. Unfortunately, my loan accrues more than $500 interest every month so a $500 payment isn’t enough to keep the balance from increasing. On the positive side, I did decrease my credit card balance by over $800. The credit card has a 0% interest rate so it would make more sense to delay paying down the credit card and use that money to pay my student loan instead. However, the 0% interest rate will end next year and I want to make sure I have the credit card paid off before that happens. Since I’m now back at work and will have two full paychecks this month I will be able to get my net worth going back in the right direction.

I’ve been using Personal Capital (affiliate link) to help track my net worth. It keeps track of all of my financial accounts and my student loan making it pretty easy to calculate my net worth each month. It is free to sign up. If you would like to sign up I’d appreciate you using my link. All blog income, including affiliate income, goes to paying down my student loan.

Personal Capital

Here is a breakdown of my income for June.

June’s income was pretty slim, but at least it was better than May.  The cash back income is approximate. It came from my credit cards and part of it was from manufacturing spend so there was some cost to earning and redeeming the cash back. This month’s income will be much better since I will have two full paychecks.  I’d like to make at least as much from my alternative sources of income this month as well. These sources usually get neglected when I’m working full-time.  That doesn’t have to be the case since even when working full-time I have plenty of time to spend on my alternative sources of income. I just need to make that more of a priority and be less lazy.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for June.

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June was a great month for expenses. They were way under my $1000 target. This is probably about as low as my expenses can get.

I didn’t have any transportation expense for the second month in a row. That will change this month since I’ll need to purchase gas. Also, my check engine light is on and I’ll need to fix the problem that is causing that. I’ve researched it a little and I think I’ll be able to do it myself for relatively cheap.

I’ve decided to list my student loan expense separately since it will throw off my monthly numbers. In June I paid $500 towards my student loan.  That was a pretty good amount for the month since I made very little money. I should be able to make a bigger payment this month now that I’m getting paychecks again.

I expect my expenses to stay largely the same this month other than my transportation expense.  I doubt I’ll be able to keep my expenses as low as in June, but I think I should still be able to keep them under $1000.

How was your month?

In order to keep track of my financial progress or lack of progress I have decided to calculate my net worth a few times a year.

My net worth as of 06/5/2017 is as follows.

Assets
Cash – $9363
IRA – $26,543
Roth IRA – $1632
Solo 401k – $1101
Car/Stuff – $3600

Liabilities
Student Loan – $114,362
Credit Card – $7775

Net Worth = $-79,898

My net worth declined a little over $800  last month. This wasn’t unexpected since I had very little income in May. Most of the month’s decline was from depleting my cash balance to pay bills. Considering I had a three-week European vacation and almost no income in May, my net worth decreasing by only $800 is pretty good. I’ll be returning to work this month. I’m not sure when my payday will be. If I get a paycheck before the end of the month I should increase my net worth this month. If not I will have another decrease in my net worth.

I’ve been using Personal Capital (affiliate link) to help track my net worth. It keeps track of all of my financial accounts and my student loan making it pretty easy to calculate my net worth each month. It is free to sign up. If you would like to sign up I’d appreciate you using my link. All blog income, including affiliate income, goes to paying down my student loan.

Personal Capital