Expense/Income Tracking

Here is a breakdown of my income for September.

September’s income was really good due to having three paychecks during the month. I didn’t make much outside my job. This month will return to normal and I’ll only receive two paychecks. I hope I can increase my other sources of income at least a little this month.  Without the third paycheck this month’s income will be down, but it still should be pretty decent. Now that I’m making almost all of my money from a regular job there isn’t much interesting to read about in the income reports. That won’t change for a while.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for September.

September was an okay month for expenses. My transportation expense was a little high since I paid for six months of insurance on my car. The household category was a little high since I bought a laptop. Health was a little high since I had a dentist appointment.

This month the health category will again be a little high since I’ll have another dentist appointment and possibly a doctor’s appointment as well. Transportation and household will return to normal. My food expense wasn’t terrible in September, but it should be much lower in October.

I expect my other expense categories to remain roughly the same. I should at least get close to meeting my $1000 target this month.

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 09/3/2017 is as follows.

Assets
Cash – $3897
IRA – $27,177
Roth IRA – $1665
Solo 401k – $2825
Car/Stuff – $3300

Liabilities
Student Loan – $115,268
Credit Card – $0

Net Worth = $- 76,404

My net worth improved almost $2000  last month.   This was mainly due to receiving two paychecks from my full-time job. My student loan balance increased over $600 despite making a $450 payment during the month. That doesn’t seem correct, but every time I check their calculations for the year they’ve been correct.  The student loan is my only liability. With the way it accrues interest, it might be a liability forever. I’d like to get it refinanced, but I can’t get it done since my debt is so much bigger than my income.

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 August.

August’s income was pretty good. Most of the income was from my full-time job.  I made about $450 from my non-job sources of income. That isn’t too bad, but it is much less than I’d like it to be. I’m going to work on getting those numbers higher. September is a three paycheck month for me so the overall income total for this month will be up quite a bit.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for August.

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August was not a great month for expenses. My expenses were way higher than normal and way over my $1000 target. The high expenses were due to my moving into a new apartment. Rent was high this month since there was some overlapping of rent for my new apartment and shared expenses I paid at my GF’s house. There was also about $300 spent on furniture and other stuff for the apartment.  For that $300 I got a futon, twin innerspring mattress , shelves, wi-fi router, pot and pan set, toaster oven, hot plate, plastic storage containers. cleaning supplies, paper towels, toilet paper, laundry detergent, hamper, dish towels, towel rack, toilet paper holder, shower massage, shelf liner, fabric storage drawers, and probably a few more items I can’t think of right now. I think I got pretty good value for my money.

I also spent $300 to have internet installed. This will allow me to have free internet for as long as I live in this apartment. That is a great deal. Electric and water are included in my apartment rent, so $435 a month will pay my rent and all utilities including internet.

Food was another bad expense category in August.  I ate out all but three days during the month. Some days I ate out more than once so I had about 30 restaurant meals for the month. That is bad for my budget and terrible for my health. I’ll be cutting way back on that this month.

This month food and household expense will be a lot lower. Health will be a bit higher since I have a dentist appointment and I’m getting new health insurance from work. Getting health insurance from work is supposed to be a benefit, but it is a detriment for me this year. The cost will be more than my marketplace insurance  and the deductible is considerably higher. Plus, I’d already met my deductible for my marketplace insurance and now have to start over meeting the deductible for my employer insurance. That will cost me some money. How much it costs me depends on how much health care I need the rest of the year.

I expect my other expense categories to remain roughly the same. I should at least get close to meeting my $1000 target this month.

How was your month?