Expense/Income Tracking

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for August.

My August expenses were nice and low. I’m quite happy with the total expenses for the month. If you deduct the $749.40 I paid towards my student loan then my total expenses for the month were under $1000 which is my stretch goal for every month. The extra paid towards my student loan in August came from my online income. I have committed to using all income earned from my blogs to pay down my student loan.  If you buy something or sign up for a service through one of the affiliate links on this site the money I earn in commission will go towards my student loan. It had been a few months since I had made an extra payment which resulted in the large payment in August. I need to start making the payments every month I have online income so it isn’t such a hit to my checking account when I make the extra payment.

The only expense category I wasn’t happy with in August was the food category. I spent way too much money on food in August. Some of that was due to my Vegas trip where I paid over $16 for a Shake Shack (overrated) meal. Even without the trip my food spending would have been way too high. I’m aiming to cut that expense in half this month.

Other than that I expect my expenses in September to be pretty similar to August.

In order to keep track of my financial progress or lack of progress I have decided to calculate my net worth each month.

My net worth as of today (8/2/2016) is as follows.

Assets
Cash – $4393.42 (-$415.14)
IRA – $23,839.74 (+$373.76)
Roth IRA – $10,320.25 (+$324.94)
Car/Stuff – $4700 (-$100)

Liabilities
Student Loan – $129,775.17 ($642.75)

Net Worth = $-86,521.76

My net worth decreased by $459.19 since the last update. Although I had a nice increase in my investments they were not enough to overcome the decrease in cash and the over $600 in student loan interest. Some of the decrease in cash is due to an increase in Amazon FBA inventory. I hope to be able to turn most of that inventory back into cash this month.

As I’ve stated before this massive student loan makes it difficult for me to get ahead financially. Since it charges over $600 a month interest I start in a pretty big hole each month. I need to increase my income dramatically to be able to get ahead on this loan.

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 July.

My income was pretty good in July considering I only had one day of pay from my document review job. The big contributor to my income this month was cash back. As part of Discover’s double cash back promotion I received $983.16 in cash back. This represented a match of all the cash back I had earned from Discover in the past 12 months. That was a pretty good return for a five-minute phone call to sign up for the promotion.

My FBA income finally came back to a decent level. It should be a lot higher this month. A hardware store near me went out of business and I bought a ton of stuff at 50% off.

I also completed a health insurance research study that paid me $48.25 after PayPal fees. That was a very good return for about ten minutes of time. The survey was a random find on Craigslist. I’ll have to check the Etc. category more often.

The health insurance research study has another study that will pay you $25 if you sign up through my referral link. I’ll get $25 for referring you as well.

My cash back income will be a lot less this month. I’m thinking I will be able to make up the reduction in cash back income with increased FBA income and online income. If I can make about the same amount this month as in July I will be okay with that result.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for July.

My July expenses were a little higher than I would prefer.  The higher expenses were due to my $605 of travel expenses which were mainly from my shortened  hiking trip. Since the travel expenses paid for two nights hotel, a two-day train trip, a one day rental car, a taxi, and several bus fares it is a reasonable number.  Since I didn’t get many miles hiked which was the purpose of the trip the expense was mostly a waste of money. On the bright side the July travel expense is also covering my round-trip airfare from Kansas City to Las Vegas. I’ll be staying three nights and have one free night and should be able to book two more nights at a very low rate. The Vegas vacation will be very cheap as long as I don’t lose too much gambling.

I have a doctor and a dentist appointment this month which will make my health expense higher. The other expenses I expect to stay about the same this month. I think I have a good shot at keeping my expenses under $1000 this month.

In order to keep track of my financial progress or lack of progress I have decided to calculate my net worth each month. This month’s is a little delayed since I was hiking at the beginning of the month.

My net worth as of today (7/1/2016) is as follows.

Assets
Cash – $4808.56  (+$697.42)
IRA – $23,465.98 (+$427.26)
Roth IRA – $9995.31 (-$52.49)
Car/Stuff – $4800 (-$100)

Liabilities
Student Loan – $129,132.42 ($515.16)

Net Worth = $-86,062.57

My net worth improved by $457.03 since the last update. That was mainly due to the increase in cash due to depositing paychecks from my temporary document review job. Surprisingly, I made money from my investment last month even with the sharp stock market drop after Brexit.  My accounts must have been up quite a bit before the stock market drop.

As I’ve stated before this massive student loan makes it difficult for me to get ahead financially. Since it charges over $600 a month interest I start in a pretty big hole each month. I am thinking of starting a private practice in order to hopefully be able to make enough money to qualify to refinance the loan and start paying it down. I don’t have a lot of confidence in my ability to make it own my own so I’m putting that idea off for at least a couple of months.

I’ve been using Personal Capital (aff 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