Expense/Income Tracking

My SWR for August was 37.25%.  While writing this post I noticed that last month I stated my SWR rate was 37.58% in the post and 35.22% in the title. I’m not sure which one of those is correct.  Depending on which is correct my SWR either slightly improved or got a little worse. I didn’t add to my savings in August, but the stock market did pretty well so I think the SWR probably improved slightly.

My goal is to get the SWR down to 4% so the lower my SWR is the better. That goal is probably many years from being met. The 4% SWR translates into having 25x your annual expenses in savings or 300 months of expenses in savings. Once I reach that point I will consider myself financially independent.

I have 32.21 months of living expenses saved which is a slight improvement from 31.92 months saved in July. This amount went up due to the stock market rebound in August. I didn’t add to my savings in August.  I calculate my months of living expenses saved by dividing the average of my trailing twelve months of expenses by my total money saved. When I don’t add any money to my savings the only changes to my SWR and months of living expenses saved are from my investment performance and the average of my trailing twelve month’s of expenses going up or down.

Here is a breakdown of my income for August.

My income was pretty good in August.  Although I only worked the first couple of days in August I received a couple of paychecks so I still had decent income from the job.

I kept better track of my Amazon FBA income during August so I can give an exact figure there.  My main motivation for doing Amazon FBA was to earn a Southwest Companion pass through using the Rapid Rewards shopping portal.  I should have my companion pass at the end of the month so I’ll probably cut back on Amazon FBA.  I wasn’t doing a big volume anyway so cutting back won’t make much difference.

I received some bonus income from the Motif  referral bonus and the Betterment referral bonus.  If you want to sign up through one of my referral links they are in the sidebar. If you want more information on either of the bonuses feel free to email me or leave a comment. I’m going to try to make more money from these referral bonuses.  I like them because they make me money and make money for my readers as well.

My cashback income stayed about the same. If you haven’t joined Mr. Rebates yet you can get a $5 bonus for signing up through my referral link and I’ll make a little money for referring you as well.

This month is the last month of my medical study.  I’ll be getting a larger check this month than last which should help my overall income for the month.  Without any job income I’ll probably make less in September.  I do plan to ramp up selling stuff on Craigslist and Ebay so that might offset some of the loss of job income.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for August.

My August expenses almost got down to my target level of $1000.  I had a dental appointment which cost $165 which caused part of the overage. My entertainment expense was the only category that was way too high.  I spent $40 on a $50 movie gift card which will be used mainly this month and I put some more money into fixing my bike which resulted in the high entertainment expense.  All of my other expense categories were okay.  This month I am having some oral surgery so my expenses will be way up. I will probably also have some travel expense. Everything else should remain about the same.

My SWR rate for July was 37.58% compared to 34.39% in June. That is a step in the wrong direction, but it isn’t too surprising since I didn’t add to my savings during the month and the value of my stock investments declined. My goal is to get the SWR down to 4% so the lower my SWR is the better. That goal is probably many years from being met. The 4% SWR translates into having 25x your annual expenses in savings or 300 months of expenses in savings. Once I reach that point I will consider myself financially independent.

I have 31.92 months of living expenses saved down from 34.89 in June. This amount went down due to my stocks declining in value and my average monthly expense increasing due to my high expenses in July. I calculate my months of living expenses saved by dividing the average of my trailing twelve months of expenses by my total money saved. When I don’t add any money to my savings the only changes to my SWR and months of living expenses saved are from my investment performance and the average of my trailing twelve month’s of expenses going up or down.

Here is a breakdown of my income for July.

My income was pretty good in July.  I did work the entire month so I expected it to be a good month.  I did have a couple of smaller paychecks to start the month due to being on vacation the last week of June and having the 4th of July off.  I made $600 from the medical study as well which helped a bit.

My cashback income stayed about the same.  If you haven’t joined Mr. Rebates yet you can get a $5 bonus for signing up through my referral link and I’ll make a little money for referring you as well.

I didn’t keep very good records of my product purchases for Amazon FBA in July, but I believe my profit was about $50 since I sold some items that I got for basically free. So far Amazon FBA has been more of a way to generate Southwest miles than a money-maker, but if I can make a little money while accumulating miles I think it is a fair deal.

My current job has now ended so the job income will be quite a bit less this month. I only have one study visit this months so that will be less as well. My other sources of income will probably remain about the same which will result in less income for August. Since I will still receive two paychecks from my job it will not be too bad though.