Expense/Income Tracking

My February investment income rose to $97.32 from $97.23 the month before.  This was due to an increase in the value of the funds and individual stocks I hold in my portfolio since I did not add any money to my investments.  I’m hoping I can get this over $100 in the next few months but I’m not yet sure when I will have additional money to add to my investments.  My cash reserves are lower than I prefer right now and I won’t be adding to my investments until I get my cash back up to what I consider a comfortable level.

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. You can see what my actual investment income for the month was by looking at my monthly income report and adding the interest and dividend amounts.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for February.

My expenses were higher than I like but not as bad as they seem.  The $227.79 of travel expenses and over $100 of the transportation expense were incurred as a result of participating in the medical study in St. Louis.  The travel expenses were for six nights of  hotel rooms and the transportation expense was the cost of gas for getting to St. Louis and back.  It would probably be more accurate to just deduct these expenses from my medical study income later this month but I’m just going to list them as expenses.  My expenses will probably be just slightly less this month but I’m hoping I can get them back to the $1000 level in April.

It is rather late since it is already March but here is a breakdown of my income for January.  I’ll get February’s figures up next week.

It was a pretty good month for income.  Online income would have been over $1000 but I had some expenses.  I did well on mystery shopping and I had some job income as well. Although it is nice to see most of the income is alternative income and passive income. Mystery shopping was down for February and I didn’t have a job so my February income will be lower but it should still be decent.

Here is a breakdown of my online income for January 2011.

Google Adsense – $214.60

Affiliate Income – $650

Brokered Ads – $49.88

Direct Ads – $101.57

Ehow –             $11.51

Total – $1027.56

My online income was once again over $1000.  It was boosted by a large affiliate check.   Affiliate income will be much smaller this week so my new streak of $1000 months will likely be over at two months.  Still I’ve made $1000 or more a month for five of the last six months so I’m not complaining.  Considering how little effort I’ve put into my online endeavors lately I am lucky to be making this month.  If I put in 40 hours a week working online I think I could make a full-time income.  We will see.

Here is a breakdown of my expenses for January.

My expenses for January were much higher than I would like.  This is mainly due to spending over $400 for bar preparation materials and over $200 for a doctor visit.  My food total only includes meals I eat out by myself, that is why it is low.  My expenses should be lower this month since I won’t have the bar prep or medical expenses.  Expenses will still be higher than normal because my wife and I are taking a short getaway to Dallas.  Also the cost of driving back and forth to St. Louis to participate in the study will increase my transportation expenses although I may just take that out of my income figure.   I’m thinking my expenses will probably get back to around my $1000 goal in March.