Expense/Income Tracking

July Expenses – $1311.23

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Here is a breakdown of my expenses for July.

Household

$340.53

Entertainment

$86.49

Transportation

 $251.92

Food

$125.51
Medical/Dental

$57.44

Utilities

$115.13
Wedding $334.21

Total

$1311.23

My expenses were up slightly from the previous month. This was mainly because I had $334.21 of wedding/honeymoon expenses.  I ended up spending a total of  about $1100 for the wedding and honeymoon.  DW probably spent about $200.  I think that is a pretty good deal.  There won’t be any wedding or honeymoon expenses this month so my total expenses will be down.  We are having a wedding reception this Saturday but the total cost of that is about $200 and my mother is covering that expense.

My transportation expense was much higher than I would prefer but that is mainly due to driving a lot for mystery shops.  Since I am now working a regular job I will be cutting back on the mystery shops and I should be spending a lot less in gas.  I might need to get some tires and other work done on the car though which would keep my transportation expense high again this month.

I spent way too much on food considering DW buys most of the groceries and I had lots of fast food mystery shops.  I need to cut back on the fast food and junk food purchases.

Everything else will probably remain about the same this month.

June Investment Income – $89.47

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My June investment income went down to $89.47  from $96.83 in April, I didn’t  calculate my investment income in May. The decline is because I didn’t add to my investments and the stock market went down  quite a bit.  It wasn’t a good time to own BP.  I should have sold my shares sooner but I didn’t realize just how big of a disaster the oil spill was. I won’t be adding to my investments this month either but my investments have recovered a little so my investment income should go up a little.  This is a little frustrating since I was looking forward to getting over the $100 mark but as soon as I’m able to start adding to my investments I should reach the $100 goal.

Disclaimer: 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.

Online Income Report – June 2010

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For the month of June I made $414.06 in online income. I report my income when I actually receive it not when I earn it so my income total may not reflect my current income trends. The total I report here is my gross income but the total I include in my monthly income is minus some expenses so the totals will not always match. Here is a breakdown of my income for June.

Google Adsense     $295.79

Text Links                $37.16

Affiliate Sales         $67.00

Direct Ad Sales      $14.11

My Adsense continues to go down.   Since there is a one month delay in payment I already know my Adsense total for this month is down and it looks like it will be down again next month.  I have done a lot of experimenting with my Adsense to try to increase my Adsense revenue but so far I have just found a bunch of ways to decrease my Adsense revenue.  I will keep trying while also trying to increase my income from sources other than Adsense.

If I receive the payments owed me my affiliate sales total for July will go way up.  I have also already had one  nice direct ad sale for a full year making a nice increase in my direct ad sales total.   I am also talking to a couple of other advertisers, if all the possible deals come through July should be my best month for online income to date.  I’m not counting my chickens yet though and I need to keep working on increasing my income and diversifying the sources of income.

June Income- $873.35

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Here is a breakdown of my income for June.

Online Income

$362.10

Interest

$19.36

Stock Dividends

$95.02

Mystery Shops

$344.96

Bank Bonuses

$20

Cashback

$.68

Job

$31.23

Total

$873.35

It was not a good month for income.  My job ended and I just had one tiny paycheck.   My online income wasn’t as high as I had hoped because I didn’t receive about $300 in affiliate sales and direct link sales that was owed me.  I should receive most of that money but it looks like Mint.com is going to be a deadbeat.  My total income will probably be even worse this month since I won’t have any job income and I am cutting back on mystery shopping.  I plan to get a job in August and get my income back up above my expenses.

June Expenses- $1263.31

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Here is a breakdown of my expenses for June.

Household

$575.70

Entertainment

$120.41

Transportation

 $292.72

Food

$117.11
Medical/Dental

$57.44

Utilities

$69.93

Debt

 $30.00

Total

$1263.31

June’s expenses were a big improvement from May but not quite down to the $1000 level that is my goal.   If I wouldn’t have spent $170 on a washer and dryer and another $130 on getting my brakes fixed my expenses would have been reasonable and I would have made my goal.

In July I should be able to make my $1000 goal if I don’t include wedding/honeymoon expenses.  The bulk of that has been paid for but there will be approximately another $300-$500 in expenses for the wedding and honeymoon.

I should be able to significantly reduce my transportation expense this month.  It has been too high because I’ve been making too many long drives.  I will be keeping the long drives to a minimum this month and will try to curb my driving around town as well.

The food expense may not look bad but it is.  Only $38 of that total is groceries I bought for the household.  The rest is fast-food I bought for myself.  Making that figure even worse is the fact that I received several free fast-food meals from mystery shops.  It is no surprise that I gained weight in June.  For July I won’t be having any fast food unless it is for a mystery shop.  I may have to make an exception for In-n-Out when I am in Vegas since I don’t get to eat it too often.

Utilities will probably go up since we will receive the first electric bill for our new apartment.  June’s utilities included my electric bill for my apartment in KC, my final internet bill, and my cell phone bill.   The July electric bill will probably be bigger than all those combined.  At least I won’t have to pay for internet any more since it is included in rent.

The other categories will probably be roughly the same.  We will not be sharing all expenses 50/50 so I will note that when I total July’s expenses.