passive income

April Investment Income – $96.83

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My April investment income went down to $96.83 from $98.43 the month before.  This is because I didn’t add to my investments and the stock market went down.  I won’t be adding to my investments this month either and it looks like the stock market is going down more so my investment income will probably go down again.  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.

April Income – $934.03

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Here is a breakdown of my income for April.

Online Income

$641.21

Interest

$24.80

Stock Dividends

$24.75

Mystery Shops

$66

Bank Bonuses

$140

Surveys/Cashback

$7.27

Focus Group

$30

Total

$934.03

It was a decent month for income.  I made over $900 without any job income.  I did start work at the end of April but I’ll be paid for those days this month.   Since I am working a job this month some of my other sources of income will be down this month but the passive income should be about the same.  Overall though I will have a significant increase in income this month.

March Investment Income – $98.43

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My investment income rose from $89.50 in January to $98.43 in March. That is a great increase and it is almost entirely due to gains in my stock portfolio and Roth IRA. I did add $100 to my Roth but otherwise haven’t made any contributions to my investment portfolio this year. If the stock market doesn’t decline I should be able to pass the $100 mark in the next couple of months. There is also a possibility that I will be making a large contribution to my portfolio which would speed things up a bit.

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

Tracking Passive Income

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To keep track of how I am doing in my quest for early retirement I have decided to add another monthly financial measurement. I will be tracking my passive income. For the purposes of this measurement my passive income will be my online income, interest, and stock dividends. My online income is only partly passive but to keep things simple I am counting all of it. Since I will likely keep blogging whether I need the money or not it doesn’t seem too inaccurate to include my online income in my passive income total. My online income, interest, and stock dividends can vary quite a bit from month to month so I am going to measure my passive income by my trailing twelve month average. This should smooth out the peaks and valleys a little. Hopefully the overall trend will be that of rising passive income.

Over the past 12 months my passive income has averaged out to $412.04 a month. My goal is to have this consistently over $1000 a month. At that point I will consider myself retired. Even once retired I will continue to participate in money-making activities of my choosing so it wouldn’t be the traditional form of retirement.

December Investment Income – $90.93

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My December investment income rose to $90.93 from $89.13 the month before.  This was all the result of gains in my investment portfolio as I did not invest any additional money in December.  There will probably not be any additional investments made for the next few months, other than reinvested dividends, as I am trying to rebuild my cash after a couple of large purchases at the end of 2009.

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.