Tag Archives: net worth

Both Best and Worst Personal Financial Times This Year So Far

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“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times“, the quote from the book: A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens best described my cash flow activity pattern for this year, so far.

Let me explain…

RichPoor

“Best of Time” Financial Perspective

First, I now consider myself at the threshold of barely being in the “Upper Middle Class” as I wrote in my article called “My Personal Finance Pyramid Update Lower (Upper Middle Class)“.

I’m doing much, much better than last year in the stock market.  In fact, I’ve already beaten my “secret wealth goal” of increasing my by increasing my net worth this year by more than my annual salary.  In fact, I met this goal a few months ago before the market started to go sideways.  So a big booyah on the net worth increase for this year!

I’m trying to max out both my 401k and my Roth IRA for the year.  This isn’t an easy task, but so far I’m on track to do both.  While this is a positive action for the year, I have to admit, I’m really starting to rethink this goal.

While saving like a mad man, I’m also having my employer take out an ESPP contribution so I can earn that sweet 15% per quarter (not I said quarter, not year!) that program offers as an incentive!  Because of the bull market and my delaying my sale of the stock option, I’ve been able to achieve a bit more than 15% return on each quarterly contribution (not to mentioned that gain off of the money I reinvested after selling my ESPP options for the year).  While there is no doubt that the ESPP is sweet, I think it has more of an impact during a slow or even a bear market.  There would be nothing sweater than gaining 15% per quarter on the money than when the market is down 10%…

“Worst of Times” Financial Perspective:

So looks like I’m doing pretty good from the “Best of Times” piece above, and I am, no questioning it, it’s been a good year for everybody…

The main problem that I have is that I’m “Cash Flow” constrained.  Actually, cash flow constrained might be an understatement.  You see, each month I’m about 600 dollar short from break even.  Now a negative 600 hundred dollars cash flow adds up and hit one hard about… right now!  Yes, my checking account cash buffer has been depleted and it looks like I’m going to have to hit some of my investments to make it through the year!

Eating my investments, is definitely a negative, and feels a bit like I’m moving backwards (because I am).  Now I probably won’t need more than $2,000 to tide me over for the rest of the year, but I need to change my financial plans now instead of later, since it’s a self-induced financial problem instead of a spending/earning problem.

My next post will have a more detailed financial action plan, to reverse my cash flow stream, making it a positive flow again instead of a negative one.

 

Our Net Worth Increased By 455% In A Ten Year Timespan

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From the year 2001 to 2011, our net worth has increased by 455%!

401k History

401k Performance History

 

Okay, first let me saying that any increase in net worth really depends on the starting amount and the ending amount.  It’s easy to be amazed by a percentage like 455% until you consider the starting amount.

For instance let’s look at a few examples:

If my starting amount was $100, that would mean that I have $555 dollars today, not so impressive after all huh!

But if my starting balance was $100,000 then I would have $555,000, that’s a much nicer chunk of change!

What I used to calculate our net worth:

  • Roth IRA (didn’t exist back in 2001)
  • 401k Balance (not to shabby even in 2001)
  • Home Equity (This is the biggest chunk of my net worth)
  • Checking Account Balance (stayed the same, surprisingly grrr)
  • Brokerage Account (big jump, yay).

So as I’ve said before, we’ve never had a year where our household income has exceeded $100,000.  But since my wife and I are frugal, and I’m investing a decent amount of our discretionary income, we were able to grow our net worth nicely.  While I won’t reveal our actual net worth number, I will say that it’s over $100,000.

Here are some random statistics about our change in net worth from 2001 to 2011:

  • Around year 2003, I started a Roth IRA
  • While my home value is the largest percentage of my net worth, my brokerage account had the greatest percentage increase (over 1000%) during the past ten years.
  • The amount in my checking account has remained at $5,000, but that’s because I have my money working for me.
  • My 401k has increased nicely too, over a 10% annual return since 2001.  Back in the early days, I had some great appreciation in certain mutual funds.

We were able to do the above activities because we sacrificed and saved like we were still in college.  Back then, we only went on a real vacation every other year or so.  Our house is full of nice looking but mostly used furniture and hand me downs.  We always looked for opportunities and took advantage of great values when we recognized them.

Hopefully for the next ten years, we can increase our net worth by 200%, I don’t think 455% is sustainable and not a realistic goal for the next ten years.

Do you frequently calculate your net worth change from the past to the present?

Bests,

MR

 

Income Loss From My Wife Being a Stay at Home Mom

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After posting “How I Have Lost Over Half A Million Dollars Having Kids, So Far!”, I started thinking about how many of my family and friend’s spouses work.

Let me start with our parents… Both sets of parents work.  All the people I know at work, their spouse works.  My boss who makes at least twice as much as I do, spouse works.  Where I live, only one other neighbor’s spouse doesn’t work, the rest do.  My college-educated sister and brother-in-law (great people), both work.  My sister is having a baby in Feb. 2010, and she claims she’s going back to work a few weeks after the baby is born.  They already make more than me…

So, I decided to go out to the website:  money.com to use their calculator for net worth and see what the median (the median, mind you) net worth would be for someone in our conservatively theoretical income range!  The number came out to be $644,100.

Missed Income

Missed Income

And that is the median!  Both my wife and I are very frugal and based on our frugality habits, I recalculated the number…  I figured for us it would be somewhere in the $800,000 to $900,000 range, Grrrr!

Who is to blame for this?  Well, unfortunately, me!  My wife and I discussed whether she would work or stay home raising the kids years before we had our first child.  I told her once I make over a certain amount, she could stay home.  Ironically, I accomplished that number more quickly then I imagined, and so she stayed at home after my son was born. In hindsight, I don’t think this was the most prudent move on our part.  It especially hits home seeing my 20 something sister start to pass me already with respect to net worth, did I mention that both she and my brother-in-law are both studying for their MBAs?  In a future post, I’ll have to tell the story about how my sister won a free house. So now that I know I’m behind compared to our theoretical income group’s class, what can I do?  I’m thinking it’s time to start some side hustling (frugaldad.com’s coined-phrase).

How do I feel about my discovery?

Sad, but not too disappointed.  My kids are doing very well in all aspects of their development.  It’s a hefty price to pay though, especially when we’re practically the only ones doing it these days in a world of the two-income earner households.  Shoot, If we had that money now, I could go into a semi-retirement state if I wanted to (I’m not old enough to think about that now though)… Oh well, the moral of the story is, think twice before and your significant other decide to quit work to raise your kids.