Lazy Man and Money

Reviewing My Net Worth

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It’s been a long time since I calculated my net worth – July 2008 to be specific. Why did I stop calculating it then? There were two main reasons:

  • The big stock market drop – Things had dropped so much that it was depressing. The fall of housing prices also played heavily into it as I count the equity of a home that I own (umm, I mean the bank owns, I’m just a small partner). For those who are new to this blog, I don’t live in the home anymore as my wife got a better job opportunity on the other side of the country. I didn’t sell the home at a loss. So it’s a poor investment property until the market gets a lot better.
  • It had gotten boring – I know that sounds like an excuse, but if your income and expenses don’t change much, month-to-month, your net worth is going to float along with whatever current investments you have. In the first 6 months of 2008 my net worth changed less that 0.5% in either direction. It’s kind of silly to write a post about that every month.

So why now?

  • I had just finished up 6 months of contracting – I was making fairly good money for a good part of it, and it’s helped me combat some of the losses in the stock market. Though I still have some money coming in to me.
  • I hadn’t done it in over a year – Instead of doing it too often, I’m not doing it often enough. Perhaps I should get on a quarterly schedule.
  • I had just finished up 6 months of contracting – I’m going to use the same reason twice. Without that contract job bringing in constant money, I back to earning by making money online. I need to evaluate where I stand financially and make a plan from there. Figuring out my net worth seems like a natural place to begin planning – and making sure what I’m doing is enough to get me to my goals.

So when I was doing my net worth, I found that I had about $10,000 than last year… going from around $212K to $202K. That doesn’t seem to be that good a number for someone who made good money for 6 months. I wish I had a better idea of how much of that money is still on it’s way in. I had been a little Lazy with copying the timesheets. I’d estimate to be around $30,000 though.

With a wife making good money, and having health care, and $202K to my name, I think I’m relatively okay to begin this journey of making money online again. Before I really make that case, I’m going to have look at my expenses and see what I really need to cut back on.

A Brief Net Worth Update

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Last month, I decided there probably isn’t a whole lot of value in sharing my net worth ups and downs with you. If you want to put yourself in my shoes, here’s a basic synopsis of my account holdings. I have a little over $200,000 in net worth. About half of that is in retirement accounts. A quarter is invested in a condo. The last quarter is cash and other assets that are lot more liquid.

Each month, I look at how I much money I had the previous month and how much I have today. The quick look this month shows that real estate has a minor upswing in Boston where my investment condo is. I use Zillow to keep track of prices, because it’s very accurate for my condo. Since it’s one of around 200 identical units – there are enough similar recent sales to get a good trend.

My retirement accounts rebounded slightly this month. I’d like to take a lot of credit for it, but other than asset allocation, I simply let the market go where it wants to.

The real part that control is the liquid portion of my account. It’s this area where I can see gains from my alternative income, reducing my spending, and other day-to-day money matters. This last month wasn’t a particularly stellar month for me as far as that goes. The biggest expense was eating out. Though it was probably fewer than 5 times for the month, we’d probably be better off with our health and our wallet if we stayed home and cooked almost all the time.

The other expense was a surprise gift of jewelry for my wife. She had been eying a particular piece for some time. She has been extremely understanding of my increasingly frugal nature and it was time to show that being frugal does have it rewards.

A Brief Net Worth Update

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For the past couple of years, I’ve been keeping track of my net worth and posting about gains and losses. I’ve started to realize that it’s typically a very boring post. I don’t know if readers really get too much value in reading that I’ve lost $800 due to stock market fluctuations. As such, I think I’ll just continue to weigh in with a brief post like this and give a couple of interesting details… if there are interesting details to give.

This month was a tough month. The stock market hasn’t been doing well and my retirement plans are taking it on the chin losing $8,000 in value. The other interesting piece of note is that I had more cash this month than last month. This is notable because I’m not making what many would consider a good income while I focus on building a few businesses.

Net Worth Update – June 2008

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It’s the middle of the month, so it’s a time to take a look at my net worth. Due to the stock market slump it slumped a little bit. It’s specifically down about $3,000 from around $220,500 to $217,380. The first half this year has been disappointing to me, because I really thought I’d be making more money that I’m spending. That speaks a little to the splurges that I’ve made, like my Asus EEE, but it really is about my income. I expected my websites to make more money. Maybe it’s the economy, or maybe I’m not doing a few things right. Perhaps the best explanation is that I simply don’t have the writing skills as some personal, finance, writers. Either way, I’m not giving up.

In the last month, I’ve been focusing a bit on another business. I mentioned it in passing in this space before. I can’t go into too many details, but I will say this. It piggybacks on the blogging skills I’ve acquired over the last two years. I will also say it heavily relies on the principals of the four hour work week. It’s on the verge of being profitable already which is quite outstanding considering that California’s incorporation costs are quite high ($1200+).

Here’s looking forward to next month.

Net Worth Update – May 2008

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It’s the middle of the month, so it’s a time to calculate my net worth. For the last 5 months or so, I’ve been pretty much break even – spending almost exactly what I’ve earned. This is not a long-term recipe for success, but it’s a lot better than many people do when starting a business. Of course, I’m aided greatly in that this website makes some money, I do some contract work on the side, and my wife earns a very good income (my net worth doesn’t take her money into account).

Due to a small surge in stock prices, my net worth grew around $2,000 to $220,490. I could have done a couple of thousand dollars better, but one organization has been slow to pay some money they owe me. On the other hand, I’ve been slow to bill another organization for work done. There is no excuse for this other than laziness and possible stupidity. I am leaving interest on the table.