Have you noticed how time runs faster than normal when you are busy? After returning from our vacation, we seem to be going non-stop. I nearly forgot to take some time to update our net worth.
We are in savings mode and our net worth is up again for the month. Let us take a look, shall we?
Monthly Net Worth Update
Assets
After meeting with our new accountant for Dr. SoS’s business we decided she would take a single paycheck per month. Since she had already taken a draw earlier in the month, we were able to add the extra money to our savings and increase our emergency fund. This extra cash was the largest increase in our assets for the month.
Cash Savings
Our cash savings includes all our checking and savings accounts. With the extra paycheck we were able to increase this by $3,448.97. It is about time. Using all our savings to pay off the Home Equity Line of Credit made things tight for a while, but we are finally getting back into the swing of savings. I set a goal for us to have at least $10,000 in our emergency fund by the end of the year and I still believe we can make that happen.
Cash Back/Gift Cards
We increased our cash back by $77.11 last month. We are up to $640.53. I could cash out $239.87 of this and add it to savings. I believe I will do that this month.
Cryptocurrency
Cryptocurrency is taking a serious hit lately. I have not been watching it, but our balance dropped by $615.28 in the past month. That’s fine. It always was a speculative gamble.
Retirement
As you may know, we are focusing more on paying down debt in anticipation of a recession. In the last month the Dow (^DJI) decreased 2.54%, the S&P 500 (^GSPC) decreased 0.05%, the Nasdaq (^IXIC) decreased 3.47%, and the Russell 2000 (^RUT) decreased 5.14%. These are the markets we typically watch in the US. Our retirement, in slight contrast, increased by 0.21%. In our retirement we include an IRA for each of us, a Roth IRA for each of us, my BrokerageLink account, my 403(b), my 401(a), and our Health Savings Account (HSA). The main increase was from contributions to my retirement accounts and our HSA.
House
We are keeping the value of our house at $310,000, which we believe we could reasonably get with minimal updating in the current market. This is contrary to the current market which is still near the all-time high for our zip code.
Cars and Boat
This was the area that took the largest hit from the previous month. Our youngest son drove Dr. SoS’s car to Michigan for vacation. This little trip knocked off $535 from the Kelly Blue Book value. My car also dropped in value by $235. The NADA Guides dropped the value of our boat by an additional $230. In a month without market increase and some minimal savings, this dropped these depreciating assets by $1,000.
Liabilities
We paid off $2,276.84 in debt last month, bringing our total liabilities down to a new low of $384,987.66.
Credit Cards
We finished this month with some shopping the last couple days of the month, which totaled $567.05. As I mentioned in our August Net Worth blog post we have to wait for the charges to hit our Chase card, but I paid all the credit cards off last Friday. Although we had a balance at the end of last month, we are back to $0 today, which is where we like to keep our cards on a weekly basis.
Car Loan
We have 16 more $600 payments to pay off my car. Now that we have a plan to increase our emergency savings we are also starting to save for a vacation for next year and a Tesla for Dr. SoS.
Mortgage
We have 111 payments or 9 years 3 months remaining to pay off our rapidly decreasing balance of $168,360.66. Many people debate the wisdom of a 15-year versus a 30-year mortgage, but I like having 15-year mortgage. We paid $1,306.65 against the principal of our mortgage last month and that feels great!
Student Loans
We have 282 more payments on this loan if we stick to the current payment plan. At $206,459.95, this is by far our largest debt. Our plan continues to be to pay off the house and then knock this debt out.
Summary
As of the first day of September 2019, we have a new net worth high of $598,030.00 up 1.01% from our net worth of $592,066.49 last month and up 34.13% from our net worth of $445,847.96 from the first of September 2018. I predict we pass $600,000 next month. Our current net worth puts us in the top 28% at 223/787 bloggers on the Rockstar Finance Directory Net Worth Tracker, however it appears that no one is currently updating that page, which is quite unfortunate.
We compile this information each month to keep us accountable and to hopefully inspire others to spend less than they make, save more, and make wise investment choices. If you have any comments or questions, please leave a comment or contact us directly.
Thank you for reading!
Mr. SoS