Net Worth - April 2014

April was a great month for me.  I managed to sock a little bit of money away in my emergency fund and put a really huge chunk of money toward my student loan.  I had family visiting for a couple of different weekends in April, which always means I spend less than when I’m at home or traveling.

This month was also the first time my paycheck showed my raise as well as a significant amount of overtime, which really helped putting money toward my goals.

·         Assets: $17,216.76

o   Checking: $1,442.10

o   Savings: $2,000.27

o   CD: $5,004.99

o   Roth IRA: $5,519.22

o   401k: $3,250.18

·         Liabilities: $22,692.76

o   Discover: $510.34

o   Loan #1: $21,666.60

o   Loan #2 (AES 02): $515.82

·         Net Worth: $(5,476.00)

·         Bottom Line: +$2,066.77

As a bonus to doing so well this month, I hit all three of my April goals!

April Goals:

·         Achieve a net worth of $(6,000.00)

·         Bring my AES 02 loan to a balance of $(1,000.00) or better

·         Achieve $2,000 in my emergency fund

Next month is a three paycheck month, which means my goals are loftier than usual.  Here’s what I’m hoping to accomplish:

May Goals:

·         Pay off my student loan with AES (so close!)

·         Contribute $1,000 to my Roth IRA

·         Contribute $1,000 to my savings

The really cool thing about my goals for next month is that one of them would actually take one of my long-term goals off the table (long-term meaning more than monthly).  When I had in my mind that I wanted to max out my Roth for 2013, it felt great when I was able to do so after months of contributing.  I think I’ll get the same feeling of satisfaction when I pay off my student loan.  It will be great to have one less obligatory goal on my plate.  It will also be great to only be paying my money to one loan servicer!

What are your May goals?  Are you close to hitting any long-term goals?

Net Worth - March 2014

[Sorry for this being such a LONG post!  I promise, it's all good things though!]

A lot of great things happened for me in March.  I turned 23 and was able to spend my birthday in New York City with my two best girlfriends from high school.  I was fortunate enough to take a road trip down to Winston-Salem, North Carolina with my little sister to visit my big sister and my twin sister was even able to be with us for a few brief hours.  I also got to head up to Hershey, PA where my twin sister lives and go for a massage and a sleepover.

On top of all that I got my federal and state tax refunds!  Woohoo for my bank account!  I managed to max out my 2013 Roth IRA and didn’t even have to cut it too close to the April 15^th deadline.  I hope everyone else is on track for those 4/15 IRA goals!

Since it was such a stellar month, let’s check out how everything is going:

·         Assets: $16,018.35

o   Checking: $962.82

o   Savings: $1,667.27

o   CD: $5,004.35

o   Roth IRA: $5,538.11

o   401k: $2,845.80

·         Liabilities: $23,556.98

o   Discover: $73.42

o   Loan #1: $21,810.37

o   Loan #2: $1,677.33

·         Net Worth: $(7,542.77)

·         Bottom Line: +$3,548.55

Whew!  What an awesome wrap-up for March.  As a bonus, both of my March goals were accomplished!

Goals:

·         Achieve a net worth of $(10,000.00).  I blew this one away, thanks to my tax refund money!

·         Contribute $1,400.00 to my Roth IRA.  Again, blown out of the water thanks to the extra $2,000 from my tax refund.

Since we’ve reached the end of the quarter, I think it would also be good to see how I’m doing overall with my annual goals.  Just like I monitor my finances throughout the month in order to meet my monthly goals, I think it’s good to monitor yourself on a larger scale to see if you’re close to hitting those annual goals!

Annual Goals:

·         2013 Roth IRA: $4,507

o   $4,507 contributed

o   100% completed

·         2014 Roth IRA: $5,500

o   $0 contributed

o   0% completed

·         401k: $3,000

o   $736.08 contributed (for paychecks paid by March 31)

o   24.54% completed

·         Loan #1: $4,000

o   $769.86 contributed

o   19.25% completed

·         Loan #2: paid off, ~$2,500

o   $843.61

o   33.74% completed

·         Emergency fund: $3333

o   $0 contributed

o   0% completed

·         Net Worth: $0 [originally $(16,053.86)]

o   $(7,542.77) currently

o   53.02% completed

Aaaaaand, after all that, here are my goals for April!

April Goals:

·         Achieve a net worth of $(6,000.00)

·         Bring my AES 02 loan to a balance of $(1,000.00) or better

·         Achieve $2,000 in my emergency fund

What are your April goals?  Are you working on building your assets or breaking down your debt?

Tax Refund 2013

I did my taxes yesterday and ended up getting amazing news.  I’m getting $1,769 back from the federal government and $387 from the Great State of Delaware.  What am I going to do with all of that moolah that will suddenly appear in my budget?  I’m going to stick it straight into my Roth IRA!  I’m so adventurous, I know.

The reason my return is so large is twofold:

·         Since I only started working in June, my gross annual income was fairly low.  This means that my initial deductions ($3,900 personal exemption and $6,100 standard deduction) stretched a lot further than they will next year when I make a full salary.

·         I paid almost $3,000 in student loan interest. (I paid off everything that had accrued while I was in school in addition to the monthly accrual since graduation.)  This means I managed another $2,500 deduction that wouldn’t even have to be included in itemized deductions.  Woo hoo!

The only downer about getting a big tax refund is that if I’d kept that money over the last 7 months, rather than paying it to the government, I could have been putting it in my Roth and earning interest and returns on it.  I know that the best situation in the long term would be to actually owe a little bit because then I would really be earning the maximum I could.

Wouldn’t it be nice if the government also paid interest to you on the excessive money they withheld?  How did you tax return turn out?  What will you do with your windfall?

Net Worth - February 2014

While January was a FABULOUS month in the world of this little lady’s finance, February was not so good.  I was away for two weekends, which ends up costing me more in the social spending category and I went on a couple of major clothing shopping sprees, pushing me over in that part of my budget as well.  Additionally, I bought tickets for Cinderella on Broadway for myself and two friends and haven’t been paid back yet.  We’ve decided to settle up after the trip, but it makes my bank accounts feel sad right now.

Regardless, it’s always good to see how I did over the course of the month and if I managed to meet the goals I set, so let’s check it out!

·         February:

o   Assets: $13,536.65

o   Liabilities: $(24,628.67)

o   Net Worth: $(11,092.02)

o   Bottom line: + $1,112.75

·         February GOALS:

o   Achieve a net worth of $(10,000.00)

o   Contribute $1,200.00 toward my Roth IRA    Unfortunately, I only put in $500. Womp womp, can you say disappointing?  I ended up taking a good amount of unpaid time off due to snow storms which means my paychecks were smaller and so were my contributions!

Wow.  I didn’t hit either goal this month.  It’s such a disappointment when that happens.  It’s okay to get off track sometimes; it just means I need to assess what happened this month and figure out how to get it together for the next one!

Here are my goals for next month!

·         March GOALS:

o   Achieve a net worth of $(10,000.00)

o   Contribute $1,400.00 toward my Roth IRA

How was your February?  Did you hit the mark or struggle like me?

P.S.  My life has been CRAZY lately.  I feel like I’m constantly away visiting friends and family or working or trying to spend time with the people in my life who live where I do.  As you can see this leaves my posting a little subpar!  I’m going to up the ante this month and really focus on bringing you some quips about my financial life!

Net Worth Update

I am LOVING January.  I did really, really well on my spending and really, really well on my Roth IRA contributions.  I managed to contribute just over $1,400 to my Roth and I didn’t spend any money on clothes.  I’ve been loving my shopping “cleanse” and am thinking about turning it into something I do once a quarter which my finances would love.  Let’s check out how I did this month:

·         January:

o   Assets: $12,781.87

o   Liabilities: $(24,986.64)

o   Net Worth: $(12,204.77)

o   Bottom line: + $3,849.09

·         January GOALS:

o   Spend no money in the clothing category (I typically budget $250/month, but I went overboard in December.  I am going to buckle down for this month to balance it out!)

o   Achieve a net worth of $(14,500.00)

o   Contribute $1,200.00 toward my student loans (I ended up reallocating this to my 2013 Roth IRA contributions since this is my top priority at the moment)

o   Build my assets to $9,000.00

I managed to hit every single one of my goals this month and even blew some of them out of the water (net worth, Roth IRA ,assets)!  My goals are going to be pretty similar for February as I’m really focusing on that Roth.  I also decided to start including my checking account balance and Discover card balance.  Typically I budget everything out by the last day of the month and get myself to a card balance of 0, but this month I have about $400 still on my card (don’t worry it will get paid in full!) and about $450 left in my budget (not for paying Discover, purely unspent).

I’m thinking about putting the extra $450 in my Roth, but am also contemplating just sticking it in my regular ole’ e-fund.  I can always put it in my Roth later, but we’ll see what happens!

·         February GOALS:

o   Achieve a net worth of $(10,000.00)

o   Contribute $1,200.00 toward my Roth IRA

How was your January?  Are you on track to hit all of your financial goals?

Does Pulling Out Work?

When I graduated from college last May, my very generous grandparents gave me a nice lump of money that I put into a CD in July.  At the time, I wanted to keep this money separate from retirement accounts and student loan payments so that I could eventually use it for a house or another larger purchase.

I’m now wondering if that’s the best decision.  I’m a ways off of purchasing a home or even figuring out where I want to be more permanently living.  I know that I won’t be buying anything until my loans are paid off, so that money is just sitting in the CD earning far less than my loans are accruing in interest.

Since July, the CD on $5,000 initial investment has earned a whopping total of $3.14.  Bummer.  I double checked and I would essentially have to pay 3 months’ interest as a fee to get out early which would be about $1.85.  However, the initial $5K is safe from fees.

If I pull out now, I can use that money to finish out my Roth IRA for 2013 ($3,907 left to contribute) and put the remainder ($1,093) into my e-fund which, as always, makes me nervous that I’ve kept it so low.

What would you do?  Is it better to take that cash and budget it out or would you keep it in savings for a bigger purchase even though it’s earning less than loans, IRA are costing you?

No Shopping Pact

So far, I’m 17 days into January and I’ve done a pretty great job of being frugal.  I’ve spent about $1,300 which seems like a lot, but $600 went straight to my Roth IRA (yay for trying to max out for 2013!) and $343 has been spent on rent and car insurance.  On top of that, about $300 went to my student loans.  In reality, I’ve bought a tank of gas and pulled a little bit of cash, which is mostly still in my pocket.

I would say I am rocking January, but this is probably because December should have been AWESOME with a Christmas bonus and Christmas gift money, but it was just mediocre.  Two of my girlfriends and I made a pact not to clothing/accessory shop this month because we all needed a break from that spending category after December.  To be honest though, I’m still recovering from all my new purchases as well as my Christmas gifts.  I’ve barely had time to even enjoy those things yet!

I’m really hoping to be able to put more into my Roth than I specified in my transfer plan and I’m definitely on track to do this.  I don’t have any trips planned (this includes the standard visits to my boyfriend which end up costing me at least $50 in gas and usually another $50 or so in food expenses) which means I should have more money left over than I typically do.  I’m also going to try to keep my spending in check when I go out with friends.  We spent a lot of nights at various area bars in December and that drained my purse.  I was paying with my Discover card, which is great because it earns me cash back bonuses, but I also didn’t feel like I was really parting with money.  In the future I’ll have to really think about whether I want to pay with cash or credit for this reason.

Do you adjust certain parts of your budget when you overspend?  Do you usually pay with cash or credit?  Which do you prefer?