We increased my Wife’s 401(k) contribution from 5% to 15%. This takes her contribution from $2,775/year to $8,325/year. We’re still waiting to hear back from her HR department as to when the new contribution level go into effect.
We decided to increase our 401(k) contributions as much as possible and force ourselves to get used to the lower take home pay. We may not be able to put as much into our Roth IRA’s, but at least we know the money will be invested before we can get our hands on it.
I went on another business trip at the end of last month and racked up a few more Delta SkyMiles. I’m now at 42,790 SkyMiles total.
In addition to my Silver Medallion status with Delta that earns me a 25% mileage bonus every trip, I found a couple of new ways to earn extra SkyMiles while traveling. I earned 300 SkyMiles for renting a car from Dollar Rent-A-Car. I almost always rent car while on business trips, but I never knew I could earn frequent flyer miles doing it. I also received ~100 SkyMiles per night staying at Howard Johnson hotels. I used to go to Holiday Inns and get points for free stays, but with the economic conditions what they are, my company has asked up to save money where we can (like cheaper hotels). I’d rather get frequent flyer miles than points towards a free night stay at Howard Johnson.
The SkyMiles really add up quick. My wife and I are flying to Hawaii next month for free using my SkyMiles (52,000 SkyMiles each ticket). I’m also close to getting Gold Medallion status which earns a 100% mileage bonus every trip.
We did a great job of keeping our spending down and bringing money in this month (click on spreadsheet below), that’s $1,200 less than last month.
We only spent $5,214.45 this month. That includes $233.50 for 6 months prepaid life insurance for my wife and I, $120.09 on gifts, $149.34 for the 4th of July, and $47.88 on a new tire (pro-rated).
In addition to our regular salaries, I received a third “extra” check, my wife received her $110 company internet and cell phone reimbursements, our old insurance company gave us a $371 refund, and we earned $25.00 in credit card rewards. We also earned $6.50 in interest income from our online savings account.
Next month should be a pretty standard income month, but we may have a couple of large expenses.
I know I’m getting lazy with posting, but at least I’m still posting our net worth data.
July was another strong month. Our net worth increased $5,033.72 from last month, to a total of $44,651.53 (click on spreadsheet below).
What Worked
July was a nice month. I receive a third “extra” paycheck, we deposited $1,000 into our savings account, and we plowed money into our retirement accounts (401k, Roth IRAs, & Traditional IRA). We contributed a total of $1,743.52 to our retirement accounts and saw them increase to a total of $3,835.21. We also increased my 401(k) contribution from 5% to 8%.
What Didn’t Work
Nothing to enter for July; we are very blessed.
Next Month
August should be a good month. There may be a couple of large expenses that limit what we can save, but we’ll see.
Last month I said we’d tighten our belts in June, and I’m happy to report that we did pretty good controlling our expenses this month (click on spreadsheet below).
We spent just over $6,444.45 this month. This was our first full month of living in our rental unit, which helped reduce our costs of living. One large unexpected bill, we do to switching insurance companies in June. We had to pay a total of $1,296.70 for 12 months of auto and renters insurance. We also had to have my wife’s wedding ring appraised for insurance purposes, costing us $135.94. If you subtract out the large insurance related costs, our expenses for the June drop to $5,011.81.
In addition to our regular salaries, my wife received her $110 company internet and cell phone reimbursements and we received a total of $131.02 in credit card rewards. We’ve both been charging a lot of business expenses to our rewards credit cards. Since we are both reimburse for these expenses, the credit card rewards are truly free money.
Next month should be another very reasonable month for expenses. Incomewise, I will receive a third “extra” paycheck next month but my take home per check will drop slightly because my 3% contribution increase to my 401(k) will kick in. We should also receive a small prorated refund from our old insurance company.
After a crazy May in which our net worth dropped $12,703.04. June turned out to be a great turnaround month. Our net worth increased $6,366.15 from last month, to a total of $39,617.81 (click on spreadsheet below).
What Worked
We piled $1,675.19 into our retirement accounts (401k, Roth IRAs, & Traditional IRA) and saw them increase to a total of $2,110.87. We also deposited $3,815.08 into our savings account, $1,795.08 of which is from our 1st mortgage that we are not clear if we do or don’t owe.
What Didn’t Work
I have nothing to enter here, thank God.
Next Month
July should be another strong month. I receive a third “extra” paycheck next month and my wife may be receiving her first quarterly bonus from her new company. My 3% contribution increase to my 401(k) will also kick in next month, bringing my total contribution to 8%.
I just returned from a business trip and am happy to be home.
Delta SkyMiles
Before my trip, I started with 29,233 SkyMiles (after using over 100,000 miles to get two free tickets to
Holiday Inn Priority Club Reward
I stayed at Holiday Inn’s each night which increased my points from 15,737 to 21,592. I now have enough for one free night. A couple of the Holiday Inn’s that I stayed at will be emailing me surveys to fill out that will give me an extra 1,000 points.
HSBC Credit Card Cash Back Rewards
I spent enough money on business expenses to earn a $25 HSBC Credit Card Cash Back Reward. My company reimburses me all of my expenses, so this is totally free money.
I will be traveling again next month and look forward to racking up the perks.
Since short selling our condo, my wife and I have taken a few steps to help reduce our tax bill for next year, since we won’t have the large mortgage interest write off.
We’ll still have some mortgage interest we can write off since we just sold the condo, but hopefully these extra steps will help minimize what we owe next April 15th.
As I outlined in my May Net Worth post, it’s been a crazy month (click on spreadsheet below).
As far as income goes, it’s actually been a above average. In additional to our regular salaries, my wife received an unexpected $1,000 bonus ($536.65 net), $110 in reimbursements, and we received $125 is credit card rewards. Pretty good.
It terms of expenses, money absolutely flew out of our accounts in May. We spent ~$9,500 with our short sale and move. In addition, we spent $980.46 for a new bedroom set, $204.79 for my Wife’s medical bill, and $270 for our dog’s annual shots and teeth cleaning. Since we were blowing through money, it was easy to get a bunch of misc little things too that added up to a few hundred dollars.
Next month, we tighten our belts.
May was the craziest month we’ve had in quite awhile. We ended up short selling our condo and moving into a rental unit. The rental unit is twice the size of our old place and will save us $1,000/month. Because of this, our net worth dropped $12,703.04 from last month to $33,251.66 (click on spreadsheet below).
Since the short sale is better for us in the long term, but not great in the short term, I’m skipping my standard “what worked” and “what didn’t work” in this net worth post. Here are the details for May, good or bad:
The costs involved with selling our condo and getting a new place totally decimated our savings account. Here’s a quick rundown:
On top of all of that, we spent:
With all of the cash outlay, our cash and savings dropped to $4,122.93. We should be able to start building our cash back up with $1,000 we are saving every month renting. We contributed a total of $1,025.19 to our retirement accounts, and saw them increase $2,945.13. Our taxable accounts also increased $198.76.
I’m not sure what to expect for next month yet. We’ll still be dealing with some of the transition costs from owner a condo to renting. God willing, we should be able to start filling our savings account back up.
