One Million and Beyond

August Assessment

September 5th, 2007

I have to say that I’m both happy with my results for the month of August and a little scared. First off I was able to spend a great deal more money than I earned, almost $2,000! But to put this into context this did include some furniture and some electronics (the DVD player broke) and some needed clothing. So overall there was more spending but some of it was simply necessary. From a cashflow point of view the month was pretty bad and I haven’t even had a chance to go through the numbers in detail just yet. The good news is I now have 2 months of detailed spending information that I can use to create an accurate budget for September (provided I don’t take too long to do it).

Other than the spending August was a good month, I got a couple ideas for businesses rolling which includes some possible financing/co-ownership, which will help me out greatly. These aren’t very far along but if all goes well one or both of these little ideas should bring in a little bit of extra money (I think it might be a bit early to guess about the amount just yet).

Finally from a net worth point of view I managed to increase my net worth by $1,289.93 to $15,515.35. This is a really nice rebound unfortunately its mostly due to the fact that I’ve just received my most current pension statement which had some nice growth. The unfortunate aspect of this is that it would have jumped more if I wasn’t spending money faster than it was being printed. If I’m able to curb spending next month I should be able to increase this even more.

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August Goals

August 2nd, 2007

Since my goals for last month turned out quite well and I was happy with the results I think this month I need to make them a little more aggressive. But I have to make sure not to make them too aggressive or risk falling into the trap of guaranteed failure that I’ve hit in the past.

August Goals:

• Reduce my overall negative cashflow by 10%
• Increase my net worth by $250
• Do the research I need to conduct about alternate business idea #1
• Write a business plan for idea #2
• Continue to track all of my spending
• Adjust my budget for September with my spending tracking at the end of the month

All of the goals for this month are very achievable and as you can tell I really want to work on setting up the alternate streams of income. I have two ideas and I need to investigate them before I dive headlong into them. I’d like to achieve both with as little investment on my part as possible.

Is decreasing my negative cashflow by 10% too little or too much? To be perfectly honest with you that is something I’m not sure about. This month is my test to see how much I can cut without impacting my life drastically after which I’ll know what I need to do to bring the cashflow back in line. I know there are more drastic steps I can take to bring everything into line but I want to enjoy my life if I can. I’m not being swallowed by my debt at the moment though if I’m not careful I might be, to that end some drastic measures might be needed. The goal of 10% is a good starting point in my opinion and if it ends up being easy I’ll continue the trend as much as possible. If it turns out to be harder than it looks then I’ll adjust appropriately and look more aggressively for alternate income.

Technorati Tags: monthly goals, cashflow, alternate streams of income

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July Assessment

August 1st, 2007

As I do each month I set some goals for myself in July and I then proceeded to try fulfilling those goals as best I could. Overall I’m quite happy with the goals that I set for myself this month because I managed to look at them all and achieve most of them. The biggest thing that I’m happy with is the fact that I was able to look at my cashflow, create a estimated cashflow for myself and then keep track of all of my spending over the course of the month.

As I write this I haven’t yet completed a budget for next month but I’ve got all the necessary tools to accomplish this and I’ve started assessing my spending numbers from July. I’m taking a new approach to my budgeting in that I’m using actual spending numbers to adjust what I am going to do next month.

The net worth component of my goals was not reached but this is because all the monthly interest charges were added to my balances which brought the overall liabilities total higher by around $300. The other impact to this is the fact that I don’t have a stockpile of cash like I did at the beginning of the month. My liabilities dropped by over $600 which I’m happy with even if my net worth dropped by $689.62 to $14,225.42

The one aspect that I’m not completely satisfied with is the fact that I only started looking and thinking about additional income generating businesses. I’m still planning on doing this but I haven’t made nearly as much headway as I would have liked. I’ve got a couple ideas one of which will need some research and another that will require more planning and an actual business plan. I’m going out of town this weekend and I’m going to take some time to work on the second of these then.

Technorati Tags: monthly planning, goals, assessment, spending, cashflow

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Cashflow – Tracking your Money

July 30th, 2007

One of the hardest things for me to do since I started this blog and within the concept of keeping my finances under control has been to keep track of exactly where my money is going. Inevitably I forget about spending money or things like smokes, food, and even small snacks I get every now and then. Unfortunately to keep everything as accurate as possible you need to keep these items tracked. The reason all these small items are so crucial is the fact that all of these small insignificant amounts really add up quickly.

For example if you forget to include your bank fees and ATM fees it’ll add up. My monthly bank fees amount to about $12 which is a bit ridiculous, but that’s a completely different issue, and say I don’t include $10 in ATM fees every month this adds up to $22. Normally this $22 isn’t a great deal of money but over the course of a year these forgotten fees add up to $264! If you completely ignore this amount you can’t plan for it or worse still see this as a potential item to bring your cashflow in line.

As part of this months goals I wanted to get a good handle on tracking where every penny has gone and for the most part I’ve been successful. I’m sure there are a few items that inevitably got missed but it’s a lot more accurate than it has been in the past. Here are a few things I did this month to track my spending in minute detail:

1. Ask for Receipts
2. Update your spending/tracking sheet daily
3. If there is no receipt write it down
4. Go back through bank records to double check things like fees

The whole purpose of having this accurate accounting for where I spend my money is going to be important in the next day or two as I come up with my budget for next month. I used to calculate my budget on a pay-to-pay basis but I’m shifting to a monthly budgeting since a lot of bills are monthly and can be overlooked or forgotten at budget time otherwise. Once you have a couple months of detailed spending numbers you can really see trends in how you spend and what you can do to adjust your spending to be more in line with the money you have coming in.

Remember this might be a difficult task at first but it’s a habit that you need to get into at least initially. Why do I say initially? Very simply once this becomes a habit you’ll not even notice it and once you’ve started accounting for all of the really minor items your budgets will be more accurate. I still think you’ll need to track the details but if your spending is under control you can simply allot a certain amount per month for the minor things and be confident that’s where the money is going. It might take me a while to get to that point but cashflow is extremely important in your budgeting and unless you’re living way below your means every penny counts.

Technorati Tags: cashflow, tracking spending, budgeting

Posted in Budgeting and Planning, Monthly Planning, Productivity | 2 Comments

July Goals – Mid Month Review

July 16th, 2007

I really want to stay on top of my goals this month because things got so lax for a while. The purpose of this blog was not to write about my adventures of staying in debt but to make a million dollars. At the rate I’m going the only way I’ll get to a million dollars is if I keep writing until my vested pension gets there. With that said the first step is to get out of debt and this month is all about figuring out where I stand in the grand scheme of things.

I’ve already posted about my Cash Flow issues and my current net worth, which cover off the first two goals I had for this month. I’ve also gotten my credit score but I don’t have the actual report and I wanted to do a bit of research regarding this before posting so that one is partially completed. I haven’t as of yet started the budget for next month but instead I have started tracking every penny I spend again. The main purpose here is to get a true sense of cash flow. I’m doing this using excel and I’m sure there will be mistakes but I wanted to get a more accurate view of what is happening with my money. So far it’s going quite well.

Towards the end of the month I’ll come up with a budget for next month based on my cash flow estimates and what I’m seeing in my daily tracking. I think it’ll end up a bit more accurate than if I were to take a stab at it now.

Moving onto the next couple items from my goals, I’ve started thinking in a bit more detail about the internet business but I need to devote a couple hours a day to plan the project out and do some additional research to see if its viable. This is a matter of time and I want to make sure I’ve got a rough plan in place by the end of the month.

My net worth on the other hand shouldn’t have any trouble increasing by $250 even from the time that I posted about my net worth mostly because I’m trying very hard to keep my cash flow balanced. Going through the cash flow exercise I’ve really come to realize that I should be increasing my net worth between $5-800 monthly without much effort. I guess time will tell about this goal but I’m very confident about it.

Finally applying the 80/20 rule – I’ve started looking at things much more critically and determining if I really need something or if it’s just something catching my attention. I’ve also started looking through all of the junk I’ve compiled in the den in an effort to eliminate as much as possible. I’m not there yet but the frame of mind is definitely improving in this respect.

Overall progress is definitely being made and with a little bit of perseverance I’ll achieve all of my goals this month.

Technorati Tags: monthly goals, goal update, cash flow, net worth

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July Goals

July 5th, 2007

Every month I’ve tried to set up goals that I both agreed with and thought I could accomplish; last month I achieved my goals with flying colours and this month I wanted to continue the trend. I’ve given them some thought and taken a couple days to review the notes and goals that I came up with. The main reason that I wanted to take my time is that I wanted to mentally process and take from my experiences of the last month. Setting goals that are challenging and achievable while at the same time rewarding is something that I’ve been working on for the past half a year with some success and some failures.

While in Paris I did have some time to take stock of my life and the grander view of our society compared to that of another. The big item that I took from all of this was the fact that every now and then we need to take a step back and take stock of our lives and more importantly to this blog our financial situation and goals. It would be stupid to come up with goals without knowing where things stand. This month will be more of a taking stock and finding out exactly where I stand rather than trying to move forward.

So without further adieu here are the goals that I came up with for the month of July (don’t worry next month the goals will be of a considerably more financial nature).

• Figure out my exact net worth (and know what goes into it)
• Come up with a monthly cash flow statement
• Get and understand my credit score
• With my net worth and cash flow statements come up with a reasonable budget for next month
• Start working on generating some additional income (aka start an online company)
• Increase my net worth by $250 from the time my net worth statement is complete to the last day of the month
• Apply the 80/20 rule to my spending if at all possible, concentrate on the 20.

I think that all of these goals are achievable and I also think that they’ll give me a status report of sorts for where I stand financially. It should allow me to plan out my finances and to automate and consolidate as much of it as possible to make it easier for me to keep track of it.

Technorati Tags: monthly goals, net worth, cash flow, taking stock

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June Assessment

July 4th, 2007

When I wrote my June goals last month I took a bit of a break from your traditional goals that you’d find on a personal finance blog. I simply decided that I was going to enjoy the month. There’s nothing worse than stressing out about this that or the other when you’re supposed to be enjoying yourself. Needless to say I didn’t want to be worried about money when I was getting married or during the honeymoon so my goal was not to and to just enjoy the experience.

Having a month where you simple don’t worry about the day-to-day financial aspect of your life is fun but also a little misleading since you have to keep it in mind or you’ll be broke very fast. Overall I didn’t concentrate on the bills (paid everything anyways) or any of the wedding funds since the parents did say they were going to help. It was a month that if necessary I could rely on others to help out with so I could just enjoy the experience and I took advantage of that.

Over the course of the month I did come to a very clear conclusion, even though personal finance (and money) is an important and interesting topic for me it’s not always about the dollars and cents. You can’t worry about money, or anything for that matter, and not notice that life is passing you by at an alarming rate and if you don’t stop to pay attention once in a while everything starts to loose its meaning. There are times when it’s about happiness and the quality of life rather than the dollars and cents of it all. If you don’t take stock of your life one in a while and realize where you’re going, who you are and why you’re doing what you’re doing you can very clearly become miserable.

I enjoyed the whole month of June; it was an amazing experience. The wedding went off without a hitch (though the weather was threatening to not cooperate until I had some stern words with mother nature *grin*). The honeymoon was in Paris and being from North America let me tell you seeing a city like this left a distinct impression, many actually, but those are other posts. Needless to say I debated not coming back to my normal life while there which should tell you that I really enjoyed it. I feel completely re-grounded after the last month and have some new (or revitalized) perspectives on life.

The month’s goal was reached and surpassed in my expectations and I’m extremely happy for that. My goals in the past half a year or so were somewhat challenging to meet and not very inspiring to me; this was a definite break from that. The next step is to take this newfound energy and take advantage of it. I’m going to set up some July goals in the next day or two and use this experience to ensure they’re equally successful.

Technorati Tags: mothly goals, goals, personal finance, experiences, life

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June Goals – Just Enjoy It

June 6th, 2007

In a couple weeks from now I will be married and on a honeymoon that isn’t going to be nearly long enough. The past almost year of planning for this wedding has come down to all of the details and small items to make sure everything is in order. In the processes I’ve also switched jobs and managed to max my financial life back out with expenses. So between the stress of getting work completed and accurate, making sure all the wedding details are taken care of, and the my slowly disintegrating financial situation I’ve decided to keep the goal for this month very simple.

Just Enjoy It.

I’m getting married and I would much rather remember it for enjoying myself during the wedding weekend and the honeymoon following rather than the stresses of work, money and wedding details. I understand that this is not a financially based goal on a personal finance blog but sometimes it’s not just about the money and you just have to live and enjoy your life. This doesn’t mean that I’m about to start spending money like crazy, I believe I’ve broken the habit of excessive spending and lets be honest I don’t have the money to spend right now. This is a once in a lifetime experience that I would like to keep as a happy moment and not one where I’m worried about exactly when my car payment is leaving my account.

There is one nice aspect to the wedding that will help ease the financial worries after the wedding is done: gifts. We’ve specifically asked for monetary gifts because we have most of what need and we’ve been bleeding money for the wedding like its going out of style. This is going to allay any worries about money while on the honeymoon (aka all the bills will be covered). Once back from the honeymoon that will be a completely different story but it will allow us to enjoy it, which is the goal.

Technorati Tags: money, goals, monthly goals

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Goal # 4 – Back to simplicity

May 4th, 2007

I guess the title of this post is a little deceptive since the goal isn’t to get back to simplicity or a simple life but to simplify the goal that I’m setting a bit more. I’ve set some lofty goals that I’ve failed at and there’s nothing more discouraging than failing at your goals. To this end The Simple Dollar had a great post yesterday about just this topic and provided some tips and overcoming this problem.

The goal that I’m setting for myself will replace the typical monthly goals until I can build myself back up to being able to reach multiple goals at the same time. The 4th goal that I’m setting for myself will be two fold and far simpler than those in the past:

Goal #4
Part 1 – Get caught up on all of my outstanding bills, start with the ones that are overdue and progress to those that are due this month.

Part 2 – Automate as much of this as possible. There is no excuse for a bill going unpaid in our world of automation and bill payment options.

As you can see this is far simpler than trying to hit X$ by a set date. The timeline for this goal will be the month of May which is a good thing since it’s a month that I’m going to receive 3 paychecks. I’ll detail my progress a bit more including outlining the bills and their payments.

Time to succeed rather than watch my goal fail miserably.

Technorati Tags: Goals, goal setting, budgeting, bills, monthly goal, automating finances

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April Net Worth Update

May 3rd, 2007

One of the things that I’ve been doing on this site is giving a breakdown on my financial situation at the end of each month. The first time I did this I was a little surprised that my net worth was a positive number. To top everything off the number hasn’t had negative movement very often at least not significantly so.

My net worth is an accurate statement of my net worth but for me it’s a bit deceiving since it includes an RPP (registered pension plan), which is virtually inaccessible to me until I retire. Pretty much everything else around my financial situation has been a disaster – especially of late.

I haven’t been happy with my money planning and spending the past couple months and the impact to my net worth is pretty clear:

Net worth

Now what this doesn’t show is that I’m behind on a couple of my bills and my cash flow situation is very tight. I think its time to buckle down a bit more and be more conscientious about my spending. Its time to get those bills caught up – they’re currently not very late but they are late. It’s frustrating seeing my net worth drop and to struggle with money because I put myself into debt. I think that once the wedding is over I won’t has as much money bleeding out.

Posted in Monthly Planning, Financial Situation | 7 Comments

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