Mortgage: $92,789.27
E-Trade: $20,061.52
Cash: $12,434.80
Condo: $143,500.00
Networth: $83,207.05
This is an increase of $3,221.18 (4.03%) over June. I’m suspicious that given my current approach (get a reasonable contract, work at it and save aggressively) this is probably what I can expect to be saving, which is a little bit lower than the $5,539 I was hoping for in the past (what was I smoking?
). I had to pay the first and last month’s rent at my new place, which was a little bit of a harder hit, and I lost about $900 in my E*Trade account, so I *think* $4600 might be a reasonable expectation (assuming I find another contract as lucrative as my last one which is far from certain).
As mentioned before, there were some fairly major changes in my life in the last month, but I’m still getting checks from my last job (they pay me 30 days after I submit invoices, so I should keep getting paid for another month). If I can find a job sooner, I might get a week or two of “double pay” which would be nice.
In terms of passive income, currently I stand at:
BMO (136) – $25.90 / m
ROC (705) – $62.96 /m
RUS (159) – $23.85 / m
NA (82) – $16.40 / m
Margin debt – $76.98 /m (this is slightly higher as no dividends were paid in July)
Net: $48.19
Condo – $265.99 / m (this increased due to a lower mortgage amount, and thus lower interest and by getting my assessment, and thus my property taxes, lowered)
Passive income: $314.18 / m
26% of cost-of-living from passive income (this improved because of my new lower cost of living, which may not be sustainable).
Obviously since passive income is what I’m really after, I need to be making more investments instead of sitting on a pile of cash. Without steady work though, its pretty hard to dump cash into E*Trade or another property. My current plan is to find another job, and once I’ve started at it, then buy another property.
August 6, 2007 at 2:27 pm
Just out of curiosity, how much were you impacted by the market at the end of july?
August 6, 2007 at 2:51 pm
I would suggest that you separate the “increase in net worth” from “saving”. You can save all the money you want but if you measure it through your networth then things like stock markets and housing markets will have a big impact along with your saving.
Mike
August 6, 2007 at 3:43 pm
I second FourPillars comment.
August 6, 2007 at 4:17 pm
You’ve probably discussed this elsewhere but I’m too lazy too look…do you not invest through an RRSP at all?
August 6, 2007 at 6:54 pm
Jason: I was down $900 when I wrote this, and was down $1400 at another point. I took it as an opportunity to buy some more BMO.
4P & MoneyGardener: I agree, the market fluctuations will really make your networth volatile. You’re suggesting that I just report how much I’ve saved, and ignore the performance of my investments (or at least separated it)? So for this month I’d just say “hey, I saved $XXXX more cash, yay!”?
telly: I don’t, just because my income has been low in the past (I’ve been saving the contribution room for when my income was higher). This year my income is going to be higher, so I’m planning to max it out ($12,000 of contribution room available, plus the $2 overcontribution).
August 6, 2007 at 9:04 pm
You got it Mr C!
August 6, 2007 at 9:39 pm
I think the confusion lies in your first paragraph where you state your increase in networth and then in the next sentence describe the value as less than your savings goal.
I think it is interesting just to know how your networth fluctauates. If you’ve decided to buy shares in BMO, then when BMO’s share price falls that is not different to your networth than saving less money.
August 7, 2007 at 11:35 am
I’ll try that next month. I agree with you (if I’m investing for the long-term, what do I care about month-to-month fluctations?).
A big part of me feels that the passive income is the best measure of what I’m after (but that probably won’t change month-to-month, it’ll just shoot up when I buy some stock or a property). Maybe rather then month-to-month I should just write up an update when my passive income changes…
August 7, 2007 at 8:48 pm
…or when a company raised its dividend, or when you raise the rent…
August 7, 2007 at 9:55 pm
Yes… either of those would be… (arch fingers) excellent.
August 23, 2007 at 8:30 am
[...] previously posted my stock position as of the end of July. Since then, on margin, I’ve put another $15K into the market (two $5K buys of BMO and $5K of [...]