Net Worth Update: $470,167.09 [+$10G’s]

What up, what up! Welcome to the best month of the year :) Where not only two of the coolest people around were born (Jesus, and yours truly), but the air is filled with love and joy and the magicalness that is Christmas. And, so far, the magicalness of the stock market too! Aww yeah…

I’ve been publishing these net worth updates for almost 7 years now (a total of 83 times), and I think I’m just now fully understanding the power of compound savings. I haven’t invested a thing since last April, and our investments have since increased by a whopping $45,000.

WOW. That’s a yearly salary!

Imagine if you didn’t have to life a finger at work and you still got paid?? I believe that’s what they call passive income :) Now if only I could pull from it before I turn Old and 1/2, haha… (All of these investments are in retirement accounts, however, if I’m serious about retiring early one day I’ll need to switch things up ASAP… All of my $$ is on lock down, d’oh.)

Anywho, that’s the biggest news from the month – up $10,000 for doing pretty much jack. I can only imagine what that number would look like with hundreds of thousands more (or even millions!) invested. Same amount of time put in but with amplified results! If you’ve been shying away from starting to invest yourself, I urge you today to just get out there and start. Skip out on a nice dinner or round of drinks this week and pick up your first stock (or better yet, index fund). Get that $30/$40/$50 working for you STAT so it can start growing! The future millionaire-you will be ecstatic!

Here’s how November broke down…

CASH SAVINGS (-$1,237.42): The least amount of $$ we’ve leaked in months… Mainly due to some new business I’ve been able to pick up, as well as a hefty amount of extra savings I’ve been snatching up a la my Craigslist Habit. Which I’ll be updating y’all again here pretty soon – how fast was that?

529 College Savings: Scroll to the kids’ net worths below…

IRA: ROTH(s) (+$2,372.59): As mentioned above, nothing new invested since April so this is all the stock market doing it’s thang… We’ll be back to investing again in a few months once the tax year is over (which is when I’ll know how much I can max out in my SEP IRA (I’m self-employed)).

IRA: SEP (+$9,276.76): Same with this guy! Almost $10Gs on the spot! (Though we have many months where we’re $10Gs in the negatives too, haha… Good thing history shows you win in the long run :))

And here’s the kick-ass graph that Vanguard always shows its members when you log in to view your accounts. These numbers are from April when I finally manned up and moved all my money over:

vanguard performance nov 14

AUTOS WORTH (kbb) (-$200.00): Nothing special going on in this area… just the cars depreciating as they should (though, I have capped my Caddy at a flat $1,000 which is what I believe I could get for it if I were to sell it today on Craigslist… It may be beat up and ghetto, but the mechanics and mileage is pretty killer for being over 20 years old.) Here are their values:

HOME VALUE (Realtor) ($0.00): Same $300,000 here as it’s been for the past handful of months… Will probably hit up our old realtor in the new year to see if it’s worth adjusting, but for now we just leave as-is since it really doesn’t matter what it is until it’s time to sell. Which hopefully WOULD be in the new year! I’m over being a landlord, haha… and I don’t even do anything with it! ;)

MORTGAGES (-$688.70): Getting farther and farther away from that nasty underwater level now – good riddance. And we owe a lot of that due to our “round up debt payments” trick over the years too. Well, that and going balls to the wall hardcore years ago and refinancing as well ;) But still – we’ve chipped away over $25,000 so far rounding up. That ain’t shabby! Here’s what’s left on the place:

CURRENT NET WORTH: $470,167.09 (+$10,900.63) – Getting closer to half a Mil!!

And here’s how our boys did :)

baby net worths nov 14

No new additions either here… just the markets doing what they do best, and the banks doing what they (don’t) do best, haha… Just my 2 cents anyways (see what I did there? Because both savings accounts increased by 2 cents of interest? It’s not funny when I have to explain it!! :))

And lastly, how our net worth has fluctuated over this past year:

net worth past 12 months

That’s it on my end – how’d you all do? Lots of increases as well, I presume? Because y’all are smart and invest that $$$? Remember, for anyone who’s not invested yet (ie most of you youngin’s reading this right now), now’s the time to jump in.  All it takes is one call to HR to start contributing to your 401(k) or to a brokerage site to snatch up your first stock (you can even throw them into an IRA – it’s pretty cool!). You won’t even miss the money when it’s gone, either. I can almost guarantee it.

‘Till next time, playas.

j. money signature

P.S: You can find all 80+ of our net worth updates here: J’s Million Dollar Journey
P.P.S: You can also find my blogger friends’ net worths here: Blogger Net Worth Tracker
P.P.P.S: Here’s the spreadsheet I use to track all this stuff. If that’s too confusing, try this one.

UPDATE: I just heard from PersonalCapital.com that they’re giving all new members a $20 Amazon card today until they run out :) They’re another great (free) place to track net worth and investments, and all you have to do to qualify for the card is attach one account with them. You can sign up here.

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PS: If you’re just getting started in your journey, here are a few good resources to help track your money. Doesn’t matter which route you go, just that it ends up sticking!

If you're not a spreadsheet guy like me and prefer something more automated (which is fine, whatever gets you to take action!), you can try your hand with a free Empower account instead (formerly Personal Capital)

Empower is a cool tool that connects with your bank & investment accounts to give you an automated way to track your net worth. You'll get a crystal clear picture of how your spending and investments affect your financial goals (early retirement?), and it's super easy to use.

personal capital dashboard

It only takes a couple minutes to set up and you can grab your free account here. They also do a lot of other cool stuff as well which my early retired friend Justin covers in our full review of Empower - check it out here: Why I Use Empower Almost Every Single Day.

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79 Comments

  1. moneystepper December 1, 2014 at 5:43 AM

    Hey J,

    Another great month – good work!! Pretty nice to get a $10k bump in your IRA: SEP in a month without doing anything!

    I’ll be interested to see how you move to investing outside of your pension accounts. My pension net worth is actually a little lower than many people think it should be, but that is because I’m hoping to “retire” by 40-45, and hence I don’t want to lock in all my money until I’m 67 (or whatever the retirement age will be by the time I get there).

    Obviously with 83 months of net worth tracking, you’ve clearly already got your game together! However, I’m running a 2015 savings challenge over at moneystepper where a whole community will work towards their annual goals for net worth increase and average savings rate together.

    For yourself, it would just be a case of submitting these % figures that you already track once a month…

    Come along for the ride if you find it of interest at all.

    Peace!

    Reply
    1. Jay @ ThinkingWealthy.com December 1, 2014 at 8:15 PM

      I agree – great work. Percentages are the way to go though, I agree.

      Question – Why do you have so much cash on hand? Seems like a waste.

      Reply
      1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:09 PM

        Thanks Moneystepper! I’ll have to look to you for some tips on the early retirement stuff then, I’m still so new to it all :) And I actually have your link bookmarked to read later about that savings challenge – I saw it while digging around for articles for Rockstar Finance.

        @JAY – There’s many reasons for that: I’m self-employed and my income is all over the place (especially this last year when I’m actually losing $1k-$2k a month), I like the flexibility it gives as I don’t want everything tied up in stocks/funds/etc, and, more importantly, it makes my wife happy :) We used to have $80,000+ in there which made her even happier! Haha… But that’s a bit too much even for me.

        Reply
  2. MMD December 1, 2014 at 6:02 AM

    Aren’t compounding returns amazing? I’ve had an upward swing of over $50K in my investments this year alone.

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:09 PM

      Yeah son – work it!

      Reply
  3. Still at Work December 1, 2014 at 6:25 AM

    Right there with you, J, literally, with $476k. You are right about how personal personal finance is. We don’t include our cars, because I’m not going to sell them and know they will depreciate into nothing. (Plus, anytime I wish I could have a new car, it’s very motivating to know my net worth would take a hit but I wouldn’t have an “asset” to book!) We do include our daughter’s 529 plan, however. She is four, and starting this year, we began contributing the maximum each year we can do without paying the gift tax — $28k a year — in the hopes that we + the markets will have her college paid for by the time she is 10. The account is currently at $37k, and I wonder if I didn’t include it in my net worth, whether I’d want to divert so much of my money to it. :-D I know our net worth will take a hit when we actually shell it out, but I hope by then between diligent saving and compound interest that the hit will not have as much of an impact as it would now. Anyway, happy December — here’s hoping the end of the year treats us right!

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:12 PM

      Your girl has one smart dad :) But tell him to tone it down a bit so I can catch up and beat him to $1,000,000!

      Reply
      1. Still at Work December 2, 2014 at 11:42 PM

        Who said anything about her dad? :-D Up $140k so far this year. I am just praying that we don’t have a 1920s-style crash in our future.

        Reply
  4. Shannon @ Financially Blonde December 1, 2014 at 6:36 AM

    With investing, it always seems that the best teacher is actually doing it. I can talk until I am blue in the face about theory and principles with my clients, but until we actually get their money to work, they don’t believe me. I think a bigger congrats are in order to you for such a small dip into your savings this month!! Investments are only good as long as they can keep working and don’t get eaten into by spending.

    Reply
  5. Mrs. Frugalwoods December 1, 2014 at 6:53 AM

    Looks like an awesome month for you! You’re so right about investing–do it now, folks! I’m so glad we started right after college, compounding interest is a wonderful thing. November was an expensive month for us since we hosted Thanksgiving and took a weekend trip, but, nothing too extreme. And, our investments just keep climbing :)

    We also took your Challenge Everything advice in November and called our cable company to see if they’d lower our internet bill, but alas, no dice. Since we only have internet (and no cable or phone line), they weren’t willing to offer us any sort of discount. But, I’m glad we tried!

    Reply
    1. JK December 1, 2014 at 8:20 PM

      Mrs. Frugalwoods..
      Don’t know which company you have but I was able to lower mine and I have only internet too. I did this when they did their annual price increase though. Tell them you like the service but are going to have to cancel because there is a better deal at such and such..(helps to look up what else is available first). If need be ask for the retention division. I also emphasized that I was not a heavy user..no streaming big movies, videos, etc..
      They lowered the price and increased the speed..a win, win!

      Reply
      1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:14 PM

        Yup! Make a calendar item in Gmail or wherever to pop up and remind you to do it too every 6 months or year, etc… I literally just called up our provider again (3rd time in 3 months – hah!) and got the service lowered even more… though, I’m slowly giving up stuff here and there too, haha… that helps :)

        Reply
  6. Jon @ Money Smart Guides December 1, 2014 at 7:53 AM

    Toeing the line between retirement and non-retirement accounts is a tough one, but becomes easier once you understand some things. To keep taxes as low as possible, keep any bond holdings to your retirement accounts since they pass off monthly income that the IRS looks at as ordinary (meaning high tax cost). You can avoid this though by investing in tax-free bonds of course.

    When it comes to equities, you don’t have to worry as much since capital gains and dividends are taxed at lower levels. But you could invest in ETFs and mutual funds that try their best to keep capital gains at bay which means less taxes over all.

    Lastly, keep real estate investments (I’m talking REITs here) in your retirement accounts as well since their income is looked at as ordinary by the IRS too.

    Hit me up with any questions!

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:15 PM

      Yes, I will have to because a lot of that just went over my head :)

      Reply
      1. AnnieG January 3, 2015 at 4:24 PM

        It’s just recently that I really understood this idea. It amounts to seeing all of your investments as one big pile. So there is no reason to own bonds in a taxable account, but rather to hold the bonds just in the retirement accounts and do your allocation across the total of all of your investments. Easy example: you have $100k in both a retirement account and a taxable account. You want to own 20% bonds, but corporate bonds because they have better returns. You would allocate $40k in your retirement account to bonds, and do all stock funds in your taxable account.

        BTW, you have been investing during a wonderful run. Don’t get discouraged when the inevitable drops occur. We’ve been doing this for 25 years, and we always try to invest more when everyone else in panicking. We are coming up on a net worth of $1.5M soon.

        Reply
        1. J. Money January 7, 2015 at 2:09 PM

          Way to go!!! And agreed w/ the stock run/etc. If I didn’t kill myself during the Real Estate bubble when my house value crashed and burned, I don’t think I will when the stocks do the same later ;) I’m in the same boat as you – Just keep plowing the money in and concentrate on the long run. Congrats on your net worth!!

          Reply
  7. Dee @ Color Me Frugal December 1, 2014 at 8:26 AM

    Love love love compound interest! December has long been my favorite month of the year because it is so much fun to watch the dividends and capital gains pour into our investment accounts every December! I’m with you and everyone else and advise folks to start investing now if they haven’t already. The younger the better. Your future self will be so glad!!

    Reply
  8. Kate@GoodnightDebt December 1, 2014 at 8:39 AM

    Look at you with your 10G increase! I’m over here excited about getting my Roth IRA to 10Gs total! I’m expecting to break $8Gs in December! Go me!

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:17 PM

      Hey, we all gotta start somewhere right? A handful of years ago my Roth was a whopping $0.00 :)

      Reply
  9. Amy December 1, 2014 at 8:55 AM

    I was going to go do some Christmas baking, until the blog post jumped into my inbox and I thought, “Darn… time to do my monthly net worth.” I had forgotten. Thanks for the reminder.

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:17 PM

      “Darn” meaning “WOOHOO! J Money is so awesome I cannot wait to work on my net worth!!!” right? :)

      Reply
  10. Laurie @thefrugalfarmer December 1, 2014 at 8:59 AM

    LOL, I say that to Rick all the time when he tells me how perfect he is: “Yeah, honey, you and Jesus.” :-) Seriously, though, way to kick it on the net worth growth! You rock, J$ :-)

    Reply
  11. John @ Frugal Rules December 1, 2014 at 9:00 AM

    Looking good sir! Isn’t it just crazily awesome how compounding works – especially when you’re not throwing money in each month and just watching those account balances grow? :) Obviously, I couldn’t agree more on getting started now, with whatever you can/have. I’d add one addendum to the call to HR…make sure they’re offering you good funds – if they’re high in fees start telling them they need to offer something else. It’s their job to work for you, so take advantage. We’re doing well, just got our SEPs maxed out last month so I’m pretty happy with that.

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:26 PM

      Good call (and way to max those puppies out already!). The good thing with employer matches is at least you’re doubling your money so even with the crappiest funds you’re still more than winning in the end :) But yes – damn good idea to ask for better ones which not only helps you, but the entire rest of the company too.

      Reply
  12. Will December 1, 2014 at 9:11 AM

    Definitely true about not missing the invested money when you’re young! I’ve maxed out my Roth and 401(k) since graduating college and I still have a huge amount of blow money compared to when I was in college.

    Reply
  13. Tonya@Budget and the Beach December 1, 2014 at 9:28 AM

    Nice! I really need to keep track monthly of my net worth just as a way of gauging how each month is going because even though I might have had a bad month income wise, I might have actually had a good month passive income wise!

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:27 PM

      Yup! It’s good to have an overall snapshot of all your money on a regular basis just so you can track and watch for problem (or growth!) areas. Same for blogging stuff too – I track the main stats across my projects once a month and it does wonders for motivation and strategy :) Literally takes 3 mins a month too!

      Reply
  14. 1MansMoney December 1, 2014 at 9:33 AM

    Nice month J. Money! Our net worth increased $7K over last month, to a total of $293K. I hope to get a job in the next month or two in order to bolster our monthly contributions.

    Reply
  15. Huw December 1, 2014 at 9:38 AM

    Hey J Money,

    That’s an impressive increase considering you haven’t added to your investments! I can’t wait for my net Worth to increase by $10k in a month!

    The trend line on the bottom graph is very encouraging too.

    I find these updates hugely motivating. Keep up the good work!

    Huw

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:29 PM

      Awww, well I’m glad!! That’s exactly why I put them out there every month – whether good or bad. To show people a real-life example of stuff to better motivate them. And, quite frankly, myself! It’s one thing to track this stuff at home, but a whole other to show it to hundreds of thousands of people a month :) So it’s win-win all around, my friend.

      Reply
  16. Jim December 1, 2014 at 11:00 AM

    I’m on month 2 of tracking (driven by 2 months of reading BaS!), and while we’re fairly level on debt reduction in November, our Net Worth is up $2124.86.

    That’s the glimmer of hope… our NW has moved from -95858.64 to -93733.78. Getting better though, and I plan to start leaving this here on your posts as an accountability tool for me! Thanks J. Money!

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:30 PM

      YES! DO IT! Good job!! So glad you’re getting something out of these. You’re going to be amazed with how you feel as the months (and years) go on when you can look back and see how far you’ve come :) I’m actually really excited for you!

      Reply
      1. Jim December 2, 2014 at 5:12 PM

        Thanks! It is a little gut-wrenching to see a very large negative number, but we’re making continual progress.

        Reply
  17. Kristin Wong December 1, 2014 at 11:17 AM

    Your net worth posts are so encouraging. I’m not banking those numbers, but my investments have helped me reach my own net worth goal for the year, so I’m pretty stoked about that :D Thanks for sharing!

    Reply
  18. Kassandra December 1, 2014 at 11:22 AM

    Imagine, $45K upswing in less than 9 months with no additional influx of cash from you…and people laugh at our lofty goals of becoming wealthy without winning the lottery. Fist bump J.

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:31 PM

      Haha… People laugh at me all the time anyways with my “crazy” hair, I’m used to it ;) Hope your year is going well too!

      Reply
  19. Noonan December 1, 2014 at 11:28 AM

    I too join in the fist bumps! Congrats on a great month!!

    Reply
  20. Jon @ Penny Thots December 1, 2014 at 2:37 PM

    Nice job with the increase in net worth. I just finished ours up and November was a good month for us as well, especially after the increased expenses in October. We are hoping to weather December and the holidays by staying in our budget, but with some travel to family, it can get expensive quickly.

    Reply
  21. Alicia December 1, 2014 at 2:42 PM

    Holy Crap – that’s so ballin’! (nope, I can’t pull that off, but I thought I’d give it a try)… and that is the magic of having money sitting in an account working for you! Well done.

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:32 PM

      I thought you pulled it off pretty well, homegirl :)

      Reply
  22. Mark @ BareBudgetGuy December 1, 2014 at 2:42 PM

    Well done on the funds for your babies. What a dad!

    Reply
  23. Even Steven December 1, 2014 at 2:46 PM

    Almost half a million dollars and the kids are killing it, it’s gotta be pretty cool to check the net worth and see an investment move 10K.

    Reply
  24. EL December 1, 2014 at 3:33 PM

    Good job on the increases, yeah the market is blessing everyone. If it lasts great and if it doesn’t last well you continue investing more. I cant wait to hit a few milestones myself before the new year.

    Reply
  25. Dividend Mantra December 1, 2014 at 4:50 PM

    J$,

    Awesome! $10k swings in one month. The joy of moving from the working class to the investor class. :)

    My portfolio’s inching near $200k and the dividend income has me on pace for FI by 40. No complaints here!

    Keep it up!

    Best regards.

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:35 PM

      I really REALLY need to talk to you about this FI stuff one of these days… I feel like I understand how you have it all set up for the most part, but wondering if I’m missing something? The concept as a whole seems pretty simple, yeah?

      Reply
  26. weenie December 1, 2014 at 5:50 PM

    $45k from investing nothing and upswing of $10k in one month – brilliant! Compounding is just crazy but even crazier are people not taking advantage of it!

    Great job!

    Reply
  27. Cecilia@thesingledollar December 1, 2014 at 5:51 PM

    I did well this month too — although my net worth is now a cool $12,000+ so I’m feeling a little behind here :) Still, it’s up over $2000 from last month, and progress is progress.

    Also, I’m now ticked off that I opened a Personal Capital account months ago! I want my gift card! :-)

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:36 PM

      A $2,000 monthly increase is incredible no matter how you look at it :) We’re all in different stages, my dear.

      Reply
  28. LeRainDrop December 1, 2014 at 9:15 PM

    Great progress, J. Money! Thanks for sharing your spreadsheets and the history of your net worth reports. Yup, October 31 to November 30 was a great month for me financially, as well! Loved seeing my net worth increase on Mint :-)

    Reply
  29. Kim O. December 1, 2014 at 9:51 PM

    Hey J$. Congrats on the significant increase this month!! Awesome. Always cool to see that arrow headed in the correct direction. I would have never thought to add car depreciation to my net worth. Interesting. Makes sense though. As always, thanks for sharing.

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:37 PM

      I like having the car stuff in there, but I know others don’t. The beauty is we can do whatever the hell we want though as it’s our money and life :) Gotta stick with what works best for ya.

      Reply
  30. Nany December 1, 2014 at 10:04 PM

    Congrats on the increase. Love seeing the kids net worth. Looking to fund a college savings account for my 6 year old but don’t really u dear stand where I should invest in college savings or even where is a good place for his savings account. Do you do a regular savings account for them, or a children’s savings account?

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:40 PM

      I think most banks offer a kid’s savings accounts which is what we went with. It’s good for when people give them money/checks or you have some extra $$ you’d like to set aside for them. People differ on the college savings stuff, but if you already know you do want to help them with it like I do, the 529s are a great place to start your research. And particularly with your own state first. The reason we dumped so much in there was because of the massive tax benefits given in the states of Maryland (where we used to be) and now Virginia. Another idea I see people doing is opening up a Roth IRA for them as well, but pros and cons to that one…

      Either way, it’s just good you’re thinking about this stuff and wanting to get things going :) Can’t go wrong no matter where you put the $$ as long as you’re putting it somewhere!

      Reply
  31. Tawcan December 1, 2014 at 11:54 PM

    A very impressive month. Congrats on the significant increase this month. Now is the best time invest your money, not tomorrow. :)

    Reply
  32. Jason @ Islands of Investing December 2, 2014 at 5:28 AM

    Awesome work on the investing J Money. I love these posts, and always get a strange combination of motivation and pangs of envy at seeing such fantastic numbers, which provides a great incentive to keep pressing ahead! Although at the moment, I can only dream of these sort of numbers. It will be some exciting times indeed when I’m sharing posts like this one! Race you to a million? :)

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 2, 2014 at 12:42 PM

      Haha… I get a tinge of envy myself when reading about all my friends at the $1 Mil mark :) I think it’s only natural… And even more so PROOF that it’s actually possible to hit! And in a few different ways too, which is interesting to read (real estate, businesses, dividend stocks, etc etc)…

      So yeah, I’ll race you there!

      Reply
  33. Barry @ Moneywehave December 2, 2014 at 3:53 PM

    Great job!

    I’ve yet to sell anything on Craigslist =( That being said a lot of the crap I have, I can’t even give away, hence why I just thew it out.

    I love reading these net worth updates, it encourages me to save more.

    Reply
  34. Femme @ femmefrugality December 2, 2014 at 4:42 PM

    Holy moly that’s powerful! $45k without touching it in 7/8 months. Holy moly.

    Reply
  35. Tim December 2, 2014 at 5:33 PM

    How long until the missus will be back in the workforce, J? Are you counting down the months until you will be cash flow positive again?

    It must be amazing reaping the benefits of your past decisions, so that you are in a place where you can comfortably handle a season on only one income, and your NW train keeps chugging along thanks to years of saving and investing.

    You should buy J$ of the past a beer, that guy really set you up well!

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 5, 2014 at 9:01 PM

      Hah – no kidding. The present J$ cringes every month putting these updates together as the savings account dwindles bit by bit :( In a perfect world Mrs. BudgetsAreSexy will be done w/ her paper and in a new job in three months (so, Feb), but the timeline keeps shifting really who knows… All I DO know is that I’m going to party like it’s 1999 again when the time comes! We’re going streaking!!!!!!! ;)

      Reply
  36. Kayla @Everything Finance December 2, 2014 at 7:46 PM

    Gotta love making your money work for you (rather than you working for your money, haha). What a nice increase. I do save/invest via my employer’s 401K plan (with match), but otherwise I don’t invest at this time. I am working on paying off debt though and that would also increase my net worth.

    Reply
  37. Prudence Debtfree December 2, 2014 at 10:11 PM

    A $45,000 increase since April – all on its own. Wow! Our debts are unfortunately getting in the way of investing! We’re withing spitting distance (well – a pretty long spit) of having only the mortgage left as a debt, and at that point (à la Dave Ramsey) we will begin some significant savings and investments. This is making me look forward to it!

    Reply
  38. Crystal December 2, 2014 at 11:14 PM

    We are paying out $10,500 in property taxes and HOA dues in the next week, so it felt like cheating to run the numbers right now. But I decided to just subtract that from cash early. Looks like our net worth is at $434,600, which is actually up about $6500 despite the $11,000 I subtracted for property taxes. Yay for stocks…

    Reply
  39. How To Save Money December 3, 2014 at 4:27 AM

    Great returns on your investment! It got me excited about mine in 8 years :)

    Reply
  40. Jayson @ Monster Piggy Bank December 3, 2014 at 5:02 AM

    Compound saving! I gotta do this to keep up with my financial goals immediately. It’s now December, and everyone is spending so much for Christmas. I think I’m gonna stick to my plans and to be frugal. It’s not how much I spend but how much I save in the end.

    Reply
  41. Chris @ Flipping A Dollar December 3, 2014 at 9:45 AM

    Last month was awesome for us too. Almost 8K in gains. Best part is that I’m going to get some free (not really) money. I had a pension from my previous company but it was under $50k so I can lump sum transfer it to my IRA (non-taxable event). Love to get it into my hands and take one more variable out of the retirement equation!

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 5, 2014 at 9:02 PM

      Right? If only there was a way to nab that every month!

      Reply
  42. Becky December 3, 2014 at 10:06 AM

    Our net worth went up just a little by working on paying off debts and the stock market doing well for my 401k. Our net worth will take a hit this month as we close on the house we are buying, but I want our monthly payments to be going towards owning something, instead of renting. Hopefully we can keep up the steady pace and build up a great net worth and retire early :)

    Reply
  43. Christine @ The Pursuit of Green December 3, 2014 at 12:48 PM

    Liking all that green I’m seeing!!! That’s wonderful. Great month and stocks are slowly going up again. Though the DOW is having its record highs it seems like our stocks are only going up by tiny percents. All in the long haul though:P

    As for me…I’m super close to maxing out this year for my retirement (yay!!!!) and stocks have gone up slightly. My corolla has gone done in value but for some reason my prius gone up a little. Putting extra each month to mortgage is helping a ton though! I love watching those numbers creep up and up.

    Reply
  44. connieK December 5, 2014 at 3:44 PM

    Hey J$, I know I’ve asked you this before and I believe you’ve answered that your monthly NW # is comprised of both your $ and your wife’s $. I mean obviously I know you guys are married, lol, but just a reminder here that for some of us, we count our NW separately/on our own. I married a guy who already has FOUR kid$ (I am raising zero kids), so I just can’t bring myself to tie any of my (NW/retirement) calculations to him. Therefore, my NW is less than your #, but I am still proud of what I have been able to accomplish on my own! It hurts but you’ve (people in general) gotta just keep pushing to save for retirement!!! Keep rockin’ it J$…
    ps and also, WHERE IS THE BLOG POST where you tell people to stop spending so much for Christmas???? :)

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 5, 2014 at 9:08 PM

      Haha… That would make for a good blog post, wouldn’t it? :)

      And yup – you’re right, I’m married and this net worth # includes both of our assets. Though, also our liabilities (ie mortgage). I wish it was more even between the two of us, but since my wife basically went into grad school right when we got married it’s all been most of my own doing (and at times, like now, my undoing – hah! At least with cash flow problems…). I just keep telling myself it’s temporary though and by this time next year we’ll be well on our way to stellar incomes again – I can’t wait :)

      And I think it’s totally fine to track your net worth separately if it makes you feel better! The number is really only for you anyways, it’s not like it affects the rest of us ;) So you track it however makes the most sense to you. Or even track it along side WITH your husbands and see what the difference is? That could be fun? And maybe inspire him/you both to work on things together too?

      Every person who posts up their net worth for us to see has a mixture of variables that go into it. What’s important is just that you can tell if you’re doing better over the months or worse so you can adjust. So you’re fine either way :)

      Reply
  45. Mr zombie December 6, 2014 at 1:36 PM

    Hi J,

    O_O 7 years worth! That’s awesome. Inspiring stuff mate.

    Started tracking my NW this summer but haven’t had the balls to post it online. Respect. Do you find it helps having it so transparent online? No ever gives you any grief for doing so well?

    You got yourself another subscriber :)

    Mr Z

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 11, 2014 at 8:01 PM

      Welcome aboard, Mr. Zombie!

      And good job starting to track it. All that really matters is that *you* know the number, regardless if you share it with the rest of us :) But to answer your question – yes, I believe the transparency has helped, both with the growth of this site, as well as my own accountability for that matter. When you know you’re going to be posting up your #’s to the world you tend to pay attention more – hah.

      I do get some grief from some people here and there (mostly people in the real world who I accidentally told about this and now wish I hadn’t), but outside of that it’s been pretty good. Helps to keep things more anonymous if you can.

      Reply
  46. The Lion's Shares December 7, 2014 at 11:56 AM

    WOW! Congrats on the $10K increase! It’s always a wonderful thing to have your money work for you :) You’re almost halfway towards your goal of a million dollar net worth, and that encourages me to keep going. Did you expect to be at this point by your 7th year?

    Reply
    1. J. Money December 11, 2014 at 8:02 PM

      No – I expected to have given up both on this blog, and chasing the million dollars, haha… but with every month and small win the motivation adds up and continues pushing everything forward! Great proof that tracking things works pretty well :)

      Reply
  47. Jeff December 9, 2014 at 6:36 PM

    Looking real good! You haven’t been putting any money away for months and are having great gains, I am socking away as much as possible (well almost as much as possible) and have two consecutive declines.

    Great job! Always look forward to clicking through the different blogs watching peoples net worth go up!

    Jeff

    Reply
  48. Stephanie December 14, 2014 at 6:49 PM

    FYI, Jesus wasn’t born in December, we only celebrate it then. ;)

    Great job in your net worth! Awesome!

    Reply

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