2012 Goals - 3rd Quarter Update

Well, another quarter has come and gone so it's time to see how the 3rd quarter went.  The first three quarters of this year have been great for me financially and let's not forget personally.  I got married the middle of this year and can't be happier.  The first nine months of the year have been pretty good on the goals that I set for the year.  Without further adieu let's check out the numbers.

2012 Budeting Goals - 3rd Quarter Results
Goal Actual through 3rd Quarter Status
70% take-home pay savings rate 75.96% average savings (Jan 74.51%, Feb 73.09%, Mar 75.10%, Apr 71.42%, May 66.93%, Jun 87.23%, Jul 81.49%, Aug 74.05%, Sep 79.83%) Exceeded Goal
Less than $1,600 required expenses $1,528.77 average (Jan $1,694.02, Feb $1,682.70, Mar $1,590.72, Apr $1,541.32, May $1,549.48, Jun $1,252.68, Jul $1,608.65, Aug $1,417.13, Sep $1,422.25) Exceeded Goal
Reduce Misc. Expenses by 20% (Exp. < $131.62 per mo) $114.39 Exceeded Goal
Reduce Restaurant Expenses by 20% (Exp. < $128.12 per mo) $148.35 Needs Improvement
Reduce Grocery Spending by 10% (Exp. < $214.07 per mo) $209.52 Exceeded Goal

Of my 5 budgeting goals I've exceeded 4 but am still behind on 1.  My savings rate is well over my target of 70% thanks to working a lot in the 2nd and 3rd quarters.  While focusing on lowering my expenses has led to great improvements the extra work I've done on the income side has helped me maintain a much higher savings rate than I anticipated.  I'm currently just shy of 76% which is a full 6% better than my goal.  I'm very pleased with the required expenses being below $1,600 and they should continue to drop.  It's nice to see that they are fairly consistently moving down.  I need to really focus on the restaurant spending because I'm way behind on that goal through the first 9 months.  In order to reach my goal I can only average $67 each month the rest of the year.  I don't think I'll hit that but I do want to make an improvement on my restaurant expenses over the last quarter.

2012 Saving Goals - 3rd Quarter Results
Goal Actual through 3rd Quarter Status
Pay off all debt Paid off 100% of debt Exceeded Goal
$100,000+ Net Worth $129,605.76 Exceeded Goal

Like they were in my 2nd quarter update, my savings goals have both been surpassed for the year.  I'm now focusing on increasing my net worth as much as possible and hopefully be able to hit the $150,000 mark which would be way higher than I expected.  I have to average just under a $6,800 per month increase in my net worth to hit $150,000.  It's going to be pretty amazing if I'm able to hit $150k by the end of the year and I think I will as long as the markets stay flat to slightly down.  Honestly I kind of hope I don't hit $150k because that'll mean that the markets took a pretty big nose dive which would help me out much more in the long run.  I currently have around $9,000 combined in my brokerage and Roth IRA that is sitting there waiting to go to work.  Plus another $2,600 that looks like it'll be freed up in December if my put option expires and then another $1,600 later this month assuming my call option is executed which it should.  So I'll be sitting on plenty of powder and hoping to make some big moves with a market pullback.

2012 Investing Goals - 3rd Quarter Results
Goal Actual through 3rd Quarter Status
Receive $1,000 in dividends $400.42 received (On target for ~$650) Needs Improvement
3.00%+ YOC for Brokerage Account 2.60% YOC (3.13% Non-ESPP YOC) Needs Improvement
Surpass $100,000 in all investments (Brokerage, Roth IRA, 401k...) $120,495.59 ($56,800 increase this year) Exceed Goal
Max out 401k $8,863.47 contributed Needs Improvement
Max out Roth IRA's for myself and my fiance $5,000 contributed Needs Improvement

My investing goals will probably end the year being the biggest disappointment.  While I won't receive $1,000 in dividends this year unless I really focus on trying to get stocks that are going ex-div soon which I'm not going to do unless they're at a good value.  But the good news is that I'm currently at $937 in forward 12-month dividends which is nice to see.  I knew the dividends would probably be lacking this year but I set my goal at a hard to reach level to force me to focus on it.  My brokerage account YOC is low thanks to my ESPP shares.  The company I work for is not a DG investors dream so starting in June of 2013 I'll be selling off shares every 6 months to allow me to purchase more DG stocks.  The good news is that the rest of my brokerage account does have a YOC over 3.00%.  I've decided to hold off on maxing out the 401k and instead am contributing 10% plus the employer match of 5% and profit sharing of 4% giving me a 19% 401k contribution.  I've got my Roth IRA maxed out for the year and now I need to focus on hers although I need to double check the tax situation to make sure we're not going to go over the limit on our MAGI to be be able to fully contribute.

2012 Personal Goals - 3rd Quarter Results
Goal Actual through 3rd Quarter Status
Lose and keep off 20 lbs. Gained 5 lbs. Needs Improvement
Workout 3 x per week Averaging 0 workouts Needs Improvement
2+ Blog Posts per week 3.83 posts per week Exceeded Goal

I actually increased my average weekly blog post amount throughout the 3rd quarter and am now averaging well above the 2 posts per week goal.  I'm hoping that during this last quarter I can start posting 1 stock analysis report every week, so that has become an unofficial goal.  I know I'll be behind for this week but after that I hope to start getting some going again, especially now that I have a lot of fresh capital to work with.  The workouts and weight loss are still the worst of my personal goals thus far through the year. I know that I need to and I want to but it's just hard to get motivated by myself. There's talk of us getting a schedule where we work 2 weeks on and 2 weeks off or 4 on and 2 off. Either of those would be very much appreciated and would help me to focus on the workouts because I can workout on my days off and with my wife.

So far I've exceeded several of my goals but am still behind on some.  The main goals I want to focus on the rest of the year are my personal workout/weight loss goals.  I've almost let a year slip by and gone backwards on those.  The financial goal that I want to focus on the most is reducing my expenses further and to get my money invested and working for me.  It's been a great 9 months so far this year and hopefully the next 3 treat everyone well.

Comments

  1. You've made great progress on several goals. In particular, I like that you've paid off all debt and increased your savings rate by reducing overall expenses. Good job!

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    1. I still need to get a personal interest free loan paid off but all my debt that had interest is gone which is great. I've made even more progress than I thought I would this far in 2012. Now I'll have a much better idea of my goal setting for 2013 since I'll have a full year in the books.

      Thanks for stopping by!

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  2. Wow, great job on the goals!

    Your savings rate is especially impressive. I find it incredibly difficult to get up to the 70% savings rate month after month. There are certainly many months a year I achieve a rate that high, and that's usually when my income is up considerably, but it's very difficult for me to average a rate that high over an entire year. My goal for this year was to average a 65% net income savings rate, but I'm probably going to hit somewhere around 60%. Great job on this front!

    Your food expenses are also very impressive.

    Don't worry about hitting the investment goals right now. You're doing a great job saving and paying off your debt, and the investing results will now start to come in spades.

    Best wishes!

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    Replies
    1. You've still made a great progress. My savings rate is more a function of making a lot of money. Especially when I hit over 75%. I'm not complaining but there's not a whole lot more that I can realistically cut from my expenses. Most of the fat that's left comes with the job that I have.

      My debt payoff is one of the goals that I'm most proud of because I was originally thinking it was going to be August/September before it got paid off but I was fortunate enough to get rid of it in May.

      I just wish the markets were at levels from a few years ago because I would be so much further ahead if I could be investing the money I have now back then. But another pullback will come it's just not like shooting fish in a barrel as it was then. I'm sitting on way too much cash in my FI account and I'm getting anxious to start deploying it. Hopefully we get some early disappointing earnings numbers that push the markets back down. We'll see how today goes since earnings season starts today.

      Thanks for stopping by!

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