Monthly Update – October 2017 – (+$802.83, +0.26%)
October was a fun month for us. From my wife’s 30th birthday, to pumpkins and Halloween, it’s been a busy 31 days (and quite expensive too). For my wife’s birthday, I took the kids for a few hours and we dropped her off for a day at the spa. I hope she enjoyed it because I don’t see how people can afford to get massages every month!
I feel like this month went by extremely fast and we didn’t get many pictures, but we did manage to take one before we took the boys out trick or treating. Our oldest son is in love with Paw Patrol, so my wife was able to find him a used “Marshall” costume for under $10. Our youngest is only one years old and obviously doesn’t care yet, so he got to use the pirate outfit we put our oldest in the last few years.
Net Worth Overview:
For October, our net worth only increased by $800 this month but this number is deceivingly low. I follow quite a few people that track their net worth each month, and a lot of them won’t include their home values because the market value is typically inaccurate, and their home won’t ever provide them income to retire. I like to track everything that isn’t relatively small/minor to give a more complete picture of our worth. Our investments actually grew by $3,832 this month but our home value decreased by $3,598 (according to Zillow) which is what mainly kept our overall growth low.
The income we got from our side businesses was only about $20 this month but we’re hoping over time this area will really boost our journey to financial freedom.
Spending overview:
The $5,112.67 spending number above was actually $4,958.67. For some reason Mint double-counted a transaction and couldn’t get a good screenshot. But anyways, some main points include:
- $686.13 between Aldi and Wal-Mart. Our target grocery budget is around $400, so this is a bit higher than normal.
- $181.50 for a spa day for my wife’s birthday (money well spent) and another $132.78 for night time festivities.
- A total of $1,236.77 (ouch) on food this month! This has really been the biggest hurdle for us to keep low and really hurts our ability to save.
- $351.51 total for shopping. This isn’t bad, but we can definitely do better. However, with Christmas just around the corner, I’m sure this category will be bigger for the next two months.
Overall, October was an average month for our finances. The financial markets have done really well and are increasing our wealth faster than we can add to it right now. Our focus over the next few months is making sure our holiday spending doesn’t get too out of control!
