June 12, 2019June 11, 2019 FOGA

Net Worth Update #4: May 2019

Net Worth

Hello FOGA Readers! Welcome to Net Worth Update #4: May 2019. 🙂

But before that, my apologies for the lack of posts over the past three weeks. Been doing through a bit of a rough patch, but starting to get better.

For now, the short version: Depression sucks and living with it is sometimes hell. I promise a longer version at some point but I am not up for it right now.

Now, onto the normal net worth stuff. That I can handle. 😉

For anyone who is not aware, your net worth is your total assets minus your total liabilities. Also known as everything you own of value minus everything you owe.

I don’t put our specific income into this, but I am sure you will be able to tell the good months from the bad ones. I get paid twice a month if I have closings. If I don’t, I do not get paid. It tends to make things interesting around here.

Of course, there is not always going to be a lot of change with some of the sections here (like our house), but it will be helpful to see the fluctuations overall.

So without further ado, let’s get into Net Worth Update #4!

Assets

Home- $254,000

The usual stuff: I don’t consider our home to be an investment. We live here, and that’s all. However, it does it have a value, so I’ve added that as part of our net worth. Not to mention, since we have to include the mortgage, we might as well note the value of the home. Otherwise, our net worth is incredibly negative, and that’s no fun.

We have officially finished the refinancing process, and we had an appraisal done as part of that. The funny thing is Realtor.com & Zillow put the value of our home at $277,000 and $269,000 respectively. I’m not sure why it’s so high. It doesn’t make much sense even with the growth our area has had lately. it’s a good thing we always took these with a pond of salt.

Investments- $74,231.66

We put $1000 in each of our IRAs in May. Only $4000 in each until they are maxed out. Maxing these out is our current priority for investing even with the market doing a bit of fluctuating.

Both of our 401Ks did well in May as well. So far, increasing my 401K to 15% seems to be keeping us on track to max it out this year. Mr. FOGA’s 401K is currently at 8%. We’ll be leaving his alone until we figure out his new paycheck since he stepped down.

Usual IUL Stuff: The IULs always go up since they designed that way. We always make at least 1% on these. The downside is we have a cap on how much we can earn in interest. It’s a trade-off, but that’s why we put the minimum in those accounts. I used to put much more into mine, which is why there’s such a difference between mine and Mr. FOGTA’s. I stopped over funding to be able to put more in the IRAs. We can also make one time payments.

Emergency Fund- $22,346.44

Ally has been doing well; I am pleased with this savings account. We have earned nearly $150 so far this year in interest in this account. If you don’t have a high-interest savings account, you should definitely get one.

The goal was to get this account to $50,000 by the end of the year, but I am starting to rethink that; more on that in the future.

We added $600 to our emergency fund, and we earned $38.91 in interest.

I wanted to keep it separate for a few reasons. First, as I mentioned earlier, Ally earns more interest. Second, it’s out of sight, so it’s out of mind. Finally, it takes a while to access (three business days), so we’re not going to use it in a pinch.

Savings- $3000

Here is where we keep the rest of our savings. This savings account is essentially an immediate emergency fund. If something comes up, we have easy access to some money, but not ALL the money. This account is also the funds we use for projects around the house and vacations. I guess it’s partially normal savings and partially a sinking fund.

We put $250 into this in May. I am considering lowering the total amount of this account and placing the remainder in Ally. Most surprise expenses would be covered with $2000- $2500 in this account and whatever is in our checking. If it’s genuinely an emergency, I would probably get three business days to get the fund out of Ally anyway.

Something we are considering.

Total Assets- $353,578.10

Liabilities

Mortgage- $228,182

The refinance is complete. Some of the closing costs were put into the new mortgage. In the long term we will save about $10,000, nearly two years, and PMI on our new loan. In the short term, the loan is higher.

The goal is to pay this off. Freeing up over $17,000 a year is highly appealing, and would go a long way towards making us financially secure.

Total Liabilities- $228,182

Net Worth

I honestly thought the higher loan balance was going to make us go backward for May. Happy to be proven wrong.

For the next few months, I will get two paychecks a month. That will go a long way towards getting this number higher.

We hope to hit $150,000 by the end of the year. That may be a lofty goal, but we made it to $125,000, so I am hopeful. 🙂

In Summation

So that was Net Worth Update #4. Next one will be at the end of June/beginning of July if all goes well. 🙂

Do you have a net worth update? If so, I would love to read it. Please put a link in the comments below.

If you like reading Net Worth Updates, check out Our Table 4 Two. They are about to hit positive net worth (technically it’s already happened, but the post would be for next month), so stay tuned for her update!

Otherwise, what did you think? Good? Bad? Any thoughts? Please share below.

Until Next Time!

-Ms. FOGA