Well, August hit like a freight train. There were a couple of whammies this month in the form of my wife’s car needing new tires and her laptop dying. We also had our anniversary dinner where we splurged a little and I had a work trip to Vegas and spent a bit extra on a dinner with friends. Needless to say, our expenses were elevated.
Luckily, and I do realize how fortunate I am, we got a bonus from work that, combined with proceeds from an ESPP sale, made up for the extra spending. If I hadn’t know that the bonus was coming in, I probably would have been a lot more conservative this month. Even though we’re focused on cutting back, it’s hard to not spend the extra.
Here’s how we did.
Goals:
- Reduce overall outstanding debt (including mortgage) by 10%.
- At the end of August, overall debt reduction is 7.71%. Still on track.
- Make contributions to investments (taxable and retirement) of 10% of salary.
- Combined saving in investment accounts is 10.55% of income. This includes 401k, IRA, ESPP.
- Eliminate any monthly interest payments due to credit cards.
- We maintained $0 in credit card interest in Aug. for a five month streak.
Total expenses for August were $14924 which was the second highest compared to Feb, but the difference being in Feb we made a $6200 payment against outstanding credit card debt.
Also, with the bonus we were still net positive by $2300 for the month. That money got divided between debt and investments.
We’re going to really buckle down and try to have a couple of calm months before we hit any holiday spending. I’m confident since I’m still on track for my goals, but it would be great if we could accomplish a little extra!
Cheers!
-cb3