I may have posted this before, but I wanted to pass along this tip about one of the better things I have ever done in terms of my overall financial planning and processes.
I track, on a monthly basis, my net worth. I do it the stupidest, old fashioned'est way you can imagine -- by plugging the numbers into a spreadsheet. Now there are apps for that, of course. Early on in life, when you have one or two bank accounts, it's not remotely necessary, but once you're older, and you have a spouse, and you have a 401(k) and the rollover IRA and your wife's rollover IRA and the defined contribution benefit fund and a house with a value offset by a mortgage, blah, blah, blah, it gets a bit more challenging to track it all.
So I have everything in a spreadsheet, and early every month I just update all the figures. For home value I use assessed value (usually a conservative number) and plug in the mortgage balance to offset. All the accounts are updated by month end statement figures, etc.
It has really helped me track everything that we have, and SEE the growth over time, which is very encouraging. Of course, you have to have the stomach to just plug in the numbers and avoid vomiting when years like 2008 come around, but then you can see exactly when you got back to where you were, and be like "hey, for the end of the fucking world, that didn't take too long to recover from".
Anyway, I've found it useful for managing my financial life. Once you get the hang of it, updating the spreadsheet takes like half an hour a month. Not a big deal at all. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Amnorix:
I may have posted this before, but I wanted to pass along this tip about one of the better things I have ever done in terms of my overall financial planning and processes.
I track, on a monthly basis, my net worth. I do it the stupidest, old fashioned'est way you can imagine -- by plugging the numbers into a spreadsheet. Now there are apps for that, of course. Early on in life, when you have one or two bank accounts, it's not remotely necessary, but once you're older, and you have a spouse, and you have a 401(k) and the rollover IRA and your wife's rollover IRA and the defined contribution benefit fund and a house with a value offset by a mortgage, blah, blah, blah, it gets a bit more challenging to track it all.
So I have everything in a spreadsheet, and early every month I just update all the figures. For home value I use assessed value (usually a conservative number) and plug in the mortgage balance to offset. All the accounts are updated by month end statement figures, etc.
It has really helped me track everything that we have, and SEE the growth over time, which is very encouraging. Of course, you have to have the stomach to just plug in the numbers and avoid vomiting when years like 2008 come around, but then you can see exactly when you got back to where you were, and be like "hey, for the end of the ****ing world, that didn't take too long to recover from".
Anyway, I've found it useful for managing my financial life. Once you get the hang of it, updating the spreadsheet takes like half an hour a month. Not a big deal at all.
Just curious, do you count anything toward your net worth other than financial accounts and your house? [Reply]
At various points in time I've calculated my net worth, but very infrequently so I never had timeline figures. I really wish I'd done what amnorix is doing. I should start now. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Rain Man:
At various points in time I've calculated my net worth, but very infrequently so I never had timeline figures. I really wish I'd done what amnorix is doing. I should start now.
Originally Posted by eDave:
I'm pretty obsessed with my spreadsheet.
Man, everyone has a spreadsheet but me.
I would only use a spreadsheet for this stuff. I'm too paranoid to use any kind of online tool to summarize everything I've got. I have nightmares of some Moldovan hacker wiping me out. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Rain Man:
Man, everyone has a spreadsheet but me.
I would only use a spreadsheet for this stuff. I'm too paranoid to use any kind of online tool to summarize everything I've got. I have nightmares of some Moldovan hacker wiping me out.
You can find plenty of templates out there. Some basic, some pretty granular. [Reply]
Investment tip I have recently learned. Please correct me if I have anything wrong. I can't wait to see some tips from some of you. I love talking about investing and savings/life goals.
Roth IRA tip. A Roth IRA is only for those not making Dane money. A Roth IRA investment account can actually be fairly liquid. Much advice that I have currently been reading is talking about funneling as much money (max hopefully $5,500/year) to your Roth IRA account over dumping extra money into a savings account and earning nothing. This is of course after you have built an emergency fund of 3-6 months. The caveat of doing this is that as long as the Roth IRA has been open for 5+ years, you can withdrawn your contributions at any time, tax free and with no penalties. Meaning that if I have contributed $20k to my Roth over 7 years, and it's currently worth $25k, I am allowed to withdraw up to $20k without penalty. Is this ideal, no. But in a sense, it acts as a second emergency fund as well. And an emergency fund with actual chance to grow unlike a savings account. The money would take at most a few weeks to get to you from my understanding. Easily in the window to pay for a major emergency. Withdrawing money from a 401k should be a last resort for most as the penalties caused by this are not worth it unless it's your last option. [Reply]
Originally Posted by JASONSAUTO:
I have a safe room l where I take my cash and roll around in it.
Edit: I go in and make it rain on the on the wife every chance I get
I haven't looked at any of our investment accounts since last Thursday. I don't want to see the losses and make a bad decision out of panic. I'll just ride it out. If I was 62 instead of 43, I'd be worried.
I'm a big believer in index funds with a long-term approach. Just keep putting money into them and forget about it. [Reply]
