By: Revanche

February Snapshot

February 4, 2008

At first glance, it suddenly looks like I’ve done remarkably well since the last snapshot at the end of 2007. As usual, there are quite a few things this doesn’t show.

First, I paid off the balance transfer, and that means I’ll be losing a source of passive income that was a steady $40ish/month. Of course, with the interest rate dropping like a rock, I wasn’t assured that same return through this year. I’ll consider doing another BT this year, because it doesn’t look like I’m going to be able to post the kind of savings I’d need to put towards the real estate investment my friend and I had discussed.

Second, my spending has been well over my income for a few weeks. A few hotspots:
A) I overpaid the insurance premium in January because I still hadn’t received my revised premium statement by the billing due date. That’s an extra $300 I’m basically prepaying. It was on my credit card so I have the short grace period, but that’ll still have to come out of the checking account.
B) I forgot to reduce my retirement contributions in time for January’s paychecks. I’ve changed it for February from $500/check to $300, but I should have reduced it even more because I need the extra cash flow. And the contribution was taken out of my extra January paycheck too! Gah. I didn’t think that it would be.
C) Thanks to Ma’s accident in the sedan, it’s been out of commission for over a month. Haven’t been able to sell the truck, so another [-$400/month].
D) Best friend’s wedding last month did a doozy on the budget because I was just too stressed to clamp down as strongly on spending as usual. Eating out? Uh, sure! Buying new sunglasses? Yep! More food? Ok! Cold at night? Heater’s on! More stress eating? Let’s get another bagel sandwich!

Meantime, I’m trying to parse out how rent and all the other bills work out without tapping into the emergency fund until my supplemental income check comes in, whenever that’ll be.

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