Breaking Even
October 7, 2009
I’m doing a quick vertical analysis of my Vanguard accounts which include the tax deferred 403(b) and 401(a), a Rollover IRA integrated into the 403(b), and my Roth IRA.
The column showing my account purchases/withdrawals since February 2006 = 34,938. There haven’t been any withdrawals, by the by.
The column showing my investment returns to date = -63.
Total? Less than I’ve contributed over a 44 month time span.
I’m going to put my full-of-hope hat on and be glad that I’ve squirreled away at least that much, mostly pre-tax, and be glad that I haven’t seen such numbers like ā$1,571.82, ā$1,908.34 or even ā$3,711.14 in a good while.
How close are you to breaking even? Or has anyone’s portfolios returned to full health?
The site looks nice. It’s very clean and minimalist.
Most of the Google ads appear “below the fold” from this direction.
How do you like the Google Search function? Does it bring in any revenue?
For some reason, Google has actually started making a few bucks at FaM lately. Not a lot, but sure better than the previous $.03 every two or three days. This morning when I logged onto Adsense Reports to see what (if anything) happened yesterday, I noticed that the site’s ads had already had three clicks today…and that was at 5:30 in the morning!
So started looking at some of Adsense’s other offerings. The “search” thing is unobtrusive. Is it worth taking up space for it?
Oops! I clicked on the WRONG post for that last comment.
So she’s b-a-a-a-a-c-k! At “Breaking Even,” I hope.
My Vanguard accounts have recovered a bit. The big IRA is held by Fidelity but run by a professional financial management firm. Those guys have money scattered all around–stocks, bonds, mutual funds, cash. The 403(b) is mostly in Fidelity mutual funds.
The VG funds (Wellington, Windsor II, STC) gained a little over $1200 this month over last month.
The total investment package is doing significantly better than that–the big IRA (about 230 grand) gained over $4,000 last month. As of yesterday afternoon, the entire set of investments had gained $49,145.57 from its low point in March 2009.
That’s the good news. The bad news is that despite the gain, total investments were still $110,469.43 down from their high point in April 2008.
Funny The Google search function is minimally productive, to match the theme, I suppose. š
When you say the ads appear below the fold, is it just pushed too far down? I’m still playing with placement. Being reduced to two columns has some disadvantages.
I like the search function, I love it on other blogs because there are times I’m looking for a particular post and a few keywords will turn it up on that blog. I’d rather give you the search revenue if I had the choice. I might even have been looking for one of your previous posts that way recently, and been reduced to trying Google for it.
I highly encourage it.
And ….
At this rate, perhaps the whole portfolio will get its feet back under by this time next year! One can hope.