By: Revanche

Money & Life Report: July 2021

August 3, 2021

On Money

Income

Our primary income comes from our full time jobs. We have minimal income from investing in index funds and dividend stocks (all reinvested). We earn money on the side to supplement our main incomes. We get a bit of income from Swagbucks and cash back sites (Rakuten, Mr.Rebates). Some posts have affiliate links that pay a micro-commission to keep the blog running and I’ve added a way to support the blog in the sidebar to the right!

Our long term goal is to replace our day job income with passive income before my health prevents me from working. I know from my Mom’s experience that qualifying for or relying on disability is incredibly tough or near impossible here in CA. Aside from that, I aim to do my best to make the most of what we can do while we can.

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Dividend income. We received $207.20 in dividends from the stocks portfolio. Our YTD monthly average is $221.

We filed our 2020 taxes on time and I just assumed that because the rental property sale completely threw our income out of whack, we didn’t qualify for the American Rescue Plan Child Tax Credit. I based that assumption on absolutely no research – I didn’t even bother to look up the income limit. Turns out that we are getting something because we don’t make THAT much money and as SP explains, some of this is half our regular Child Tax Credit up front. I needed to decide if we want to get the monthly payments. I read an article saying that maybe families wouldn’t want to get the payments because they are banking on that big tax refund payment (not us) or because that unplanned for income would throw their tax planning off (maybe?). That may be us just because I do not have the brain power to figure out what effect it will have on our tax planning. I just didn’t have any more energy for this so I’m gonna bump up our withholdings a bit to hedge our bets and see what happens.

Little squee: three of my shirt designs sold and I’m as pleased with the wee bit of income as I am that someone liked my design. I made something that someone liked! That’s so cool!

Spending

FINALLY, between the insulation and some other changes, our power bill has come back down to a normal amount. It was outrageous for the past 6 months, averaging $250/month rather than the $115 we’re used to. Yes everyone’s home but even still, last year’s bill still weren’t THAT home. Anyway I’m hoping it’ll stay down where it needs to be and stops gouging my budget. I have other things to spend on!

Giving

Finally! I finally got to pick another family for our collective funds to help out! Our family this month is three generations with a matriarch fighting with diabetes. We supplied her with a huge box of the cleaning supplies she requested, plus some of the basic hygiene supplies (toothpaste, toothbrushes, soap, shampoo, conditioner, hand soap), shoes for her son and grandkids, and diabetic socks, shoes, and nice comfy pants for her.

I’m sad that the best coordinator that I’ve worked with for the past 4 years who made this time consuming process a little bit easier left suddenly at the end of the year. It’s always obvious when you’ve been working with someone who is really good at the job and then they’re not replaced with … Well, anyone.

I did have the unique experience of having a chat with the FedEx outpost out there, because they were having trouble with the shipping information. I spoke to someone who was actually quite familiar with the challenges of delivering to the reservation and was very kind about it. I was very pleasantly surprised. She explained that the drivers are happy to deliver if they know where the person lives, it’s just tough because on some roads, even with valid addresses, the homes won’t have any numbers on them. When it’s several homes in a row without any number, well. You can see the challenge. It did make me wonder if there’s any way to help address that issue. Maybe we can get each of the families that we help a sign for their house number if they want one.

Saving and investing

I’m pushing for our all time high savings rate this year in anticipation of having daycare gobble up a very large portion of our income currently earmarked for savings in 2022. Not sure that I can hit it but I must try! At least that way I would have this one good year to coast on, emotionally, for a while. We’ll see, that might not be how my dopamine works. I did change my savings from a once a month auto save to smaller amount once a week because I needed the more frequent smaller doses of feel-good-ness.

Net worth

Nothing exciting in either direction here. We’re creeping in the right direction very slowly and I appreciate that a lot.

On Life

Reading. Reading did happen but I didn’t have time to log them all this month! Next month. Lots of good stuff.  JB and PiC went to the library about a dozen times this month and I was jealous the eleven times I didn’t get to go. I love the library! But I don’t actually need to go, I read all my books online.

Food! I cooked a few times this month! It’s exciting for me to be able to have the time, energy, and desire to cook again. I made a couple meatloaves (called the Best Meatloaf Ever by JB), and my version of a sort of Thai curry.

Entertainment. LEVERAGE: REDEMPTION. I’m loving it. I didn’t realize we don’t get Aldis Hodge the whole time and I already miss him but I hope hope hope hope it gets renewed and he happens to have enough time to come back. Hope hope hope.

:: How was your month?

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