$70,000!

 

 

I haven't been posting much this year because....well... it's been a strange year.  I just wanted to put up a post to memorialize the fact that my retirement accounts hit over $70,000 for the first time!  It's crazy, I remember back in 2011 when I first started making $70,000 as my salary.  It felt like a lot of money. Now, I have that much all in one (well 2) places. I am still in my 30s and I definitely need a lot more, but this feels good.  My hard work, effort and sacrifice have started to accumulate and the ball is growing.  I will be thrilled when I finally hit 6 figures!

Also, in the interest of showing reality on this blog, the good and the bad, I wanted to let everyone know that we are not getting Christmas bonuses this year.  Covid has definitely had an impact on the legal industry and the mid size law firm that I work for was definitely hit hard.

To be transparent, I had hoped for a bonus this year and had already planned out where the money would go. I'm not sad about the lack of the bonus and I knew that it was unlikely that I would receive one due to the economic climate.  Nevertheless, I am still happy for everyone else who received bonuses and I take pleasure in hearing about that money! 

Happy Holidays! 

Retirement Contributions for 2020 Complete

 

My goal this year was to contribute $11,000 (after tax money) to my retirement accounts.  I have completed this goal today!! This has been an expensive year for me and I am so glad and so happy that I was able to make this goal happen!! When I logged in and transferred the money it pushed my retirement accounts to over $66,000.

I know that this has been a tough year financially for a lot of people.  I don't share this news to brag.  I just want to have a record of my journey. I feel like I am accomplishing things in spite of this pandemic. I hope that if things go poorly for me, as they have for so many others, I will at least have this money to fall back on. (Or at least some of it if the stock market crashes). 

In other news, I have to undergo a $1,200 dental/periodontal procedure during covid-19.  I thankfully will be able to cash flow it.  I'm a little nervous about it and I hope it goes well.  Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Missing in Action

 

It has been almost 2 months since my last post.  I don't really feel like I have lots to say. 

 It's Autumn and the weather has been so nice. I have been finding reasons just to sit outside.  I am still working from home and it's working out better than I thought. 

In financial news, I am $263 away from completing my retirement contributions for the year.  My goal was to contribute $11,000 to retirement.  What's even more exciting, I am up approximately $17,000 from January.  I also met my goal of hitting $65,000 in my retirement accounts for the year. My goal will be to donate $12,000 to retirement next year. 

I have also completed  my charitable donation goal for the year! I have donated $601 to charity this year.  My goal was $500 and I have gone beyond and above!  I really felt compelled to give money to the food banks this year.  They were hit hard due to job loss from covid. 

I have lost about 18 lbs this year! I am so excited.  Being home more has made it easier to eat healthier and get in more exercise. Just gotta keep it up, 18lbs to go! 

September

 

It's almost Fall (Autumn)! I cannot wait for some cooler weather and less lawn care. I already have my Fall wreath up(even though I have been warned, numerous times, that it is not yet Fall).  

Things are pretty quiet here on my little area of the world.  I am still working from home and the firm plans to continue wfh until the beginning of the year.  I discussed the wfh with my boss and he acknowledged that he would have to continue to permit some wfh, after covid, if he wanted to me continue working for him.  Woohoo!  I plan to take full advantage of working from home in the years to come. I'm just as productive and I love not having to go into the office. 

Otherwise, I am just saving and hoping to be able to retire one day. :) 

P.S.

MERJ- if you read this, I hope you are doing okay.  I have been catching up on your blog and I hate that you have been feeling so down.  I hope the EAP helps. 

$100,000

One hundred thousand dollars. Twenty years ago when I was an optimistic high school student (even a young college student or truly even when I was a young lawyer) I dreamed of having $100,000 in cash or salary.  I thought a six figure salary meant that you were rich. I thought a $100,000 was a lot of money.  Frankly, it is a lot of money and I would not turn down a $100,000 salary or $100,000 in cash.  However, in the last 20 years I have learned that a $100,000 does not make you rich.

What made me think of this?  I finally reached $100,000 in cash/investments.  I hate to break this to you all, but despite this, I'm not rich.

For future me, I want to lay it out.

$57,175 in investments Roth/Taxable account

$10,989 in a HYSA

$33,429 in a bank account

    Total: $101,593

I know this is only a temporary amount of money.  The stock market may drop considerably today and I'll have substantial losses. Also, over $25,000 of this money (in the HYSA and bank account) is marked for me to purchase a new car).  At some point, I plan to spend the money set aside for a new car.

On the other hand, I will continue to save and continue to contribute to my retirement account and taxable account.   I know that this number will also continue to fluctuate and, if I'm equal parts diligent and lucky, this number will increase.

Cheers to Tuesday and cheers to being rich (one day).

2020 Goals!

Just a quick post, I just wanted to document that I reached my 2020 goal to donate $500 to charity.  A few years ago, I realized that I was severely lacking in the area of charitable giving. So I decided to start tracking and documenting the amounts that I was donating each year.  Thereafter, I decided to increase my charitable giving by $100 a year.  This year my goal was to give $500.  It's not much, but  over time it will really add up. 

Anyways, after all that rambling, the point of this post is that I have donated $500 to charity this year.  Due to the pandemic, it was pretty easy.  I donated $200 to the local food bank, $100 to St. Jude, $100 to my law school and $100 to my local legal aid clinic.

As long as I am employed, I plan to keep donating throughout the year.  I hope to donate more to St. Jude and find a reputable BLM organization. This is an awful time to live through and I hope my donations will help just a little bit. 

Roth maxed

 Update- too many typos.  I had to fix at least some of them.

There is soooo much turmoil going on in the world right now and I have not been able to put together a post about it.  The virus and the racism are entirely too much to bear. The world seems deeply divided into two camps: people who believe that the virus is real and that racism exists and people who do not believe in either.

Despite this deep traumatic existence we are living through, I am trying to persist. So the good news is that I maxed out my roth! My retirement balances haven't really increased much from where they were at the peak earlier this year (prior to Covid-19). I just hope to make good purchases during these dips in the market and hopefully when this is all over I will feel much more on track for retirement.

My contributions to my roth for 2020 were as follows:

1/3/20   $100
1/4/20   $100
1/15/20 $1000
1/31/20 $100
2/14/20 $800
2/18/20 $100
2/27/20 $100
2/28/20 $200
3/5/20   $850
3/31/20 $100
4/15/20 $1000
5/1/20   $100
5/30/20 $100
6/15/20 $800
6/24/20 $550

Whomp, Whomp - more car repairs

I hope everyone is doing well during this pandemic.  It is oddly stressful and difficult to adjust to a new normal.  I'm ready for things to return to normal, but only once everything is safe. 

Anyways, on the point of this post! My 14 year old car, selfishly, decided that it needed a oil change and a few other repairs in the midst of this pandemic.  How rude!!  A new CV axle (last replaced around 80,000 miles) and a new seal to stop the leak in the camshaft.  Oddly enough, my 14 year old car with 150,000 had never had never needed a new seal on the camshaft.  Apparently, the seals are only supposed last 80,000 to 100,000 miles.  I suppose it was time to be replaced, but I am not happy about it.  I cash flowed the car repairs (I only had $700 in my car repair fund) by using my May 15 pay check to cover the amount over and above my car repair fund.  I also earned some awesome cashback from my credit card for the repairs!

I feel like I am spending more money lately, which is the total opposite of my pandemic goals.  I just bought a new printer for approximately $350 to have at home.  It is a wireless color laser printer, it scans, copies, etc.  It can print double sided pages and has a feeder to scan multi-page documents. 
It does help with not having to run back and forth to the office to scan documents or print large documents.  Hopefully it was a good purchase.

Otherwise, I have still been steadily saving for my replacement car.  I will likely try to keep this one going until the end of the year and then try again for a good year end deal on a car. 

Stimulus Checks

How are all of you handling the shutdowns? I'm pretty introverted so my life has not changed very much.  I call and text my mother.  I call and text a few friends. My firm has officially gone to "work from home" status. I go in the office 2 or 3 times a week to check on the mail that has come in or to print large documents, etc.  All and all it's pretty weird not to be able to run to the store at 6:30am on my way to work or 9:00pm at night on my way back from out of town. 

Did any of you receive stimulus checks?  I made just slightly less than $90,000 in 2018, so I qualified for ~$450 in stimulus money. I have not yet filed my 2019 taxes.  In 2019, I grossed about $97,000 so I am glad that I have not had the time to file.  Based on my 2019 income, I would have only received ~$100.  I plan to donate $100 of the stimulus check to charity.  I plan to save the rest.  What are your plans for your stimulus check?

Stay safe everyone!

Retirement Savings

Frankly, it's hard to talk about anything but COVID19 right now, but I am going to try. My retirement investments have dropped considerably.  I am down around $14,000 to $15,000 overall.  Nevertheless, I plan to plow forward and to keep investing.  So below are my retirement contributions to date:

1/3/20 $100
1/4/20 $100
1/15/20 $1,000
1/31/20 $100
2/14/20 $800
2/18/20 $100
2/27/20 $100
2/28/20 $200
3/5/20 $850
3/31/20 $100

All of these contributions have gone into my Roth.  I still have $2,550 left to contribute for the year.  I hope the stock market recovers.  It's so disconcerting to see my paltry savings dwindle away.  I certainly don't believe that I will reach my goal of $100,000 in savings by the time I am 40.

Coronavirus Happenings

I hope everyone is staying safe during this pandemic.  I feel as though everyone has lost their minds. Here in North Florida everyone has been panic shopping and toilet paper is in short supply.  I just want to stay in my house and wait this thing out. Luckily, my office has asked us to work from home indefinitely.  I will probably work from the office if everyone else stays home.  It will be nice and quiet. I'll probably go in around 9a.m. and leave about 3:30 or 4:00p.m.

I did buy some toilet paper (12 pack) and it should last a month.  I do not intend to go into anymore stores. 

I do have to go out of town this week.  I have been feeling unwell (Stomach issues- definitely not COVID-19).  I'm definitely not looking forward to traveling or staying in a hotel later this week. Or eating out in restaurants. I am bringing apples, beef jerky, bottled water, etc.  Hopefully I won't have to eat out in a restaurant. 

Sigh.  People, seriously, do not let your children become lawyers.  There are many law firms which are not permitting employees to work from home even though the work could easily be done from home. I have several court imposed deadlines which are still in place which require me to get travel.  (It's hard to do a site inspection from home when your discovery deadline is at the end of the month).

That's all I can muster for a Monday night.  Stay safe everyone.  

Car Shopping Adventures #4

Next stop, Volvo! I forgot to take pictures at the Volvo dealership.  So I just used a stock photo from the internet. 

Volvos are expensive, but I really like the look of these vehicles so I figured I would give it a shot.  Unfortunately, I think they are just too costly for my taste (well wallet really).   The sales guy I interacted with was nice. He was a young man probably in his early to mid 20s and VERY tall.  We test drove a XC60. 

The car drove very nicely and smoothly.  The auto/stop start feature was also very smooth, I could barely tell when the car cut off.  The best feature, in my opinion, was the fact that the car was made of steel.  Cars these days are mostly made of that weird plastic, fiberglass stuff.  The steel was nice and made me feel very safe when driving the car.  When touching the car you could really feel the difference.  The car did not bend when pressure was applied, it was definitely steel.  These cars are know to be good vehicles in a roll over crash. 

I asked the salesman to let me know about the rates and any special offers.  He was having some difficulty with that and took down my email.  He promised that he would email me the rates.  Spoiler alert: he never did.  That made it easy to cross Volvos off my list.
 
I still haven't purchased a new car. I have about $29,689 saved up to purchase a new car (that does include the trade in value of my car).

Next stop, Mazda.