Now that the end of the month is here, here’s my income/expenses report for October 2014!
After my standard pre-tax 401(k) contribution and various deductions, my net take-home pay was $5,054.39.
I invested $2,500.00 to start the month off. This was a purchase in KMB, which I mentioned I wanted mostly as a spin-off play. I still consider it overvalued, so won’t be adding for a while. I recently got my 6 shares in HYH, the spinoff from KMB. Unfortunately, management says that “[w]e currently do not anticipate paying cash dividends on Halyard common stock.” As a result, I won’t be adding any time soon.
Separately, I placed $700 in my savings account to replenish it.
My expenses for the month were: $2,021.72. It can be broken down as follows:
- Rent: $935.00
- Bills: $175.73
- Includes: cell phone, electric, gas, cable, and my FAST Graphs subscription
- Car maintenance: $0.00
- Gas: $145.51
- Groceries: $352.81
- Medical expenses: $161.51
- Discretionary expenses: $334.14
- Restaurants/eating out: $27.44
- Road trip: $112.18
- Gifts for girlfriend: $130.68
- Everything else: $63.84
My thoughts:
This was a much better month than last time. My expenses plummeted, mostly because I didn’t have a major road trip this time. Yet, I still took one. Yeah, I know, soon after I said “never again”, I drove 8 hours to visit my grandparents in Michigan. Definitely a much easier trip than North Carolina, but naturally, my gas and food expenditures went up. It was an awesome trip, as my parents were visiting them too. Fun thing was, my grandparents didn’t know I was coming too, so it was a complete surprise to them! They were really happy to see me, and we had a great time. The one thing that annoyed me was that they live close to the Canadian border, and my phone connected to one of their cell towers without me knowing. Since I don’t have international roaming, texts cost me $0.25 each. Thankfully I caught it early, so this didn’t happen often. But because of a complicated situation that I won’t bother trying to explain, I ended up paying my November phone bill in advance. That explains a slight increase in my bills too. If you’re a shareholder in AT&T, you’re welcome! The other major spike in expenses was gifts for my girlfriend. Our yearly anniversary was October 4th, so naturally I got her some gifts. At the risk of sounding like a sappy SOB, she means the world to me, and I’m willing to push my early retirement back a few years if I could make her happy now. I love her more than anything (even investing!), so I don’t regret the expenses at all.
The end result of the month was that I managed to save 60.0% of my income this month. This is a very solid number, and I’m proud of myself for achieving it. If I keep it up, FIRE is guaranteed!
Separately, my dividend income for the month was $378.62. I want to keep this in a separate category, as I never actually handle this money. It is automatically DRIPped into the stocks that produced that dividend. Besides the abovementioned spinoff, I transferred $1,000 from my savings to my brokerage account, where I bought JNJ. I also sold ARCP and bought AOS. These were more transfers of capital rather than new purchases from income, so they’re listed here instead.
How was your month? Did you meet your target savings rate?
Disclosure: Long KMB, HYH, JNJ, AOS. My Income/Expenses archive page has been updated accordingly.
8 Comments
DD,
Awesome month. I think anything above a 50% savings rate kind of gets in that “extreme” area, so a 60% net savings rate is fantastic.
Congrats on your anniversary. I hope you and your significant other had a great time!
My month was pretty solid. Eclipsed 50% even with some temporary expenses still weighing on me.
Keep up the great work!
Best regards.
Dividend Mantra recently posted…Dividend Income Update – October 2014
Yeah, that kind of savings rate is ideal for me. No complaints at all! Nice job on your end as well! Thanks for the congrats on our anniversary. It’s always a wonderful milestone to achieve. Maybe if I’m lucky, I’ll get to write a post about our coming marriage soon, as you did!
Great month! Savings and investiments pretty solid! I now an strugling to have just 20% savings, it would be a great savings rate for me.
Nuno recently posted…Corticeira Amorim – Quoted in Euronext
It’s all right. Each person has their own situations. Hope you meet your mark regularly!
Well I’m happy reading this for two reasons: 1. You don’t have the large road trip expense you had last month and 2. You didn’t raise the bar for all men again.
Keep it up!
Clay recently posted…Net Worth: October 2014
Hahaha! My car likes #1 too. Thanks for stopping by, Clay!
Nice month Dividend Developer! Anytime you can save/invest more than half your income, you have done well! Don’t knock yourself too hard for your visit to your grandparents…if you’ve even listened to Suze Orman, she subscribes to the think of “people first, then money, then things.” After all, even all the money in the world will never allow you the opportunity to visit grandparents once they are gone. In know, I have no surviving grandparents.
Keep up the good work. AFFJ
A Frugal Family’s Journey recently posted…Retirement Accounts (Update) – November 2014
I know, I don’t regret visiting them at all. Just pointing out that that is where my major discretionary expenses came from. Suze Orman is definitely right. Your family (and their love) is the most important asset you’ll ever have.