April 2014 – Money Making, Saving, and Investing Report
Welcome to the April 2014 Money Making, Saving, and Investing Report!
April 2014 was a fun month! There were a couple of challenges along the way, but overall it was great!
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Actions Plans for March 2014
Key: Complete/Some Progress/No Progress
- Read the book: Secrets of the Millionaire Mind
– COMPLETE!
- The book review is coming soon!
- Sell at 5 things on Ebay (I need to list a bunch more stuff – I’ve been slacking here) – MEH!
- I was only able to sell three things total for this month:
- Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for Wii – $32
- Adult soccer cleats – $12
- Lord of the Rings PC game – $25
- I was only able to sell three things total for this month:
- Finish chapter #6 of the Investing for Beginners book that I’m writing – COMPLETE!
- The book is really starting to come together nicely now! I will be sharing more soon 🙂
- Post at 7 additional monetized YouTube videos – COMPLETE!
- I actually made 34 videos total – Most of these are on my new channel under the name JollyGood
- The videos are comprised of Tribes Ascend gameplay and Hearthstone gameplay.
- Develop and post math & science tutoring “brochure” – that’s right. I’m going to try my hand at tutoring! – COMPLETE!
- I decided to charge $40/hr. I’ve had several requests and actually start my first session this week 🙂
- Finish my MBA!!! – COMPLETE!
- I just graduated on Saturday!!!! It feels great to be done with all of the schoolwork. It was sad to say goodbye to all of my classmates, but I will keep in touch with many of them.
I’m happy to say that I met all of the goals I had for April except for one. I’m most proud of finishing up my MBA and making great progress on my investing for beginners Ebook. Now, let’s look at the financial specifics for April 2014:
Notes on Making Money for April 2014
April’s income was pretty similar to March’s – nothing new there. Google Adsense was a bit low for the month at ~$28. YouTube income was ~$6, and Ebay total was ~$69. I also had one sponsored post to bring the total April side hustle income in at ~$232. Dividend income was decent at $109 for April.
Notes on Money Saving for April 2014
Routine expenses for April were good, but the high grocery bills are really driving me crazy. We seem to have a real hard time getting our hands around that.
The biggest non-routine expense we had for the month was our daughter’s 5th birthday party. Because it was her 5th, we decided to go a little more extravagant. In the end, the total bill was around $350 🙁 A little more expensive than we were planning for, but on the bright side everyone had a ton of fun 🙂
Because our routine expenses crept up a bit, our savings rate for April was only 44% – bummer 🙁 But, it is what it is.
Notes on Investing for April 2014
For April, I picked up 21 shares of SPY at a price of $189.40 for a total of $3,977 invested for the month of April. SPY is the SPDR S&P-500 market index fund. This stock pays a quarterly dividend (1.8% annually). This ETF is a great way to get market index fund exposure to the broad US market. I am trying to keep my portfolio with 30% allocated to SPY .
Actions Plans for May 2014
- Read the book: Think and Grow Rich
- Sell at least 5 things on Ebay
- Finish the entire rough draft of my Investing for Beginner’s Ebook
- Create the Investing for Beginner’s Ebook cover
- Get Dad (a senior editor before he retired) to begin editing Ebook
- Post at 7 additional monetized YouTube videos under my new JollyGood gaming channel
- Conduct at least one tutoring session for $$$
Other Points of Interest
- Here are the posts I created for the month of April:
- Shoplifting Tips
- Why Invest in the Stock Market? Inflation!
- Personal Finance Tips for New Graduates (guest post)
- Find a Competent Insurance Agent (sponsored post)
- 2014 Forbes Billionaire List (guest post)
- How to Write and Publish an Ebook – Top Tips
- How to Achieve Great Success
- How to Make Your Own Microphone Stand for Cheap
- Happy Birthday MoneyAhoy!
- How I Almost Bought an $80,000 Car
- MoneyAhoy turned one year old in April!!
- My Alexa ranking has crept up quite a bit recently for some reason… It’s currently hovering right around 150,000 🙁 I was able to get it as low as 134,000, so I’m hopeful I will get it lower in May.
What are your money saving, money making, and investing plans for May?
Congratulations that you finished your MBA! And by the way, good luck on your first session this week, $40/hour would be a very good start!
Clarisse @ Make Money Your Way recently posted…An Unconventional Approach to Buy and Hold
Clarisse,
Thanks! It is actually tutoring someone on how to use WordPress 🙂
I always enjoy seeing what you’ve sold on eBay. 🙂 I’ve been meaning to try to sell my son’s old baseball equipment, but now I fear I’ve waited too long because the youth sports season is in full swing. I should give it a try, and if it doesn’t go, list it again next year.
Brock @cleverdude recently posted…Why I Use The Self-Checkout Lane
Brock,
I would just list it as a “good until canceled” auction. I’ve listed soccer cleats and had them up for weeks/months. Eventually someone will buy it if the price is right. Go for it!
I love reading about your side hustle stuff, Derek. We are thinking about doing some monetizing You Tube videos. Do you have how-to posts written about that?
Laurie @thefrugalfarmer recently posted…Cutco Cutlery: A Review
Laurie,
I’ve struggled a bit with YouTube monetization. So far, I haven’t had any runaway hits – my top viewed video only has ~1,300 views over ~6 months and has made around $6. It probably took about one hour of work. Nothing to write home about 🙂 I think it is similar to a blog where once you get tons and tons of content over time, the money starts to come in.
I have not developed a “how-to” for YouTube video monetization, but that’s a great idea. That’s something I can plan to create in the next couple of weeks 🙂 Thanks for the idea!
Great results for the month of April. I wouldn’t consider finish the MBA a monthly goal, just the final test / paper. In any event congrats on the new diploma. Good Luck.
EL @ Moneywatch101 recently posted…5 Reasons you Need an Emergency Fund
EL,
Good point on the MBA – it was a real struggle to stay focused right up to the end and not develop senioritis 🙂