February 2017 Money Report
The MoneyAhoy February 2017 Money Report is now ready for your reading enjoyment! Read on to find out how I successfully make over $300/hour blogging. I also discuss our money making, money saving, and investment performance for the month. The report is packed with helpful pointers on how you can start your own side hustle business and start bringing in cash for yourself! We had another new all-time record and a 1-year record in this report, so read on!
To view any previous monthly money reports, check these monthly money reports. Let’s start with a review of our goals for February 2017 to see how we did:
Actions Plans for February 2017
Here is a quick review of how we did with our goals for the month of February:
Key: Complete/Some Progress/No Progress
- Publish 6 posts for MoneyAhoy.com
- COMPLETE – I hit this goal on the money with 6 posts for the month.
- Publish 1 post for HealthierDay.com
- COMPLETE – my wife knocked this one out: The Skinny On Carbohydrates
- Create 2 YouTube videos for MoneyAhoy
- COMPLETE – the two videos I create were:
- Exercise at least 15 minutes every day
- COMPLETE – I started alternating between situps for 20 minutes and jogging for 30 minutes a day.
- Gain over 1,000 Pinterest followers (get to 3,500 followers)
- SOME PROGRESS – I got about 500 followers, so I got half way to the goal (3,000 followers total now).
- Make over $1,000 / month in side-income
- COMPLETE – We made $1,708 in side-income for the month.
Another home run again on our goals for February! We hit 5 out of 6 goals with the 6th goal half way complete. So far so good in 2017 – now let’s get onto the money discussion!
February 2017 – Money Report
Notes on Making Money for February 2017
February 2017 was a new all-time high record for income! We had decent side-income for the month, my wife worked a bunch of hours, and we received our annual company bonus (much higher than in previous years). As a result, our grand total income for the month was over $18,000! I think this is one record that is going to stand for a very long while :-).
Total side-income for February came in at $1,708. This was a bit below average due to it being a slow month for dividends. The split between MoneyAhoy.com income and dividends was as follows:
- $1,351 – MoneyAhoy.com income (third highest month on record!)
- $357 – dividends
For the MoneyAhoy.com income for the month, all this money was made in the month with less than 6-hours of total work spent on the blog. That means I am earning over $250/hour by running my own blog!! If that sounds awesome to you, maybe you should consider starting your own WordPress blog with Bluehost? Check out my article linked there to get started on your money making journey all for less than $4 a month!
My new income goal for 2017 is to make over $1,000 each month of side income (MoneyAhoy.com blog income plus dividends). You can see that we are averaging more than this if we can continue our money-making momentum, but I’d like to try and make $1,000 each and every month. We will see how we do – it will be a stretch on those months where the dividends are light!
Here’s a detailed breakdown of the total $1,708 in side-income for the month of February:
- Best Way to Start an Online Business Today – $504
- Sponsored Posts – $475
- Monthly Dividends – $357 (JNK, HYG)
- Ad Brokering – $124 (acted as the middle-man to put together a package advertising deal on two other blogs)
- Advertisements in sidebar – $98
- Youtube – $72
- Start your Own WordPress Blog with Bluehost – $65
- Google Adsense – $7
- Amazon Affiliates – $4
- Stock Market Investing for Newbies
book – $1
- HealthierDay.com Adsense/Youtube- <$1
- TOTAL = $1,708
I sound like a broken record here, but our plan remains to continue reinvesting all the profits from this blog and our dividends back into either the business or the stock market. Employing this strategy will put compound interest to work for us. Did you notice that monthly dividend graph slowly go up higher and higher? That’s because we are continually investing each and every month! If you’d like to learn more about investing, read my free book: Stock Market Investing for Newbies.
Notes on Money Saving for February 2017
February was the second great month in a row for money saving. We hit a 12-month low for routine expenses which is great! We were above the six-month moving average for monthly saving due to monthly non-routine expenses.
Here are some of the largest non-routine expenses we had for February:
- $1,470 – We pre-paid for a Spring Break vacation to Universal Studios. This is also double dipping for our daughter’s birthday present. This price is for 4 days and 4 nights. We shopped around quite a bit, and I think this is a pretty good deal.
- $124 – Charge for trophies for the boys and girls basketball teams my wife coached this spring. This was mostly reimbursed, so maybe I shouldn’t have counted it. I also got a trophy for our technical group’s first annual ping pong tournament that I organized :-).
- $120 – This was for our son and daughter’s annual membership to Prodigy. This is a math game that they play at home and at school. Seems like a pretty modest price to pay to encourage our kids to learn their math!
- $50 – 2017 yearbooks for our kids. Not sure they really needed these, but….
- $47 – Valentine’s presents for the Mrs.
We now have a total of $10,600 in the new van fund. We continue to put $1,000 a month away so that we will have enough to replace my wife’s van when the time comes. By mid-year 2017 we should be able to have enough set aside for a pretty decent one. If we decide to continue holding out longer and continuing to save, we’ll just be able to afford one that much nicer. Basically, it is just a question of “when to cash in the chips.”
I am resisting the urge to use a large chunk of my bonus to buy a new big-screen TV. We already have a 50-inch plasma, so I know I really don’t need a bigger one. I think this is mostly through my system by now 🙂
Our overall savings rate for the month was a record breaking 82%. We were able to hit such a large savings rate largely in part to my annual bonus hitting this month. This also allowed us to put more $$$ in my 401(k).
Notes on Investing for February 2017
For the month of February, I purchase 153 shares of VNQ for about $12,800 in my normal investing account. VNQ is the Vanguard Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) Index Fund. This is an ETF that is passively managed and derives income from real estate. This ETF is currently paying an annual yield of ~4.76%.
Real estate is pretty under-allocated in my investment portfolio right now, so I need to bring it up. You won’t find me engaging in any sexy day trading or investing in single stocks like snapchat or anything. It’s pretty boring overall, but that’s what long-term investing is supposed to be! If it is too exciting, then you are probably doing it wrong :-).
If you truly want to gain financial independence, then you need to learn more about investing to build your long-term wealth! Investing in the stock market is one way to build up your passive income stream. Check out my free stock market investing Ebook to get started on your own stock market investing journey now!
Actions Plans for March 2017
We had another grand-slam month overall in February all things considered. I will be real busy in the month of March, so I am going to keep the goals light for the month to be realistic with myself.
March 2017 Goals
- Publish 6 posts for MoneyAhoy.com
- Publish 1 post for HealthierDay.com
- Create 2 YouTube videos for MoneyAhoy
- Exercise at least 15 minutes every day
- Gain over 500 Pinterest followers (get to 3,500 followers)
- Make over $1,000 / month in side-income (blog + dividend income)
I continue to plan on trading off a bit of time writing articles for MoneyAhoy to promote the blog through additional blog comments and Pinterest. It seems as though many bloggers have hit the gold mine through social interaction on Pinterest. I hope to so the same now that I’ve learned more about the ins and outs of Pinterest.
Other Points of Interest
Here are all the great MoneyAhoy.com posts for February if you happened to miss any:
- Investing for Millennials – Why it’s Different
- January 2017 Money Report
- Want to Upgrade Your Home? Here’s a Cost Breakdown
- Five Tips for Hiring a Moving Company to Make Your Next Move As Easy As It Can Be
- Figuring Out Your Financial Personality
- 4 Tips to Start Saving for Summer Holiday
You Can Make Money Online Too!
Are you interested in making over $250/hour by running a simple blog?!? I thought you might be! I truly believe that anyone can make money online if they are willing to put in the a bit of time and effort to make it a success. There are just a couple of simple things you need to do to start on your journey toward online success:
- Start your own online business – You can start your own business online in just a matter of minutes. Check out my guide on how to start and setup your own LLC online. I show you how, in less than 6 minutes, to form your own business as an LLC! This article will teach you all the benefits of owning your own LLC for your business versus just skipping ahead to step #2.
- Start your own Blog – The next step is to start your own blog. Whether you will be blogging or running some other type of online business, you will need to setup a blog for your business. I show you step by step how to start a WordPress blog on your own with Bluehost! If you have never run a blog before or don’t fancy yourself a writer, don’t worry. It is really simple, and the learning curve is very friendly.
I started MoneyAhoy.com just over three years ago without knowing the first thing about blogging. In that amount of time, I’ve made over $26K and my monthly blog income continues to grow and grow – just check out the blue portion of the income chart above! I have also saved over $50K with all the research and tips this blog has helped me to implement! Starting your own blog can truly be a life changing experience!
If you have ever thought about starting your own business or blog, then now is the time to get started! Don’t wait until you have everything figured out, or you will never start :-). You can get started with your online business or blog with just a few hours a week and build it up from there. The sky is really the limit with your business and/or blog income. With a little bit of elbow grease, you’ll be on your way to making thousands of dollars a month in no time! Click here to form your own LLC and click here to start your own blog and get started making money today!
