November 2015 Money Report

The monthly money report for November 2015 is ready!  Check out our November monthly money report update to see how we did this time around!

To view any previous monthly money reports, check these monthly money reports.

Actions Plans for November 2015

We will start with a review of my goals for the month of November to see how well I hit them:

Key: Complete/Some Progress/No Progress

• Publish 8 posts for MoneyAhoy
  • Complete – I had 8 posts total for the month of November!
• Publish 4 posts for HealthierDay.com
  • Some Progress – We only had one post on HealthierDay.com for November 🙁  We kinda dropped the ball here.
• Create comments on  30 other blogs (average 1 a day) to build link juice
  • Complete – I was able to comment on 30-40 blogs in November.
• Create 2 YouTube videos for MoneyAhoy/HealtherDay
  • No Progress – We did not make any videos for November.  I filmed one, but we had both computers completely crash this month and I wasn’t able to produce and upload anything!  More on that below – I hope to have the computer fixed in the next week.
• Create free version of my stock market investing book: Stock Market Investing for Newbies – make it available at SmashWords.com
  • No Progress – Same with this item, with the computer crashing I lost MS Office, so I could not work on this at all!
• Exercise at least 5 minutes every day
  • Complete – I was able to hit this except for about 10 days where I got sick with a cold/flu and could not really exercise.  I made up for it as I started to feel better.

As you can see, I did a pretty terrible job hitting the goals I set forth for November.  The biggest detractor was that we had both of our computers completely crash.  One had a hard drive failure, and the other screwed up the hard drive boot sector as I was updating the bios.  Both required a total reinstall of all the software!  I hope to get my main computer up and running in the next week so I can get back to producing videos and making Stock Market Investing for Newbies available for free.

Now, let’s see how we came out on our finances for the month of November:

 

Notes on Making Money for November 2015

As you can see, our overall household income for the month of November was a bit below the six-month moving average.  This is mainly due to my wife taking the week of Thanksgiving off so we could go visit family in Virginia.  That was anticipated, so no biggie there.  Dividend income continues its slow and steady rise and my side-hustle income for the month was pretty good at over $600.  Total for the month (dividends plus side-hustle income) was around $900 – pretty good :-).

Here’s a rundown of our side-hustle income for the month of November:

• Sponsored Posts – $300
• Monthly Dividends – $255
• Start an LLC for your Online Business – $187
• Youtube – $113
• Ad in sidebar – $25
• Google Adsense – $20
• Stock Market Investing for Newbies book – $0
• HealthierDay.com Adsense/Youtube- $0
• TOTAL = $899

Compounding interest with the dividends continues to work as we roll over all dividends into new stock purchases.  You can see this through the 6-month moving average (black line) as it begins to curve upward.

Notes on Money Saving for November 2015

Drum roll please…….

We hit another all-time low record for our total monthly expenses!!

As you can see, we are way below the six-month moving average for our monthly expenses in November with this new record.  Our routine expenses were pretty routine (imagine that) :-), and we did not have any large “other expenses” for the month.

Here are the biggest “other expenses” for the month (as you can see they are pretty small):

1. $59 – I took my entire team out to lunch for doing a great job with our weekly metrics.  This was well deserved by them.
2. $20 – I got a new wireless router because after ~10 years, our current one was starting to randomly crash left and right.
3. $80+ – several miscellaneous and small Christmas presents that my wife and I got for the kids and other folks from a couple different stores.

Overall, this was a grand slam month from a month saving standpoint.  Because our income was a bit less for the month, our overall savings rate was just  64% for the month – that’s still pretty good!

Notes on Investing for November 2015

For November, I purchased 37 shares of VBK for a about $4,600 for the month. VBK is the Vanguard Small-Cap Growth ETF.  This is an ETF that is passively managed to track the MSCI Small Cap Growth Index.  It pays an annual dividend of just ~0.6%, but it should appreciate quickly if the overall market is increasing.  It also has a very low expense ratio.

If you are interested in stock market investing but don’t know where to get started, check out my excellent book: Stock Market Investing for Newbies.  It will get you up to speed with stock market investing very quickly!

Actions Plans for December 2015

Here are my goals for the upcoming month of December – I am keeping them pretty close to the same as they were in November since I did not complete many of them:

• Publish 8 posts for MoneyAhoy
• Publish 2 posts for HealthierDay.com
• Create comments on  30 other blogs (average 1 a day) to build link juice
• Create 4 YouTube videos for MoneyAhoy/HealtherDay
• Create free version of my stock market investing book: Stock Market Investing for Newbies – make it available at SmashWords.com
• Exercise at least 5 minutes every day

Other Points of Interest

If you missed any of the below posts for November 2015, be sure to check them out:

1. How Much Are You Paying to Invest Your Money?
2. October 2015 Money Report
3. DIY Interior Design Ideas That Will Save You Money
4. How to Pocket $5,000 in Savings in One Year
5. Is Your Water Heater Giving You Financial Stress?
6. 5 Holiday Budgeting Tips to Save You Money
7. Top Tips for Saving Money on Healthcare
8. Retail Scams – Don’t Fall for Them This Holiday Season

What are your money saving, money making, and investing plans for December?