November and December 2014 Money Report
Welcome to the 2014 November and December Money Report! I wasn’t able to get the November one out in time, so now you can see two for the price of one! See how my money making, saving, and investing went for the month!
To view any previous monthly money reports, check here.
Actions Plans for November (and December) 2014
Key: Complete/Some Progress/No Progress
- Post at least 2 videos on OfficeForNewbies.com
- Failed – I didn’t post and videos here the past two months. I got started with this site and videos and it hasn’t really taken off at all. Maybe I’ll get inspired to give it another chance before I put the wraps on this one.
- Post at least 3 videos on MoneyAhoy Youtube Channel
- Complete – I posted 4 videos total, so I hit the goal
- Submit resume to area community college for adjunct professor positions in science/math
- Failed – After thinking more about this, I really want to focus my time on building up passive income streams. This would be the exact opposite of that 🙂
- Get our old home in Virginia sold – this one is continuing on from last month!
- Failed – Our house never sold – with the relocation we seem to have been assigned a dud of a Realtor. So, we lost out on the $10,000 relocation bonus if our house would have sold within 120 day 🙁 I guess you win some and you lose some.
- Read the book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
- Complete – I read this book and enjoyed it quite a bit. A couple of useful nuggets. I suggest checking it out if you’ve never read it.
Not so great in terms of goals the past two months. Hopefully I’ll find some inspiration here in January and kick things into high gear – I still need to come up with a couple good yearly goals too!
Onto the graphs and the details!
Notes on Making Money for November and December 2014
We had a good month in terms of money making for November and December. My wife’s pay started kicking in for her part-time job, and that helped quite a bit. As you can see, many stocks rolled around to paying their quarterly dividends as well. This is the first month I’ve made more than $500 on just dividends – pretty sweet! Side hustle income also saw a very nice increase in both November and December.
Here are the side-hustle income highlights for November and December (I combined the months):
- Sponsored Posts – $1,060 ($370 in Nov. and $690 in Dec.)
- Monthly Dividends – $594 ($70 in Nov. and $524 in Dec.)
- Youtube – $95 ($69 in Nov. and $26 in Dec.)
- LegalZoom – $67 ($45 in Nov. and $22 in Dec.)
- Ebay – $57 ($57 in Nov. and $10 in Dec.)
- Ad in sidebar – $50 ($25 for Nov. and Dec.)
- Stock Market Investing for Newbies
book – $27 ($7 in Nov. and $20 in Dec.)
- Google Adsense – $30 ($15 in Nov. and $15 in Dec.)
- TOTAL = $1,981
Total side income (dividends plus side-hustles) came in around to almost $1,981 for the two months! Side hustles were the second highest since I’ve been keeping track! I’m definitely stoked about such great results. Now, my challenge is to figure out how to take this to the next level while continuing to enjoy it!
Notes on Money Saving for November and December 2014
Expenses for November and December are trending lower. Routine expenses were the lowest ever since we’ve been tracking them – yeah for downsizing downsizing! Non-routine costs drifted up a bit due to my wife and me buying Christmas presents. There were no real large expenses for the month other than that.
Notes on Investing for November and December 2014
For the month of November I invested in the Vanguard FTSE Developed Markets ETF. This fund provides exposure to developed markets in Europe, Australasia, and Japan. I bought 130 shares of VEA at a price of ~$38.70 per share for a total of $5,031 invested for the month. VEA is an Electronically Traded Fund (ETF) and pays a quarterly dividend of 0.875% (3.5% annually).
For the month of December I invested in the SPDR S&P-500 ETF. This fund tries to mimic the price and yield performance of the S&P-500 index. I bought 46 shares of SPY at a price of ~$199.41 per share for a total of $9,173 invested for the month. SPY is an Electronically Traded Fund (ETF) and pays a quarterly dividend of 0.465% (1.86% annually).
You can probably also see that CASH is a big percentage of the pie currently (27+%). We received all the equity from selling our home in Virginia, and I’ll be investing that into the stock market over the next couple of months. This will hopefully move our cash holdings to something more reasonable like 5%.
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
Actions Plans for January 2015
I didn’t do too well in November/December with my goals – Here are my monthly goals for January:
- Post at least 4 videos on MoneyAhoy Youtube Channel
- Read the book Mini Habits: Smaller Habits, Bigger Results
- Read the book Go Solo: How to Quit the Job You Hate and Start a Small Business You Love!
- Help my wife figure out how to earn more income since her job is slowing down
- Brainstorm on 2015 goals to set for myself
- Write at 8 posts for MoneyAhoy
Other Points of Interest
- In December, my wife’s part-time job has slowed down a bit. As a result, she isn’t getting her full amount of hours 🙁 This will really cut into our income for January!
- Also in December, my wife had a scare and ended up in the hospital for 4 days! She is OK now, but I’m dreading to receive all the medical bills!
- Here is a listing of the posts for the months of November and December – I went a little crazy with sponsored posts since I was going to be out of town in December:
- What Are Typical Stock Market Investing Results?
- Learn How to Invest in Multifamily Apartment Buildings (sponsored)
- Tips for Dealing with Bankruptcy (sponsored)
- October 2014 Money Report
- What Are Today’s Most Popular Home Exterior Materials? (sponsored)
- How to Save a Wet Cell Phone
- Why Small Business Owners Must Constantly Keep Learning (sponsored)
- Fuck You Black Friday!
- How My Wife and I Made $370,000 in One Day!
- Are You Prepared for These Financial Emergencies? (sponsored)
- Upgrade Your Kitchen on a Budget (sponsored)
- Five Top Traits of a Successful Job Seeker (sponsored)
- How to Read Your Financial Aid Award Letter (sponsored)
- 3 Ways to Save After the New Green Electricity Rate Hikes (sponsored)
- How to Improve Your Credit Score (sponsored)
What are your money saving, money making, and investing plans for January?
Oh sorry to your wife. I hope she is doing fine now. I hope your plans will go on well in January. All the bset
Amos recently posted…Why You Need to Start Saving for Retirement Now
Thanks Amos – she is doing better now 🙂
Hope the new year inspires you to keep up with your goals! I like how you create monthly goals for yourself instead of the yearly ones that a lot of people, including myself, do. Maybe I should start this habit.
FinanceQA recently posted…How Much Of My Income Should I Set Aside To Invest?
FinanceQA,
Thanks! I’m also going to develop some yearly ones too – just haven’t quite decided yet what they should be 🙂
That stinks about losing out on the $10K from the old house not selling. When I was in my last job, I could have gotten a $2K bonus for getting a certain license. I missed it by a few months. It stinks, but sometimes life happens.
December was a good month for us and we are looking forward to an even better January.
Jon @ Money Smart Guides recently posted…How Long To Keep Financial Statements
Jon,
It stinks, but we’re lucky we didn’t lose money at least!
Over $1,000 in sponsored is a nice chunk of change. Awesome to see the $500 in dividends as well. Always nice when hard work starts paying off. Congrats man, I enjoyed the read.
Sam @ ReddySetGo recently posted…When to Invest in Stocks
Sam,
Thanks – it seems like things are starting to come together 🙂