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About Me:

Amy

I created this blog because I like reading other military spouse's blogs. Part of being a military spouse is having the uncertainty of not knowing where you will have to live next or for how long. It often means moving around every few years and dealing with the deployment of a loved one. Financial advice isn't one size fits all and often financial advisors tailor their advice to the non-military folks out there, saying to buy a house right away and talking about 401k's instead of TSP's.

About 5 years ago (very soon after my husband and I got married) I saw David's Bach's book, "Automatic Millionaire" and it truly changed my life and how I thought about money. We started out with pretty much nothing when we got married. I had $1,000 in credit card debt, and my husband had $1,000 saved from a recent re-enlistent bonus.

We have since managed to save for a downpayment on a home, open and contribute automatically to 2 retirement accounts, and get rid of all our credit card debt once and for all. At the time this blog was first written I was very excited to write that we had "increased our networth from $0 to $18,000!" Now that number has gone up a bit.

Retirement.
We save 15% of his pre-tax income in the Thrift Savings Plan, which is the government's version of a 401k retirement account, only with no matching funds. We also try to max out our Roth IRA every year (some times it doesn't quite happen but close enough).

Saving.
We used to save 25%, or $1,000, per month of his take home pay but still had credit debt and as you'll see in some of the old blog entries we struggled with that for a while. We've notched down savings a bit, but still save regularly and have an emergency cushion that we're comfortable with.

Home.
After moving back in with my parents we saved like crazy and managed to save $33,000 for a downpayment on a our first home! We financed the rest with a 15 year mortgage since we had recently begun listening to Dave Ramsey and liked a lot of his ideas. We pay an extra $300 a month towards principle which means that if everything goes as planned the house will pay off in 10 years instead of 15!

Cars.
Part of the reason that we can save so much is that we have no car payments. I'm no finance expert, but I firmly believe that people spend too much on new cars when they should be saving instead.

Our goals now are to pay off the house and save for when my husband gets out of the army, whenever that may happen...

Net Worth for March 2007 ... $16,400

April 3rd, 2007 at 03:04 am

http://www.networthiq.com/people/ArmyAmy/2007/03

Hey thanks YOUCANDOIT for the link to the Net Worth IQ website...

I don't count our cars or personal property in figuring our net worth...maybe i would if they were worth more. Anyways the only thing I don't like about the networth website is that they list "cash" as a column, and that's where I wound up putting what we have in our savings account since there was no column for "Savings account".

Our networth is currently $16,400. Not bad if I do say so myself. Smile

That's 16 months of hardcore savings!!

Posted in Net Worth | 6 Comments »

6 Responses to “Net Worth for March 2007 ... $16,400”

Amber Says:
April 3rd, 2007 at 03:11 am 1175569870
1175569870

Not bad at all
Ryan Williams Says:
April 3rd, 2007 at 03:19 am 1175570398
1175570398

Nice work and thanks for using NetworthIQ. You got the savings account in the right place, the "cash" category is meant to be anything liquid really, and savings/checking fit the bill perfectly.
Lux Living Frugalis Says:
April 3rd, 2007 at 12:35 pm 1175603708
1175603708

That's a great amount for someone your age! Good going!!
Ima saver Says:
April 3rd, 2007 at 02:25 pm 1175610343
1175610343

You are doing great!! I love networthiq. I put all my savings, money markets and c.d.'s under cash. The only thing I don't count is my checking account, cause it is mostly there for bills.
pfodyssey Says:
April 3rd, 2007 at 05:39 pm 1175621945
1175621945

I think it is absolutely fantastic you are monitoring your finances this early on in your "financial life". Stay the course and keep learning...you will achieve your goals.
armyamy Says:
April 4th, 2007 at 01:06 am 1175648763
1175648763

Thanks all! I guess I wish the networthiq page had more columns that you could use, for example instead of just "retirement" have individual columns for each account and let the user list "Roth ira" and "TSP" so you can pinpoint exactly where the money's at.

I suppose I could do that myself on an excel spreadsheet, but it's alot easier to go to the networthiq.com website!

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Army Amy's Amazing Personal Finance Blog (wow!

Saving money while my husband's in the Army and I work for peanuts.

Net Worth for March 2007 ... $16,400

6 Responses to “Net Worth for March 2007 ... $16,400”

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