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About Me:

Monkey Mama

Just a 46-year-old mom of 2 in Northern California. My kids are Monkey Monkey(MM) and Drama Llama (DL). I am married to Monkey Hubby (MH).

We were a one-income family for 13 years. In late 2015 my spouse returned to work (minimum wage/part-time/seasonal). Something recent on his resume just buys us more options for the long run. The main benefit of this job is that he just works while the kids are in school. As always, we are saving 100% of his income.

{2023 Update: I expect that MH will retire from this job when kids are done with college and/or home is paid off. I think he likes the idea of finding more interesting or full-time work, with kids both adults now. But practically, might just stick out the *good* and very flexible job as long as possible. The very part-time job is allowing him to pursue his film passions. We are only about 5-ish years away from financial independence. Would be very different if we "needed" the money or he thought he might have decades of working years ahead of him.}

We saved a lot while we were very young and also moved to a lower cost-of-living area, to make life much simpler. We still live in California though (in one of the most expensive regions of the U.S.). *Simple* and *inexpensive* is relative.

Likewise, we have never had debt aside from our mortgage.** My blog is a testament to how much simpler life is without debt; how we have that much more money to both save and enjoy!

**Caveat: I have no problem whatsoever with credit cards paid off monthly, or low-risk credit arbitrage (for example, 0%-interest debt while earning 5% on FDIC-insured cash). These are the kinds of debt we have had. Just not interested in high-interest debt, using debt to buy beyond means, and not interested in the hassle that comes with loans and payments. With age and means, the latter (hassle) is our biggest debt avoidance motivation.

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2024 Goals

[ ]Small monthly Charitable Contribution
...($35 @ 1/31/24)
...Trying to be more mindful about how the little amounts add up and are helpful.
...This is not an all inclusive list of charitable giving but it is a new habit I want to add in addition to other donations of time, goods and money

[ ]Pay cash for college
...This is so much a given, to me. But I realize not everyone can read my mind, and so will memorialize in my goal list.
...#1 We don't do Debt
...#2 The student loan system is a scammy and corrupt mess.
...Seriously, wouldn't touch these student loan servicers with a ten foot pole.
MM YEAR 1 ✔
MM YEAR 2 ✔
MM YEAR 3 ✔
MM YEAR 4

DL YEAR 1 ✔
DL YEAR 2

[ ]$10,000 to savings
...($4,529 @ 3/31/24)
...$1,000/month, plus interest
...Topping off with snowballs

[ ]$7,500 to investments
...($1,750 @ 4/30/24)
...$350/month, plus snowflakes
(Snowflakes: credit card rewards and dividends)
...Topping off with snowballs

[ ]$2,025 to mortgage
...($0 @ 4/30/24)
...Topping off with snowballs and/or excess cash
...Keeps us on track with $10K principal paydown per year

[/]9% of household income to work retirement plans
...(9% @ 3/31/24)
...This is the minimum for the match; I'd otherwise rather fund IRAs.
...Note: Total retirement savings rate is 20% (with IRAs)

Goal savings rate = 25% of gross salary, plus funding IRAs from other sources.

[ ]$14,000 to IRAs 2024 (MAX)
...($0 @ 4/30/24)
...Will fund with MH's income
...Will not fund until the year is over. This is for tax and planning reasons. I won't know what mix of Traditional/ROTH IRA we literally can contribute until we do our 2024 taxes. In addition to that, can make a more informed decision based on our financial and tax situation for the entire year.

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**Long-Term Goals**

[X]$500,000 in retirement accounts by age 45.

Current big picture goal:

[ ]$1 Mil in retirement accounts by age 52.

Stretch Goal: Achieve by age 50

Have decided to pretty much stay the course. Keep saving 20%+ to retirement. This means taking 401K match & maxing out IRAs.

NOTE: WE HAVE NEVER CONTRIBUTED LESS THAN 10% TO RETIREMENT. NO EXCEPTIONS.

If we can't achieve at least 10%, then something else has to give. I share because it's infinitely easier to save for retirement if you start early. Let the investments do the hard work for you.

-------------------------------

Debt: $85,000 mortgage
{Home Purchase Price $290,000}

Ongoing goal is to *never borrow money again.*

Took on a $230k mortgage in 2001 and have not added to that.

-------------------------

Net Worth: Increase net worth by $600,000 in the next 10 years. This is my "financial independence" goal.

2017: +$ 70,000 (partial year)
2018: +$ 51,000
2019: +$105,000
2020: +$104,000
2021: +$215,000
2022: <$ 65,000>
2022: +$ 85,000
TOTAL: +$565,000

This is in line with prior goal, saving 100% of our expenses every year.

{Our expenses are far more consistent than our income. Also, helps to prevent "living up to income."}

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My Pages

Saved $10!!

November 14th, 2006 at 03:40 am

I know flowers are pretty extravagant - especially the lazy just buy them online angle - LOL. But ds's preschool teacher is so wonderful - wanted to do something special. Ds even helped me pick out a beautiful arrangement of yellow and white daisies and roses in a yellow happy face mug. Yellow is his favorite color and he is so happy I knew she would appreciate it - would remind her of my super cheery son. Plus he picked out one of the cheaper arrangements - all the better - hehe. I would have swayed him if he hadn't.

So I go to check out and apparently I bought flowers from this site about 2 years ago, and I had a $10 coupon. They just automatically applied it. So my $40 extravagance turned out to be only $30. I think that is pretty sweet!!

I know I have been online way too much, but popped on to order flowers and change my credit cards for as many vendors as I could think of. Since I Switched to a bigger/better rewards card. Good thing too because I realized I never got either my phone bills. By some strange miracle I Was under my minutes on the cell. I had kind of decided a little extra money to call my mom from the car which is the only time I have any peace and quiet - was okay. & yet I managed to stay under minutes too - cool!! ANyway, I have been getting so much JUNK in my e-mail I deleted my 2 phone invoices AND also an e-mail from that lady who had realized her check had bounced and had offered to meet me today to give me cash. I Called her today and since she would see dh tomorrow just said give it to him. She felt bad and had a reasonable excuse - I feel better about it. Phew. I thought she was lying that she had e-mailed me because I did not see, but I really dug deep and finally found it. YEah, at face value it had looked like junk and I Deleted it. oops!!!

Anyway, darn e-mail, I will have to look closer before I hit delete - amazed how much I missed this last week!! The junk has just gotten SO out of control. I Am super anal about all of my bills so unlikely I Would miss one completely. But who knows...

Posted in Spending, Saving | 3 Comments »

3 Responses to “Saved $10!!”

janH Says:
November 14th, 2006 at 05:46 am 1163483168
1163483168

I've deleted stuff, too! I am such a dork with the computer.
tinapbeana Says:
November 14th, 2006 at 12:59 pm 1163509183
1163509183

perhaps instead of going through a deleting what is junk you shold create a safe list of addresses (like phone bills & what not) to go to your inbox and everything else goes to spam. usually you can also add a domain name to your safelist so anything from, say, @gmail.com comes through no problems. then you could just peruse your spam box and grab anything that's OK, put it on your safe list, and so forth....
monkeymama Says:
November 14th, 2006 at 02:59 pm 1163516349
1163516349

Good idea. I hesitated to that in the past and miss something important. But it has shift to I have to do that so I don't miss important things - hehe. My dh is the computer geek so I will have him work on it. Thanks!

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Monkey Mama*s Monkey Money Blog

Over Prepare, Then Go With The Flow

Saved $10!!

3 Responses to “Saved $10!!”

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