So I'm slowly but surely getting use to the idea of us having to pay more than 10,000 in taxes by April 15th. Still not liking it much, but I know its coming. I still think the IRS should just keep the 1200 they are planning on sending us and putting that towards that 10K+.....
We changed the plans a little. We went ahead and decided to just get the Vanguard account up to 25,000 for right now. That will hopefully enable us to keep that account with at least 10,000 in it even after we have to pay our taxes and the April tax estimate. If that works out, we will most likely go ahead and pay the July tax estimate from the Vanguard account as well and just keep on working towards paying off the house sometime during August. We owe just over 38,000 on the mortgage that got put on hold to add some to the Vanguard account. The Vanguard account is about 150 dollars away from that 25K amount now, so as soon as we get the January paycheck, I'll go ahead and move that 150 dollars into the account and pay the rest of the extra to the mortgage. That should get the mortgage down into the 34K range and any solitaire money will start going towards the mortgage again. If we can keep a 5,000 pace alive for the next 7 months, we will be down with the mortgage in August. If we can kick it up to 6,000 per month, we will be done in July. The problem with the 6,000 scenario though is, of course, the tax estimates. We should know more sometime late February or early March once the accountants actually do our taxes. That will make the picture a whole lot clearer.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
January 9 - January 27th Results
9 - 150
10 - 250
11 - 200
12 - 0
13 - 50
14 - 200
15 - 75
16 - 365
17 - 50
18 - 100
19 - 100
20 - 50
21 - 150
22 - 75
23 - 200
24 - 0
25 - 50
26 - 0
27 - 0
10 - 250
11 - 200
12 - 0
13 - 50
14 - 200
15 - 75
16 - 365
17 - 50
18 - 100
19 - 100
20 - 50
21 - 150
22 - 75
23 - 200
24 - 0
25 - 50
26 - 0
27 - 0
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Death and Taxes
Ok, so more about taxes than death, but where there is one....
So we have done our preliminary tax prepartions and it isn't looking good. Unless the accountants can come up with something that we haven't, we are going to owe federal well over 12,000 dollars. Not a pretty sight to see that number pop up. Its about twice what we were expecting that we would have to pay. And the really bad part is that is just federal, TaxAct doesn't have the Mississippi forms ready yet, so I have no idea how bad that will be....
So we are dropping back and punting. Prior to yesterday, we thought we had the mortgage balance down into the 32Ks, but we are going to have to divert some monies to the taxes. We have about 21K in the Vanguard account but we really don't want it to drop below 10K, so we are going to take 3000 for each of the next 3 paychecks and move it over to the Vanguard account in order to have plenty to pay the taxes. We will also have to have enough to not only pay last year taxes, but we will also have to have enough to make the first quarterly estimate payment in April. Fun, fun!!!!
So we will be ok, kind of funny to say when I start thinking about a 12,000 dollar expense. We will be cutting it close on paying off the mortgage in 2008 now. We need to come up with about another 4800 to pay off the mortgage this year. Of course, we will also have to come up with the quarterly estimates, so that will have to be added on to that number.
Do I think we can do it? Yep. Do I know we can do it? Hmmmm Are we going to do it? Heck yeah!!!!!
So we have done our preliminary tax prepartions and it isn't looking good. Unless the accountants can come up with something that we haven't, we are going to owe federal well over 12,000 dollars. Not a pretty sight to see that number pop up. Its about twice what we were expecting that we would have to pay. And the really bad part is that is just federal, TaxAct doesn't have the Mississippi forms ready yet, so I have no idea how bad that will be....
So we are dropping back and punting. Prior to yesterday, we thought we had the mortgage balance down into the 32Ks, but we are going to have to divert some monies to the taxes. We have about 21K in the Vanguard account but we really don't want it to drop below 10K, so we are going to take 3000 for each of the next 3 paychecks and move it over to the Vanguard account in order to have plenty to pay the taxes. We will also have to have enough to not only pay last year taxes, but we will also have to have enough to make the first quarterly estimate payment in April. Fun, fun!!!!
So we will be ok, kind of funny to say when I start thinking about a 12,000 dollar expense. We will be cutting it close on paying off the mortgage in 2008 now. We need to come up with about another 4800 to pay off the mortgage this year. Of course, we will also have to come up with the quarterly estimates, so that will have to be added on to that number.
Do I think we can do it? Yep. Do I know we can do it? Hmmmm Are we going to do it? Heck yeah!!!!!
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Jan 1 - Jan 8th Solitaire Results
Jan 1 - 50
Jan 2 - 50
Jan 3 - 150
Jan 4 - 150
Jan 5 - 300
Jan 6 - 350
Jan 7 - 150
Jan 8 - 250
So far so good this month. Couple of good tournaments have lead to some rather nice results.
Jan 2 - 50
Jan 3 - 150
Jan 4 - 150
Jan 5 - 300
Jan 6 - 350
Jan 7 - 150
Jan 8 - 250
So far so good this month. Couple of good tournaments have lead to some rather nice results.
Solitaire Results Dec 15th - Dec 31st
Dec 15th - 0
Dec 16th - 0
Dec 17th - 0
Dec 18th - 100
Dec 19th - 100
Dec 20th - 50
Dec 21st - 0
Dec 22nd - 0
Dec 23rd - 200
Dec 24th - 100
Dec 25th - 250
Dec 26th - 200
Dec 27th - 50
Dec 28th - 50
Dec 29th - 0
Dec 30th - 50
Dec 31st - 0
Dec 16th - 0
Dec 17th - 0
Dec 18th - 100
Dec 19th - 100
Dec 20th - 50
Dec 21st - 0
Dec 22nd - 0
Dec 23rd - 200
Dec 24th - 100
Dec 25th - 250
Dec 26th - 200
Dec 27th - 50
Dec 28th - 50
Dec 29th - 0
Dec 30th - 50
Dec 31st - 0
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Can't Sleep
So I slept too late today. I slept a little past 10:30 and that means I can't go to sleep now. I finally got up because I was afraid I was keeping Susan awake. I'm not sure how she slept later than I did, took a couple of naps, and is still able to go to sleep now....
Anyway, an update on where we are at since its been a couple of days. Solitaire has been going very well the past week. I'm already at 1200 for the month, which is way ahead of where I thought I would be. Every time I think I will only average 50 dollars a day, something happens and things just seem to work, and I make a lot more than that. The exciting part of this though, means that the imaginary mortgage balance is now below 34K. Yep, folks, we are now in the 33K zone.
So anyway, why we decided to pay off the house instead of investing:
1. We want Susan to be able to stay at home whenever we have kids. Not having a mortgage will make that a much easier task to accomplish. We can live on less than 2000 a month if we don't have a mortgage payment, so that will mean living on less than 2/3rds of my income.
2. Just the security of knowing that no one can come and just take the house away because we missed a payment for whatever reason. This is just a security thing that both Susan and I feel. Just knowing that the house is paid for will be a big relief.
3. "The borrower is slave to the lender." (Proverbs 22:7) Enough said on this item.
4. Because Susan said so. Ditto.....
Anyway, an update on where we are at since its been a couple of days. Solitaire has been going very well the past week. I'm already at 1200 for the month, which is way ahead of where I thought I would be. Every time I think I will only average 50 dollars a day, something happens and things just seem to work, and I make a lot more than that. The exciting part of this though, means that the imaginary mortgage balance is now below 34K. Yep, folks, we are now in the 33K zone.
So anyway, why we decided to pay off the house instead of investing:
1. We want Susan to be able to stay at home whenever we have kids. Not having a mortgage will make that a much easier task to accomplish. We can live on less than 2000 a month if we don't have a mortgage payment, so that will mean living on less than 2/3rds of my income.
2. Just the security of knowing that no one can come and just take the house away because we missed a payment for whatever reason. This is just a security thing that both Susan and I feel. Just knowing that the house is paid for will be a big relief.
3. "The borrower is slave to the lender." (Proverbs 22:7) Enough said on this item.
4. Because Susan said so. Ditto.....
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
January 1, 2008 Net Worth
Well, our net worth did next to nothing last month. What extra we paid on the house was pretty much off set by how much the stock market went down and Susan's IRA last month.
Net Worth: 118,381.53 up 0.21% from the previous month.
Net Worth w/o House: 62,393.41 down 4.82% from the previous month.
Net Worth w/o IRA: 25,967.07 down 9.72% from the previous month.
But since October 1st, the numbers look like:
Net Worth up 18.87%.
Net Worth w/o House: -2.90%
Net Worth w/o IRA: 1.56%
Since I have been tracking, we have yet to have a month where the net worth went down. I know that month will come, and it almost did this month (the intrest the money market account draws is what put is in the positive).
My main goal as far as this goes is to increase the Net Worth at least 50% in 2008. That would add another 59,000 to the net worth. My stretching goal is to have the net worth up above 200,000 before the end of the year. That would be an increase of close to 70% in 2008. I really think that is doable. Might not be easy, but that is what a stretch goal is suppose to be.
Pretty soon the (July or August) we will have the entire equity of the house to list, so that will be a very good thing. After we pay off the house, the change of investments will be going way up, so the other 2 numbers will start playing a bigger role.
My plan is to go in 3000 dollars increments, simply because a lot of the funds that we are looking at have an initial investment requirement of 3000. We will save 3000 and then buy a mutual/index fund for 3000, and keep on doing that until we have a diversified portfolio. Once we do that, we will use 3000 as the base to get the percentages right by investing more in the funds that we want to get to the "right" percentages. That's our diversification plan for right now. We will have to take Susan's IRA into account to decide what funds we want to buy at first.
We are almost to the fun part....only about 7 more months to go!!!!
Net Worth: 118,381.53 up 0.21% from the previous month.
Net Worth w/o House: 62,393.41 down 4.82% from the previous month.
Net Worth w/o IRA: 25,967.07 down 9.72% from the previous month.
But since October 1st, the numbers look like:
Net Worth up 18.87%.
Net Worth w/o House: -2.90%
Net Worth w/o IRA: 1.56%
Since I have been tracking, we have yet to have a month where the net worth went down. I know that month will come, and it almost did this month (the intrest the money market account draws is what put is in the positive).
My main goal as far as this goes is to increase the Net Worth at least 50% in 2008. That would add another 59,000 to the net worth. My stretching goal is to have the net worth up above 200,000 before the end of the year. That would be an increase of close to 70% in 2008. I really think that is doable. Might not be easy, but that is what a stretch goal is suppose to be.
Pretty soon the (July or August) we will have the entire equity of the house to list, so that will be a very good thing. After we pay off the house, the change of investments will be going way up, so the other 2 numbers will start playing a bigger role.
My plan is to go in 3000 dollars increments, simply because a lot of the funds that we are looking at have an initial investment requirement of 3000. We will save 3000 and then buy a mutual/index fund for 3000, and keep on doing that until we have a diversified portfolio. Once we do that, we will use 3000 as the base to get the percentages right by investing more in the funds that we want to get to the "right" percentages. That's our diversification plan for right now. We will have to take Susan's IRA into account to decide what funds we want to buy at first.
We are almost to the fun part....only about 7 more months to go!!!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)