My Financial Journey

Well another year in the books and another year of growth for my nestegg. Overall my nestegg grew by over $80,000 this year and topped the half-million mark in April.

My investments outperformed the SP500 pretty handedly this year with my nestegg investments besting the SP500 by almost 6% and my individual stock accounts besting it by almost 13% which is excellent – especially in a flat year like 2015. **note earlier version of this post incorrectly listed SP500 return without dividends

Another very positive thing is that I contributed $47,500 to my nestegg this year which is an all-time record for me as well. This is actually a little surprising for me given all of the expenses we had this year with a new baby and being in the middle of building our dream home. I definitely have $50,000 in my sites for next year – which is also what I said last year, but I still have the looming house hanging over my head so am still hanging onto a large cash cushion for surprises.

Taxable Account – $23,691.87 (+11.88%)
Traditional Rollover IRA – $31,829.74 (-3.07%)
My Roth IRA – $146,721.47 (-2.28%)
Wife Roth IRA – $82,105.95 (-0.12%)
Traditional 401k – $241,310.02 (-0.76%)

Roth/Traditional % = 43.53% (tax free)

Total Retirement Nest Egg $525,659.05 (-0.73%)
Retirement Salary (4%) – $21,026.36

Monthly Contributions $802.85 (401k)
SP500 Performance -1.75%
My Monthly Investment Performance -0.88% (+0.87% vs SP500)
My Monthly Individual Stocks Performance -0.70% (+1.05% vs SP500)

My retirement contributions for 2015 $47,506.55
401k $18,000.00
401k matching $11,206.55
My Roth IRA $5,500
Wife Roth IRA $5,500
Taxable Account $7,300

SP500 Performance for 2015 +1.38%
Investment Performance for 2015 +7.34% (+5.96% vs SP500)
Individual Stock Performance for 2015 +14.34% (+12.96% vs SP500)
Total Investment Return 2015 +$32,684.06

Well a little bounce back after last months drubbing and I am getting closer to breaking an all-time new high and my investments are still doing quite well against the market for the year. We have started house construction and there are numerous costs hitting our budget this year related to that, yet we are still on pace to put about $50,000 into our investment accounts which will be an all-time high for us – so I feel pretty good about that.

The new house will certainly put a crink in our finances for the foreseeable future, but the good news is we saved a lot of money when we were young so we should not jeopardize our financial future too much by taking on that massive liability. Granted we could be retired by now if we had never entertained the idea of a house out in the country with loads of land and an indoor basketball court, but life is all about balance and with our ability to save a large portion of our take home pay we should be able to overcome seemingly unfrugal decisions.

Taxable Account – $21,175.65 (+4.41%)
Traditional Rollover IRA – $32,836.97 (+0.96%)
My Roth IRA – $150,138.67 (+2.76%)
Wife Roth IRA – $82,208.01 (+2.95%)
Traditional 401k – $243,151.54 (+1.00%)

Roth/Traditional % = 45.24% (tax free)

Total Retirement Nest Egg $529,510.84 (+1.93%)
Retirement Salary (4%) – $20,780.31

Monthly Contributions $1,716.64 (401k)
SP500 Performance +0.05%
My Monthly Investment Performance +1.60% (+1.55% vs SP500)
My Monthly Individual Stocks Performance +2.73% (+2.68% vs SP500)

Well my individual stocks took a drubbing this month – pretty sure this has to be the worst monthly performance ever compared to the SP500. Lots of my biggest stock holdings were beat up this month. Bank of Internet down 38%, Solar City was down 31%, Buffalo Wild Wings down 20%, Tesla Motors down 17%, etc. Ouch I guess I suck at individual stock picks and should sell them all change strategy and only invest in index funds – or maybe individual stocks can be volatile in a very short period like a month and they will make me very wealthy some day. Guess time will tell.

Taxable Account – $20,281.92 (-7.95%)
Traditional Rollover IRA – $32,523.57 (-9.13%)
My Roth IRA – $146,105.44 (-1.62%)
Wife Roth IRA – $79,852.00 (-1.92%)
Traditional 401k – $240,744.68 (+8.41%)

Roth/Traditional % = 45.24% (tax free)

Total Retirement Nest Egg $519,507.61 (+1.90%)
Retirement Salary (4%) – $20,780.31

Monthly Contributions $1,716.64 (401k) Roth IRA $1000 Taxable $1000
SP500 Performance +8.30%
My Monthly Investment Performance +1.17% (-7.13% vs SP500)
My Monthly Individual Stocks Performance -3.82% (-12.12% vs SP500)

Taxable Account – $22,033.72 (-3.26%)
Traditional Rollover IRA – $35,791.96 (-3.64%)
My Roth IRA – $148,510.84 (-2.87%)
Wife Roth IRA – $81,413.76 (-3.63%)
Traditional 401k – $222,077.53 (-2.33%)

Roth/Traditional % = 45.24% (tax free)

Total Retirement Nest Egg $509,827.81 (-2.83%)
Retirement Salary (4%) – $20,393.1124

Monthly Contributions $1,716.64 (401k)
SP500 Performance -2.71%
My Monthly Investment Performance -3.16% (-0.45% vs SP500)
My Monthly Individual Stocks Performance -3.21% (-0.50% vs SP500)

Well there were a few exciting days during the last month. There was the flash crash where stocks fell for like 30 minutes and the media ran with it for the entire month. With the volatility in the market I thought it was a very good time to get some more money into the market and I added $8,000 in contributions to our Roth IRAs this month. I was not able to get it all invested, but did take advantage of a few of the dips to buy some more Solar City and Tesla stock. Overall this month my accounts fell some, but I was still able to outperform the SP500. I still have another $1k I can contribute this year to my Roth IRA as well as about $3k in cash so hopefully we have some more precipitous drops in our near future. Overall for the year including 401k matching I have been able to add just under $42,000 to our retirement accounts this year, which I found really encouraging as I feel like this has been an expensive year for our family with the new baby, building a house, and some other family emergencies.

Taxable Account – $22,776.99 (+6.23%)
Traditional Rollover IRA – $37,145.15 (-6.96%)
My Roth IRA – $152,891.90 (-3.04%)
Wife Roth IRA – $84,476.02 (-3.29%)
Traditional 401k – $227,385.17 (-5.21%)

Roth/Traditional % = 45.24% (tax free)

Total Retirement Nest Egg $524,675.23 (-3.96%)
Retirement Salary (4%) – $20,987.01

Monthly Contributions $1,716.64 (401k) $3,500 (Wife Roth IRA) $4,500 (My Roth IRA)
SP500 Performance -6.26%
My Monthly Investment Performance -5.73% (+0.53% vs SP500)
My Monthly Individual Stocks Performance -5.58% (+0.68% vs SP500)

Another month of new records for my Retirement Nestegg. An all-time new high and the largest single month increase in the nearly 10 year history of my blog. Granted compound interest has a lot to do with the feat, but still my individual stock portfolios returned 11.75% last month and outperformed the SP500 index by 9.78%! A $37k increase fueled by $34.5k in investment gains is pretty remarkable and it almost blows my mind what might be possible a few years down the road as compound interest continues to work its magic.

Taxable Account – $21,440.49 (+7.57%)
Traditional Rollover IRA – $39,923.58 (+11.98%)
My Roth IRA – $157,683.80 (+13.89%)
Wife Roth IRA – $87,349.49 (+9.00%)
Traditional 401k – $239,889.06 (+2.12%)

Roth/Traditional % = 42.94% (tax free)

Total Retirement Nest Egg $546,286.42 (+7.31%)
Retirement Salary (4%) – $21,851.45

Monthly Contributions $2,574.96 (401k)
SP500 Performance +1.97%
My Monthly Investment Performance +6.80% (+4.83% vs SP500)
My Monthly Individual Stocks Performance +11.75% (+9.78% vs SP500)

Well despite the market being down over 2% last month my retirement nestegg still grew by a few thousand dollars thanks to some pretty extreme out performance by my individual stock investments. My stocks this month outperformed the SP 500 index by 4.35%!! Which is pretty impressive and impactful seeing as how over half my nestegg is invested in individual stocks.

Taxable Account – $19,931.18 (+2.59%)
Traditional Rollover IRA – $35,651.20 (+3.02%)
My Roth IRA – $ 138,459.05 (+2.44%)
Wife Roth IRA – $80,140.79 (+1.51%)
Traditional 401k – $234,905.52 (-1.53%)

Roth/Traditional % = 42.94% (tax free)

Total Retirement Nest Egg $509,087.74 (+0.47%)
Retirement Salary (4%) – $20,363.51

Monthly Contributions $2,059.97 (401k)
SPY Performance -2.10%
My Monthly Investment Performance +0.07% (+2.17% vs SP500)
My Monthly Individual Stocks Performance +2.25% (+4.35% vs SP500)