Thursday, February 17, 2011

Update: Short Term Goals

A few months ago, I came up with a few goals to keep my finances and life on track.  Here's a quick update on my progress:


Financial

  • Create a $1000 emergency fund by September 2011.  75% of the way there! Woo Hoo!
  • Have a "no-spend weekend" every month.  I started off well, but I didn't plan ahead so some weekends I needed to buy groceries, ran out of supplies around the house, or was too lazy to cook.   
  • Double my 401k contributions by December 2011.  Doubled it starting February 1st!
  • No credit card debt by September 2012.  About this one...I discovered online shopping over the Christmas holiday and spent more than I should.  Everything I put on my credit card in November and December I paid off by the end of the month...but I didn't increase the total amount I paid each of those months so the balance remained pretty stable. On the bright side, I've revved up my monthly payment since the new year (and contributed part of my tax refund to the credit card) so I'm on-track to meet my goal, probably even hit it earlier.  
  • Set a wedding budget (and date) with an action plan for saving the money to pay for it by January 1, 2011.  I'm a slacker, haven't gotten to this yet.  

Personal Growth

  • Read 1 book a month from now until December 2011.  So far, so good!  For February, I'm reading "The Millionaire Next Door."
  • Identify 1 skill that I have and create an action plan (certification? Books/other resources? Practice?) with a timeline to develop it.   I've narrowed down a few ideas/skills, done a ton of research, and came up with some action steps, BUT I haven't set it to a timeline yet.  

Four out of six, not too bad!

2 comments:

  1. aim higher, i think you can save 2000 dollars by September ;)

    ReplyDelete
  2. lol, you're probably right. In the beginning I thought it would be so much harder for me to stick to the plan.

    ReplyDelete

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