I looked at all of my past financial updates when deciding what I wanted to do for my first financial update when I’m back, and after much deliberation, I decided that I would keep up what I established at the end.
So, rather than walking through every single transaction piece by piece right off the top I’m going to give some overviews first.
With that said, if there’s anything you want added to the overviews or any suggestions for changes I could make to make sure the posts are easily readable let me know.
So let’s get into my first financials back!
| Total for all accounts except credit card | |
| Opening Balance | $497.70 |
| Income | $1,051.15 |
| Expenses | $916.19 |
| Closing Balance | $597.02 |
| Profit | $134.96 |
Personal
| Personal Chequing | TFSA | |
| Opening Balance | $18.70 | $100.78 |
| Income | $2,740.02 | $0.01 |
| Expenses | $2,367.23 | $100.00 |
| Closing Balance | $391.49 | $0.79 |
| Profit | $372.79 | -$99.99 |
Business
| Business Chequing | Marketing | Payroll Holding | GST Holding | |
| Opening Balance | $169.96 | $0.00 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Income | $6,482.12 | $0.00 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Expenses | $6,269.70 | $0.00 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Closing Balance | $382.38 | $0.00 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Profit | $212.42 | $0.00 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
Credit Card
| Credit Card | Student Loan | |
| Opening Balance | $1,637.94 | $77,407.88 |
| Payments | $2,638.60 | $101.00 |
| Expenses | $1,935.78 | N/A |
| Closing Balance | $935.12 | $77,306.88 |
| Debt Change | Lowered by $702.82 | Lowered by $101.00 |
Bills
| Payments | Owing | Overdue | |
| TV/Internet | $456.32 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| Phone | $446.25 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
Expenses
| Category | Amount Spent |
| Groceries | $215.72 |
| Vehicle Registration/License Update | $40.65 |
| Hosting/Blog Related | $24.10 |
| Business | $291.55 |
| Car Insurance | $251.13 |
| Eating Out | $189.00 |
| Pet Supplies | $13.65 |
| Gas | $108.86 |
| Christmas Presents | $272.79 |
| Christmas Travel | $797.28 |
| Rent | $800.00 |
| Car Payment | $400.00 |
| Health Insurance | $103.40 |
Comments/Things to note
The biggest change since my last financial update is that my income has skyrocketed. I made almost $3000 more this month than August. This is due to acquiring new clients, each of which added $750 – $1000 a month in income! I then used this new income to completely pay off all outstanding bills, including my credit card.
Additionally, Christmas, unfortunately, came this month and I spent the least I could on presents, but having 4 families to buy for, even with them all having low gift value expectations adds up. Definitely going to try to convince them to go non-commercial gifts next year!
As you can also see, this is the first month that I have had car-related expenses. This is because with my girlfriend and I now broke up it was necessary to get my own car, and not share with her. As I had no money at the time I, unfortunately, had to finance one. The cost for financing is not $400 a month, as I picked the cheapest car on the lot, it is instead $288 a month. I simply want to pay it off early, so I am budgeting for $400 a month.
Finally, you’ll see I had almost $800 in travel expenses this month. This was due to the fact that I took a trip to Vancouver at Christmas, after 7 years, to see my aunt. Originally I had planned to go 50/50 on this with my girlfriend, but after we split up I had foot the bill for 2 people.
Goals
My goals for the upcoming month are simple:
- Continue paying $400 a month towards my car to pay it off early.
- Put at least $200 per month into my TFSA as an emergency fund, with the long-term goal of having $1,500 in there.
- Put any excess on my credit card to support at least a $1000 available credit.
Final Thoughts
I kept the previous financial update layout this time.
It still covers all the points I try to cover by doing these updates, however, I decided not to share the transaction-by-transaction breakdown of all the money, instead, grouping them into categories, as one would a budget.
If you like the new form please let me know. Same with if you don’t. I haven’t decided how in-depth I want to go as hopefully these reports get more complicated the longer I continue on my journey.
