Neville's Financial Blog

All this talk of rising energy prices, just for fun I decided to see how this affects me personally. Since everything has some correlation to transportation which is directly related to gas and energy prices, the prices of pretty much everything has (or will) rise.

I want to see what areas of my life are affected more than others in respect to rising energy prices.

How They DON'T Affect Me (much):

• Driving in Austin. Thankfully most things where I live are pretty close. My gym is 5 miles away and I usually ride a bike (bicycle) there. Downtown is also about 5 miles away.
  
• The Scooter. I bought a scooter a while ago to bypass traffic and parking when I was in college. That scooter gets 122 MPG (Yes, one-hundred and twenty two miles per gallon), and I can comfortably ride anywhere within about an 8 mile radius (can't use freeways). Full tank of premium gas (1.9 gallons) used to be about $4.30, now about $7.80. However it's still negligible. 200+ miles of travel for less than $10 is pretty good.
  
• Groceries. I know all the prices have gone up, but I eat a very simple diet of mainly fruits and a few other things, so each trip to the grocery store (about once per week) costs me roughly $20. Simple trick: use one of those hand-carry carts instead of a normal shopping cart. It's hard to stuff that little thing with more than $20 worth of food and it forces you to only buy the essentials, no junk. So while rising energy prices DO affect this area, it's not extremely significant yet.
  
• Going to work. I wake up, walk to the next room and BOOM I'm in the office. Zero commute time = zero transportation costs.

How They DO Affect Me:

• Prices on my websites go up. For example HouseOfRave's shipping prices have literally doubled in the last year. Many products have also gone up in price to correlate with higher shipping costs from Asia. People accustomed to paying $5 for shipping are sometimes surprised to see $10+ shipping charges on relatively small orders.
  
• When I drive to Houston. My family and lots of friend live in Houston so I try to go back often. It's exactly 150 miles from Austin to Houston, so a 300 mile round-trip (Roughly one full tank of gas in my GS300). Each trip to Houston equates to about 450 miles of driving which equates to nearly $110 in gas per trip.
  
• When I drive IN Houston. This city is huge, and no matter where you go, I'd say it's at least a 15-30 minute drive. There's really no way around this in Houston.
  

Conclusion: So far rising energy prices are more of an annoyance to me than a real issue. They haven't really had too much effect on my lifestyle, although I'm pretty sure this is something that will slowly become more of an issue in the coming years.


*By the way...this article really tested my grammatical ability to differentiate between 'Effect' and 'Affect'!

Labels: Financial, Transportation

I don't know where this came from, but I was randomly curious on how much it costs me to simply exist here in Austin, TX. per year.

Fixed Yearly Costs:
$1,000 = Car insurance ($84/month)
$1,800 = Health insurance ($150/month)
$960 = Cell phone ($80/month)
$6,000 = Rent ($500/month)
$12,000 = Food, gas, general items ($1,000/month)
$2,400 = Random Costs ($200/month)

Total = $24,160

That's just to live, doesn't even account for going out, travelling etc.
I also have few monthly bills because I have no debt, no loans and no car payment.

Hmmm....good to know.

Labels: Financial, Personal

From the beginnings of this blog on November 17th 2004, I openly wrote how much money I made, saved and spent. However I rarely reported what I earned through partnerships or consulting. This means what my actual finances were and the finances listed on this blog were different.

December 2006 was the last month I publicly accounting my income. For all of 2007 I haven't listed specific income, and I will finally take off all that income on the NevBlog.com sidebar.

The plethora of bloggers openly listing their income generally hide their identity, write under pseudonyms or don't name the companies they work for.

It's not exactly hard to find out that I look like this:

...or that I live in Austin, TX. and Houston, TX., or that my phone number is:

...so listing detailed income gets tricky. Let's say I do some consulting for a company and I openly list how much they're paying me per month. It's not fair to them to openly list that information.

One of the interesting things people found about this blog was the fact I so openly listed income. It was also good for me, as I felt self conscious about my finances if they were too low. An open environment definitely helped.

But for now, I'll stop writing every piece of specific income on this blog.

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

Here is the income for 2005 and 2006. And yes...I know I listed "Change Jar" as income when it's not.

Money Made from January 2005 till Deceber 2005:
Online Biz - Jan. $ 502
Work $ 253
Work $ 281
Ebay Sale $ 100
Change Jar $ 55
Online Biz - Feb. $ 751
Work $ 271
Change Jar $ 30
Rebate $ 30
Work $ 229
Lottery Experiment $ 2
Web Design $ 100
Online Biz - March $ 946
Syntel Dividend $ 270
Ebay Sale $ 218
Ebay Sale $ 340
Water Experiment $ 5
Work $ 246
Work $ 248
Online Biz - April $ 836
Web Design $ 300
Change Jar $ 32
Surveys $ 55
Books $ 165
Selling Notes $ 105
Work $ 297
Online Biz - May $ 1,024
SYNT Dividend $ 21
FO Dividend $ 6
GE Dividend $ 10
Work $ 213
Change Jar $ 17
Work $ 167
Online Biz - June $ 718
FO Dividend $ 11
Work $ 274
Work $ 261
Online Biz - July $ 834
Work $ 304
GE Dividend $ 10
SYNT Dividend $ 11
Change Jar $ 35
Acco Brands $ 183
Work $ 210
Books $ 30
Online Biz - Aug. $ 804
ACCO Dividend $ 7
Work $ 228
Change Jar $ 76
Online Biz - Sept. $ 654
Selling Pixels $ 1,350
FO Dividend $ 11
SYNT Dividend $ 11
GE Dividend $ 9
Online Biz - Oct $ 1,120
Misc. $ 1,000
Birthday $ 200
Online Biz - Nov $ 1,630
Change Jar $ 115
Online Biz - Dec $ 1,801

Total on Dec. 31st 2005
$ 20,021


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


Money Made from January 2006 till December 2006:

January 2006
Selling Pixels $ 700

Online Biz - Jan $ 1,131
SYNT Dividend $ 11
FO Dividend $ 11

February 2006
Change Jar $ 85
CraigsList $ 100
Online Biz - Feb $ 2,016
Adsense Experiment $ 138


March 2006
Mobile Marketing $ 158
Other $ 3,000+
Online Biz - Mar $ 1,915
Selling Pixels $ 100


April 2006
First order f/ new biz $ 30
Other $ 350
Selling Pixels $ 50
MobileCampus $ 110
MobileCampus $ 50
Online Biz - Apr $ 1,080
SYNT Dividend $ 11
FO Dividend $ 11


May 2006
SYNT Sale $ 681
ABD Sale $ 175
Other $ 1480
Selling Pixels $ 50
Change Jar $ 55
Online Biz - May $ 1,345


June 2006
FO Dividend $ 11
PGH Dividend $ 12
DYN Sale $ 250
Other $ 30
Online Biz $ 2,505
FacebookProfile $ 28


July 2006
Online Biz $ 1,770
Other $ 300


August 2006
Online Biz $ 1,600
Other $ 300
Change Jar $ 80


September 2006
Online Biz $ 1,700


October 2006
Online Biz $ 5,000+
Other $ 1,000


November 2006
BIDU Sale $ 230
Stock Dividends $ 32
Other $ 500
Adsense $ 120
Online Biz $ 4,000


December 2006
Stock Dividends $ 30
Other $ 500
Online Biz $ 4,500

Total on Dec. 31st 2006
$ 38,341

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

Last Account Snapshot:

Explanation of accounts

Labels: Blogging, Financial

The Bottled Water Experiment (and part 2) were some very interesting experiments in a micro business, and since then I've got tons of feedback about them.

However it's always cool to see someone else take the idea to the next level. Here's a guy who saw these water experiment posts and tried it out, and is currently making more money selling water than his job!

Checkout this comment on part 2 of the water experiment:

-----------------------------------
I started my own water business after reading this post. I put a twist on it however as I replaced the stationary location with a backpack lined with a trash bag full of ice and bottles, and parked my car in a stationary location with the ice chest and other water to come back and refill. I am MOBILE! I made the shirt that says "Bottled Water $1" and headed to the river on a very hot day. People could not believe that I was doing this, everyone thought the idea was so awesome, and I couldn't take credit. But I did sell ALL my water. 200 bottles on the first day.

I did this 5 days in the first week, for 4 hours before my shifts as a manager at chick fil a. I found out that I was making more money from selling bottled water than from my real job. So I posted ads on craigslist, offering to pay college students $10 an hour to do my bidding. I got 14 responses, and hired 5 people. Now I have a guy at the river, one at the biggest local park, two on the college campus of VCU and one in the popular downtown business sector. Each person generates about $100 a day for 4 hours of work at ten dollars an hour. thats 20 hours of labor for me to pay so 200 dollars gone, but 300 dollars are mine, minus my costs of getting water from costco, which costs me roughly $100 dollars each day. and I make $200 a day for myself, and all I have to do is go buy water once a day. Thanks nev!
-----------------------------------

I love how he took the concept, put a small spin on it then scaled it to make $200/day. That's some serious summertime cash (not to mention good experience)!

Labels: bottled water experiment, business ideas, Financial

That's right, I bought a house.

Technically the house is still just a plot of land with the builders temporary office and a large trash bin on it...but it's MY plot of land.

I put down a $500 deposit and instructed the builder (Centex Homes) to build it far out as possible, so I won't be moving in the new house till around November 2007.

The plot I bought was the last one in the entire neighborhood (71 and Riverside in Austin, TX.). It's on a cul-d-sac and is an oversized lot so I'll have a bigass backyard.

SUPPOSE SOMETHING GOES WRONG and I don't end up wanting the house, I basically get my deposit back from Centex. However I can also sell the contract to someone else and make a nice 4-figure profit as the demand for space in the neighborhood is very high.

The cool thing is this community is strictly no-investors, so the demand for these homes is not coming from people just trying to flip the homes or rent them out, which is a sign that a bubble is not driving the prices, but just shear population growth (Austin is growing like crazy).

The reason this neighborhood had such great prices is because it's in a relatively unknown area. However there are 4 major projects around the neighborhood under construction (and nearing completion), and a brand new highway with an exit/entrance right near by. It's also only 5 miles away from Downtown.

There is nowhere to buy a house in Austin for $148,000 with that proximity to Downtown.

This is a bad Photoshop rendition of what the brand new house will look like. In actuality it will look much like that house on the right.

Me on my swath land (and an industrial receptacle in the background):

Move in date: November 2007
First Payment: October 2007
Price: Roughly $148,000 + additional features.
House: One story, 4 bedrooms, roughly 1,500 sq. ft.

One room will be my bedroom, one room will be an office, and two rooms will be rented out. There are 3 very large high tech companies not even a mile from the house, so I can pretty easily find some other young professionals to rent to.

Hopefully this turns out to be a good financial move in the long run, I have a feeling it will with the amount of development happening around here! I also have 8 months before I have to start paying for anything, which means I can get proper finances in place for the mortgage and start saving for all those expensive things associated with home ownership (furniture / tools / TV / bedroom sets etc. etc...).

Labels: Financial, house, Housing

Resumite.com was put on sale a few days ago, and now the auction is over.

Total I made was


So all in all Resumite for me wasn't a failure, but not necessarily a stellar success either. It was something that had potential, but it just wasn't in my interest or right timing.

All in all I learned something and made a little money. End of that saga!


Like most of the little sales like this, I put the money away:
30% - Bills Account
30% - Investment Account
20% - Permanent Savings
10% - Spending Account 1
10% - Spending Account 2

Labels: Financial, Website Sale Resumite

Through some simple marketing and a bit of luck, I'm glad to say House Of Rave received 530 orders this October! Profits exceeded $5,000 for the month which is good news. Hopefully I can successful sustain at least 80% of his profit level in the non-Halloween months. According to my sidebar, I made $1,120 in profit from House Of Rave just one year ago in October 2005, so there has been significant improvement in profits.

This is a new milestone because it indicates I could realistically live off just one venture of mine if needed. Now the real work starts, sustaining and growing these temporary results.

HoR still runs almost the same, just a few modifications that cut out certain steps like manually charging each customer or creating orders one by one. My time should be spent growing, marketing and adding content, not caught up in small details which can be easily automated.

Labels: eCommerce, Financial

I've complained about Google AdSense many times before, saying I will never put them on NevBlog. Well, that's changed.

I have a very under-funded Charity Account with Bank of America which I recently started, and not much money has gone into it. This account automatically accumulates money every week from my main account, but relatively slowly compared to the other accounts.

Starting this Feb 1st I put a vertical Google Adsense banner on NevBlog to generate income for this new charity account. I tried to make it very un-invasive:

Leaving the ad relatively out of the way is contrary to maximizing its profit potential, but I don't want to clutter the site.

So far the return is extremely BAD. The first day I got several thousand impressions, 8 clicks and a grand total of 38 cents. If that's a taste of the profit to come, then I'm not sure AdSense is even worth it.

I thought this would be a painless way to increase the amount of money I give away, so hopefully the profits improve!

Labels: Financial

I came out of 2005 earning around $20,000 for the year just from side projects and while still a full time student. Not too bad, but not a living wage.

I am now graduated and can concentrate full time on the game of making money.

For my own reference, here is the money I brought in for 2005:

-Online Biz - Jan. - $ 502
-Work - $ 253
-Work - $ 281
-Ebay Sale - $ 100
-Change Jar - $ 55
-Online Biz - Feb. - $ 751
-Work - $ 271
-Change Jar - $ 30
-Rebate - $ 30
-Work - $ 229
-Lottery Experiment - $ 2
-Web Design - $ 100
-Online Biz - March - $ 946
-Syntel Dividend - $ 270
-Ebay Sale - $ 218
-Ebay Sale - $ 340
-Water Experiment - $ 5
-Work - $ 246
-Work - $ 248
-Online Biz - April - $ 836
-Web Design - $ 300
-Change Jar - $ 32
-Surveys - $ 55
-Books - $ 165
-Selling Notes - $ 105
-Work - $ 297
-Online Biz - May - $ 1,024
-SYNT Dividend - $ 21
-FO Dividend - $ 6
-GE Dividend - $ 10
-Work - $ 213
-Change Jar - $ 17
-Work - $ 167
-Online Biz - June - $ 718
-FO Dividend - $ 11
-Work - $ 274
-Work - $ 261
-Online Biz - July - $ 834
-Work - $ 304
-GE Dividend - $ 10
-SYNT Dividend - $ 11
-Change Jar - $ 35
-Acco Brands - $ 183
-Work - $ 210
-Books - $ 30
-Online Biz - Aug. - $ 804
-ACCO Dividend - $ 7
-Work - $ 228
-Change Jar - $ 76
-Online Biz - Sept. - $ 654
-Selling Pixels - $ 1,350
-FO Dividend - $ 11
-SYNT Dividend - $ 11
-GE Dividend - $ 9
-Online Biz - Oct - $ 1,120
-Misc. - $ 1,000
-Birthday - $ 200
-Online Biz - Nov - $ 1,630
-Change Jar - $ 115
-Online Biz - Dec - $ 1,801
---2005 Total - $20,021

There are some dividends and interest earnings missing, but nothing significant. I also do not publicly publish income made from partnerships I have going, as that violates other people's privacy.

I ended the year with the following in my public accounts:

-General Account - $ 3,647
-Spending Account - $ 179
-Spending Account 2 - $ 350
-Investment Account - $ 2,234
-Bill Account - $ 1,379
-Permanent Savings - $ 3,342
-Stock Portfolio Value - $ 11,016
-Roth IRA - $ 6,680
-Emigrant Direct - $ 1,002
---Total Liquid Assets - 29,829
-Credit Card Balance - $ 0
-Business Holding - $ 1,647
---Total On Hand - $ 31,476

2006 will be the year I hope to firmly establish myself....or go really broke. Either way will be quite fun and teach me a lot :-)

Labels: Financial

Almost 2006, so it's time to start setting goals. I made a poster board with goals and a sort of calendar to make sure I work towards those goals every month. Goals rarely get accomplished unless they are constantly kept track of.

I've also bought a giant cork board to thumb-tack inspirational articles right in front of my desk. I'll start putting up quotes, articles, pictures or anything that inspires me to work harder.

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

I think a great financial move I've made is splitting my money into separate accounts. It really shows how much money I have for what purpose. I had too much cash sitting in my extremely low-yield permanent savings account (aka "No Risk" account), so I maxed my Roth IRA for the year by adding $2,000 to it, and threw $1,000 into an EmigrantDirect savings account.

I also recently opened up a 2nd Spending Account specifically for the holidays and larger purchases. I noticed every holiday season is much more expensive than other months, so I've been stashing a little money each week for a couple of months and built up around $800 for gifts and other holiday expenses.

It makes me feel good that I can buy gifts for family and friends without worrying about prices.

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

The second scooter I bought has recently been fully registered and is now actually legal to drive. Almost immediately after I bought it, I got a ticket for driving with: No insurance, No inspection and No registration.

I've also got two parking tickets, each $50 a piece. In relation, it takes me $3 to fill an entire tank of gas.

I've also been yelled at several times for cutting through standing traffic. One cop said I was a "Traffic Unit" like everyone else and couldn't go through just because I could. I disagree. I'm not sure what kind of ticket I can get for moving through a line of traffic, but I'm willing to find out.

Despite $700+ extra dollars of additional costs (Not counting helmet, gloves etc), I have been able to easily absorb these costs thanks to my "Bills Account."

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

Visit GoDaddy.com and see if yourname.com is available. If yes, buy it. I don't know why, but it just seems a good idea. It costs $9 or less per year. NevilleMedhora.com redirects to my original webpage, http://www.neville1.com/. Having a website throughout the years has really helped me in many ways.

Labels: Financial, Goals, Quotes

My longest held business has a phone number, and paying for phone service costs me around $21/month. Since I deal with people in all states, I always call people back with my cell phone....this confuses customers with different area codes and intermingles my personal and work life.

The perfect answer seems to be Vonage. So long as you have a broadband connection, you can get unlimited phone service anywhere in the United States and Canada for $25/month. You can also select ANY area code and number, no matter where you are.

I bought a nice Vonage Router from Fry's this weekend which also doubles as a wireless router. Cost: $118 with $100 rebate. I just sign up on their website and hook my phone directly into the router.

---

On Another Note:

For some other side projects, I've learned to use the Wordpress blogging system. I installed it on my server with ease and picked it up quickly. It was extremely dynamic, quick and intuitive. Anyone with just a little bit of web publishing experience can pick it up in minutes.

---

On Yet Another Note:

Here are my current longterm stock holdings:

---

And on One More Note:

I did a Google Guide a while back, and to prove I knew what I was talking about, I did an experiment concerning the keyword "Starbucks Liquor".

Well, the experiment worked and put me in the #1 spot when "Starbucks Liquor" is searched on Google. I get several hundred hits on my site p/week from people typing that keyword, so I decided to give them what they were searching for: Starbucks Liquor Recipe's!

Labels: Financial

My stock portfolio has gone into the 5-digit range in the last few days. Here is my portfolio as of Wednesday, 6-8-2005. The main factor in this is Dynegy (DYN). It keeps going up about 3% per day. I went from a 25% loss to a 9% gain in a few days.

Also, Thursday morning I will be crashing an exclusive entrepreneurial convention. "Bob" tipped me off that some pretty important people will be attending and speaking. I've got my suit ready, a black portfolio, business cards and a fake name tag....lets see if I can pull this off!

Labels: Financial

$22 - Tubing down river for 6 hours.

$13 - Food For Tubing.

$17.50 - CiCi's Pizza.

$12 - Brunch at Moonshine's with business associate.

$10 - Misc. Expenses.

22 - Miles I drove exploring East Austin. Just keeping my eyes opened to what's around me.

2 - Amount of new business projects I worked on.

2 - Number of times cops have been called for excessive noise violations coming from my apartment this semester.

Bazillion - Number of motorcycles I saw at a bike rally this weekend in Austin.

14 - Number of new people met this weekend.

Labels: Financial

I had some visitors stay over in Austin this weekend and I was really expecting to completely exhaust my spending account. Fortunately, I could not find a single boat to rent this weekend, and certain people refused to let me pay for meals/drinks etc.. I wasn't complaining.

I came out alive with $54 in the Spending Account.

I felt smug having such a fun weekend and spending half of what I expected, see for yourself:

Still had tons of fun and went to all sorts of fancy places in Austin. However, if I didn't previously save for this weekend, I would have exceeded my spending account limit.

Labels: Financial

This weekend was for the most part nice and relaxing. I hate that.

I like lots of activity so I feel productive. I accomplished some things, but I am under obligation not to say anything. Too bad.

The weather was in the high 90's all this weekend, PERFECT for selling bottled water. One problem, I couldn't find Barry. Apparently the police have been giving tickets to all the homeless people near the Riverside/I-35 intersection, so he was nowhere to be found. This weather is what I need to make this bottled water venture profitable. This weather mkaes everyone thirsty and also brings everyone out, including this weird blimp I saw:



I've been saving money for next weekend, so I only spent $10 this entire weekend. It was all on food, particularly late-night Burger King. Other expenses were either free or previously purchased.

Financial Update:
General Account: $1,706
Spending Account: $143
Bills Account: $835
Investment Account: $1,239
Permanent Savings: $2,283
Roth IRA: $5,000
Stock Portfolio: $9,673
Total Assets: $20,879
Business Holding: $6,193
Total On Hand: $27,072

Labels: Financial

This chart shows the daily movement of my portfolio only.
I was asked about my stock portfolio several times lately. I enjoy having a long term portfolio which just sits there. I've tried active trading and it isn't for me. I leave that up to Kirk.

Here are the current stocks I own and reasons I bought them:

Dynegy (DYN) - Got pummeled after the Enron scandal. I hold this as a long term turnaround stock. Dynegy deals mainly with natural gas. They keep paying off their debt which short term investors hate, but long term investors like. Has put me at 25% gains at times and at a 30% loss at times.

Syntel (SYNT) - An Indian outsourcing firm with relatively little media coverage. Healthy company with no debt and an ever-expanding operations. On days when the NASDAQ does well, Syntel does really well....but when NASDAQ performs poorly, Syntel performs very poorly. Who cares, I am in it for the long haul.

Fortune Brands (FO) - Conglomerate with a million different brands under their name. Company has balanced their portfolio of brands to survive in good or bad markets. I idolize this company and its great track history.

General Electric (GE) - Bought as a "rock" which moves neither up or down very fast. GE dabbles in jet engines, water treatment, appliances, television stations and much more.

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

On another note, I've started preliminary research for my traffic experiment. I went to three different tall buildings adjacent to I-35 and got permission to take pictures of the rush hour traffic.

I'll explain later.

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

Even though the Fall semester is over with (I have one more summer to take and I should be done), I have been gallivanting across town trying to strike up some new business deals here and there.

I want to have a good amount of moola in reserve by the time I get out of college for good.

Labels: Financial

A lot of buzz is going on about China and their emerging economy. If it's all over the press, it's old news.

One emerging market I've been interested in (on the domestic and international level) is Mexico.

Some quick observations:

• Hispanic Americans (wow, I'm so politically correct!) have the highest percentage level of disposable income in the United States. This means they are big spenders for their relative level of income. Appealing to this market will be big business.
• The hispanic population is the fastest growing in America. In a few years, it is projected the majority of Texans will be Hispanic.
• Strong trends that introduced new races into more mainstream culture are currently happening: Hispanic boxers, music artists, athletes, politicians etc. are rapidly on the rise.

States such as California, Texas and Florida can already see a very strong infusion of Hispanic culture. In fact, my favorite radio station in Houston is a Reggaetone station (Spanish Rap). That's just on a domestic level. In Mexico itself things are starting to become more online, a great opportunity for anyone. So how do you profit from this?? EASY:

Take a look back at the United States and other developed countries before our full-blown internet age, and replicate the processes and new services offered.

One lucky lady who happens to be in the PERFECT position to take full advantage of this is Rebecca who runs a new blog called Trendy Tendencias. I have been reading her blog as she brings something fresh to the blogging world, and is identifying trends you can profit on. I'm keeping an eye on her as she brings all sorts of new trends in Mexico to my attention.

It would be wise to appeal to this market before the press jumps all over it.
-Nev

Labels: Financial

Few points of interest:

-Part 2 of the Bottled Water Experiment will be posted tomorrow. That's right, I've got Barry the Bum selling 5 cases of bottled water this Tuesday. So far I've invested $42. Will he run away with my investment or outperform all expectations?

-My Alamo Apprentice team (Here and Here) beat the opposing team by 152% and set a new record for food/drink sales for a Wednesday night.

-I bought my first tailored suit. Thanks to "Bob" for the hookup.

-I bought another pair of shorts from Nordstrom. I still can't believe how courteous and helpful their employees are. My own friends aren't even that nice to me!

-PineCone Research sent me a $5 check for a 20 minute survey. Very painless process, and they sent the check in less than 5 days. Brought to my attention by Jim at Barganeering.

-I didn't meet my 4-31-2005 goal of making $11,000. Son of a....... It was pretty much an arbitrary number that I selected, but I'm still very dissapointed I failed. I will continue to keep track of how much money I've made for another few months. I need to further analyze the wrong steps I took to miss the goals.

-I've added FORUMS to the site. It's a work in progress, but fully ready for posting. Registration costs $150.00.....just kidding, it's free and not even necessary (you owe me now!)

Labels: Financial

Ahh, the famous piggy bank. Call it a piggy bank, money box, change jar....whatever. The point is to put spare change from time to into this container for savings.

I think the power of the piggy bank is very underestimated. Take a look at MY piggy bank (Actually it's a 3-year old Snapple bottle).

I stash away spare change AND SPARE BILLS. If I have five $1 bills, I will (without thinking) stash away two of them in the change jar. I do this all the time. I even stash $10's and $20's in there at times.

If you use a lot of cash or change, make a subconcious habit of putting some of it away everyday. DO NOT USE THE CHANGE JAR FOR SPENDING. This defeats the whole purpose.

Once, you've got a nice amount built up:

• Go to a CoinStar or similar machine that gives you cash for change (at local grocery).
• Get your ca$h.
• Count all cash.
• Deposit all cash into bank.
• Keep 10% or 20% of the money for spending purposes (this will "reward" you for stashing money away).

Since January I will have "made" over $100 from my change jar. Not bad considering it would have just been money wasted in other places.

Also make sure to pickup EVERY penny, nickle, dime and quarter you see laying around. It truly adds up. I was once walking with a multi-multi-MULTI-millionaire who caught sight of a penny from the corner of his eye. Without breaking his line of conversation, he stopped, turned around, walked to the penny, picked up the penny and continued walking with me. He proceeded to carry on the conversation like nothing happened.

I understand why....it's FREE money. No matter what economic class you are in, you've gotta like free money.

This has got to be the simplest form of savings possible. Do it.......NOW.

Labels: Financial

Take a look at my current assets and glance at my Spending Account.

Balance: $.86 (That's 86 CENTS)

So it looks like I will be living very frugally this weekend! I will stay away from 4th Street (Where I have been very often recently because of the Alamo Apprentice) and I will not spend on any frivolous expenses. I need to be careful of making it to Downtown this weekend:

The Downtown area of Austin has a few primary attractions:

• 6th Street - Cheap drinks, lots of live music and tons of college students. Austin is the Live Music Capitol of the US. On weekdays regular drinks are generally in the $1 range, very cheap. Weekends the price goes up to at least $2.00 specials and an average of $3.50-$6.00 for anything else. 6th Street is blocked off at nights due to the mass amount of people that walk through (It's like a mini Bourbon Street). Lots of small food vendors on 6th also. I DO NOT leave 6th without getting pizza first (and maybe a Bratwurst). It's a strict rule.
• 5th Street - A mixture of clubs, restaurants and nicer bars. Priced between 4th and 6th Streets, but leans more towards 4th Street prices.
• 4th Street - Mainly the more affluent, 25+ crowd. The bars and clubs here are swankier and appropriate dress is required. Expect to pay $6.50 - $12.00 for a relatively common drink (Mohito, Martini etc). There are lots of very nice restaurants in this area. My record is a $150 bill for 2 people at a Hawaain Fusion restaurant. I tend to have a drooling problem on 4th because of the amazing cars.

Going Downtown with friends generally ends up being pretty expensive, especially when you pay for other people also...but it's also terribly fun!

Luckily I am good about not exceeding my spending account (I still have $20 in cash for the weekend), but I must spend it wisely. I also need to keep at least a $50 cushion of money in the Spending Account.

I wish I was a non-drinking, anorexic vegetarian. Life would be so much cheaper :-)

Labels: Financial

There is all sorts of talk about why the "Tech Bubble" was created then burst so suddenly. It's really no secret, especially when looking at it in hindsight.

Bubbles happen over and over in history because the chance to make a buck is generally too appealling for the public to resist.

Bubbles have happened all through history, in every country and in various sectors of these economies. Let's take a quick stroll through a few major bubbles over the centuries:

Tulip-Bulb Bubble of 1634

• A non-lethal strain of virus caused some tulips to devlop stripes.
• Enthralled with these new flowers, tulips were in high demand.
• As more and more people watched all their friends getting rich by selling tuplip bulbs, they too saw an opportunity to get rich quick.
• People from every walk of life starting selling the bulbs, even selling their homes to buy them.
• With such nice high prices, everyone started selling their bulbs to extract profit. Supply now far exceeded demand and the prices fell dramatically.
• Many small investors were highly leveraged to buy tulip bulbs, and many loans were defaulted on.
• The small investors ended up being hurt the most.

The South Sea Bubble:

• In 1711 The South Sea Company was formed in England.
• Public saw enormous potential in the South Sea Company and the soaring stock price showed their sentiment.
• All sorts of new companies went public after seeing The South Sea Company's success on the market. All these stocks enjoyed immediate stock inflation as the public poured in money.
• The directors of the The South Seas Company saw their stock rise from 55 to 1,000 and knew it had no relationship whatsoever to the company earnings.
• They sold all their stock at its highest price.
• Directors then made the announcement that the stock was not being based upon actual earnings, but public speculation.
• The stock plummeted as people began bailing out of the stock
• The small investors ended up being hurt the most.
  

Florida Real Estate Craze of the 1920's:

• Land bought in Miami for around $800,000 in 1923 could be subdivided and sold in 1924 for twice the price.
• The next year, that same land could be sold for $4,000,000. With real estate red hot, the public saw an opportunity and acted.
• One third of the Miami population had become real estate agents by this time.
• The bubble then collapsed as there was a lack of buyers and huge supply of sellers.
• The small investors ended up being hurt the most.

Needless to remark on, the severe stock crash of 1929 was also just a giant bubble that burst.

What I've noticed is the remarkably similar situation we are currently experiencing with real estate. The popularity of books like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" which promise riches from buying old properties and selling or renting them out has encouraged everyone and their dog to become involved in real estate and become an agent.

The small investors will invariably get hurt in the end.

You cannot predict the madness of the masses, so a better lesson to take out of this is how to profit from it: Get on board early and when the masses of people start entering the sector, get ready to bail.

Obviously this is easier said than done.

Labels: Financial

During and after the market hours I tend to glance at my stock prices on Yahoo Finance, but I don't really look at my gains/losses as I am currently going very long on my stocks. The little changes no longer concern me.

Turns out Fortune Brands (FO) has been sitting in my lazy 'ol portfolio gaining green. As of today I am at a %17.72 gain on Fortune Brands which equates to a $270 profit.

I remember Charles Kirk (TheKirkReport.com) saying, "Investors are often willing to hold onto huge losses, but sell too early when they start making huge profits"

Point is, I'm not going to sell Fortune Brands for a very long time. One thing I was proud of was my non-reaction to the news of my gains. When I first started trading my heart would beat faster while just logging in to check my stocks.

I'm beginning to think with a clearer and more rational mind than in the past. I have TheKirkReport to thank for this, I think I might drop him another donation soon!

On another note.....


I started a new business two days ago which I think can make me approximately $200-300 in extra income a month. This business will require even less work than my current online business. I will post the business on this site in about two weeks . Total business costs so far: $9.20

Labels: Financial

Many people want to be "rich" in the future so they can do things like: Travel, buy nice cars, support family etc...who wouldn't?

I believe "rich" means many different things to different people. Here are a few materialistic wants I feel would make me "rich" :

• Being able to travel to Dubai and lodge, dine and recreate in the Hotel Burj Al Arab for a week with family and friends in a 3-bedroom suite.
• Being able to buy a $40,000 car without really denting my disposable income.
• Being prepared and able to buy a $300,000 home in cash.
• Have enough disposable income to comfortably shop at Nordstrom and other higher-end retailers with a personal shopper.
• Be financially prepared for all the unexpected expenses life throws my way.
• Eat Ramen Noodles when I know I can easily afford a 5-star meal.

I'll share a joke:

"The American Dream is a German Car an Italian wardrobe and a Swiss bank account. "

I think the fun of becoming rich is getting there. I like a good challenge. So until I can do all of the above without breaking a financial sweat, I will be working my a$$ of to achieve it.

Labels: Financial

An anonymous poster left a post (here) on my site which partly stated:

"....if you had a business degree, then it would possibly be easier for you to obtain financing to finance your entreprenuerial dreams."

Perhaps a guy in a suit who lives at the bank from 9am-5pm might think a simple business degree makes me a better entrepreur, but there is a way around this. Here are a few of the people I have met who have become extremely successful without the initial help of a bank:

• James Flores - CoFounder of Ocean Energy - He started his oil/gas exploration company when he had no money. He borrowed from family friends and maxed out close to 30 credit cards totalling over $120,000 at 26% interest.
• Robert Sek - Started an internet company with a relatively small investment. Rapidly grew his company and used the profits to invest in larger ventures.
• Tim League - Founder of Alamo Drafthouse chain of movie theater/resturants. Needed several hundred thousand dollars to convert a parking structure into a movie theater. He used his $50,000 of savings, his wife convinced her parents to re-finance their house, they got a small-business federal loan (which almost anyone can get) and they maxed out 26 different credit cards.
• Family Friend 1 - Built up small savings from working, then started buying/selling condos. From there he has moved onto multi-million dollar commercial properties and full apartment complex's.
• Family Friend 2 - Was working an everyday job when he landed a small government contract for an environmental cleanup. Reinvested profits and the business grew into a multi-national environmental cleanup corporation with operations in almost every state in the U.S.
• Family Friend 3 - Worked an engineering job for many years, intelligently saved his money and bought his first piece of commercial property. He now owns a highly successful real estate company.

As you can see, the bank did not play a crucial role in the beginning of these lives. In a case such as Tim League's, I think his borrowing methods actually drove him harder to succeed. If he didn't succeed, he would have lost his family money, lost his savings and absolutely obliterated his credit score.

So even if a business degree can make you more qualified for a loan, there are always ways around it.