I'm doing a little celebratory dance right now as our net worth has finally reach the golden positive numbers. WOOHOO!!!

We still have my student loan debt, however, we now have more assets than liabilities and can really start aiming to build on our current financial foundation.

It feels good to reach these goals.

Last month I started tracking my progress against my financial goals for this year against a monthly scale. As I have set several goals in different areas of saving and am aiming to achieve these goals in order of priority, I find this a much easier way to measure my progress. How I am trying to do this is that I am noting down what my individual goals are and the value amounts of what I expect to achieve by the end of the year. Then I noted what my actual starting amounts were then minused these two amounts, which gave me the actual amounts I would require to reach my goals. I then divided these amounts by 12, which gave me the monthly amount required to reach the goals. I can then compare my actual amounts saved or paid off each month to the monthly amounts provided by the above calculation. This way I can see which goals I am on target to reach after 12 months and which ones I am still behind on.

I have also carried out this calculation on my goal net worth, which includes all the individual golas I set. This gives me a clear indication of how I am tracking overall for the month.

So for example, I may be behind on paying off my student loan by 2 months, but I may been ahead of paying off my CC by 2 months and therefore still be on track to reach my financial goals by the end of the year as my net worth may be right on target.

I hope my explaination is understandable. This system of goal tracking is very much a work in progess for me and I'm open to any feedback or suggestions you may have that might help me keep a better overview.

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Well after all the explaination lets have a look at my progress to date. I managed to pay off our CC this month (woohooo go us! - I'm still celebrating this one and will be for a long time) which means I have accomplished my total target for the next 12 months on that one. The only debt we still have is my student loan, but due to the very low interest rate (3.5%) on that loan we have decided not to pre-pay it just yet. Instead we are going to build up our savings, which has already started and hopefully should pick up some momentum in the next few months. We are currently not behind on any of our goals and are ahead on some, which puts our net worth at our 5 months expected goal. Woohoo!



This is the first year that we have ever set actual financial goals for ourselves and it is also the first year that we've had so much extra cash. Mainly due to both of us changing our jobs in the second half of last year, which increased our take home income by 1000 EUR each month. So there were alot of uncertainties when I set the goals for this year. I do not feel as though we will keep up this great progress for the whole year so I don't think I need to adjust my goals to be more agressive. If we can reach them I'll be happy. Then we'll see what the next step will be.

We have finally paid off our CC in full WOOHOO. Below is the beautiful sight that I saw when I checked out CC balance online today, with all personal information removed.



I was aiming to have this baby paid off in March'08, however due to life happening the pay off date was delayed. However I am so happy we have finally paid off this 17.5% interest rate financial shackle.

I also want to celebrate the fact that our net worth is only -251. We're almost at our goal of having a positive net worth. I'm so proud of the amount of progress we have made since January and am determined to keep up the momentum as much as possible. I do not expect that we will keep to the great rate of progress for the rest of the year, but I do feel as though we have managed to adjust our way of thinking from a mindset of spending to one of saving. I think it helps that we have discussed both our longer term desires and that we are both focused on saving in order to make them possible.

Woohoo go us!

It is only 2 days into the month of March and all my financial plans for this month have already gone up in smoke. Mostly because I always count my financial month starting from the day I am paid which is the 25th of February, rather than the start of the calendar month. Also because the money we expected to be deducted from BH's salary this month to go towards his pension, was not deducted, which just means we'll have to pay an additional month's contribution if the money is deducted next month. I am doubtful whether the month will deducted next month as it seems the company who is handling BH's pension is very unreliable. This makes it very difficult for me to put a plan into place. Also this month we helped BH's parent financially, which was an unexpected expense and one that may become a regular on our monthly budget depending on how a few things play out.

So the CC will not be paid off by the end of March. In fact we also had our microwave oven break down the last month, so the debt open on the CC has gone up to 1156 EUR after a 100EUR payment made in March (On my sidebar I register the current total paid off since the beginning of the year). Due to the unexpected expenses that have come up, I'm not sure when we will have the money to pay off the CC now. I just hope it is not too far in the future.

On the upside, there has been an additional 794 EUR added to the pensions this month as we found out that BH's company was actually contributing to his pensions plan for the last 6 months, so at least there has been the compulsory contribtuions going in.

Also for this month I participated for the first time in my company's saving plan, which meant I sent 56 EUR pre-tax to a savings account. About 18 EURs of this is money would otherwise have been paid to tax. We also received 155 EUR refund from last year's gas and electricity bills. This money has been transferred to our high yeild savings account(4.5% interest rate) as a start on our long terms savings.

We have also received an unexpected tax bill, which I should have been aware of but had forgotten about. So that's an additional 410 EUR. We can pay this one off in 2 installments, the first is due before 30th March and the second is due by 31st May. We are currently discussing how we should pay this particular bill.

In the meant time, my plan for March is to try and keep control of our spending as much as possible. Prepare our savings for when the pension contribtuions are deducted from BH's pay and use any extra money to pay off the CC.

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Despite all the uncertainties, I wanted to take a look at how we are tracking against the goals I set for us at the beginning of the year as no matter how badly we seem to be doing right now, we need to keep our focus on the goal, as you never know when your luck may turn.

I am going to track these goals pro rata or based on the fact that we are 2 months into the year so should be 2/12 (two twelfths) of the way to the total goals.

- Goal was to pay off CC in full.
Starting amount was 2140.14 EUR
Current amount is 1156 EUR
This would require 178,35 EUR paid per month.
Expected for Feb 356.70 EUR.
45.98 % paid off or 5.5/12.

- Goal was to contribute 4800 EUR to pensions.
Current amount is 981 EUR.
This would require 400 EUR per month
Expected for Feb 800 EUR.
20.44 % contributed or 2.5/12.

- Goal was to save 3000 EUR for long term savings.
Current amount is 210 EUR.
This would require 250 EUR per month.
Expected for Feb 500 EUR.
7% saved or 0.84/12.

- Goal was to save 2000 EUR for EF.
Current amount is 0 EUR.
This would require 167 EUR per month.
Expected for Feb 334 EUR.
0% saved or 0/12.

- Goal was to pay off 480 EUR for student loan.
Current amount is 89 EUR.
This would require 40 EUR per month.
Expected for Feb 80 EUR.
18.54% saved or 2.23/12.

- Goal was to earn 40.09 EUR interest.
Current amount is 4.55 EUR.
This would require 3.34 EUR per month.
Expected for Feb 6.68 EUR.
11.35% saved or 1.36/12.

- Goal was to increase net worth to +6,739.14 EUR.
Current amount is -2,532 EUR.
This would require 1032.43 EUR per month.
Expected for Feb -3,585.14 EUR.
25.17% saved or 3/12.

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These totals have actually made me feel better, because although I am very behind on some of my goals, my overall net worth goal is 1 month ahead of where I expect to be. This is mainly due to my concentrating on paying off my CC card. Once that baby is paid off I'll snowball the money to my savings goals and should be able to catch up quite quickly. So despite the current misfortunes we are on track in the bigger picture. woohoo go us!

Well we have made some decent progress on our CC debt, however we are still paying the minimum on my student loan. The updated figures are as follows:

Credit card debt: 2,110.69 EUR (-1,912.84 EUR)
Student Loan: 9,041.00 EUR (- 203.72 EUR)
Total debt: 11,151.69 EUR (- 2,116.56 EUR)

Looking at the total amount of debt reduction I am quite pleased with our progress. I believe we are well on track to reduce our CC debt to zero by the end of the year, the trick will be keeping it there.

As it has recently occured to me that at the current rate we are paying back our loans, it will take us 15 years to be debt free. Quite shocking when you take into account that I am 25 and my fiancee is 31, we do not own a car or have a mortgage. Only one of us has a university degree and just a bachelors at that. We both work fulltime in reasonably paying jobs (not minimum wage) and yet we are already in over our heads.

Our situation is different to most people on this website as we live in Europe and we both do not speak the language of the country we inhabit, however despite this we have decided we feel quite at home in this place, despite our financial nooses.

I believe that this blog will help me keep track of our progress and hope that it will help keep me motivated in my goals to reduce our debt and hoefully eventually become actively involved in some sort of investing scheme. Our current situation is as follows:

Credit card debt: 4,023.53 EUR
Student Loan: 9,244.72 EUR
Total debt: 13,268.25 EUR

We are pretty good paying back our credit card debit, however at the current rate of paying off it will take us just over 8 months to zero the credit card. We are however only paying off the student loan according to the monthly minimum payments and that is why we will carry the debt with us for 15 years.

My two main goals for this year are to pay off our credit card in full and to increase our student loan payments. I have decided that I need to come up with a payment plan for the student loan and to see how an increase in the payments may reduce the time it will take to pay this loan back.