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Home > Archive: April, 2013

Archive for April, 2013

Added a spending goal

April 19th, 2013 at 03:38 pm

Because I don't have enough goals to work on, I am planning on buying DH and I road bikes this year. It's my fault because I mentioned wanting to get road bikes again and DH went and researched the ideal ones for long distance travel (we think of 30 miles as a quick bike ride). Long term its a fairly cheap hobby and we got our use out of our bikes we bought last time (sold them awhile back because they were too small long term and we knew we needed larger frames). Fortunately with all the overtime DH has been working and the raise he got, it won't actually slow our debt payoff.

If you include debt payoff, we are saving 45% of our gross income this year (25% gross to retirement savings). While I would have preferred to wait another year, I think we are doing well even with this big purchase.

Could have been a problem

April 15th, 2013 at 02:05 pm

Our toilet in the basement appeared to be slowly draining (probably something small between the rubber gasket and the whole it covers) so I went down to check on it and see if I could jiggle something to prevent the pump from kicking on every half hour (ended up just shutting the water off to it until we have time to work on it). While down there noticed that the washer machine connection hoses (which are reinforced rubber) were bulging in multiple places. Not good. Had DH turn the water off to them and went online to order stainless steel braided hose replacements. We had already replaced these once about 3 1/2 years ago thanks to the previous hoses leaking where they hooked up to water supply after only 6 months but our high efficiency washer is tough on the water supply and sounds like a jackhammer when it kicks the water on and off so can't say I am surprised.

Now I am thinking I should make a point of checking the dishwasher line (suspect that one is already stainless steel braided but the gaskets in the ends can periodically fail). That one is about 4 years old. Just glad I noticed the hoses before we had one burst. Even with a drain in the basement, that could have been one very big mess.

Another nice surprise

April 5th, 2013 at 02:12 pm

I have only recently gotten access to my DH's 401(k) thanks to mint accessing everything for us. So imagine my surprise when I see another deposit to his 401(k) when we already got the matching. Turns out he gets a profit sharing contribution every April as well. I remember him mentioning something like this last year but didn't realize it was an every April type thing till I checked the account history.

And this is why I have one of my goals on mint as the retirement goal. Not because I don't know what I am shooting for, but because I need something tracking how much the retirement accounts are growing every month. My guess had been less than half of what we have been averaging...

You would think I would have had a better idea because I know what percentage I am putting into the 2 401(k)s and I know the actual dollar amount that is going into the Roths but...by the time you have 4 different accounts going and you are using different methods of contributing, it just seems that its hard to tell the actual dollar amounts, especially with market returns. Which is further complicated with his matching and profit sharing.

Not that I am complaining. Its a good problem to have. But this is definitely the first year I have gotten a good look at how our retirement accounts are growing as a whole.