April Goals Update

So glad that the weekend is finally here. For the most part work as been busy and interesting for the last year but the last couple weeks and especially this week work has not interesting at all providing an excellent reminder of why I am pursuing financial freedom. Setting and completing goals is the most important step to achieving financial freedom and to keep myself on track I like to update my goals each month to keep myself accountable.

GOALS

Financial

Expense rate under 45% of my net income.  C

My expense rate was 51% of my income, which isn't bad on its own and is actually quite good considering I spent half of the month in New Zealand on vacation. So 51% good all things considered but I had several bad months already this year so I need to be bringing my expense rate down by keeping the remaining months under my goal of 45%.
 
Establish an emergency fund and automatically deposit some money into it each month. C

Still no progress in this department yet, if I want to open a Money Market account, as I was planning to do, I need at least $10k to open that account with my bank so I am still trying to decide how much cash to save up for this goal.

Invest $2,500 per month. A+

I invested over $2,482 with purchases of NOV and my Loyal3 purchases of Disney (DIS), Kellogg's (K), Unilever (UL), a Pepsico (PEP) this month. Not where I would like to be for the month, but I am up to $10,836 for the year, so I am right now track, if not a little ahead of schedule.

 

Open a Loyal3 account and start a small amount of automatic investing. B+

In one sense this goal is complete, I opened an account and starting automatic investing, however I don't want to mark this as complete yet, I would like to reevaluate in a couple of months and if all is going well, add to my automatic investing.

Pay for my vacations with overtime. C

With being on vacation for half of April I was only able to put in 4 hours of overtime in April, fantastic. I was ahead of schedule last month so I am probably where I would like to be. 

Establish one new source of income. C

No update on this front yet.

Physical

Complete the Tough Mudder. C

I am already signed up for this one, so it will be happening.

Workout my legs 2x per week. F

I definitely did not meet this goal after being on vacation for half the month.

Complete a sprint triathlon. C

No progress on this front yet, but I have been looking for a race I want to join.

Run at a faster Pace: complete a 15K in 1 hour and 24 minutes (9 minute/mile). D

No progress here either.

Reduce my percentage of body fat to 12%. D

I am actually not sure what my current percentage is but I don’t think it is good. 

Track my calorie intake every day and review weekly. F

April was a lost cause on this front.

Personal

Read 6 Books from my Reading List. C

Finally started one of the books on my reading list.

Take an online class. D

Nothing here either.

Average one blog post per week. A

I posted 4 articles in April just barely squeezing in this goal.

Travel somewhere new. COMPLETE

We did it and it was great! We loved our time in New Zealand and I wish we had gone for longer.

Try meditation. C

I need to figure out a game plan for accomplishing this goal.

Try out one new hobby. C

I think I am going to pursue mountain biking, but I need to figure how I can try it out instead of diving headfirst into it.

Date night with my girlfriend at least once per month. A

Our whole trip to New Zealand was one long date night..

Conclusion

I am definitely making progress. But my financial goals need some tightening up if I am going to reach my goals, my expense rate in particular.

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