Oh, question for y’all. If I have an I bond that accrues interest monthly, would you count the interest as both income and savings? I don’t count the ups and downs of my investment accounts of course but those are locked-in gains. I’ve been ignoring it but it’s enough money to notice!
I personally do but wouldn’t say I’m a particularly knowledgeable source 
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I would do both but that is me
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| YTD | |
|---|---|
| 403B - Me | $4,130.48 |
| 403B - Employer | $0 |
| Cash | $1,755.96 |
| Total | $5,886.44 |
24.53% to goal of $24,000, 16.67% of the way through the year
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$4656.99 out of $20,240 saved (23%) into retirement accounts.
$5289.92 (26%) saved when I include cash savings as well.
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Well, now that I have a job again-- I’m in! I’ll probably also have a head start from my severance payment as well.
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TFSA - $3000/$15000
RRSP- $1000/ $15000
Freedom 55 - $2575/ $5000
House Reno - $840/ $25000
I wasn’t paying attention to how much I was setting aside in the freedom 55 and home Reno account. Thought the house Reno account I had only put $300 in. Huh.
Good thing I decided to do a check in!
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I’ve been absent from the forum for um well I’m not sure how long but trying to get back into it. I’m joining the challenge as my goal for the year is to max out my 401k, HSA, and Roth so hitting $20,240 is on track.
So far I’ve saved
401K = $4,791.70
HSA = $1,729.16
Total as of March 20th = $6,520.86
*I’ll update again after my end of the month paycheck
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Q1 check in! Monthly checkins aren’t a great fit for me because the Boy finds it burdensome to send me his paystubs that often, but he send me the first three all at once.
So far we have grossesd $38,842 and saved $6908, Savings rate of 17% and we’re on track to meet the goal!
I took almost $10K out of savings for the heat pump upgrade. Even with that, we would be close to the $20,240 goal if nothing changes the rest of the year- but I said that was the stretch goal (regular goal is to not count the HVAC against the savings).
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I should have checked in at the end of this month instead of midway…but I was thinking about it today.
TFSA- $6815/$15,000
RRSP- $10565/$24,000
Freedom 55- $2737/$5000
Home Reno- $1065/$25000
Profit sharing - 6,000ish
So total so far is $27,182. bonus went straight to RRSP account, and profit sharing went into a DPSP.
I will reforecast this in May because as I am shuffling accounts around, I have a margin account that will be receiving cash. I decided the smart thing to do will be to shove part of it in to the TFSA to max out available room, and then reinvest the rest. RRSP I will let continue bi-weekly as it is pre-tax dollars and will shift over next year to QT. I also have $24,000 in RRSP room that I’m trying to hit this year now since I messed that up last year.
So technically I have met the challenge but let’s see how far we can get this year! 
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I’ll just call this Q1 check in but I know I’m late! I’m about to get a long overdue COLA raise at work so I’m excited to rework and increase my savings after that! For now I’m shifted more money into my Roth because we’ve been lucky and I haven’t had to pull out of my emergency fund for a while so it’s fully stocked for now.
Retirement contributions: 1662
Deferred Comp: 400
Roth IRA: 1650
Savings: 3389
Total: 7101
So I’m definitely on track after 4 months to hit more than $20,240 by the end of the year.
Not gonna lie though, I’m feeling so afraid of the state of the world and the long term stability of our economic system that saving for retirement is feeling strange right now How do ya’ll deal with that fear while still doing the current right thing to be secure for the future?
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Some things are inside my zone of control. Some things are outside of my zone of control. In most cases, more money will help at the beginning of a bigger problem, and if the problem gets so big that it doesn’t matter any more, then I will have bigger worries than the loss of my investments.
I also go back to some of the original tenets of YMOYL and MMM - decreasing consumption as environmental action, increasing community behaviours as a resilience benefit. e.g. cooking meals from scratch hits so many different items on the scorecard. Not owning a car, living in a smaller space than we could afford on paper, choosing a community with high economic diversity and many independently owned stores, all there.
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| YTD | |
|---|---|
| 403B - Me | $8,238.74 |
| 403B - Employer | $795.14 |
| Cash | $3795.14 |
| Total | $12,629.75 |
52.64% to goal of $24,000, 41.67% of the way through the year
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You said this so well! this is a good way to think about things and how I often approach it
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So, I apparently didn’t join a savings challenge this year? I should. I think we’re likely to hit this one in spite of Husband not getting his contract renewed for the 2024-25 academic year. We found that out not long before the challenges went up, which is probably what happened.
But, we’ve funded our IRAs since then (at “old people” rates of $7500 each) and are putting his full salary into his 457K account because the vast majority of our retirement accounts are in my name and that doesn’t seem right. We’re doing both Roth IRA and Roth 457K so we can access the contributions without tax or penalty if we have to.
All of which probably means we’ve hit it already, or close to it.
- Roth IRA - $7,500*2 = $15,000
- HSA him - $755*4 = $3,020
- Pension him - $342*4 = $1,368
- Roth 457B him - 3,433.87*4 = 13,735.48
- HSA me - $377.50*4 = $1,510
- Roth 457B me - $50*4 = $200
- Pension me - $423.13*4 = $1,692.52
(everything *4 because we’ve gotten 4 paychecks so far this year)
Total: $36,526
I guess we did it! We will go for $20,240 per person if he lands another job (tried to talk him into retiring, but he won’t). If he starts up a consulting business instead, we probably won’t go for it.
I almost wonder if all this even counts since we’re hedging our bets so heavily with the Roths. We can get it back as liquid cash if we need it. So does that count?
The wonders of being older DINKs, you guys.
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OK, this year has been weird.
We bought a house, carried two mortgages for awhile, then sold the other house, paid off the HELOC out of necessity (it was registered to the former house), had a truck stolen, bought a new truck, and carried out a huge reno (still ongoing).
So far this year:
$2500 J2 RESP
-$5000 withdrawn from Star TFSA for downpayment
$29292.50 Deposited into Star TFSA from house proceeds (max for 2024)
-$43500 withdrawn from Prospy TFSA for downpayment
$22450.51 Deposited in Prospy TFSA from house proceeds (Max for 2024)
$3150 Deposited to Star RRSP
$4000 Deposited to non-registered GIC
So - that is a net of $12893.01 into investments. However, there is also a wad of cash sitting in a savings account, which will refill the TFSA’s to their max on Jan 1 2025.
Old house mortgage $5256.90 paid on principal, prior to sale
New house mortgage: Once old house sold, we put the maximum 10% annual prepayment on it, plus have doubled up all payments since. Principal paid since possession on Feb 29 2024: $67,733.52
So, a net of $72990.42 paid onto mortgage principal (Excluding the payoff of old house mortgage)
I know I said HELOC payments didn’t count, but while we were previously paying a voluntary $250 weekly into the HELOC, the mortgage payout meant paying off around the $100,000 balance. So, just noting the payment
Investments $12893.01 + Principal $72990.42 = $85883.43
@anomalily I am declaring us complete at the stretch goal
Edit: forgot to include company pensions
Me: $5466.72
Company Match $5466.72
Him: Who knows, probably comparable to mine if not more
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We were going backwards but may end up making it because i got a job. 
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I am a little delayed making my Q2 update but I finally got all the info!
In Q2 we drew from savings to fund our new heatpump, so technically we saved -3430, bringing our total for the year down from 6908 to 3478.
But my goal was to save $20,240 not counting the heat pump. By that metric, we are at 13,140 saved for the first two quarters, putting on track to meet our goal, barring unforeseen domestic disaster.
I am counting the home equity I am building but not the equity in the van.
This exercise is AMAZING for my sanity. We are usually in the red if I’m comparing take-home pay to monthly spending (we catch up on minor windfalls like three paycheck months, tax refund, bonuses), but here I see that we are actually gaining a decent amount of ground.
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So instead we’re currently ~$15k backwards from the start of the year, but between Ponder’s bonus and my new job we’ll be at 0 week before end of year. And I’m aware of some gaps in our budget buckets that are now being addressed. Most of the issue was the mortgage rate jumping when our fixed rate finished last year. Feeling very fortunate we have a giant cash float and that I started my new job in July because we were gonna be having some uncomfortable discussions otherwise.
(Net worth was fine and went up, but money was dripping from the available cash). I guess I’ve not decided if things like Superannuation counts. Maybe for stretch goals but not for my “what did we deliberately set aside” money.
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I get to come to this challenge now that I got a nice commission check!
I’m at $15,300 saved thru August with income of $34,642 which is 44.2% saved.
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