January 2008 Site and Net Worth Review (-7.35%)
By Pinyo • Feb 4th, 2008 • Category: MiscellaneousNet Worth Review
January was a bad month for the stock market despite two rate cuts by the Fed. The S&P 500 index dropped -6.12% from 1468.36 to 1378.55. According to NetworthIQ, my net worth went down -1.66% and net investable assets went down -7.35%, or from 23.93% to 22.18% of $1 million goal — 2 down months in a row!
Highlights
- We are still a single income family with my wife staying at home with the baby; so we are definitely seeing our cash reserve go down.
- My alternative investment through peer-to-peer lending networks grew:
- On Prosper, my portfolio grew from $100 to $251.67. The $1.67 is interest on my first payment of my first loan.
- On Lending Club, my portfolio grew from $0 to $50.61 — the $0.61 was a test deposit.
- We were able to reach the maximum contribution limit for my 401k and both of our Roth IRA for 2007. The last $4,000 was deposited to our IRAs early in January. So, this was the big win for the month.
- My retirement portfolio dropped by -3.08% due to the market decline, but was buoyed by new contributions.
- My estimated home value increased by +0.77%. This is surprising considering the weak housing market. But the explanation could be a regional thing, or the two Fed interest rate cuts. I am not an economist, so I am not sure about this one.
What my friends are saying about their net worth
- January Net Worth Review at Single Guy Money
- January 2008 Net Worth Update: -3.7% at My Dollar Plan
Blog Review
At the end of this month, members of the M-Network got together and started a blog to help new bloggers. If you have chance, please visit us at Blogthority.
As always, I owe the success of this blog to the support from my readers and other bloggers. So a big THANK YOU!
Performance
This is a month of incredible growth for Moolanomy. There are a lot of factors that contributed to this, but I would like to say a special thank you to Lifehacker.com for linking to my post about 35 common sense rules of investing.
- Subscribers grew +63% from 537 to 876 — if you are not a subscriber yet, subscribe now…it’s free.
- Search traffic grew +28% from 3,008 to 3,847
- Unique visitors grew +129% from 18,605 to 42,562
- Page views grew +178% from 31,884to 88,609
All four stats are at their all-time high!
Top 5 Most Viewed Posts This Month
- 35 Common Sense Rules for Investing from 7/31/2007
- 12 Investing Mistakes I’ve Made, and How You Can Learn From Them from 12/12/2007
- Personal Finance Blogosphere Best of 2007 from 1/15/2008
- 7 Steps Debt Reduction Illustrated from 11/28/2007
- Using Simple Rules to Predict your Retirement Needs from 12/6/2007
Top 10 Referrers
Special thank to the top 10 referrers.
- Lifehacker.com
- Get Rich Slowly
- Cash Money Life
- Being Frugal
- I’ve Paid For This Twice Already…
- The Kirk Report
- Free Money Finance
- Gather Little By Little
- Plonkee Money
- The Dough Roller
Again, a big thank you to my readers and fellow bloggers for your support.
Outstanding Growth! Your finances are doing well too.
I’m glad I could send a few people your way.
You’re doing great! And I’m always happy to refer!
Thanks for the link to Blogthority. I’ve been on a “blogs about blogging” kick lately and this will be a great addition to my daily reads. And congrats on how well your blog is doing!
How are you measuring your home value - are you using something like zillow.com?
Hey, I referred some traffic. Wonderful.
And, just think of all those stocks that you’re buying on sale.
congrats - sounds like you’re doing pretty well.
Hopefully i’ll someday have a fraction of the readers you do.
Terrific job, Pinyo! One day I will be in the big leagues with you and having fun. It is interesting how despite the wild ride on the stock market, as long as we keep contributing to our retirement funds, it is not so much of a hit after all.
I have no clue but I suppose if contributions stopped, it would be a bigger hit.
Thank you everyone for your contribution and support!
@Lily - Thank you. I look forward to see you on Blogthority.
@Ryan - Right now I use average of estimates from the following sites: Real Estate ABC, HomeGain (Low), HouseFront, Cyberhomes (Avg), and Zillow
@Plonkee - I wish I have more cash
@Pete - You will. Just keep blogging and if your quality is good, the readers will come…eventually.
@Mark - Thank you. You already have a big league blog, so I don’t know what you are talking about
Yeah, the hit would definitely be bigger without new money added to the existing fund.
Hi Pinyo,
Thanks to you, I was inspired to post my net worth too…I intend to post about it monthly so that I could remind myself of my goals.
Amazing traffic progress! Congratulations!
Congrats!