Paul Net Worth Update – November 2011

Finally a good stock market month! Also a positive cash flow month, the savings is climbing. Highlights this month:

• Investments: Clearly my bottom line benefited from the stellar stock market performance this month. I read that it was one of the best months ever. However, latest news out of Greece is not good, so I’m expecting the start of November to be in the downward direction. In other news here, I’ve started investing in Lending Club, so that will also hopefully continue to grow in the future.
• Cash: I wasn’t expecting this large of a gain this month, what a pleasant surprise! Our savings is increasing, which is a great thing. Hopefully in the near future I can leverage this into making some more investments, but for now extra cash is all going towards a down payment on our next house.
• Credit Cards: I would expect my credit card balances to continue to be large over the next few months. I’ve signed up for the Chase Sapphire Bonus and been approved, which means I’m putting nearly all purchases on that card to ensure that I spend the $3,000 required to get the 50,000 bonus points. I’m being careful here to not make extra purchases. I’m just moving purchases that we would normally pay out of checking with our debit card and using the Chase card.
• I made the first mortgage payment on my newly refinanced mortgage. It’s nice to see so much go towards equity.