Net Worth Update: October 2021

Welcome to my net worth update for October 2021! These numbers represent my wife and I’s net worth as of October 1st. If you haven’t already, check out our previous net worth update.

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Car Finally Paid Off!

I’m so happy to share that my car is finally paid off after seven years of monthly payments! I bought my car soon after starting my first full-time job. At the time, financing rates with the dealership were only 1%, so I decided to sign up for an 84 month(!) term. Seven years later, and I’ve finally paid it off.

Now how about a question: Do I have any regrets about signing up for such a long commitment?

That’s a tough one. My car has been reliable and of great utility to me for all these years. But on the other hand, having access to such cheap financing certainly encouraged me to buy a new car instead of a used one. Knowing what I know now, including how reliable vehicles can be, I probably would have bought used if given the opportunity to re-do that decision.

Tracking Our Expenses

This month my wife and I focused our efforts on repainting some of our interior walls. The previous owner left a lot of holes in the walls from paintings, photos, and I can only imagine what else. So we resolved to patch these holes and give the walls a fresh coat of paint to cover up the repairs.

I also completed the quintessential homeowner task of fixing a towel rack. Along with our paint and supplies, that fix contributed to the $412 in total we spent on home maintenance.

Our largest expense for the month was our car insurance payment. We usually pay the entire year off at once, saving us about $40 in financing charges. Spending $1,764 on insurance may seem like a lot ($147 per month!), but it has actually gone down significantly compared to last year when I paid over $2,000 for the same insurance.

Too bad our house insurance couldn’t follow the same trend. Our policy expired, and the price of insuring our home increased $13 to $99 per month. The agent I spoke to justified the increase by explaining that the cost to rebuild our home had increased significantly. I suppose inflation of building material and trades costs are affecting us all, even if we’re not building a home or doing renovations.

Net Worth Increase

Last month was interesting because it was a three paycheque month for both my wife and I. That pushed our income up to $14,600 after taxes which is way higher than in a typical month. After all of our expenses and transfers (by transfer, I mean refunds, rebates, etc.), we saved $8,300. This was music to my ears, at least until I checked how our investment accounts were doing.

That’s right, across all of our investment accounts, we accrued a $5,900 loss for the month. Finally, our multi-month streak of positive investment growth has come to an end! For reference, last time our investments dragged down our net worth growth was in November of 2020.

Despite these losses, we increased our net worth to $424,600, which is up $4,300 from the previous month’s $420,400.

Counting Our Dividends

Last month we earned dividends from 4 sources: VEE, VTI, XDG, and XDIV. Two of these ETFs, XDG and XDIV, pay monthly. VEE and VTI are some of our quarterly dividend payers, so they only show up occasionally. Combined, we pulled in $238 in dividends over the last month.

Comparing this month to last year’s shows us just how much progress we’ve made. Last October, we reported $112 in dividend income. That means our dividend income is up 112% compared to the previous year. 

In 2021 we have already earned over $1,900 in dividends. I don’t typically track our forward dividend income. But if we keep earning dividends at the current pace, we should hit $2,375 by year’s end.

That’s equivalent to working 158 hours at $15 per hour, excluding taxes. Not too shabby for only our second year of investing since purchasing our home!

Thanks for Reading

Thank you for checking out my net worth update for October 2021. I recently wrote a few articles that you may be interested in. This includes my guide to closing costs in Canada and my choice for the best REIT ETF in Canada. Consider giving those a read if you think they’ll help you on your financial journey!

As always, please consider following me on social media or signing up for my newsletter if you’d like to be notified periodically (less than once per month) with a list of my recent articles.