Net Worth: $10380.25

Winning and losing at the same time

Our net worth is still climbing. But if you look at what we’re doing, you can see we’re still sustaining some bad habits. Student loan debt is holding pretty steady. Credit card debt is steady or growing.

The Story the Numbers Don’t Tell

I raided my daughter’s piggy bank for $1.50 today. I didn’t have any cash on hand and needed to add money to my transit fare card to ride into work.

Here’s some of the problems. We moved in March and I switched jobs. Without any lifestyle inflation of us enjoying more or different things, we had a huge bottom line inflation of our basic costs. They went up. A lot.

• Rent – up $405/month
• Health Insurance – up $100+/month (I know before it was around $300 and now it’s about $400 in premiums)
• Transit – up $50/month

So, total increase of $6600 in costs while my base salary went down $10,000 a year. If/when I get my bonus, I’ll have more cash, but that doesn’t help pay my health insurance or rent costs today.