I didn’t really do New Year’s resolutions this year, but I did whisper some goals to myself. I would like to be better about posting. I will likely fail at that goal. And fast. Anyone want to take bets?

Whatever your goals, be kind to yourself

Last year was a bit rough. This year may be starting out rough for you too. During my days supervising Zoom school from home, I heard some wisdom dropped by my daughter’s first grade teacher.

She told the girls, “Just do your best.” “You may not get it all done.” “You may not understand how to do it and get frustrated.” “It’s OK.” “Just do your best.”

And sometimes, your best is good intentions and reasonable goals that you fail to meet. It’s OK.

Our net worth has continued to grow while we take on more debt

I added a new row to my net worth tracker. A Home Equity Loan has joined the “nonsense” party. We got a loan to help pay for our bathroom renovation. This doesn’t cover all of it. But it’s all the bank would give me. And I didn’t fight them on it. It’s at 4.25% interest.

We have almost $1 MILLION DOLLARS in Assets

We were close in December, but seeing it hit nine hundred ninety nine thousand and more dollars hits different than 980k. Wow. This seemed like an impossible pipe dream a few years ago. And now suddenly financial independence seems like a thing that could happen.

Net Worth for January 2021: $365,247

Due to the power of the stock market, our assets grew more than the amount of extra debt I managed to put us in. Hi Ho. I’m doing my best to keep it all low interest.

But…..

I have a raging dumpster fire that needs to be solved NOW!

I have $23,868 that is sitting on credit cards that had 0% balance transfer offers expire. They are now at 12.99 – 16.99% interest. That is a four alarm fire requiring a swift response.

I do not have an immediate solution to this problem. I’m trying to sell things on Ebay. My two months of sales of garbage lying around the house has grossed $444. In case you weren’t sure: $444 is very far away from the $23,838 I need. We’re on Plan B right now: hoping for another balance transfer card to push some of this debt into being “next years problem” while I direct every cent possible over the coming months to paying off the rest. My nuclear option is taking out a 401(k) loan to make this raging dumpster fire debt go away quickly.

It is pointless to invest money at like 10% returns if consumer debts are growing at nearly twice the rate.

Fingers crossed I find a way out before going nuclear option.