What a roller coaster month in the market. We lost about 10% of our 401k in January, but kept on contributing to it. We've got another 30 years before we touch it, so it doesn't matter what we did. Overall our retirement savings gained $122, solely due to the fact we made our 2007 Roth IRA contributions and left it in cash. We didn't have time to buy anything before the year was out.
Second, we increased our cash position to $14k, decreased our stock position by $8k. And we decreased our mortgage by $700 and our CC $100. So we'll keep the cash on hand till this summer. No bashing, but DH has participated in the employee stock purchase plan (ESPP), but we're not sure where the money is. So next month we'll get it straightened out.
Also I forgot to wrap up my CC rewards for the year. We earned $300 from Citibank Simplicity, $200 from Citibank Driver's Edge, Amex $115, Discover $120 = $465 for the year. Not a bad rewards year. Also we'll be earning rewards from having the Costco Executive membership. I wonder if it'll be worth it this year?
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Half way through the month I was down about 14% and have come back to down about 6%, so I guess that is good? I am heavily invested in stock and am set up for aggressive growth right now. As I get older and look at playing it safer, I will scale back on the stock. There were a few people I know that pulled out when the market 'crashed' and I thought that was dumb. My friend calls 401k dollars Monopoly money because we can't touch it for a few more decades yet anyway. I like your rewards programs too, even though it probably doesn't offset the interest paid on the credit cards. We have a Costco nearby and I have never been in it, debating if a membership is worth it.
My net worth decreased because my investments did so poorly...I even increased my cash by about $400...and contributed over $700 to my retirement fund...
I don't think you should watch the market that closely, especially for investments in retirement accounts. The wisest thing to do usually during market ups and downs is absolutely nothing.
When the market goes down, all is it means is that you're buying more shares with the deposits you're making. It's not the time to be selling.
Barb1954
Jim I don't pay interest on my CC. If I did, I wouldn't use them at all. The rewards are gravy. I'm debating if the Costco Executive membership is worth it, I'll keep the regular membership. Although recently since some things happened, we may switch back and buy 2 seperate regular memberships so our parents can each have a membership too. Some stuff happened, so we might have too. This will probably happen when we find out what our rewards are.
Barb, no timing of the market. Just laziness. We weren't trying to time it, we just didn't have time to research what we wanted to buy and do our due diligence. Hence we decided it's best to wait until we do.
401k is on auto-invest, but the Roth IRAs, until we know we are on hold. And this weekend starting our taxes. So it might be put off until next week or later depending on how much time we have.
I'm down 4% from the first of the year and 7% since the first of December. I only tally it once a month.
I was half way to being a millionaire the first of the year. Not so now.
cj
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