Why Do I Post My Net Worth Each Month?
Filed under: Blog, Personal Balance Sheet, Personal Finance
Around the beginning of every month, I have been posting the month-to-month change in my assets, liabilities, and net worth. It’s not a terribly common thing to do and it does open me up to some risk, but I think it’s important in my situation. I debated with myself for quite a while on how I would do it and how much I would release, but I like the balance I’ve come up with.
I don’t do it to brag about my net worth (it’s not too much to brag about, anyway) and I don’t do it just to maintain an “open relationship” with you.
I do it to show whether the advice and ideas I share here on my blog actually work.
When I write about a debt snowball method, it’s because I’m actually doing it myself. When I write about putting snowflakes to work, it’s because they’re already working for me. I won’t write about the benefits of some new idea if I’m not following it myself, unless I also make it clear that I’m not. If I’m following a philosophy that doesn’t work, you will see it clearly over the course of a few months through my net worth.
While it still makes me a bit nervous at times to release the data, I believe it’s important to my mission.
What I hope is that you take what I share and try to beat it. I’m not doing the worst, but I’m also not doing the best - there is always room for improvement. And the purpose of this blog is not just to chronicle my financial journey, but also to encourage you and hopefully give you tools to do at least as well as I am. And over time as we all evolve together, we’ll all come out ahead in the end.
I hope what I share encourages you. Personal finance can be a big and scary thing and everyone needs a cheerleader every now and then. As long as you find good advice, parse it against your own common sense filters, and put it to good use, you will have a better chance than most.
Here’s to a positive and growing net worth from here on!
April 2nd, 2008 at 10:09 am
I tend to do the same thing as you and announce my monthly earnings on my blog. I find that it helps to motivate me to make more money as I know people will be looking and comparing how much I have made to how much they have made.
April 3rd, 2008 at 8:01 am
Posting your net worth each month does give your methods an air of credibility. I don’t calculate or post mine monthly since my income is very irregular so my net worth declines most of the time even though the overall trend is positive. I may give it a shot this fall once I have a salary and money coming in every month.