In February I visited South Africa and spent way too much money. Am I still on track?
As decided in my new year resolution I am now tracking expenses. It is embarrassing that I am spending so much money… I can only recommend this exercise.
January and February Expenses
| Expenses | |||||||
| January | February | ||||||
| Category | EUR | SGD | USD | EUR | SGD | USD | |
| Travel | -1,684 | -2,584 | -1,912 | -2,438 | -3,740 | -2,768 | |
| Car | -336 | -515 | -381 | -265 | -407 | -301 | |
| Groceries | -311 | -477 | -353 | -96 | -147 | -109 | |
| Eating out | -273 | -419 | -310 | -20 | -31 | -23 | |
| Business | -254 | -390 | -288 | -50 | -77 | -57 | |
| Cleaning & Ironing | -219 | -336 | -249 | -180 | -276 | -204 | |
| Eyes, Hair, Health | -195 | -299 | -221 | -57 | -87 | -65 | |
| Other | -213 | -327 | -242 | -196 | -301 | -223 | |
| Utilities | -192 | -295 | -218 | -192 | -295 | -218 | |
| Gifts | -119 | -183 | -135 | -4 | -6 | -5 | |
| Entertainment | -108 | -166 | -123 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Canteen | -85 | -130 | -96 | -23 | -35 | -26 | |
| Bars | -74 | -114 | -84 | -28 | -43 | -32 | |
| Uber | -42 | -64 | -48 | -36 | -55 | -41 | |
| Total | -4,105 | -6,298 | -4,661 | -3,585 | -5,500 | -4,070 | |
Another brutal month in terms of expenses. I spent two weeks in South Africa which was probably one of the best experiences I ever had. All spending during this time (rental car, meals, restaurants) was combined into the “travel” category. My wife also paid for some things, but this table only shows my expenses, as we keep separate accounts.
Already now the expense tracking is proving eye opening. I am looking at this table and can’t believe these amounts. Now that a lot of the trips for the first half of 2019 are booked and paid I hope for some lower travel spending. I need to come up with a strategy to get the costs down.
Portfolio update
Portfolio increased by SGD 11,185 to SGD 346,439 (USD 256,000). Fresh investments of SGD 5,622 and gains of SGD 5,563 contributed. The market is so optimistics this year – no idea what is going on!
Investments vs. plan
I invested SGD 5,622 into my portfolio which was less than planned (SGD 6,300). So far I am already SGD 2,640 behind the plan for this year. Things are bound to improve though, especially the outlook for bonus in April seems better than expected, as my boss submitted me for an extra bonus for high performance. Needless to say this is welcome, but highly undeserved.
Dividends received
Outlook
It is already mid March – I need to make more efforts to create updates on time. The company I founded takes up all my free time now. After a slow start I now keep getting enquiries and have to work with a lot of prospective customers. I just hope some of the prospective customers will turn into real customers soon … So far the company has been only a cost, but also a huge learning. Still cheaper than doing an MBA I guess!