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Just like every month before it, August flew by.

I had a stronger financial month than I expect and I even achieved 2 of my money milestones!! More on that below.

I felt confident in my finances throughout the month and just very good about them overall. I’m hoping this continues.

General $ Updates

I reached over $8,750 saved for my student loans

That’s a lot of money to me!! This is a great number for August because I didn’t expect to get this high.

I now have over $10K invested

A milestone achieved!! I always invest $150/month into my Roth IRA and I’ve had MANY people take advantage of the $50 M1 Finance bonus so my M1 Invest account increased by almost $1K!

My emergency fund is over $3K (1 month)

Another milestone achieved! I’ve reached over $3K before, so it’s nice to be back.

I technically broke a No Spend rule, but covered the purchase strategically

I purchased 2 books that I definitely didn’t need. However, I redeemed a $25 Amazon gift card via Fetch and that I what I used to make those purchases.

Debt

I started the month of August with my official debt at $36,000 and ended with $36,000. However, I technically started at $29,256.09 if you consider the money I have saved to pay those loans down. 

In August I saved an additional $2,006.09 for my student loans (bringing my total saved to $8,756.24) so my final debt for August would be $27,243.91.

I still have paid $0 in interest 😊

Spending

Some main things to point out about my spending in August:

Groceries: I was under budget on groceries!! Yay!

Food out: I did go over budget on food out though because there were 2 times that I bought food for myself and someone else.

Flipping: I purchased 3 items at GoodWill to potentially flip. I’m working on getting my extra income up!

Income

Full-time job (microbiologist): $5,134.44

ONLINE/BUSINESS INCOME

Google AdSense (ad revenue from YouTube): $491.35
Financial Coaching: $200.00
Buy Me a Coffee: $134.57
Mediavine (display ads on LivinglikeLeila): $111.21
Teachable: $108.48
Etsy: $26.18
Affiliates: $10.45

Online/Business Income Total: $1,082.24

EXTRA INCOME

BOA Cash Rewards: $14.19
Chase Cashback: $21.30
IBotta: $23.00
Fetch (Amazon giftcard): $25.00
Medical Bill Refund: $50.35
Rakuten (referrals): $60.00
SimplyCodes User Testing: $75
Discover Cashback: $76.54 ($50 is referral)
Surgery Refund: $772.37

Extra Income Total: $1,117,75

Pre-Tax Total Income: $7,334.43

Net Worth

As of August 31st my net worth is -$3,631.00!!!! WHAT! Last month I just got under -$10K and now look how much higher!?! Crazy.

Roth IRA: $8,086.19
M1 Invest: $2,833.58

Sinking Funds:

  • Taxes = $2,839.83
  • Emergency Fund = $3,339.61
  • Gifts = $495.81
  • Medical/Dental = $0.99
  • Car maintenance = $837.92
  • Travel = $84.14
  • Car insurance = $601.05
  • FinCon = $1.19
  • Phone = $321.67
  • MacBook = $400.78

Credit Score

My VantageScore remained the same at 766.

August Goals Update

  • Put at least $1,000 to my student loan savings CHECK
  • Make over $1,000 online CHECK
  • 1-2 new financial coaching clients NOPE
  • No spend month 2 KIND OF

September Money Goals

  • Put at least $1,500 to my student loan savings
  • Make over $1,000 online