January 2016 Finance Report

Well hello there o’ legendary email subscriber. This is my January finance report, prepared and delivered to you from the fine city of Amsterdam.

As usual, I’ll share with you all the details of my finances below, along with a few notes that I think you’ll find interesting.

Diving in…

January Expenses

Food & Drink

My monthly target here is €400 or less, and I’m rarely far below that mark. Didn’t think I was doing anything differently in January, so not sure how I managed to keep it so low. I have cut back on meat, but that doesn’t account for the big savings.

Housing & Utilities

Rent has gone up a little this year. I could save quite a bit on rent if I shared an apartment but I’m happy to pay a premium for my own place in a central location.

Taxes

Now that I’m staying in one place long enough to be considered a resident, I’ll soon be on the hook to pay taxes. At some point I should set myself up so I’m putting money aside each month :-/

Health Care

Travel & Transport

Business Expenses

Some notes on the above:

• I hired a copywriter to help me with the 3M1K sales page. Even though I didn’t get as many sales as I wanted upon launch, I consider this money well spent, as he helped me craft a much better sales page than I would have alone and saved me a bunch of time too.
• After many years using AWeber for my email marketing needs, I’ve made the switch to ActiveCampaign. AWeber is great for the basics, but for advanced stuff like sales funnels AC takes the cake. I’m really loving it.
• I upgraded my MoneyWiz app to the latest version in time for the new year. Happy to do it, too, as it’s the best app I’ve found for finance tracking. Saves me a lot of time putting together these reports!
• Think I’m paying my accountant too much? You’re not alone. I addressed this in a previous report.

Gifts & Donations

A friend asked me to help out with that campaign for Nathan, her cousin’s son.

Books

Listed above are only the books I paid for last month. I also get books as gifts and via rewards credit. You can see all my book recommendations and what I’m currently reading over on Goodreads. I usually get through a book a week.

Clothing

Miscellaneous Expenses

Expense Summary

I was aiming to keep expenses under €2.5k, so didn’t quite make it. I didn’t foresee hiring that copywriter, which ended up making the difference.

January Income

Away from the minuses and on to the pluses…

I was shooting for €3k total and… well, yeah, that didn’t happen.

The €3k goal was based on the assumption that I’d get two products launched by the end of January, but I didn’t get either of them out there in time.

It always sucks when you spend way more than you make in a month, so I won’t pretend that it’s all fine and dandy. January was tough.

Biggest Regret?

Nothing major.

Except for that €1 to use the toilet at Escape, the bar/club where I take salsa classes. Really bugs me when you’re a paying customer at a place, taking their classes or buying their overpriced drinks, and they make you fork over more money just to take a piss.

Where That Leaves Me

I had €7,836/$8,509 to my name at the end of December. After applying the most recent exchange rates (I have accounts in EUR, HKD and USD), those totals shifted a little to €7,829/$8,525.

Taking into account all my January income and expenditure, my total bank and cash balances now work out to €4,767/$5,191.

Outlook For February

No point making predictions for February since that month has come and gone as I’m writing this. Check out that report here.

Feedback Welcome

Thoughts? Questions? Speak up in the comments below.