My goal until April 15th is to fully fund my 2009 Roth IRA. I’ve stoppped contributing to my employer plan and will be socking away as much as possible until I hit the $5,000 mark. It was going to be close because I happen to get paid of the 15th of April this year and didn’t want to leave it until the last minute, but the $800 in tax refunds I’ll be getting should put me over the top and help me reach the Roth IRA limit.

Blog Traffic

Another month of unsustainable growth has gone by an increase in traffic of 111% and the statistics continue to surprise me. I’m sure some of the progress is due to the Alexa Challenge, and as that page makes its rounds on other blogs, I hope many of the readers stay.

Samurai Alexa Ranking Challenge

It’s been awesome getting to know everyone and being part of an awesome community, and the results have been fantastic. Everyone is moving up, and in the past month, my rank rose from 441,611 to 142,090! How great is that?? I’m definitely starting to slow down, but I’ve reached the front page of the Wisebread rankings and now I’ll start to enjoy many of the other benefits of being a member of the Yakezie.

Favorites

Personal Finance 101

Pay Down Variable HELOC or Fixed Mortgage?

What the Credit Card Act Means for You

The True Cost of Coffee

The Best Deal I Ever Got

Guest Posts

FiscalGeek - Why I Don’t Use Zero Based Budgeting

I have been giving updates on my budgeting each month, but as my spending becomes more regular and I have less fluctuation to report, it becomes less interesting, so I am going to change the focus to my net worth, which is a long term goal as I reach for decreasing my debt, increasing my savings, and reaching 0.

January was a great month for both my net worth and for the blog. Let’s start with my financial progress. My bank accounts got a nice boost because I received the second half of my signing bonus at work and completed my orientation period. That comes with a small salary increase which I’ll see in future paychecks. It’s always nice to get a raise and receive recognition for doing a good job.

Net Worth

I was able to increase my net worth by $1,510, up to -$15,975. This includes fully funding my emergency fund, starting my IRA, and paying down student loans. This brings my student loan debt down to $22,587, with the average interest rate being a low 2.79%. Since I’m paying just the minimums due to the low interest rates, this won’t be decreasing quickly, but my other accounts will definitely show sizeable increases moving forward.

Blog Traffic

In terms of the blog, traffic increased 158% over December numbers. The great increase in visitors was likely due to several guest posts, which explains the increase in subscribers as well as return visitors. While these increases are beyond what I would ever have expected, I don’t think the trend will continue. However, I would like to continue growing at a 20% rate, which is definitely possible if I continue to guest post and get my name out there.

Samurai Alexa Ranking Challenge

Personally, I have been doing very well in the Samurai Alexa Ranking Challenge. When we started 12 days ago, I was at 682,918, which was my average ranking over the previous 3 months. Obviously, as I grow, my ranking increases, so even then, my 1 month ranking was just 371,965. Currently, my 1 month rank is 213,551, and my 3-month rank is 441,611. As long as I keep my 1-month number below my 3-month rank, I will continue to build toward my goal of breaching the 200,000 mark.

Favorites

Here are my favorite articles from January, as well as my list of guest posts that went up, in order of referral traffic generated from each post.

Mailbag: 5 Steps to Get Out of Debt

How to Avoid Paying $900/Month For Your iPhone

How to Use a Windfall

Impressing Your Friends Can Cost You

Maybe Phone Insurance Would Have Been Worth It  (Lauren’s Guest Post)

Guest Posts

Money Relationship – Why I Don’t Stress About My $23,000 Pile of Debt (Jan 14)

Budgets Are Sexy – Who Cares If You Saved Money By Spending Money? (Jan 14)

PT Money – Simple Negotiation Boosts Your Mood and Your Wallet (Jan 13)

You Have More Than You Think – The Pinnacle of Frugality (Jan 13)

PT Money – How I Saved $27.95 on My Taxes (Jan 29)

Budget

December was a crazy month for spending. With the holidays and a special trip, I spent more than last month, but I planned for my purchases and subsidized them. Still, I was $500 over my budget, which is over 25% above my projected $1,757 in expenses. Here’s how it broke down:

Overall I was $448 over my budget. The three categories that are fixed (rent, investing, and TV) were all hit on the nose. $62 may seem like a lot for TV, but keep in mind that I pay once out of every four months, so my budgets for the three previous months were 15 and I never really spent that money. The other category that should be fixed, student loans, was over by $26. The reason for that is that they misapplied an extra payment, so the actual amount due and the amount due on the bill were different. I was in the process of signing up for automatic debits from my account, so this shouldn’t happen in the future.

I was $12 over in the Shopping category and $36 over for groceries. I’m not very concerned about their one. I bought new shoes, which happens once a year, and some earmuffs, which I’ve never had before but suddenly love. Only spend $12 on presents for the girlfriend this month! For groceries, if I remember correctly, I did shopping at the very beginning and the very end of the month. So now I’m left with a bunch of food left over. I could roll over the purchases to January, but I won’t.

The categories where I was far off from my predictions were fun and miscellaneous. Maybe I was too fine in categorizing my purchases, but I could easily throw in some of my shopping purchases into the miscellaneous category and make everything look a bit prettier. For the fun category, there were several times this month where I spent money to go out with friends. I justified this by working hard to get some additional referrals from work. I was able to get 5 this month, which gave me the extra $50 for going out and having a good time. The budget was actually higher for fun this month, but I was able to increase my earning for a net loss of the same amount as usual.

The fun category is where everything goes crazy. I made a decision last month to spend more of my money on experiences and after hitting all of my savings targets, not to worry about making larger purchases if I’ll enjoy them. Well, I booked a ticket to California to visit Lauren for her birthday weekend/New Years (it was supposed to be a surprise, but I guess I ruined that by putting my mother on speakerphone without telling her: “So when are you going to LA??” Doh). The tickets were $424 roundtrip, but it was money well spent.

In total, I spent $448 too much, but $36 of that was in a larger debt payment and $424 was for a special trip. So I was really $16 under my budget if you exclude the expenses.

Blog Update

December was a great month for the blog and I’ve been getting more hits. I am going to be guest posting a few times this month for a few terrific blogs, but I should be posting here just as regularly as normal. Also, I am planning on bringing back the “Best of the Rest” posts, possibly on Sunday so I can get quality content posted during the week.

Here are my favorite December posts:

As always, please sign up via RSS and share posts you like with your friends through Facebook, Twitter, Email, or anything else! It really makes a huge difference and hopefully they’ll learn something!

November Budget

November was a difficult month for me in terms of keeping to my budget. I had two unexpected expenses totaling $265, but adjustments to other categories kept me at only $115 over my projected budget.

I expect December to be a good month for me. The only expenses I expect are new sneakers ($41) and getting my suit jacket tailored (~$30), and miscellaneous expenses, which includes snacks, laundry and dry cleaning, and pharmacy items, should be well under my projected budget. I adjusted my miscellaneous expenses down to $160 for the month. That still sounds high, but while I expect the best but plan for the worst. However, I am paying the cable bill 2 months early as a favor to my roommate. That will even out later. Also, Lauren, my fantastic girlfriend, has a birthday at the end of the month. Any suggestions about what to get her?

In terms of the blog, it’s been an exciting month for Sweating The Big Stuff and I’m excited to say that readership has been increasing. I’ve committed to posting more regularly and think I have found a groove that allows me to present new information while giving my insight as well. Of course, any help you provide by promoting the blog (to facebook, twitter, word of mouth) is much appreciated. At the bottom of each post are links to various social networking sites. I encourage you to post the ones you find interesting. Also, don’t forget to subscribe or get articles emailed to you.

Let’s take a look back at my favorite posts from November

These should help you with you get started with your budgeting as well as some ideas about planning:

How To Create A Budget

Budgets Can Work Both Ways

Planning for Unforeseen Expenses

Winning The World Series…Now What?

These two articles show how you can save a lot of money in both the short run and the long run:

Why Phone Insurance Is A Scam

Adjusting Your Withholding

These articles explain a financial idea and tool and gives you a little of my perspective on the current market:

Calculating Interest On Loans

Retirement Accounts Explained

Why I’m Rooting Against The Stock Market