December 2005 net worth

(click for larger image)

Generally it looks good—net worth up almost 3% in one month. But there are several disappointments in there. In the last week of the month, all the investments went down over $4,000, led by stock options (almost $3K down in one week). I would have hit $450K in net worth otherwise, but I’ll have just have to wait a little longer for that. Here are a few details on the month:

I’m happy we set up the emergency fund and have it automatically funded. It’s small now, but having it at a separate bank will make accumulation easy.

There is a lot of overlap between Investments and the IRAs, and most stocks in there did very well in December. The market took the 401K up some, but $1,200 of the $2,110 increase was from contributions and employee matching. And I finally set up a ShareBuilder account thanks to an $80 incentive through Costco. I’m looking forward to steadily funding it.

The stock options were hands down the most disappointing area. I had some options vest in December, and at November 30 pricing they were worth $10K. However our stock price dropped a lot this month, so I’m only up $5,650. Every dollar the stock moves is over $2,000 in value change for me. There is potential here for some sizeable upside gains, but I don’t see that happening for at least 18-24 months. (As a side note, I value the options after-tax. Tax is withheld at the time of exercise and sale, so I only see about 60% to 63% of the total gain.)

I should know soon if my estimate on the house is good. A house down the street with the same floorplan as ours has a sale pending (it was a pro athlete’s second house and he is now with a team in a different part of the country). They had it listed at $899K, but I felt that was too much. I’m hoping they were able to get close to my estimate.

I had planned on the credit cards going down more this month, but some last minute trips to Costco and Ikea pushed the balance back up. By the end of March, those balances should be cut in half or more. The asset side of the equation has been growing faster than the liability side decreases, but that has been by design. We’ll change that to some extent this year.