March 2007 Score Card — Part I: Net Worth

Our net worth growth returned to its normal rate in March after barely coming out positive in February as we got some cooperation from the markets (Dow rose 87 points in March, NASDAQ gained 5 points, and S&P added 14 points).

Overall in March, our net worth saw an addition of $15,032 (or 3.22%) as compared to February. On February 28, we had our net worth, excluding house and car related asset/liability, at $467,091. That number jumped to $482,123 on March 31. The breakdown into each category looks like this:

• Credit card balance: The net change in credit card balance is -$50,122, or 487.68%, which helped to push the total balance to $60,499. However, there’s nothing to be alarmed about as the iincrease is entirely due to the two 0% balance transfer offers I took in March: $18,000 from Citi and $32,000 from Bank of America. In addition, I also have another $8,186 with Discover. Excluding these BT balances, our credit card has about $1,700 from daily spending.
• Cash: All the $50,000 free loan from BT went to our cash account as we saw our cash reserve more than doubled in March, up from $42,855 in February to $89,670. Most of the money is at IGoBanking, earning 5.30% APY. I haven’t decided what to do with the $32,000 from BoA yet. Since I can only keep the money for seven months, the safest way, again, is to go with either Treasury bills or online bank accounts. There aren’t many choices available for me to guarantee both the safety of the principle and the growth of the money in such a short period of time.
• Taxable investments: The biggest story in our net worth in March came from our taxable investments, as this part of assets grew from $207,667 to $220,106, or nearly 6%, better than the lukewarm rebound of the general markets after February’s sell-off. Early last month, I bought 360 shares XFML on its IPO day and the stock has been declining since its debut. Now at $10.97 per share as compared to my entry price at $11.10, XFML is negative contributor so far. On the other hand, my largest stock holding, LFC, gained $3.23, adding more than $4,000 to the growth.
• Retirement accounts: The total assets in our retirement accounts added a moderate $5,260, or 2.67%, in March to reach $202,186. Unlike our taxable investments, the gain is mostly from new contributions to our 401(K) plans at work.
• 529 plans: Our daughter’s 529 plans gained $517 in March, good for a 8.17% growth, to $6,862. In addition to our regular contributions, there was also an investment of $33.95 last month from the UPromise credit card reward program. The reward has been accumulated in my credit card for quite some time and finally reached the investment threshold. The last transfer I got from the credit card was $34.88 back in September 2006.
• Bonds: The gain in our bonds investments is a mere $154, or 0.65%, last month. On March 31, we have $23,697 invested in I and EE bonds, as well as 4-week T-bills. Currently, I buy $6,000 4-week T-bills every week. The total investment will be doubled this month as a portion of the balance transfer money will be used to buy T-bills. Actually, this should have started in the last week of March had I remembered to hit the “Submit” button when I updated my T-bill purchase plan, :((.

I have created a separate page to track our net worth, which will be updated monthly, but the page isn’t completed yet (now has only one plot from Networth IQ). For now, all the updates can be found under the About me -> Net worth category.

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Around the blogosphere

• In March, It’s Just Money has a net worth gain of $4,667.58
• Boston Gal’s Open Wallet added $11,227.73
• Savvy Steward saw his net worth grew more than 15%
• Our Finance Journey improved their bottom line by $8,612
• 2million increased his fortune by $10,274
• My New Choice saw an increase of 4.06%
• The Simple Dollar had an hefty gain of 10.6% in his net worth

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