October was a good month. I’ve had an increase in net assets and net worth almost every October since I started tracking my net worth, and this month was no exception. It seems that both income and investments are usually pretty good at this time of year. Another reason October is a good month is that it’s my birth month. This year I turned 35, which is hard to believe! Whitney helped make my birthday very special this year with lots of festivities. It was a good time celebrating with family and friends
Besides my birthday, the month was pretty quiet. We didn’t have any big trips planned or major conferences, which is unusual these days. We did do some presentations on travel therapy and finances for a few schools and state conferences, but we’ve done those so many times now that it isn’t a big deal. We did a lot of hiking and lifting in October, and the weather in Virginia was nice for most of the month. With the leaves changing and temperatures cooling off, fall is always my favorite time of year to spend at home in Virginia.
Income
Income from our websites (FifthWheelPT and Travel Therapy Mentor) for October was really good. It was our second highest earning month of the year and our third highest earning month all time. We’ve continued to follow up on overdue payments and hone our processes to find missed payments, which really paid off this month. We also received a quarterly advertising payment which provided a big boost to the income numbers for the month.
Expenses
My October expenses were much lower than normal. Being home for the full month meant very little costs overall. Besides groceries, going to restaurants a few times, and gas, I had few other expenses during the month. One thing I really like about not having a mortgage on our townhouse is the very low fixed costs each month. Utilities are rarely more than $150/month, the HOA is $100/month, and property taxes are also about $100/month. When not traveling, it isn’t difficult to keep my monthly expenses to $1,000 or less even if not trying to purposely spend less. We plan to buy a nicer house within the next year, so these expenses will increase in the future, but for now it’s nice to have such low monthly costs at home.
My savings rate for the month was well over 90%. A very high earning month and low expenses at home equals an extremely high savings rate.
Investments
The S&P 500 was down by about 2.2% in October. There is still a lot of fear and uncertainty in the markets right now with rates staying high and average household savings depleting. Home affordability is at all time lows which is really slowing down the real estate sector. I’m seeing more and more price cuts on houses in our area, which is nice to see after the explosion in prices over the last few years. Houses are still very overvalued relative to historical norms and median income though. So there are probably a lot more price cuts to come during 2024. The yield curve remains inverted and the unemployment rate is starting to increase, which are both good indicators of a coming recession which I believe will be in Q1 of 2024. Everyone seems to be waiting on the Fed to cut rates for the bull market to continue, without understanding that the only reason the Fed would cut rates is in the face of a recession which means bigger issues for the market.
Bitcoin was up by about 28.5% in October! That was a huge gain and really boosted by investment returns for the month. We’re now over 2 years from the prior Bitcoin all time high, and after a pretty brutal bear market, it’s nice to see the price rebounding. I’m feeling really good about some of my purchases at the end of last year. The discount on the Greyscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) continued to narrow in October, which meant that GBTC significantly outperformed Bitcoin itself. My GBTC holdings were up almost 40% on the month and almost 230% year to date! The discount closing is giving me less reason to hold onto GBTC instead of spot Bitcoin though, so I don’t know how much longer I’ll keep the shares I own.
Financial Independence Progress
My net assets increased by about 8.0% in October. Another high earning month combined with an increase in the Bitcoin price and an even bigger increase in the GBTC price had a big impact, despite the decrease in the S&P 500. This increase actually put me at another new all time high in both net assets and net worth!
My cash and Bitcoin heavy asset portfolio continues to pay off, although very non traditional.
With this increase in my net asset value, my assets are now equal to approximately 78.5 times my annual expenses.
Next Month
In November, we don’t have much going on again and will be home the whole month. It should be another month of writing, hiking, and lifting mostly, plus spending time with family for Thanksgiving. My expenses should be pretty low again and hopefully business income will be close to October numbers if things go as expected. It’s hard to have any idea what to expect investment wise. Even though a recession in Q1 2024 seems likely, the market can often rally into a recession, so the end of the year could be really good for investments. Either way, I’m not planning to try to time anything and will stick with my current allocations.
How was October for you financially? Let me know in the comments!
Fifth Wheel Physical Therapist 