Zero net worth! WOOOOO! (1 and 3 year update!)

[Apocalyptica602]

(2015 Edit: Mods, I'm okay leaving this in Share your Badassity, but if you feel it would be better suited in Journals at this point feel free to move it!)

Haha. Hey everyone. I'd like you all to join me in celebration.

When I graduated college almost exactly 12 months ago with my bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering I was so excited because I had a well paying job immediately upon graduation. ($67,000/yr)

I had to relocate from Hoboken New Jersey to a suburb of Baltimore Maryland.

I graduated with literally $100 in my bank account and $35,000 in school loans.

I had to furnish my 1 bedroom apartment, I had no roommates to split my rent, and some of my purchases certainly weren't very mustachian.

I began to read personal finance blogs. At first I read GetRichSlowly, and then I stumbled onto MMM.

I had a net worth of -$34,900 on May 26th 2011. Today I stand before you with a net worth of $0

I paid off roughly half of my school loans, down to $17,900, and have a 401k/emergency fund/checking account worth essentially the same.

My goal is to be 100% debt free by May of 2013.

I wouldn't be here without thanks to MMM, J.D. Roth and the writers at GRS, Mint.com and all of you Mustachians here on the forum keeping me honest.

Thank you so very much.

Edit: Sorry if this section of the forum isn't exactly the right place for this topic. Mods move it if you feel it's appropriate. I just figured "Share your Badassity" works because I attained this goal by applying a variety of MMM's / forum users suggestions.

[James]

Fucking awesome!!!  :)


It took me 7 years to pay my school loans down that much, and that's a good chuck of stache invested as well!  Congrats and well done!

[Mrs MM]

Wow!!  That is incredible!  Great job and congrats!  Now, time to stash some cash...

[Norman Johnson]

That's great!!! Congrats and keep it up! :D

[Parizade]

well done! congratulations!

[Ben]

Congrats! This is absolutely the right place to share that kind of progress!

[arebelspy]

Congrats.  That's amazing, and to have gained 35k in net worth in a year means your savings rate must be around 60%.  Well done, and keep it up.

[smedleyb]

Only in our debt fueled world is having nothing worthy of a celebration. (not a slight against OP, by any means).

Congrats Apocalyptitca.....hey wait a minute, maybe it's time to change that handle!

Keep saving your ass off. 

[Apocalyptica602]

Only in our debt fueled world is having nothing worthy of a celebration. (not a slight against OP, by any means).

Congrats Apocalyptitca.....hey wait a minute, maybe it's time to change that handle!

Keep saving your ass off.

Haha, no offense taken. That is kind of the point I was trying to make with the way I phrased my title/topic.

It's amazing that I could be so happy about having a net worth of $0, but the beauty of it is, because of my debt emergency and aggressive stance I've taken on paying it off.... once I go debt-free my net worth should grow rapidly and exponentially if I keep the same habits.

[Guitarist]

Congrats!

[adam]

I'm constantly reminded of this comic who has a bit about passing a bum in the street asking for change :

"Hey man, can you help me out? I've got nothing"

"Really?  You have nothing? Thats Awesome!, I have $18,000 less than that!"


It hits particularly close to home when I think about it and say to myself "$18,000?, that's awesome, I wish I had that little"
:(

Congrats to OP though.

[CeciliaW]

Well Done!

[chrissyo]

Nice work! Now the real fun begins - no debt to pay off means you can use the same spending/lifestyle choices and grow your stache!

[D-Mang]

Wow, congratulations!

Your numbers are almost exactly like mine, which motivated me to register so I could post. I finished my Engineering degree last year, $36000 in debt, job at $63000 a year, and just reached zero net worth on Mint last month!

I even followed the same blog reading path as you did!

[trammatic]

Way to go!

[Dicey]

You are one badass dude! You will really pick up momentum now, as the rest of the ride is all downhill.
There's a maxim that goes like this: If you save $1K per month from ages 20 to 30, invest it in a diversified portfolio and never add to it, you will have more money at age 65 than the other guy who starts saving the same $1K/mo, invested the same way, at age 30 and continues to do so every single month until he's 65! That is so awesome! I wish I'd known this factoid when I was your age. There several versions of this floating around, but the gist is the same. Compound interest really is miraculous!
My point is that you are paying down your debt so fast that you can take advantage of this other option as well and set yourself up now for life. Please report back on your continued progress.

[spi]

That is awesome! I wish I knew when I crossed the point from negative to zero net worth after getting out of college. Sadly I didn't keep good records so I don't know exactly when I crossed that line. It definitely took a few years in my case though.

[sideways8]

That's damn good progress in one year! That's more than my take-home pay for a year. You should be proud. :)

[Apocalyptica602]

Hey all, here's an update!

I posted back a little over a year ago that my net worth became $0.

According to Mint today my net worth is now: $38,917

My goal was to be debt-free by May 2013, I managed that by March 2013, although I got a little 'greedy' and exhausted my emergency fund to simultaneously finish it off, and max a 2012 Roth IRA at $5,000 prior to April 15th.

I haven't rebuilt my emergency fund yet but my job is essentially guaranteed at least until June 2014 so I'm not overly concerned, plus I'm cash flow positive about $500 a month after Taxes, Roth IRA and 401k deductions. So once my emergency fund is built back up I guess I'll start looking at taxable accounts.

Realistically I could be a little more cash flow positive, because there's always room for improvement, and I'm still certainly not as mustachian as I should be. This is because I have the luxury of grossing nearly $70k as a 25-year old engineer with no dependents in a reasonable cost of living location.

Currently maxing my 401k at 17.5k/year and 2013 Roth IRA at 5,500.

[arebelspy]

Currently maxing my 401k at 17.5k/year and 2013 Roth IRA at 5,500.

Good for you.  That'll put you so far ahead of most other 25-year olds.

Congrats on sticking with it, now youth at it's starting to become habit everything will be so much easier for the next 10-20 years financially.

[Insanity]

Hey all, here's an update!

I posted back a little over a year ago that my net worth became $0.

According to Mint today my net worth is now: $38,917

My goal was to be debt-free by May 2013, I managed that by March 2013, although I got a little 'greedy' and exhausted my emergency fund to simultaneously finish it off, and max a 2012 Roth IRA at $5,000 prior to April 15th.

I haven't rebuilt my emergency fund yet but my job is essentially guaranteed at least until June 2014 so I'm not overly concerned, plus I'm cash flow positive about $500 a month after Taxes, Roth IRA and 401k deductions. So once my emergency fund is built back up I guess I'll start looking at taxable accounts.

Realistically I could be a little more cash flow positive, because there's always room for improvement, and I'm still certainly not as mustachian as I should be. This is because I have the luxury of grossing nearly $70k as a 25-year old engineer with no dependents in a reasonable cost of living location.

Currently maxing my 401k at 17.5k/year and 2013 Roth IRA at 5,500.

Awesome job.  Don't be stupid and buy a new car  (not that I know anything about making that mistake.. really.. I swear)..

[matchewed]

Congratulations!

There is always room for improvement. Don't beat yourself up because of that. Just improve where you can and want to. Great job.

[N]

congrats! thanks for the update, too. so nice to hear!

[Lord Cashmoney]

CONGRATULATIONS! This is amazong. :) And inspirational! I've been looking at my own dismal negative net worth and was considering making a public challenge to myself about it, as you have. Now I think I MUST. :)

[happy]

well done:)

[Apocalyptica602]

Awesome job.  Don't be stupid and buy a new car  (not that I know anything about making that mistake.. really.. I swear)..

Haha, Good advice, thankfully I'm in a fortunate situation regarding my car.

Since 2008 I had a 1999 Honda Prelude that I purchased for $6000 with only 38,000 miles on it (literally old-lady-church-and-grocery-store kind of situation)

I wasn't mustachian then, so I racked up a lot of miles on it in a relatively short time, it was around 100k in 2012.

My aunt passed away in June of 2012, and left her only relative (my father) a 2006 Camry with ~60k miles on it.

My dad and I didn't see the point of having 3 cars for 2 drivers in our immediate family. So I sold my trusty Prelude to my girlfriend's brother for a small sum and I inherited the Camry for free.

Realistically I could probably sell the Camry and get something a few years older but still reliable with a couple thousand left over... but since it was overwhelmingly generous of my dad to give me the car, I figured that would tarnish it a little.

[aj_yooper]

+1 for you and your dad!  Great job on the SL and wracking up the 401k.

[Hamster]

Awesome job.  Don't be stupid and buy a new car  (not that I know anything about making that mistake.. really.. I swear)..

Since 2008 I had a 1999 Honda Prelude that I purchased for $6000 with only 38,000 miles on it (literally old-lady-church-and-grocery-store kind of situation)

That was a sporty car for an old lady to drive to church! Was her name Maude by any chance? Not that Maude owned the cars she drove...

p.s. Big props on the debt payoff and maxing out your retirement options. Keep up the good work!

[Insanity]

Awesome job.  Don't be stupid and buy a new car  (not that I know anything about making that mistake.. really.. I swear)..

Haha, Good advice, thankfully I'm in a fortunate situation regarding my car.

Since 2008 I had a 1999 Honda Prelude that I purchased for $6000 with only 38,000 miles on it (literally old-lady-church-and-grocery-store kind of situation)

The irony of that is that I had sold the first car I purchased for a new car...

That car I purchased was a Honda Prelude.  I absolutely loved that car.    But it was starting to hit the point of needing more repairs than I cared to put into it..

[nktokyo]

Nice job.

What's your retirement date?  ;-)  I'm only half kidding, you seem to be building a good platform.

[kirsten]

Congratulations!  Awesome news to share! 

[Apocalyptica602]

Nice job.

What's your retirement date?  ;-)  I'm only half kidding, you seem to be building a good platform.

Haha, I've thought about it a little bit, I'm mostly building the FU Money and seeing where it takes me.

I mostly want freedom and options, and consciously will likely have a higher spending in retirement than most mustachians here. I'm spending about $25k annually now, and I always err conservatively so I'd like my SWR to support 2x or almost 3x times that, with the ability to cut back dramatically in down years.

I want a kid or two, but likely no more than that. I'm finishing up a 3-year Engineering Leadership Development Program at my job so likely will have fairly significant increases in income within the next 5-7 years to ~90-100k. Also if things continue to progress with my girlfriend of the past 4 years into marriage, she'll add another ~100-120k/year (she's a Pharmacist, and we balance each other well as we're generally frugal high-earners)

So overall things are looking up for me, I read this thread from time to time when I'm having those 'Nagging Voices of Success' (http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/05/21/embracing-the-nagging-voice-of-success/) to remind myself just how lucky I truly am.

[ender]

Are you me? :P

We have such ridiculously similar situations. Our net worth is pretty similar. Our savings rate is similar (though I'm not maxing my 401k, "only" on pace for about 13k a year... lol, but instead saving a fair bit a month for a house downpayment). I guess I have a MS in ME and not just a BS, which translates to a slightly higher salary, which seems like the only difference. But I'm also 25 and recently started working. I'm also in a engineering rotational development program.

It's so awesome to realize we are increasing net worth by over $3000 a month when most people our age are, well, not.

Race you to $100k net worth? :)

[olivia]

Wow, congratulations!  That's awesome!  Keep it up and you'll reach FI in no time!

[aclarridge]

Congrats Apocalyptitca.....hey wait a minute, maybe it's time to change that handle!

I think maybe OP likes Apocalyptica, a Finnish band with 3 cellists and a drummer that does a lot of Metallica (and I think other heavy metal) covers.

[Apocalyptica602]

Congrats Apocalyptitca.....hey wait a minute, maybe it's time to change that handle!

I think maybe OP likes Apocalyptica, a Finnish band with 3 cellists and a drummer that does a lot of Metallica (and I think other heavy metal) covers.

Aha! Bingo! =P

[Bigote]

Great story and great progress!

[2527]

Congrats.  You will take off like a rocket now.

[Dicey]

Hey A...602,
Just checking in after a long forum break (for many positive reasons, including marriage and retirement). I am so happy for your success! Looks like you kept your head on your shoulders and can now see a clear path ahead. You have given yourself a gift that will pay dividends for the rest of your life. Hooray!

[adam]

If you believe Zillow's home values (which, lets be honest, you shouldn't), my net worth not only just crossed over to being less than 0 last month, this month it jumped to $27k!

I find it hard to trust that number though.

[Ed Mills]

Congrats!  I remember being so excited to get up to a $0 net worth.  After grad school, my wife and I owed $40k on student loans, so I took an overseas job to slay the beast.  It took about 20 months to pay them off.  I remember how free I felt to owe $0.  Once again, way to go!

[Apocalyptica602]

Sorry for the long bump everyone. Was looking through my old topics and figured I'd post an update! (Mods: I'm okay leaving this in Share your Badassity, but if you think this is more appropriate in Journals then feel free to move it!)

Things have been going super well on my financial journey. 27 now, living and working in Maryland near Baltimore.

That girlfriend I mentioned earlier in the thread is now my wife (!), we were married this past July! Although we've been cohabitating since July 2014 and combined finances shortly after our engagement in Dec 2014.

I got promoted at work and make about $95k all-in ($80k in salary, approx ~$5k bonus, and $10k / year in tuition reimbursement to get my MBA part time).

Wife finished pharmacy school in 2012 with about $70k in debt, that was gone within ~2.5 years, before we got married but slightly after we combined finances.

So now: even including the -8.33% YTD ROR lately, our net worth is $235,000

Future goals: aggressively saving for 20% house down payment. 1-2 kids within the next 5 years or so depending on how things turn out. Our incomes are such that we could easily become a one income family, but what will happen more likely is the wife will go part-time since Pharmacy is essentially very high-paying shift work. I can't really go part time as a Mechanical Engineer that supports manufacturing and runs projects or even work from home except on the rare occasion, even if I was willing to take a proportional pay cut.

Going to do a 15 year mortgage most likely so even if we don't accelerate our payments we'd be done with the house by our early 40s. (I'm aware of the math and certainly a numbers guy, but I do fall prey to 'sleep well at night' with the mortgage payoff issue and couldn't handle a 30-year term).

Overall we're still a bit spendier than I'd like, but our savings rate is still 75% of gross (~65% of net) due to our high incomes. So at this point I'm working more on http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2014/05/29/give-yourself-the-gift-of-not-worrying-about-money/

Looking to have the bare bones retirement 'FU money' by our late 30s, probably be willing to pull the trigger once the house is paid off and with a little buffer. Say early 40s if all stays on track.

[matchewed]

[Rosy]

I got promoted at work and make about $95k all-in ($80k in salary, approx ~$5k bonus, and $10k / year in tuition reimbursement to get my MBA part time).

Wife finished pharmacy school in 2012 with about $70k in debt, that was gone within ~2.5 years, before we got married but slightly after we combined finances.

So now: even including the -8.33% YTD ROR lately, our net worth is $235,000

From zero to hero:) You guys are rocking it!

[MrsPfennig]

Great job!

[happy]

You're on fire, way to go!

[Bob W]

You are freaking rocking it!   

 May I suggest you begin to consider a nice early retirement community in the Midwest.   If you aren't tethered to the East Coast that is.    One can live a very nice lifestyle for a family for under 25K per year in a nice University town like Springfield MO.   You're only about 2 years out from that investment wise.   Lots of demand for pharmacists as well. 

In fact there are tons of places one can live for sub 25K especially if you buy a 100K house.   (In many Midwest midsized towns a 100K house = a 500K house on the coasts)

Your call of course.   Just putting ideas out there for everyone. 

[Apocalyptica602]

You are freaking rocking it!   

 May I suggest you begin to consider a nice early retirement community in the Midwest.   If you aren't tethered to the East Coast that is.    One can live a very nice lifestyle for a family for under 25K per year in a nice University town like Springfield MO.   You're only about 2 years out from that investment wise.   Lots of demand for pharmacists as well. 

In fact there are tons of places one can live for sub 25K especially if you buy a 100K house.   (In many Midwest midsized towns a 100K house = a 500K house on the coasts)

Your call of course.   Just putting ideas out there for everyone.

Thanks for the kind words Bob and everyone else. Definitely in a very fortunate spot.

I'm not going to claim I'm 'lucky' like people will probably tell me when I FIRE as they can't imagine not sucking down daily Starbucks, $200 cable bills and leased SUVs and think I won the lottery or received a fat inheritance.

That being said: I have been FORTUNATE to have supportive parents, an aptitude and ability to enjoy engineering as a career, a loving wife who's on the same page and shares a high paying career, started reading FI blogs in my early 20s,  general good health etc.

I'm not against relocating to retire and that's actually part of what the wife and I have talked about. We have family all over the country but primarily up and down on the east coast (NY, NC, FL)

That being said, (parts of) NC and (parts of) FL are way cheaper than where we live now in MD. At this point we've only semi-seriously discussed the Carolinas and Texas (My Cousin, Wife's Sister and Snowbird Parents live in Austin / Houston) as a possibility post FIRE.

Still got at least a few years to think about that and we do want to buy a house in Maryland as well. But by then we'll decide to either keep and rent out or sell and downsize depending on how the market is come FIRE time.

[Megma]

I loved seeing your updates! Over the years of your journey!

But I'm mostly posting to say that NC is awesome! I am a transplant here and I love it. Lots of job opportunities (generally, I don't know about engineering specifically), lots to do and a low cost of living even in the "expensive" areas of NC.

[arebelspy]

Fun rereading this thread with the 2012 posts, 2013, etc. What awesome progress you've made. Well done! (And congrats on the recent wedding. :) )