The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Investor Alley => Topic started by: moneytaichi on October 26, 2018, 09:38:55 PM
-
I normally update my networth once a month. With current market conditions, I am little scared to update it. Maybe I can only look at my cash flow (mostly banks) without tuning into too much into the stock market ups and downs. But on the other hand, I see the values of updating my networth even when the market is down so I get to know my risk tolerance level better.
How often do you update your networth?
-
Like you I pull the numbers to do a net worth update once a month.
But, honestly, if you don't want to calculate your end of October numbers, don't force yourself. For some people, part of how they achieve greater volatility tolerance (which is a little different from risk tolerance but let's not get into that tonight) is just thinking about other things when the market is dropping.
-
I keep track of my network in a worksheet at a very high level and take a look at it about once every couple months and if something looks wrong I'll take a look at the numbers in all my accounts and make adjustments to match them. I used to do this more often but it was getting tedious and I wasn't really getting much out of doing it that often.
-
I add everything up in January and July.
-
I know this is probably weird, but I calculate it daily. It's not much to add up, log in to 2 investment accounts and add to what I keep as an emergency fund, which doesnt change much. I don't count anything else, just invested net worth and cash not in my checking account, and I round to the nearest $100 when I'm adding them, no need to be more specific than that. I find it keeps me motivated on a daily basis to save more and work harder, and it's entertaining to watch it go up and down with market swings.
-
Timely thread.
I decided just a couple of weeks ago to start tracking my net worth at the end of each month.
A few days ago I stopped reading one of the forums I normally read when people were saying they have withdrawn all their money to take advantage of "buying cheap". The ego and arrogance of people who think they know more than the market made it just more sensible for me to just leave than to bother even responding. Actually I just realised that I have since then, not looked at the market. So that has been the benefit I was looking for.
I suppose this is a pretty big downside of keeping a record of net worth - looking at it to note it down.
Is there any work around that others do, or just leave out the calculation for a month (or more) to avoid looking ?
-
I do it at the start of every month as part of my financial chores. I find that this helps to focus my goals a bit more (I used to do quarterly, but if I wasn't aware and had drifted off for a quarter then it was difficult to recover for the year). The key is to not worry about market conditions, though, it's just a data point and tomorrow it will be different.
Anybody do credit score monitoring / tracking? That one is black magic to me. I'm often surprised to see it change by 6-10 points without any real changes in my life and finances (except for savings increasing thankfully).
-
I also track my net worth once a month, usually the first Saturday after the end of each business month. Saturday is simply when I have the time to do it.
I add up all of my Investment Accounts and also get an estimate on the value of my home (use Zillow). I put it all into an Excel Spreadsheet I started about 15 years ago.
I do it every month (no matter what is happening in the markets) - not always fun to do it when there a big "down" months. But, being consistent gives me that long term view and a great idea of how I am really doing.
-
Rarely. A couple of times a year, maybe?
When I was young, I used to keep track on a weekly basis, but now I realize that's kind of pointless.
-
I just let the Personal Capital app do it for me. I’m still in the accumulation phase and have noticed that with greater market volatility I check it less frequently. Maybe twice a month now. The drops don’t bother me though. It’s kind of fascinating in a way.
-
I general calculate mine every 3 months.
This may change, we entered full retirement on
Oct 10th. I was semi retired and my wife had finally
come around to the idea of retiring. We had started
putting out the word that our small business was for sale.
Micheal came through totally destroying our business.
Since the day we had our forced retirement, VTSAX/VTI
is down 7.8%. Not a good start. But we over saved, so
we will be fine. Starting January, I'll be getting a good
handle on how much we spend on in a year.
-
We did monthly last year because of a lot of changes to our finances (new house, new location, etc) and wanting to get a good baseline for target setting.
We scaled back to quarterly this year because it's now just tracking of progress to the target.
-
Mint calculates it for me daily. I have a spreadsheet which I then update for historical and forecasting purposes. It's just part of my daily financial hygiene routine.
-
Once a month. Regardless of major losses or major gains.
-
Whenever I log into my account, I inevitably see my networth.
-
Once -- Jan 1st. Our savings rate was already high and we have enough in that market peak and dips like has happened in Oct is enough to overshadow new investments for a year.
-
Weekly, sometimes daily.
Spreadsheet updates realtime, so why not?
I also get some sort of masochistic joy out of the volatility.
-
I typically run the numbers once a year or when we have a life change (i.e. change in income or expenses).
-
Personal Capital app does it for me whenever I want each time I log in. Pretty much daily to monitor the stocks and also to review spending to make sure nothing unauthorized is coming from my CC’s, bank, etc.
-
Usually every day. It’s as easy as clicking on the App.
-
I used to track daily, but only save month-end numbers in my spreadsheet. Lately, I'm just looking too often (okay, I look, but not enter the numbers)
As someone said, it helped me get comfortable with market volitity, seeing things jump $10-20K in a day makes me recognize that things will sometimes drop by that amount (or more)....don't like it, but helps me not panic when a correction comes.
I also update expenses in a spreasheet once a month - pull the CC statement and dump the spending into rough catagories and pull and online bill pays (utility for example). It's what I've used to project our retirement spend (I have just over 4 years now). We have some variable spending and I use it see the big picture. It helped me convince my hubby that we didn't need the big yearly number he thought for retirement.....
-
Whenever I log into my account, I inevitably see my networth.
Seems like a good idea. Instead of a certain time, just do it whenever you go to add money since you are already there, and no need to look at it any other time.
-
GnuCash shows me our net worth automatically and I enter transactions every other week. We're down roughly $30k this month, but it's hard to complain when we're still up $90k compared to the same time last year.
-
My behavior changed when I went from accumulation mode to FIRED mode.
When accumulating, I did a full net worth calculation once a year in January.
For the rest of the year I tracked contributions to the stash each payday but didn't follow the market at all during the year. That way, if the market went up at all during the year, I was pleasantly "surprised" at the higher balance. My forward FIRE plans were based on contributions, not on market growth. I.e., 0% market growth. At the end of the year, I updated balances to account for market growth or its opposite.
That way I got to FIRE earlier than predicted, which is a lot easier to accept than the other way around.
All of that is silliness, but it worked for me.
This year, our FIRE year, I've been tracking net worth at least monthly and also when a big dip or rise was reported. I wanted to get used to "losing" $100,000 in a day when I knew it really didn't matter. I put "losing" in quotes because I still own the stocks, so I didn't really lose anything.
This month I've gotten so used to the ups and downs of this year that I haven't bothered to do a calculation after the drops. So I guess my mental innoculation strategy has been working...
-
I check it a lot when the market is going up, and not very much at all when the market is going down.
-
Daily(ish) via Mint, Personal Capital, etc...I also keep a spreadsheet that includes both my wife’s and my accounts that gets updated at the end of each quarter. I keep the spreadsheet as it’s been interesting watching the trend line and forward predictions over the last few years. I also compare the forward prediction against a Monte Carlo sim and it’s been interesting how closely they have tracked. The last couple weeks will certainly flatten the trend a bit but I just keep buying...
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
-
When I first started, I did it once a month, then backed off as such high granularity/resolution is really unnecessary. Now I do it once every few months, but avoid doing it during market downturns, so depending upon near term market movements, it could be a long while before I calculate again. That said, I budget, and review my budget weekly, or even more frequently as expenses come and go.
-
Quarterly, and it would be very rarely except that I post it in one of the challenge threads. We are in the gigantic space between having way more money than we need to make it though the week, but way less than we need to make it through life so there just doesn't seem any point to logging in to the six or however many accounts on a regular basis. Also so far we never had a quarterly loss of net worth, and I doubt we will for several years yet as out incomes increase. That is one advantage of quarterly calculations: less noise.
-
Never. I don't really care.
We calculate our cash+investable assets monthly just to xjexk nothing fishy is going on with accounts.
But determining the value of our house and any other assets? Too much work
-
Quarterly but not actual networth. We have a lot of types of account and such so it takes some effort.
I don't actually do networth since that doesn't matter to us. It is just an accounting of accounts that have money. House mortgage, student loans, other assets we don't factor any of that in as they are being paid off on schedule or aren't for sale.
LV
-
I try to do it once per month, but forget more often than not. If you don't want to calculate it, don't, just keep investing.
-
Quicken shows my net worth everyday, but I track it monthly in a separate spreadsheet by category, fund, and account. Then I add those up and compare changes by month. It helps me to see when I have a month when I'm down $50K, that the previous two months I was up $80K. Even though I can see my number getting higher on a regular basis, when I see a "bad month", that tends to stick in my mind and I forget about all the "good months" I had previously. I find seeing it this way helps me see the big picture.
-
I calculate my net worth once a month, on the first of the month.
I calculate all my real numbers and get a sub total. Then I calculate the value of my home and future pensions and come up with a second total. I usually just compare the first total, since that is actual money or funds that I control. The other is not in my control.
-
Never. I never calculate my net worth because it's meaningless. Net worth includes my paid-off house, and I won't be drawing down on my home using the 4% rule. My drawdown will be determined by my stash, not my net worth.
If the question was about my stash instead of net worth, I would give a very different answer.
-
Thank you for your replies! They are super-helpful. It's amazing to see the range of options. I guess the frequency would be largely determined by your FIRE-stage, personality and goals.
I just updated my networth, and it drops a big amount. But it didn't hurt so bad because your comments have given me much perspectives.
I have decided to stick with monthly updates for now because 1) I recently have done lots of financial changes so I need to update it to reflect the new situation; 2) I always combine financial learning with the updating process so I have learned a lot (including verifying my hypothesis such as post-FIRE withdrawal strategies & asset allocation) during the update process; 3) the process helps me build tolerance to market volatility. 4) I use a spreadsheet to keep a historical view and allow me do some simulations.
One useful tip I got from this thread is to track our expenses more closely since we are in post-FIRE.
Thank you all for your input!
-
Accounts are reviewed and spreadsheet is updated quarterly.
Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk
-
I add up accounts a few times a week on the calculator, but spreadsheet NW on a quarterly basis. This has got me very comfortable with volatility. This quarter is down a lot, but the last three were each up as much or more. Time to buy more!
-
I track my finances with Quicken. It pulls in the value of publicly traded securities all the time, and at this point in my life that's where most of the day-to-day fluctuations in my net worth come from. That's not to say I actually look at it daily, maybe weekly? I plug in other income/expense transactions every month or two to give a more accurate representation of the current net worth.
-
I update about twice a week. Cash accounts are easy and I log into 4 investment accounts and update the balance.
Lost 19k this month in my investment accounts, but staying the course.
-
Once a quarter here. More often than that, and it's easy to get obsessed with what's basically noise, IMO.
-
Mint is pretty effortless once set up. I check daily.
-
Upon finding MMM, was logging into Personal Capital daily to check. Now just checking 1-2 times per month, less frequently as time passes. Not too many events occurring to change the number. Income, expense, market swings. Kinda boring.
-
Twice a month on payday. I'm in the race to $10k and I like doing a twice a month update to stay on track. This month I really don't want to post an update since I had a "big for me" drop in my investments and that's where most of my assets are. So it looks like a bad month even though I continue to pay down debt and save/invest money.
-
Rarely. Maybe 1x a year? I see it often when I log into Mint but it doesn't really do much for me. I track my savings rate like a hawk though. I think of the net worth number as an output. Kind of like checking your body weight to assess health instead of checking your blood pressure and other vitals.
-
Monthly.
Monthly cash flow, monthly networth. I used to do it weekly, then per paycheck, but found monthly was easier for me to manage. I've noticed dips when the market crashes and I say "Hmm, oh well." Then I've noticed increases when the market soars, and I say "Hmm, that's neat." Neither appears to change my investment directions, but tracking it monthly helps me stay better on top of my spending habits.
Doing it this way allowed me to change my networth from -$89,000 (student loans are a b*tch) to +$1,300 in 20 months. That may not seem like an accomplishment to some on here, but I'm happier than a pig in sh*t with it.
But ultimately, whatever works well for you is the answer.
-
Upon finding MMM, was logging into Personal Capital daily to check. Now just checking 1-2 times per month, less frequently as time passes. Not too many events occurring to change the number. Income, expense, market swings. Kinda boring.
Market swings drastically change the number. It sucks to lose a year's salary from the last time you looked. But whatever, it will be back eventually I'm sure.
-
Upon finding MMM, was logging into Personal Capital daily to check. Now just checking 1-2 times per month, less frequently as time passes. Not too many events occurring to change the number. Income, expense, market swings. Kinda boring.
Market swings drastically change the number. It sucks to lose a year's salary from the last time you looked. But whatever, it will be back eventually I'm sure.
I moreso meant boring in my case because there's no action prompted by the changes. Once income/expense were understood and are now as close to predictable as possible, it's boring because I'm not doing anything based on the number I see. At least for now at the beginning of the journey.
-
I update every 2 weeks when I get paid. However, for now I'm tracking contributions rather than current value, because I find it keeps me more motivated to see how much I've invested vs how much it's gone up or down in the period. Since withdrawal is such a long time away, it doesn't really matter anyway.
-
Once a year - when I do my taxes. The rest of the time I can see how much I have "stashed", but I don't really track it. I haven't seen any evidence that tracking improves returns yet...
-
With mint its pretty easy to peek most everyday but its more out of habit than anything.
-
My net worth updates daily in Quicken. I keep a pretty close eye on it, as well as spending. I don't pay too much attention to the ups and downs of the market, although this pull-back has been much more noticeable (mostly because I have more invested).
I update the value of my illiquid assets (house, cars) once a year in January.
-
I've been checking it about once a month for the past three years. I was afraid to look this month, but finally did it today - we lost about $100k (!). And DH just retired last week.
However, we don't have plans to change anything. We're basically 60/40 across all accounts.
-
A spreadsheet calculates my net worth every time I visit it. But I'm not looking at the number so much as the delta. If markets have dropped, then it might be time to rebalance into the recently cheaper stocks.
-
Literally never.
And if you are talking about more of a "stache" calculation--invested or other assets that will be used for living expenses in retirement, I suppose the true answer there is also never, but about 95% of that is in the portfolio trackign spreadsheet I use, which does have a formula and a tiny box way at the bottom that adds everything up, along with a few other calculations (like the amount it will be in x years at y% growth and w years at z% growth). I added those just because when I was building the spreadsheet I was having fun including every bell and whistle. But I don't check those every time I update the sheet, and a few of our stashe assets aren't included (like our two rental properties, for example).
I just don't care, especially about net worth. If I sold my car and my tv and my sofa and my computer, I'd have $X. But I don't plan on selling any of those things (and in fact will replace all of them when they die) so what good does knowing the value of X do me? And as for my stache amount? It's nice to have a rough idea of what things look like, but retirement for DH and I is based on some career goals for him, not on getting to a specific number. By the time he reaches those goals, there's almost no way (outside of a catastrophic market collapse) we won't be at well more than the stashe amount we need. And fluctuations in the value of that stache don't trigger any actions according to my personal investing plan, so what's the point?
-
I tally our financial assets once per month, plus or minus a few days whenever I get around to it.
More frequently than that and I think your signal to noise ratio is too low. Less frequently than that and it's hard to stay motivated about your progress towards FI.
-
We lost a comma this month :(
I would have gone crazy if we looked at it daily with all the bumps this month.
-
Quarterly. Got in the habit of doing it quarterly when the balances were much smaller and didn't change as much from one quarter to the next. Have bigger swings now but it still seems like the right balance for tracking but not obsessing.
-
Once a month, when I posted in the race to $xxx thread.
-
Doing it this way allowed me to change my networth from -$89,000 (student loans are a b*tch) to +$1,300 in 20 months.
Congratulations @specialkayme ! Great job! I found tracking my networth in my early wealth accumulation stage really motivated to pay off the mortgage and save extra. Now I think I need to switch the focus on expenses after FIRE.
-
I've been checking it about once a month for the past three years. I was afraid to look this month, but finally did it today - we lost about $100k (!). And DH just retired last week.
However, we don't have plans to change anything. We're basically 60/40 across all accounts.
Keep breathing... Our loss is huge too. But I feel comforted with my earlier decisions on cash reserve for a year in the bank, bonds for the next tier. Bad markets are especially valuable for validating your withdrawal assumptions.
-
Every Friday I officially record my NW and do averages and projections. Been doing that since 2001.
I used to look daily with Quicken but I refuse to buy the upgrade only for its automatic downloads of stock prices. I have to update prices manually so that is only weekly now. I always manually entered 401K deposits and dividends into Quicken, never did the automatic linking of accounts there. I have never done Mint or Personal Capital either because I don't trust them with all my financial accounts with account numbers and passwords. I am kind of a luddite on that stuff even though I know that is the future. I have a few single stocks and the rest are mutual funds so it is not like updating dozens of data points.
GnuCash (which is free) will grab quotes semi-automatically. Once you have it set up you click the get quotes button whenever you want to grab the most recent prices for all your stocks/funds/currencies. Though since Yahoo shut down its API it hasn't always worked as smoothly as it used to.
-
I've been checking it about once a month for the past three years. I was afraid to look this month, but finally did it today - we lost about $100k (!). And DH just retired last week.
However, we don't have plans to change anything. We're basically 60/40 across all accounts.
Keep breathing... Our loss is huge too. But I feel comforted with my earlier decisions on cash reserve for a year in the bank, bonds for the next tier. Bad markets are especially valuable for validating your withdrawal assumptions.
It's not a loss until you sell!
We have about 3 months' cash in savings + checking and another ~ 18 months' funds in after-tax accounts, and we're both going to be earning combined probably a couple thousand $/month (DH is planning to work 1-2 days per week at the place he just retired from as a part-time on call IC, and I have some self-employed work) so shouldn't have to draw on any of the big accounts for another couple of years.
We really need to find a tax advisor/financial planner to go over all this stuff with us soon so we have a plan for how to withdraw after that. But I am dragging my feet on spending that much money for advice.
-
I do my budget every month.
I undertake one or two focused action steps to increase my net worth every month.
However, I only update my net worth sheet once a year.
You have to plant seeds to get the fruit.
It takes time for the fruit to grow.
Looking at my net worth monthly would depress me, because it's too soon to see progress, and too easy to get hung up on market fluctuations.
-
I make updates to my net worth spreadsheet as needed (typically only when I buy or sell stocks) and do a full update with all of my account balances twice a year in Jan and July. Anything more often then quarterly seems like a bit much :)