Finally Calculated our GROSS savings rate....

[oneil]

I always just set dollar amount goals monthly for "regular" savings and have retirement accounts happen automatically. I could tell roughly that our savings rate has hovered around 50% for at least a year+ (even though I didn't discover MMM and FI/RE until a few months ago). Also, I have even been relaxing our savings a little for my husband's sanity in recent months. (ie more "fun money" and travel)

Side note: In the past year, we have depleted our savings 3 times...
1. Rental duplex 22% down payment
2. Paid down mortgage on a different duplex to get rid of PMI
3. Paid off my husbands car.

We now have no debt besides mortgages and no PMI. But after paying off the car our cash savings was very very low and we did not have an emergency fund.

Now we are re-building cash savings as an emergency fund before we start investing in taxable accounts for the first time!! I figured it would be a good time to calculate our gross savings rate. Which includes my company's 401k match, but not my husbands since I always forget what his match is - - so I guess not 100% accurate still - sorry!!

During the "debt pay down" phase recently I counted paying off debt as a positive in our net worth and as savings. I have been tracking our monthly net worth for only 6 months and decided to add a few columns for savings rate too...

I was pleasantly surprised to find that our gross savings is 55% - 70% every month! I am going to continue to track this monthly along with our net worth. Sorry, I just need to brag a little - since I can't exactly tell friends/family. Definitely on our way towards that 75% savings rate goal!

[MrDelane]

Congratulations!
That's definitely something to be proud of.

[FITortoise]

Brag away! That's an awesome savings rate, and keep going :-)

[PhysicianOnFIRE]

Strong work, oneil!

If it helps you at all, I've bulit an Excel based Savings Calculator that can help keep your thoughts and contributions organized to calculate both gross and net annual savings rate.

If you just recently discovered this site, I'm guessing your rate is only going to improve (which is hard to do when you're in the 99th percentile!).

Cheers!
-PoF

[forummm]

By "gross" savings rate do you mean that you include taxes as expenses? If so, that's a pretty high rate.

[PhysicianOnFIRE]

By "gross" savings rate do you mean that you include taxes as expenses? If so, that's a pretty high rate.

No doubt. I could only pull off a 70% gross rate if I had negative spending. More than 30% goes to taxes. My net savings rate exceeds 70%, though.

[oneil]

Congratulations!
That's definitely something to be proud of.

Thank you!!

Brag away! That's an awesome savings rate, and keep going :-)

Thanks! Working on it!

Strong work, oneil!

If it helps you at all, I've bulit an Excel based Savings Calculator that can help keep your thoughts and contributions organized to calculate both gross and net annual savings rate.

If you just recently discovered this site, I'm guessing your rate is only going to improve (which is hard to do when you're in the 99th percentile!).

Cheers!
-PoF

Thanks, I'll check out the calculator you linked to!

By "gross" savings rate do you mean that you include taxes as expenses? If so, that's a pretty high rate.

Yes, gross means before taxes. I have included taxes in our expenses. Our tax rate is relatively low due to a lot of deductions. We got a HUGE tax refund this year, so I have decreased my withholdings (increased my exemptions?) Plus, I live in a state with no state income tax which helps.

**Not factored into our savings rate is our contributions towards our HSA and my employer's contributions to HSA.

We have 2 rental properties. I keep the rent income, mortgage, and other expenses separate. So, these don't positively or negatively affect our savings rate.

[Davids]

That is awesome, congratulations!

[clarkfan1979]

I like bragging about gross savings, because we make retirement contributions to avoid the 25% tax bracket. Ignoring taxes and focusing on net savings seems a little short sighted to me. Good job!

[dandypandys]

This makes me curious to find out what mine is.. no idea! Dont think i can figure it out for 2015 either, as i am not sure what i started with in my savings account. eugh.. next year will be different :)

[Metric Mouse]

Congrats! That's pretty badass.

[Zoot]

Awesome work!  :)

I just did the same thing this year; turns out our gross savings rate YTD is 51%, with 26% to taxes and 23% to spending.  I like tracking it in this way--it has made me realize the drag that taxes have on the overall progress, and has given me some ideas about how to re-tool our savings methods so as to mitigate the tax impacts.