My main goal is to build a portfolio of $1,000,000 in 1500 days with no debt*, starting from 1/1/2013. Every month, I provide an update on my status. My goal for 2015 was to get my portfolio up to $874,353. Because we saw exceptional returns in 2013 and 2014, I have already accomplished this. Let’s take a look at March.
March was a transition month (Translation: transition = crap). I finally started my exit from the Apple Cart. At the same time, I made my first contribution to my new Solo 401(k). Let’s talk numbers before I get into all of that.
I started the month at $1,029,877 and ended at $1,006,450 for a decrease of $22,427. $20,000 of this loss was due to debt I paid off (more below). Even without the debt payoff, it was still a losing month. They can’t (and shouldn’t) all be winners, so I don’t lose sleep over stock market farts. The long term trajectory is upward, but not always so in the short term.
Here are the numbers as of 3/31/2015:
2015
- Days elapsed: 90
- Days remaining: 275
- 2015 gains: $19,097
- Left to go (2015): Goal accomplished!
Since the start (1/1/2013)
- Days elapsed: 820
- Days remaining: 680
- Gains since 1/1/2013: $420,407
- Needed for $1,000,000 (investments and cash only): I’m there!
- Needed to retire ($1,120,000): $113,550
- Net worth**: $1,256,450
Giving 175 shares of AAPL a new home
I have too much Apple stock, so I placed a stop-loss sell order at the end of February. Not more than a week later, the order executed netting me around $22,000. I took most of that money and paid off one of the last bills from our home construction. That lightened up my portfolio by about $20,000, but I sleep better at night without the debt.
Han Solo 401(k)/saving like a Wookie!
In 2014, I contributed just enough to get the full match in my company 401(k) and stopped there. Home renovations drained our bank accounts silly. Perhaps we were silly for spending all of that money in the first place. I don’t regret it, although I would have done things different if I had a rewind button. No tradebacks though.
With all of that construction spending in the rearview mirror, the savings pedal is to the metal. We’re socking money away with wild abandon from now until my job ends. This month, I made my first contribution to my Vanguard Solo 401(k) to the tune of $5,475. Wow, that felt good.
Rolling over and playing Vanguard
My job recently changed and I had to switch to self-employment. This has been pretty great because I can plow loads of money into our Solo 401(k). Another benefit is that I’m able to roll my 401(k) over (about $275,000) into low fee, Vanguard funds. I’m in the middle of this now and will have a full report soon. I’m still a bit of a fool, so I won’t be putting it all into VTI…
Random thought: money isn’t the hardest part of retirement
A co-worker recently went to part-time as he prepares to retire. He is 71, but you would never know it from looking at him. The guy has a sharp mind and body. Even at his advanced age, I’m convinced that he’s in better shape than most 40 year olds. He’s a real inspiration.
On the flip side, my parents get worse every time I see them. Somehow, they find ways to become more sedentary and eat more fried food. My co-worker is a decade older, but I’ll bet that he’ll outlive both of my parents.
At the same time, I see all of the searches that bring traffic to this site and it’s clear to me that lots of others also struggle in retirement. While I don’t think that I’ll have this issue, I admit that it scares me just a bit. Remember that investing should be passive, but retirement should not. More on that later.
*I still owe something like $120,000 on my mortgage. Because I have a low rate, I firmly believe in not paying it off. My compromise is to have enough money put away to pay off the mortgage at time of retirement. So, to retire today, I would need about $1,120,000.
**The numbers on the right side of the page only reflect my investments and cash. Net worth includes, but is not limited too:
- Home equity
- Cars
- Bicycles
- My huge fan base: No, I’m not talking about the tens of readers who come here each month. I’m referring to actual fans. I have no idea why, but I have fans everywhere. Our home is infested with them. I hate being hot, so perhaps I went overboard during a summer spell of heat when I couldn’t think straight. Maybe I’ll try to conjure up my own personal tornado or hurricane one of these days.
***This is an affiliate link. If you sign up, the blog makes a little bit of money. I can then afford to carry on with this experiment, sleep better at night and buy even more dinosaurs (or fans). With that out of the way, I would never, ever, ever, ever recommend anything I didn’t use myself and completely believe in because I love you. Personal Capital is a totally free and awesome way to keep watch over your investments. It’s worth it for the fee analyzer alone.
Join the 10s who have signed up already!
Subscribing will improve your life in incredible ways*.
*Only if your life is pretty bad to begin with.
Haha, I like the “fan base”. We don’t own a single fan (but a small electrical heater).
EurFI recently posted…March 2015 – networth and expenses
No fans? Hmmm, you must be in Northern Europe. I CANNOT stand heat and I’ll never get used to is. I was born to live near the the Arctic Circle.
What you need is a fitted sheet over your fan base. Fan Fort! Then you can get real close to the fan and tell Luke that you’re his father. Good times.
Way to lose $20 grand! 🙂
Kate@GoodnightDebt recently posted…Thank you Debt
LOL, you crack me up! Great ideas and certainly something that I would do!
PS: Do you have 20 grand I can borrow?
The who retirement thing also scares me, especially since I am determined to go live my life out loud during my Act Two years. I don’t have as much as most at my age, but I’m sticking to a plan in hopes I can make it work. Love the fan based. I think I’m gonna get me some of those too.
Petrish @ Debt Free Martini recently posted…A Different Kind of Spring Cleaning
If you’re aware of the challenges of retirement, I think that you’re already halfway there.
Need a fan?
Congrats on staying a millionaire.
And feel free to ship any of those fans out this way, it is already heating up…
Debtless in Texas recently posted…Springtime Savings
Texas. As a lover of the cold, I have no idea how humans live in a place like that.
I don’t think I’ll stay a millionaire for the duration of 2015, but I’ll take whatever I can get.
Two months in a row in the double comma club.
Nice contribution to the solo 401K. How much are you going to put in there again this year?
Oh….that’s right….$50,000 (nener nener nener)
Glad you were able to peacfully part with some of your Apple stock. No one ever went poor taking a profit 🙂
Cheers!
Gen Y Finance Guy recently posted…March 2015 – Detailed Financial Report #3
$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000,$50,000!
Congrats on building up the courage to diversify a little more, and setting those AAPL shares free to grow elsewhere. And you can never have enough fans!
Fervent Finance recently posted…How much house can you afford?
Fans! Everywhere!! Fans!!!
Glad to hear your Apple stock and rolling over the company 401k to Vanguard.
Interested to see what gets purchased in addition to VTI, too.
Don’t know if I told you, but the missus and I borrowed (okay, stole) your goal. We want $1M in invested assets, but in roughly 2200 days or so…right in the last few days that I’m forty.
Done by Forty recently posted…Middle Class Wealth
I love that you stole my goal! I hope you reach it before me too! We should invent a board game. Ticket to $1,000,000.
I’m dividing the money up 7 ways. It will be a fun experiment. Stay tuned.
I think it’s wise to rid yourself of the home construction debt- like you said, it helps you sleep better, and you need sleep these days.
I’m glad you’re finally getting paid so that you can hit that $50K contribution club. Way to go pedal to the medal.
I hate, hate, hate debt! I can barely tolerate my mortgage. Anything else gets crushed ASAP!
Excellent progress as always. And I am with you on being hot. The difference is we have ceiling fans in practically every room in the house (and we didn’t put them there). I don’t know what it is, but not only don’t I like to be hot, but the hum of the fan is soothing. I always sleep with it on.
Jason recently posted…Paying Off Debt Update
Right on fan brotha! Despite the small size of our home, we have 6 ceiling fans. One in each of the 4 bedrooms and 2 more in common areas. I even have a whole house fan (WWF). A WWF is the Holy Grail of home fandom.
Star Wars themed posts, I’m in. If only you included just one more character, man you must be busy.
Even Steven recently posted…Doing It Yourself, Just for the Satisfaction
Yeah, I should have include Boba Fett or Luke FIwalker.
Woohoo on staying on the double comma club. It’s important to keep your body and mind sharp so you can enjoy your life during your retirement years.
Cool that you are selling off some Apple stocks, it’s been quite a ride. 🙂
Tawcan recently posted…Continue investing in US dividend stocks at current subpar exchange rate?
It’s been a very, very good ride. Great company and great products too. Go Tim Cook!
I love this line, “Remember that investing should be passive, but retirement should not.”
I see so many people who retire without a plan of what to do. I think that’s why it’s important to cultivate hobbies and friends while you’re still young and working. That way you’ll know how to spend your time once it’s all yours!
Zina at Debt Free After Three recently posted…What I Bought: March 2015
Hey Zina, nice to see you again!
Yep, the issue with my dad was that work was his life. When that rug was pulled out from under him, TV and food replaced it.
Are you in our neck of the woods now?
It’s crazy how tied we are to our old ways. We just lucked into the fact that my wife has 401k and 457b options at work. No difference in fees or funds. Also no match for either. So why the hell would anyone put the money in a 401k then? They’re exactly the same except the 457b has no early withdrawal penalty. Talk about a bridge to retirement!
Chris @ Flipping a Dollar recently posted…March 2015 Profits – Still not Great.
No early withdrawal penalty! How awesome is that? Can you get Mrs. 1500 a job at wherever she works?!?
Well, your wife does already seem to deal with crazy people… 😉
My wife’s going to be a psychologist at a state run hospital – the guy who walks around and constantly rubs the walls/doors/etc. is one of the easy to handle ones! And that’s not even talking about the fact that she’s in the union. That’s a whole ‘nother level of crazy.
On a separate note, the lady was very angry that my wife didn’t want any of the crappy managed funds (SOME WERE ALMOST 2% IN EXPENSE RATIO!!!!!!)
Chris @ Flipping A Dollar recently posted…March 2015 Profits – Still not Great.
You may have explained this before, but what is the workaround to contributing $50,000 to a solo 401k? I understand you act as employee and employer, so as employee you can contribute the $18,000 max, but as employer there are restrictions of something like 20% of net earnings. I work as a consultant now within a company and my plan is to eventually go off on my own as I transition toward early retirement so I’ve been trying to wrap my head around this option.
Yeah, so Mrs. 1500 is an employee too. So together, we contribute $36,000. The best part though is that the corporation can match your wages by up to 25%. After matching my wages of 50K and the wife’s wages of 25K, our contributions come to about $55,000. I get excited just typing that. Seriously.
We live on about $36,000/year, so being able to save that much (pre-tax mind you) is just great.
Having your own corporation/Solo 401k is an incredible deal for a saver. The tax benefits more than make up for the double-tax of FICA.
Oh, and the other great thing was that it was super easy to setup with Vanguard. One hour on a Saturday morning and that was it. I didn’t even mess anything up.
Are you able to avoid a lot of SS taxes too? If I remember it correctly, you don’t have to pay SS on the profits for the business after paying yourself (and wife) a “reasonable” wage. But I’m not an accountant!
Chris @ Flipping A Dollar recently posted…March 2015 Profits – Still not Great.
I confess, as an Apple fan, I’m a little sad to see you selling their stock, but as a PF fan, I understand.
Here’s an idea for what to do with all your fans:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OL_VUh4gzIk
Daniel Flucke recently posted…Good Friday 2015 Sermon
Oh, I love Apple too. That was only 10% of my holdings and I have no plans to sell any more any time soon.
Ha, that fan video is awesome! Oh Mrs, 1500, guess what I’m going to do in the backyard this weekend…
Those search terms that lead to your blog are awesome.
I’ve got some weird ones as well. Perhaps we should regularly publish them and compare who can find the weirdest search term that lead to the blog?
brian recently posted…My New Daily Goal: Practice Random Acts of Kindness
Yeah, they are great! Well, most of them anyway. Some are truly bizarre.
Very jealous of your solo 401(k). If only I were self-employed! More importantly, congrats on maintaining over a $1mm! Any idea what you’ll do with your savings once you retire?
The Professor recently posted…Stocks for the Long Haul: Dollar Cost Average and Reinvest Dividends
Thanks Professor!
I’ll slowly roll the 401(k)s over so that I can access them before 59.5, although I may not even need to. Stay tuned for a post on that…
Congrats on reaching the goal way earlier than expected! I just did the math to turn my FI date into days and it is just under 2,300.
I am way overweight in AAPL as well. I just can’t convince myself to sell it though. the prospect of dividend increases and profitability levels make we unable to find a stock I would rather own than Apple.
Vawt recently posted…Liebster Award
Hi Vawt!
Thanks, but I’m a bit scared about market valuations. I expect that my portfolio will drop into the 800s when the market corrects.
I like Apple too. They make great products, but there is SO MUCH competition in technology. Even if you come out with something very cool and innovative like the iPhone, competitors will just copy you (hello Android!) within a year or two.
Be aware that those 2300 days will be here before you know it!
If I had to guess, I’d say that Apple will continue to be strong for quite some time. I just don’t want to be holding too much whenever the tide turns. I too look forward to those dividend increases next month with the shares that I have left.