I was doing my monthly account reconciliation with @youneedabudget and I noticed my net worth is up a LOT in the last year. Last summer I was at about $4.5M and now I’m up to $5.3M. I think this breakdown of where that increase came from could be interesting.

• The smallest factor was profits from my businesses. When internet people are being mean to me, they often say something like “he doesn’t know what he’s talking about, he just got rich selling a company and now he sells a course online”. I think they’re implying I am making big bucks by selling some sleazy course. WELL IT’S THE OPPOSITE. I’m making very small bucks and the course is amazing. Actually PFC lost a little bit of money over the past year. Another company I have made about $50K leaving me in the green.
• The W-2 income is my paycheck from PFC, so that’s my only “normal” income.
• Dividends are cash deposited directly to my accounts from all of my investments. Those are kicking off about $55K/year right now which is sure nice!
• The estimated value of my home increased about $120K in the last year so that was a healthy chunk.
• The biggest piece was the increase in share price of my investments. This time frame is a little cherry picked because the market has screamed up the past year. Outside of my Roth IRA, these are also “unrealized gains” too, which means I may have to pay tax on the gains one day.

So while it’s nice to see numbers get big, it does feel a little fragile to me. My actual cash flow income isn’t all THAT much. About $130K and I tend to get a lot of big tax bills that cut way into that. A big down year in the housing or stock markets would cause these numbers to go way down and I could easily have a big negative year. BUT I know that’s part of the process and this is how I’m building wealth. Buying and holding index funds and letting time do the work.

As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.

-Jeremy