Lanny’s 3rd Quarter Goals Check Up

Now that 3 full quarter’s are in the book, it’s a great time to see where I stand in comparison to Q2, but also to the 2015 goals I set for myself towards the end of last year.  It has been such a unique year thus far, and 9 months have come and gone.  Question I have to find out now is – am I hitting my goals?  Am I on pace to somehow reach those items I set?  After all of the traveling, weddings, investing and life experiences – am I on track?  Let’s find out!

Goal Re-Cap

During November I established 7 monster goals to accomplish, with the main target of $5,750 in dividend income which quickly changed to $6,750 after MyDividendPipeline pushed my envelope and my Italian nature to be ballsy.  Here is the quick summary:

  1. Projected Dividend Income at $6,750
  2. Make $1,000 off of the Dividend Diplomats Brand
  3. Pay and additional $2,000 towards my mortgage
  4. Lower my insurance to below $69/month
  5. Go on a new road trip with family and/or friends
  6. Join a new group (business or pleasure) that I an truly passionate about
  7. Learn a language or musical instrument

They were very big goals, stretch goals more specifically, and I wanted to see how far my wingspan could go. I knew that I had contributed more than $45,000 in capital last year and that, given the same track record or even scaling it back to accomplish other items, I could hit these targets. Out of all of these items listed above, the language/musical instrument was going to be the hardest/most challenging aspect by far. Why would it be? One word = Time. Those two take the most time, without a shadow of a doubt in my mind. However, it’s one of my main goals to either be able to learn the piano/guitar or speak Italian – my true native language – as a good portion of my family speaks it, as they came over on that good ol boat back in the day. What helps supplement, these goals, however? Online community here is a HUGE help and I cannot thank you all enough. Saving over 60% of your income each and every month allows a great portion of the monetary goals listed above. Further, discipline in your life, staying focused and possibly tuning yourself to oneself (say you can look back at my emotional memoir) to define and accomplish the non-monetary goals. Establishing the “why’s?” of your goals allows these goals to be easier to accomplish, as they are your more pure passion plays.

First 4 Monetary Goals

1. Projected Dividend Income at $6,750 – Well, as of this writing coming on the first week into August, I currently am sitting at an expected/projection of dividend income in the amount of $6,330 or 93.8% there (see my portfolio).  This is up an astonishing $429 since the second quarter post for my results or 6.4% higher.  Which is even more than the $412 I increased during Q2 by a tad.  How am I able to jump that much? All of the capital plays, such as buying EMR a few times, and all of the saving that I’ve been trying to do.  The combination of purchases, automatic 401K per my employer and dividends reinvested, the total capital that has plowed in to make this happen is between $11-$12k (again), not including any of the ever-so-loving dividend increases (why we love that dividend growth rate!).  I have 3 months to go for this goal to achieve a whopping $420 more in projected income. Doing the math, I have paced myself to increase my income $1,241 so far this year, which is hilarious by any stretch of the means, but I need to average an additional $140 added per month to reach my goal… sounds insanely difficult to say the least, with $420 left to go for the milestone.  I was able to Crush my ass over $6,000 in projected income though easily a few months back and have added over $300+ since then…. game on.  Track Progress: Going to be tough – I am assessing Dark Orange here (as I would say Green light = passed and Red = Failed).

2. Make $1,000 off of our website! This is a fun one, as we primarily aren’t writing for revenue. We actually just love this stuff, want our analyses to be reviewed and have our journey to be tracked by us all = more of a motivational and naturalizing point for us, but we love to teach and spread any knowledge we can.  How have we fared so far?  Well, through 9/30, we have earned $491 or we are 49.1% there.  This is actually a MUCH bigger growth from Q2 as Q3 figures alone brought in $215 vs the $159 during 2nd quarter, 35% growth.  How is this happening? Well, our page views at Q3 were MUCH higher than Q2, and I believe given the higher page views are receiving better advertisements and our advertisement clicks were MUCH better also. We still have a STEEP hill to climb, essentially, we need to earn $509 over the next 3 months alone – don’t this one will happen.  On the track to failing this goal, but wouldn’t mind finishing strong. 

3. Pay $2,000 extra towards the mortgage – Well due to my savings rate attempt of over 60%, I have the ability to place $500 per quarter for this year to the mortgage.  How am I doing? Crushing this and have made a payment on 1/1/15, 4/1/15, 7/1/15 and 10/1/15.  That is $2,000.  GOAL COMPLETED.  This one is in the books, officially.  Done and done.  This has already taken off a few years just by doing this.  Essentially my payment is $446 per month.  Doing this is already 1.12x each time I do it.  4 X 1.12 = 4.48 extra payments made this year alone essentially (instead of just the rounded 4).  This means to me that after 2 years of performing, it’s essentially 9 payments extra.  This is fun as I was looking how to balance either paying off the mortgage or investing, something I’m always curious on individual’s feedback.

4. Lower my Auto Insurance to $69/month – Alright, so I signed on the “right track” for my auto insurance company – Liberty Mutual to save upwards of 25% as I described in last quarter’s post.  I achieved the 18% savings rate where I was standing during my Q2 post and managed to save that on my auto insurance.  Therefore, my premium should essentially be $75.16 BUT a few tickets will fall off when it goes to review next April.  This is an orange to yellow color as I am getting closer, I can feel it.

Final 3 Personal/Non-Monetary Goals

5. Go on a Road Trip – Well, it may not be a roadtrip per se – but I have gone to a wedding with the girlfriend to Michigan in August and am going to one in Florida in 2 weeks.  Then, in December – flying to Florida again for my first vacation/trip in 2.5+ years.  I would say this is a green light goal and will mark this as Goal Completed for the year.  The bottom line is that I went on trips, some of which were road trips and some flying.  Getting out and experiencing is the name of the game.

6. Join a new group – Everyone… I joined a basketball league thanks to Bert and his high school friends.  We won the first season we played together this year – just awesome.  I was catching more of my stride towards the end of the year.  Our 2nd season – I have only played in the first 3-4 games due to work travel situations, it’s awful.  One game I dropped 18 points, however, and like seeing the double digit scoring back up.  Goal Completed.

7. Learn a language or musical instrument – I did cash out Amazon gift cards on swagbucks to purchase the Living Language Italian Set.   I haven’t been able to read much due to work and the crazy-busy weekends over the last 2-3 months.  I have picked it up a few times and have more of the phrases and sayings down, but I’m no where close.  Maybe 0.00001%.  Dark, dark orange here.  

Overall Q3 Goals Conclusion

From the goals set back in November of 2014, I feel like we are steadying the course with 2 big challenges ahead – the income for our Dividend Diplomats brand and the learning a language, posing as the biggest 2, similar to last quarter.  The next two behind that, in order, will be hitting a forward income mark of $6,750 (December will be a huge reinvestment month and need some amazing dividend increases) but to maintain high savings and consistent investing will be key for the next 6 months.  Go check out Bert’s goal update once he has it posted, because he already blew one of his goals out of the water by investing over $15,000 in the market – way to go Bert!

-Lanny

14 thoughts on “Lanny’s 3rd Quarter Goals Check Up

  1. Just wanted to let you know that your EMR purchase showed up in a Seeking Alpha article in Google Finance. Congratulations on achieving your goals. If you have a chance see my comment on your previous entry for EMR.

  2. Lanny,
    Sounds like a good quarter, and thus far a good year on all fronts. Been liking all your purchases, and I think next year you will crush whatever puny goal stands in your way.
    Its funny to read about your Italian pushing you and then at least starting to try to learn it. If you’re really interested in Italy, but lack the time to learn the language at the moment you can start learning about Italy in a different way. There is a podcast I just finished call The History of Rome, by Mike Duncan. Takes you through the founding and fall of the Western Roman Empire; mind you its 179 episodes long (74 hours). If that strikes your fancy and you like history, you’ll find its a great way to pass the time in the car if you have to drive for business especially.
    Fun fact, I speak pretty good German and learned it in HS. Its cool to know a 2nd language, not matter what it is. Good luck in trying to learn Italian, it is hard, can be confusing, but is always fun.

    – Gremlin

    • Gremlin,

      Thank you for the comment – my purchases lately have been calm and easy – JNJ, EMR and NSC primarily when I realize that.

      History of rome eh? I may have to download that – on amazon or on an app?

      I need that 2nd language and pretty awesome you know German. Mad props for that.

      -Lanny

  3. Well done. I particularly love the fact that you’ve got a few very cool non-finance goals in there too. Like our goals (which our nots pecifically for 2015), we include quite a number of non-financial ones and we are happy to say that most stuff is pretty much on track.

    Way to go and keep up the good work. I hope you crush that dividend income goal!

    Cheers

    • M,

      Thanks for coming by. I’m trying to mix it up and that’s cool that you don’t keep it specific to one year but have more long term tracking/focuses. I do that in a way, as I have an idea of around 4-5 years out, and have an idea of where I’d like the financial aspect to be at that time frame. Alla bout the push!

      Appreciate it, like always.

      -Lanny

  4. Getting there Lanny! The idea when setting goals is to improve by succeeding or improve by learning from your failures/mistakes. No matter the results, you’re still getting better! 😉

    Cheers,

    Mike

    • DivGuy,

      Nice and thank you for the post! Making mistakes = can be the greatest learning tool. Lots of positive changes going on in life right now and curious on where this road is really taking me. Time, actions/choices and all will tell. Appreciate you coming by!

      -Lanny

  5. Nice job Lanny! Do you fall under the yearly goals mindset or do you adjust/add new ones as the year goes on? I’ve tried doing yearly ones but normally fall off at some point. I’m attempting to do smaller, quarterly goals instead and so far so good.

    • IPD,

      Thank you for coming by! I adjust if I think I’m either way too far behind or way too far ahead. Rarely will I adjust if I’m behind, if at all, however. Quarterly.. interesting, never really thought about that. Appreciate the tip.

      -Lanny

  6. Hi Lanny, well done on the goals this year. It is amazing how you pushed for a higher goal on dividend income to stay motivated. It certainly helps to have such a high savings rate to be able to allocate fresh capital each month. I found the mortgage goal quite interesting. It is great to reduce the overall cost of borrowing by chipping away with additional payments like that. On the language front, much like a dividend snowball, you have to start somewhere. If I may make a suggestion, memrise is a free app that has a great interface and makes learning words in a new language fun and addictive. I’ve managed to make some progress towards learning basic Croatian using the app 15 min a day. Good luck in Q4!

    • DNiche,

      Thank you for coming it. High savings rate = opens doors for further time, freedom and choices, it’s quite a challenge and push, can be very difficult, but once it’s done it’s done. The goal is to not sacrifice quality of life in the pursuit of that of course.

      Cost of borrowing = trying to make moves, nuff said.

      Language = time is my enemy at the moment. Memorizing a free app eh? Is that what you have done before? Croatian? Interesting.

      Appreciate the luck!

      -Lanny

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