Happy New Year everyone! It’s that time of the year that we set goals for the new year. 2021 was a good year in which I achieved most of my goals but now it is time to look ahead to the new year. Below are a few goals that I have set for 2022.
Savings Rate
In 2021 my savings rate was 21.8% of my gross pay. This is money that went either into savings or investing. I am actually impressed by how much I managed to save in 2021. At the start of the year my savings rate was much lower. When I received a raise at work, I increased my savings. When my car got paid off, I increased my savings. I have taken deliberate actions to avoid lifestyle creep. My goal for 2022 is to increase my savings even more, up to 25% of gross pay. In my opinion, this is my most important financial goal. Achieving this goal will set me up to achieve the rest of my financial goals.
Dividends
The goal for dividends is $4,000 in 2022. This would be up from the $3,652 of dividends that I received in 2021. This goal would be about a 9.5% increase in dividends and should be relatively easy to achieve. The increase will happen from funding the accounts, reinvesting the dividends received to allow for compounding, and dividend increases.
Options Trading
The goal this year is to bring in $6,000 of options premium. This goal may be a little difficult but I believe it is achievable. Last year I was able to bring in $3,994 in options premium so $6,000 is a significant increase of about 50%. I continue to learn and improve at trading options and I expect that to continue in 2022.
Blog
In 2021 I made 77 blog posts. In 2022, I plan to increase the amount of blog posts I make to over 100. In addition to my weekly and monthly updates, I plan to do more posts that will provide some insights into my thought process for investing, savings and personal finance in general.
Another goal for the blog is to actually get paid in 2022. I have been blogging for over a year now and have only made $30 from one referral to M1 Finance. So far, I have not received any payments from ads on my blog. Payments do not start until $100 is earned from ads. I am currently a little more than half way to the $100 threshold. The amount I have been getting from ads has increased the past few months so I believe I can meet this threshold sometime in the first half of 2022. I would like to make at least enough from blogging to cover the expenses of running the blog this year.
Odds and Ends
In 2021 I focused on paying down debt and was able to eliminate my high interest debt. In 2022 I will continue to pay down debt but it will not be with the same focus as in 2021. The goal for this year will be to get my overall debt below $100,000 including the mortgage.
Since I started investing a couple years ago the total amount I have invested has grown significantly. At the start of 2020 I had about $70,000 invested. At the start of 2021 the total amount invested was about $108,000. At the start of 2022 I have almost $138,000 invested. I would like to have a total of $175,000 invested by the end of 2022. While this is a goal that I am setting for myself, I understand that this goal is very dependent on what the market does in 2022. I have some control over this goal but not as much as the other goals that I have listed. If the bull market continues I should be able to achieve this goal. If it does not, than I likely will not achieve this goal.
Since I started investing a couple years ago I have what I consider to be great success. I am looking forward to building upon that success in 2022. As always, I will be documenting my journey as I work towards my goals in 2022 on the blog. I appreciate all of you who have been following along on my journey. I wish everyone a happy, healthy and prosperous new year!
On a side note, I have added a Recommended Resources in the menu. It currently is a work in progress. It will contain blogs and YouTube channels that I enjoy as well as some sites that I use. I hope you take the time to check it out.
*Disclaimer – I am not a financial professional. The information shared here should not be considered financial advice. I am just a factory worker sharing my experience as I strive to achieve financial freedom. Before investing or making any financial decision do your own research and due diligence or consider seeking the advice of a financial and/or tax professional.
Here are some of the businesses that I use that I thought some of you might be interested in.
Lolli has a variety of stores that it is affiliated with and offers rewards for shopping at these stores. I use Lolli when I shop on Chewy and I get bitcoin as a reward. Who doesn’t want free bitcoin! If you are interested in Lolli and want to help support the blog here is my referral link: https://www.lolli.com/share/XP7gxDgqC4
I use M1 Finance for my taxable growth account. M1 Finance offers promotions for signing up. At the time of writing this post, the promotion is for $50. These promotions vary from time to time but is usually a $10 bonus. If you are interested in M1 Finance and want to support the blog here is my referral link: https://m1.finance/ktIiFeOI5zDr
Varo Bank is one of the banks that I use. From time to time the bank will run promotions. Currently, you can earn up to 3% on your savings with Varo, if you meet certain requirements. If you are interested in checking it out, here is my referral link: https://bank.varomoney.com/signup?r=William360
I use the free version on trackyourdividends.com. This is a quick an easy way for me to track my estimated annual income from dividends.
If you use the referral links listed above I could receive compensation. Please take the time to read the terms and conditions before signing up.
Savings rate above 20% is pretty impressive considering you are still working down some debt, I didn’t hit that rate until my credit cards and mortgage were paid off. Job well done on keeping those expenses in check!