1st Quarter
My entire retirement income went up 5.49% since the end of 2006. When you subtract all my contributions as well as my company’s 401K match, the gains was a measely 0.40%. Definitely nothing to be proud of. The first 3 months was when the market pretty much traded sideways. There wasn’t alot of movement at this time as far as from my part. I was only contributing 7% to my 401K since I needed to squeeze out my paycheck due to vehicle maintenance expenses and setting aside some cash for my 6 months emergency fund.

2nd Quarter
My entire retirement income went up a whopping 20.21% since the end of 2006! That’s a 14.72% jump since the end of 1st quarter. After my contributions and company match were taken out, that gain was down to 7.98%. So what went right this time?

1. I was given my annual review and got a bump in pay for that.
2. I was also promoted and that further bumped my salary up.
3. I paid off all my vehicle maintenance bills.
4. The stock market also went bullish and is still doing so.
5. Completely funded my emergency fund.

All these events made it possible for me to increase my 401K contributions to 30% of my take home pay. Yup the max! The best quarter I’ve had since I began monitoring my earnings.

Looking Ahead
I’ve got a vacation and car insurance to pay for that will suck up some money for this next quarter. Besides that I should see another steady increase since I will still be contributing 30% until I reach the maximum pre-tax cut-off. That probably won’t happen until early to mid 4th quarter. Just in time for Christmas shopping for some extra cash.