Mapgirl’s Fiscal Challenge

I think I’m going to be lucky if I reach the peak of my 2007 net worth.

The reason is two-fold.

1. I am taking a bath in the markets lately in my retirement accounts. Coupled with my low contribution rate in 2008, I think I’ll be lucky to be flat and not lose anything in the funds I hold. I have shifted some money around to re-allocate to a heavier international portion, but honestly, I think things aren’t look too good globally either.

2. I just got my 2008 real estate assessment and I’m taking a $4k hit on the value of my condo. No worries though, I’m still up 14% on my original purchase price from 3 years ago. Unlike other people who bought at the top of the market, I bought an undervalued property and am still enjoying a positive increase in valuation. With the way regional planning is being done, I actually am primed for a huge increase in value in my property in the next 5-10 years. (They’re putting a new trolley/lightrail system a few blocks away, which they want ready in less than 10 years.)

Add on all that some changes in cash flow with my job transition and I’m holding onto cash as much as I can right now, but it’s been tough since I know I have to upgrade my wardrobe and I cannot submit my eye surgery to my new Medical FSA account just yet.

Lately, the search referrals I’m getting include a lot more “asset allocation international” type searches.

Are you guys also looking to internationalize your investment portfolios? I thought I mentioned this before, I’m bumping up my international portion by reallocating money to a second international fund which is less growth oriented and more blend/value. Seems I never said this when I search my posts, but yes, I’m now holding two international funds not just one.

Unfortunately, I’m not sure I am going to do a full rebalance and sell stuff to buy stuff. I was doing lazy rebalancing by changing my 401K contribution allocations. But that’s a little moot right now since I’ve stopped the 401k contributions altogether for the rest of the year.

What about you? Are you doing lazy rebalancing like me or an actual rebalance into more international funds?

JD of Get Rich Slowly has the 105th Carnival of Personal Finance available now. He’s done it DJ-style. “Stacks of tracks on tons of wax, etc.” I think I can almost hear Casey Kasem.

Madame X at My Open Wallet with Who Do You Think You Are? I’m serious. I think I can hear the song play when I read that title. Anyone else remember it? “A star?”

Accumulating Money has a really fascinating post about buying experiences over things. I suppose this is one reason why I don’t own a TV. It forces me to do things I want to be doing like hobbies and chores.

Mighty Bargain Hunter explains exactly how being disorganized costs you money. If you’ve never been able to see the direct connection, he lays it all out for you and invites commenters to leave more.

Jim at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity has chosen his post Money isn’t everything and it isn’t you.

The Sun’s Financial Diary on opening a T-Bill account with Treasury Direct. He references Jonathan at My Money Blog, but I actually think you have to read Jonathan’s T-bill category for truly complete information.

Wealth Building Lessons on Canadian Royalty Trusts or “Canroys”, one way our northern neighbors save. It’s like an industry mutual fund, similar to an REIT.

SFOrdinaryGirl, my recent guest blogger, claims her best post is Giving Old Clothes a Second Chance. Pretty good advice since I’m about to go through my closet soon.

Clever Dudette with the famous packing your lunch post. This was put up on a high traffic website and has generated a lot of comments about lunch ideas. I highly recommend reading through all of them.

Five Cent Nickel says his best post is Ten Simple Ways to Cover Your Ass(ets). I agree! This is one of the best posts I’ve seen at his blog, but certainly not the only one. I definitely think you should take the long view on planning, and contingency planning like this is very important, especially if you have kids (say like, 4 boys).

A new blogger, Grace, at GRACEful Retirement only has 8 posts, but I do like this one on Special Needs Trusts. As many of you know, I’ve thought about something like this for my cousin. This might be the advice I’ve been looking for.

GolbGuru at the Tao of Making Money says his boss is lame, er, no. He writes about sharing knowledge about paying bills and investing. Though many couples decide on a division of labor, perhaps that’s not the wisest route. This is the only “couples” post I put on my list since most of them don’t apply to me. However, I watched my parents divide this labor and I think my dad is a disaster with money, so I agree a lot with the advice.

WOW. 104. I should only hope to live that long. But eh, maybe not.

The 104th Carnival of Personal Finance is available at Getting Green. Matt is a pretty snappy guy and he’s doing it minimalist style. It’s nearly Zen with the soft green/grey theme. I can almost hear the trickling water and the lotus flowers floating by.

Yours truly has participated with a post about Investment Clubs.

The ones that really caught my eye:

NCN on drip drip dripping your way out of debt. I really needed to hear this message this week. NCN has got it going on! I like being a part of the NCN Network because of cheerleading, motivating posts like this one.

The Sun’s Financial Diary on picking stocks like a guru. Thank god he put this together. I never would have known whose work created which style of investing without this post. The stock picking tool is kind of interesting too. Click through to get to the link for the tool.

Madame X at My Open Wallet describes her thoughts on expenses and retools her savings plan. I am looking at her spreadsheet and I think I’m a little confused. But I am going to try and figure this out and post results. Maybe this is the thing that I’ve been missing all along.

Enough Wealth advice for a newbie investor. uh. I have no idea what a superannuation fund is, but he’s an Aussie, so whaddyaknow? I think it’s a retirement account. For the most part, it’s sound advice despite the funny accent! (just kidding!)

Plonkee, which is one of the most original monikers I’ve heard. She’s the resident Brit in the PFBlog community and here she’s talking about ISA’s in Britain, which like superannuation funds, appear to be retirement accounts. But like an American IRA, come in different flavors, which are unlike the American Traditional or Roth flavors.

Make Your Nut, with a very funny or very sad story about explaining the modern world to a co-worker. Reminds me of the time that our intern was agog over automatic doors at the supermarket. That wasn’t funny though. Just really sad.

Trent at The Simple Dollar with very good advice about life insurance, from an actual actuary.

Penny Nickel at Money & Values on sweatshop free clothing.

Share and enjoy!