This week started out good. Friday was payday, and I paid some additional debt. I also moved $100 over to my investment account that I just setup, more on this later.

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Current account status:

Automobile loan: $24,244 – 1.9% No Change
Credit Card: $10,339 – 0 Interest – $300 paid
Installment Loan: $2,439 – 0 Interest – Minimum paid (Card 6)

Card 15: $1699 – 15.49% Another $600 paid.

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We plan to have card 15 paid off at the beginning of July. We also plan to move an additional $500 back into our savings account.

On my investment account, a week ago I moved some money from my emergency account to an investment account using Ally Invest. I indicated this in last Monday’s update.

When I opened the original account I made a mistake and opened a self-directed investment account instead of a managed portfolio. I do not know much about investing so I thought if I put it into a managed portfolio it would be easier.

After I opened the account I realized my mistake but in order to fix it I would have to transfer the money to a new account and call the bank to close the other self-directed account. A few days after the second account was opened I decided to keep the old account and try to research stocks.

I settled on using ETFs or exchange-traded funds. ETFs are funds that hold assets which can be a combination of stocks, bonds, or commodities like gold and silver. I researched some low-cost high performing options and settled on one that I liked.

I purchased two shares and watched as my investments started to see gains. On $100 the gains were small, but after seeing an increase of $5 on the first day I decided to put a bit more into the account. In the past week I transferred $300 from my checking account to the investment account. I purchased five more ETFs and now see my gains at $14. My managed portfolio gained another $8 making my weekly gain at $22.

While I know the market is fluctuating and most of the gains were because of the lower unemployment rates announced last week, these will be long term investments. I plan to use this as an additional amount. I also increased my contribution to my 401k from 3% to 4%.

My company matches me at 3% but as I get out of debt I plan to increase the 4% to 5 or 6% by the end of the year. Being in my late 40s I know I have a lot of ground to make up.

Overall it was a good week. My liquid assets increased by several hundred dollars as I moved more into savings and my debt was reduced by $859. I have to wait another two weeks before I can reduce my debt further.