June 2024 – A good month

June 2024

June 2024 was a nice month, well-balanced. The weather could have been better, but there were still some pleasant days. And with the few days of sun we had in a row, we still managed to plant things in our garden. And we could even already pick up some raspberries.

Compared to May, we had fewer things planned in June. The main event was a family weekend with my mom and all my siblings. It was enjoyable, we spent the weekend in Valais.

The first half of the month, our son slept really well, with uninterrupted long nights. And then, he went back to his older pattern of shorter interrupted nights and no naps (leading to tantrums). It was almost weird to wake up fully refreshed and without an alarm. We are hoping this will come back.

As for my back, I have finished physio. It seems a bit better, but no major differences, and I definitely need to continue muscling again my back muscles. I also went to see an orthopedist and the results are interesting. My gait is undoubtedly bad and could cause these issues. I will discuss with my doctor, but the next step is very likely to get insoles.

Financially, we are following the same trend as before, with too many small expenses piling up. And with a few extraordinary expenses, we are far from reaching our spending goal. That being said, we still managed to save 43% of our income this month.

Expenses

Here are the details of our expenses in June 2024:

In total, we spent 10112 CHF. Without taxes, this amounts to 6314. This is significantly higher than our goal.

We had a few non-monthly bills this month: the household insurance and the power bill. Other than that, this was only monthly bills or non-recurring expenses.

One of the biggest expenses of the month was buying a full pig again. We restocked our freezer. Since we still had some beef (we bought a quarter a few months ago), we are very close to maximum capacity on our freezer. And we actually broke one of the drawers because it was stuck. We will have probably soon have to buy a new one.

Other than that, it is the same as usual: many small expenses piling up. We had to buy gas for the BBQ, we had to replace our garden umbrella, and my wife had to change her glasses. And then many more smaller expenses are adding up. At this point, I do not know how to change this trend. But maybe I should just stop worrying about it, as long as our total expenses are not too crazy.

I still think we can improve our expenses, but we still managed to save enough money this month for it to be a good month.

2024 Goals

Here is the status of our goals by the end of June 2024:

Our savings rate and income goals are doing well, but our expenses goal is in poor shape and increasing again in the wrong direction. As said in the previous chapter, this is due to many small expenses on top of a few extraordinary expenses. If we do not course correct, we will have increased our spending compared to last year.

My health goals are doing fine. I am still sticking to four circuits for each workout. And I have added multiple exercises with dumbbells on each workout day (not counted in my goals). I have not walked enough outside this month, but with my walking desk, I have more than enough steps. I have grown used to this habit and I hope to keep it at this level and more in the following months.

Next month, I plan to remove a few supplementary health insurance from my son’s coverage. We took the full package before he was born, but we know we are not going to use several of them. So, this will reduce slightly our expenses.

Seeing how our expenses are doing, I think it does not make sense anymore to optimize recurring bills. This goal will likely go away next year. We need to focus on eliminating small expenses that pile up.

We have not yet made a lot of progress towards reducing our power consumption. I was more careful in the office with turning things off and automating some shutdown. What I will do next month is to automate the shutdown of my servers earlier than now, since I go to bed very consistently.

During the short heat wave we had this month, the temperature already went up significantly in our room. As a result, I slept poorly for a few nights in a row. I am seriously considering buying an A/C if this happens again. I know it is bad for our budget and the environment, but I will not compromise on sleep quality anymore.

Overall, our goals are doing well.

FI Ratio

Here is the progress of our FI Ratio as of June 2024:

Overall, our FI ratio is doing well. We have reached an all-time-high in our FI Ratio, at 37%. The stock market did some nice gains this month. And we managed to save a little money as well. If this trend continues, we may reach 40% by the end of the year.

Our average expenses went slightly down this month because June 2024 was significantly cheaper than June 2023 (because of taxes). This lowered our average expenses, leading to a lower goal and in turn a higher FI Ratio.

I am starting to think I should only keep track of one FI Ratio. Our target is 100’000 CHF per year, but our running expenses are about 140’000 CHF. I am thinking that I should adapt my target o 120’000 CHF and then change that limit over time instead of having wild variations in my FI ratio.

Overall, I am happy about our progress toward financial independence.

The Blog

I managed to keep writing my usual sets of articles this month. And as of this article, I have a few more articles scheduled as a buffer.

I had time to finalize the e-book I wanted to write. I need to wait for the reviews before I can move forward. Furthermore, I also prepared the system for payments. And I used the same system to create “buy me a coffee” links in the about page. I hope to release the e-book in August at this point.

As usual, the forum was pretty quiet.

Other than that, I got to meet Dror Allouche (the author of several guest articles such as the one about the pitfalls of financial independence). We spent a few hours walking in Bern and having a nice lunch!

Next Month – July 2024

In July, we already have a few things planned for our weekends. Mrs. The Poor Swiss is going on a short vacation with friends, and I am doing the weekend with my son.

Financially, it should be a standard month normally. We have to buy a new car chair for our son, but it should not make a significant change in our expenses.

What about you? How was June 2024?