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May 2018 – Wedding and 100K net worth milestone

Baptiste Wicht | Updated: |

(Disclosure: Some of the links below may be affiliate links)

A lot of things happened in May 2018! The most important event of this month is that we got married! We had a nice and simple wedding with close family and friends.

And as you will see, we have reached the 100K CHF milestone in our net worth! This is the first time! We can now hope to stay at this level for some time!

Even considering the wedding expenses, this month has some good savings rate. This is mostly due to the extensive gifts we received. This month is the month with my largest income yet. We should have been able to turn it down. Let’s hope we can keep expenses to a low next month.

May 2018

After turning 30 in April, I got married in May. And in June I will start my new job! What an eventful year.

In May 2018, my savings rate was 49.32%. It is quite a good result. However, considering that is also the month with my largest income yet, it is not so good. Indeed, I received part of my 13th salary and a lot of wedding gifts.

The biggest expense this month was the purchase of our honeymoon. For our honeymoon, we both wanted to have as little to do as possible. Therefore, we decided to choose an all-inclusive hotel. We found many great deals but ended deciding for Egypt. More specifically, we will go Hurghada. We were really impressed by the extremely cheap prices of the hotels in Egypt. Unfortunately, the flights are really expensive. That is the only way for their government to make money on tourists.

In the end, we spent  1373.80 CHF on the package. For 6 days, that is around 114 CHF per person and per day. This is not cheap by any standard. But, for an all-inclusive 5-star hotel we felt it was worth it. In countries where the flights were cheaper, the hotels were more expensive. We will not get married every year, so I believe it is good to indulge ourselves!

There were other big expenses this month. We spent around 700 CHF between the wedding fees and the residency permit fees. This is really starting to pile up. I know there are still some documents to fill. I hope they would not be as expensive as that. And, I also had to replace the shock absorbers on my car for 450 CHF.

Homemade Chocolate Chip Cookies
Homemade Chocolate Chip Cookies

We also did a lot of groceries and cooking this month. And we had to buy some foods and drinks for our wedding party at our house. We also did some pork dumplings! And Wednesday was my last day at work. So we did a little leave party for my colleagues. We had to buy a few more drinks. And we cooked cookies, cake, dumplings, and some scallion pancakes. All this added to our Food budget this month. But this should not be often the case. And it is quite enjoyable! And Wednesday was my last day at work. So we did a

Home made Pork Dumplings
Homemade Pork Dumplings

We also started our own vegetable garden. This is something really enjoyable. However, it does not go very well. Several plants already died. Probably because of the lack of sun or too much water. And we have a lot of ants. We will see how that goes. But this will definitely be a net loss.

Here is the breakdown of all my expenses for May 2018:

  • Insurances: 255 CHF: Average
  • Transportation: 650.20 CHF: Well above average. I had to replace the shock absorbers on my car.
  • Communications: 107.08 CHF: Average
  • Personal: 2943.35 CHF: Well above average. We paid for our honeymoon. A lot of fees for Visa and Wedding
  • Food: 779.20 CHF: Well above average. We paid for two parties, a few going out and a few large cooking at home.
  • Apartment: 1247 CHF: Average
  • Taxes: 771.15 CHF: Average

I will have to pay my car insurance next month. However, these are normal expenses that are expected.

If you are interested in weddings in Switzerland, I have compiled a list of tips to save money on weddings.

2018 Goals

My goals as of May 2018
My goals as of May 2018

This month I was able to invest 5000 CHF in my broker account. Which is great :) My third pillar is already maxed out from last month. As for investing, my goals are going great :) I already put more in 5 months than I would have thought possible. I have put the 5000 in my Switzerland ETFs this month. For the next two months, I will invest again everything in my total world ETF.

On the investment side, I finally was able to sell my PostFinance 25 and PostFinance 45 funds. I bought shares of PostFinance 75 with the results. I was waiting for them to earn again before I sold. Now, this reduces my bond allocation further. This is good since I realized I have too much bonds.

Unfortunately, for the second month in 2018, I was not able to stay under 4500 CHF expenses. Next year, I should probably set an average expense as a goal. But, considering that we paid for our honeymoon, it is not so bad. As for the dividends, I only received a very small dividend this month from my Swiss Dividend ETF.

The Blog

As for the blog, I have posted quite a few articles on the blog this month. I still enjoy writing and have a few more articles in my pipeline. This is the most important thing about the blog. I will probably try to write only two weekly articles next month, not three. With the new work and my wife at home, I will not have enough time for three. I think.

For the audience of the blog, it is not great. The audience has already been going down this month. I was thinking that I was doing something wrong. On a very nice note, my post about my biggest investing mistakes has been featured on Rockstar Finance (now Rockstar Finance is dead). This completely exploded all my page views:

Pageviews after being feature on Rockstar Finance
Pageviews after being feature on Rockstar Finance

In one day, I had more page views than in the entire month :) Thanks a lot J. Money. This shows that at least I am not doing everything wrong! I will continue my writing as such. To all first-time readers from Rockstar Finance, I hope you enjoy the content!

As for Pinterest, it is now been one month since I started using Pinterest. It is not going great. I have had 18 visits from Pinterest in one month…

That is really terrible. Considering the time invested, it is a really bad investment. I will continue pinning some things like I am doing now. But I will definitely not invest more time now. It seems a big waste. I am pretty disappointed. At least, the pictures on each post are great. I am open to advice from anybody on how to improve my audience or to what I’m doing wrong with my Pinterest ;) For now, I don’t want to pay for an expensive course. I will see later for this option.

Net Worth

Let’s see how my net worth is going. I reached 101’494.18 CHF. This is the first time my net worth passed over 100K :) I am really happy about this. Here is the evolution since I started tracking it:

My net worth as of May 2018
My net worth as of May 2018

I really like the increase in the last two months :) I am on a good way now. A lot of people are saying the first 100K is the hardest. Let’s hope they are right :) I am on way to 200K now!

Next month

On the first of June, I am starting my new job. This will increase my salary and offer a few advantages on the money side. I will probably make a few posts about this shortly.

So far, I have got two big things to pay next month. Half of my car insurance is coming. I also need to pay my home insurance. Together, it is already almost 900 CHF. And if the very slow people at the insurance finally decide to consider our case, we will have to pay for my wife’s insurance. We will see how it goes. It should still be pretty good with my new salary. But there may be something unplanned coming to us. I really hope we can stay under 4500 CHF.

Next month, I will probably open a Cumulus MasterCard. I checked the different credit cards in Switzerland. And it seems it is the best one around for me.

What about you? How were your finances in May 2018?

Recommended reading

Photo of Baptiste Wicht
Baptiste Wicht started The Poor Swiss in 2017. He realized that he was falling into the trap of lifestyle inflation. He decided to cut his expenses and increase his income. Since 2019, he has been saving more than 50% of his income every year. He made it a goal to reach Financial Independence and help Swiss people with their finances.
Discover Swiss Financial Secrets That Maximize Your Money!

Learn easy ways to optimize your finances and save thousands in Switzerland with our exclusive e-book. Learn about the most cost-effective financial services tailored for savvy residents and expats!

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5 thoughts on “May 2018 – Wedding and 100K net worth milestone”

  1. Congratulations a lot🎉🎊 for the new life and new stage of your life and your new job !!!
    The trees are green and red roses too🌹 , what a wonderful world 🌍!

  2. Congratulations on all the big changes – wedding, job, Rockstar Finance feature.

    I still think that the price you paid for the honeymoon is decent. As you said, you only get married once, so at least you chose a place that made you happy.

    Was it difficult to get your wife a visa? How long did that take? Will she be looking for a job here too?

    1. Thank you very much Janet :)

      Yes, you are right. Considering it’s a nice hotel in a nice place, it’s not expensive :)

      It was not very difficult. But she had to do quite a few things in China and use a notary for Chinese documents. Then I also had to do quite a few things in Switzerland. And after she arrived, she only had 6 weeks visa and we had to marry in the meantime. It’s easy to get a visa for less than 3 months either for tourists or family visit, but difficult for longer time.

      What about you, was it difficult to get a visa ? What kind of visa do you have ?

      1. Yes, it took me about 4 months to get the visa (Permit D) to enter the country and then after I entered I had to wait another 2-3 months for the Permit B. And when I renewed my Permit B in the second year I had to wait another 3 months! And now for the PhD, I am waiting for the work visa, I’m pretty sure it will take 3-4 months… My work applied for me in May and hopefully it’ll be ready before August (that’s when my contract starts.

      2. Wow, then we were actually pretty lucky. It was not really long, just a bit painful to do all the administrative tasks. The Permit B was very fast once we got married.

        I hope you’ll receive your visa in due time ;)

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