Okay, I admit there are no net worth games and nobody is participating in anything. But I have a confession to make. I’m a creeper. Yup. Weird. No, you don’t have to hide your kids, or your wife. You might want to hide your finances tho… I’ll tell you why.
Net worth Creeping
Shortly after I started blogging in July of last year, I became very interested in knowing what attributed to net worth bloggers successes and shortcomings. Was there something I could learn from them? I started creeping on their net worth posts. Some had their net worths in graph form. And when they posted to Rockstar Finance, they were random points in time without dates. So I started tracking them from a comparative and longitudinal perspective.
Who qualifies
I used Rockstar Finance net worth directory to identify key bloggers. Those bloggers who were included track their net worth on a monthly basis for least the past year. In some cases, I was able to go back beyond 10 years. I primarily focused on those below $1M and ahead of me with a couple of exceptions (e.g., where it was easy to grab their net worth). BTW, if you want me to remove your numbers, I’m glad to do so. If you want me to add your numbers, Just let me know your site and post monthly, I’m also glad to do so.
~*The Net worth GAMES*~
So I began pitting them against one another. It was 2million blog against Freedom40Plan. Freedom40Plan against Planting Our Pennies. And Max Out Retire Early – the biggest underdog – coming from behind to beat everybody! Okay well not everybody and not right away. So I’m going to show you how people compare against one another in 2017 as well as their dollar and percentage changes from 2016.
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I highlighted (bolded lines) a couple of my favorites: GenY Finance Guy and Freedom40Plan. Highlighting is based on liking their writing style and success with growing their net worth. I’m the bolded orange line.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
While I didn’t have the biggest dollar growth in 2017, I did have a good percentage growth. I would discount the percentage change since I’m starting with a smaller asset base. However, I outperformed those below Accumulating Money.
What five things did I learn?
- Time is uber important – everyone “starts at the bottom, then they at the top” (paraphrased)
- Income is uber important – true rockstars have healthy incomes whether w2 or other sources like real estate
- Savings rate is uber important – rockstars also have a healthy savings rate usually via combination of brokerage accounts and retirement plans (e.g., 401k, TSP, SEP-IRA, Roth)
- ~$500K gives people enough confidence to begin thinking about/acting on early retirement
- Those around or above $1 million have diversified investments beyond stocks and bonds
I hope to keep tracking, adding new bloggers and learning from the community.
-Max Out!
PS: Again, if you’re tracked and don’t want to be, let me know. OR if you wanted to be added, let me know too!
