Bit late with this one as concurrently working on another post which should be ready soon-ish.
Anyway, July was a great month which had me enjoying the sport on TV (Women’s Euros – Get in, England! – and Wimbledon) and basking in a couple of heatwaves.
Have enjoyed tending to my garden this month – harvested a few courgettes and some tomatoes are just starting to ripen.
Flowers in full bloom and spent a couple of lazy afternoons watching the pollen gatherers.
Nice colours in my garden!
There were a few social outings which included a trip to Haydock Races (no wins!).
I probably had money on the one at the back!
I also renewed my passport this month and totally forgot I would be getting the ‘Brexit Blue’ version – I do vaguely remember my first passport being this colour. Anyway, passport renewal was all done online and was a fairly straight forward process, with the only fiddly bit getting the photos done in a photo booth.
So, how did my numbers look for July?
I saved 26% of my net salary. The above includes £34.47 from doing Prolific surveys and £27 gambling winnings (football, not horses!).
Shares and Investment Trusts
No new investments, I just topped up existing ones.
Anyway, current share/IT portfolio can be found here.
(Entire portfolio here)
Future Fund
The rocket continues blasting into unexplored territory (for me!). I’m still just being cautiously optimistic as you never know what’s going to happen round the corner! At the end of July, my FF ended up at £331,159.19.
Dividends and Other Income
A decent month for dividends:
I received £751.07, of which £239.64 was from my ISAs, the rest from my SIPPs. All dividends were reinvested.
Here’s what my ISA dividend income graph looks like:
Goals Update
Here’s how it looks for month 7:
Other stuff
Went to visit my elderly neighbour – looks like she’s unlikely to be back in her house any time soon and will continue to live with her daughter round the corner. Other than still being a bit wobbly, she seems fine and well.
On my other side, the people renting have moved out and the guy who owns the house has moved in with his girlfriend and their dog. I mention the dog as its bark is a ‘new voice’ in a neighbourhood of yappy dogs so it sounds ‘different’, but soon, I’m sure I’ll be able to tune that out too.
I had a nice little chat with them as they were moving in (they’re only young, late 20s/early 30s at most) and I look forward to his drive and garden being maintained – I was getting his weeds growing over onto my drive and garden. However now, I really need to keep on top of my drive so it doesn’t look scruffy next to his spotless-newly-jet washed-and-sanded-drive! ‘Drive wars’ haha!
Anyway, I’ve booked my annual leave for October so credit card bill will be a bit nasty next month but yay, I have my holiday to look forward to!
And that’s it really – hope you all had a great July!
Thanks for the update, Weenie.
Pretty flowers: you even managed to get a bee in the shot of the sunflower(if that’s what it is?). Is your rear garden all paved with the flowers in pots? Can’t quite tell from the tight framing of the photos.
The dividends continue to roll in. I see you have Middlefield Canadian…funnily enough, I read in passing yesterday that the management are proposing to convert this IT to an ETF. Does this bother you (other than having to move it out of your list of ITs!)?
Are you going anywhere (Hong Kong?) on your annual leave or is this time to do work on the house (as you battle for supremacy against your new neighbours and their top-notch drive)? 🙂
All the best.
Hey Curlew
Yes, that is a bee on the sunflower, think the only one I managed to catch on it! And yes, my rear garden is all paved, with my plants in pots. There are two natural beds, at the bottom of the garden and a smaller one on the side – I have mainly shrubs in these which attract small birds.
I’m not really bothered that Middlefield Canadian will switch an ETF as I do have one or two ETFs in my divi income portfolio – as long as it continues to pay a dividend I’m happy to keep it. Thanks for the heads up, I hadn’t seen that.
I’ll be going to Hong Kong for my annual leave, maybe another little trip while I’m out there too. I have made a step towards getting work done on the house, so hopefully will get a quote soon!
Cheers and thanks for reading!
Good update, always look forward to reading your posts.
Thanks and thanks for reading, Peter!