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Jan 12 update

January 12th, 2012 at 11:11 pm

I'm trying to blog every day to stay on track and spend time focusing about money and not wasting it playing on the web. I love playing on the web :}

I was inspired after blogging yesterday to finish entering the remaining statements for my hobby business. I tend to call it a hobby business because its not my main job, but its a real business, it did gross $150,000 last year and employed 22 people at least part-time. Plus me, but I work for free :} Its run from my house and I do a lot of advice, but the daily stuff is run by others. I do all the financials though. I am currently a sole owner so it all goes on my personal income tax.

Other things I need to compile for taxes - charity donations - work trip receipts (Germany, ?), bank info (interest, mortgage interest), Kansas house sale info + income before sale, stock sell info (wasn't there a letter about this from last Jan?), ... I'm sure I"m missing things. Next year I will be more prepared because of this wonderful blog that will help keep me organized.

TODO - organize paperwork and set up files so they will be maintained over the year instead of just putting everything in a 'to be filed' hanging folder.

I bought a $50 coupon for a local Mexican restaurant for $4 yesterday. Yes, FOUR dollars. From Restaurants.com. Regularly $20, but I got $16 off by going through upromise and typing in DINNER for a coupon. My friend is getting 13% for her student loan. I chose a place I haven't been that I think my nieces will enjoy. Its an inexpensive place and I'm not sure we can even eat $50 worth!
I also bought some toner and other things for the business using the upromise link, Staples.com offers 2% so I bought all the things I usually do at the end of tax time (1099 forms, storage boxes, etc) and got free shipping, and they will arrive before I could have gone shopping anyhow.

I also opened a new type of savings account and transferred my 6-month emergency fund to it (and set up the $1200/month automatic savings). The old savings was getting 0.25 (going to .3 at 25,000), the new one is 0.30 now going to 0.35 at 25,000. Not a huge difference. The CD rates weren't worth the lock. This savings is something to look into when I start studying my investments... (TODO)

Posted in Investing, To Do Lists, Rambling Updates, Taxes | 2 Comments »

2 Responses to “Jan 12 update”

  1. CB in the City Says:
    January 13th, 2012 at 02:07 pm 1326463674
    1326463674

    Interesting. What I call my hobby business employs only me and one volunteer and loses $50-80 a month!

  2. PurpleLight Says:
    January 13th, 2012 at 05:12 pm 1326474756
    1326474756

    I don't always make money on my business, despite grossing so much. I originally set it up as a way of making income for my friends; I was selling things on ebay to help pay off my student loans and people were asking me for more than I had time, so I saw there was a market. I had friends having babies who needed stay-home jobs, and when a good friend found out she was having twins (and daycare would cost her salary) I decided to set it up and have her run it. I was also buying my house which I had moved into with 3 other housemates, so I saw the business as a way of helping with the mortgage. It takes up ~ a 1/3 of the house and I do write off 1/3 of the mortgage, utilities, and insurance. About 3 years ago my friend who was running things moved away. I decided to start working on it and expanding it (I didn't have time or desire before) and have spent the last few years getting more people, improving the website (we sell things online) and I'm hoping we will eventually move to a store front. I changed the business model a bit - we used to just do on demand, but now we have in stock. So I'm growing inventory. And learning about it - I have the book "Essentials of Inventory Management by Max Muller" right beside me ready to read.

    TO DO - READ the book!

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