What's Your Net Worth?

If you don't know your net worth, you are not financially independent and definitely not ready for retirement!

Net worth  is the total assets minus total outside liabilities of an individual or company. In personal finance, net worth (or wealth) refers to an individual's net economic position; similarly, it uses the value of all assets (long term assets) minus the value of all liabilities.

If you do not know your net worth, it is impossible to set financial goals and meet them for a successful retirement. But if you do, you can easily know where you are at financially and can easily set some investment goals to fund your retirement. And of course you'll know how much you are supposed to spend and save each month.

Knowing someone's net worth used to be very difficult especially of you have a lot of bank accounts, credit card accounts, assets and loans. But these days, not anymore. There are plenty of free appplications/websites online that anybody can use.

We use Mint.com and we love it. Mint automatically pulls all our financial information into one place, so we can easily get the entire picture. It gives us total visibility and helps us stay on top of our finances. We see what's happening with all our accounts – checking, savings, credit cards, investments, retirement – at any moment of the day. And their free mobile apps mean we can track our money on-the-go.


Mint can help us reach our goals. We can set a budget and create a plan to reach our personal financial goals. We can track our progress online or stay up-to-date with monthly emails. And it helps us achieve our goals faster with helpful free advice and next steps.


I understand that it is a little scary to have all your account information in one place but Mint is trusted, safe and secure. It has more than 10 million users who know their information is always secure. That's because they use 128-bit SSL encryption – the same security that banks use – and all data is protected and validated by VeriSign and TRUSTe. Plus, since Mint is read-only, no money can be moved in or out of any account. In addition, if someone gets your login information, they can't do anything about it. The account numbers are hidden.

And the nice thing is it is free. Try it and if you don't like it, cancel or close the account.

Make sure that you know your net worth. And make sure that it is going up instead of going down!

More than $3,700 in Credit Card/Bank Rewards in 2012? How's That Possible?

Call me "creditcardoholic", "bankoholic" or "credit card freak" :) but I just looked at my Mint.com account and I can tell you we made more than $3,700 in credit card rewards last year!  Yes, that's $3,700 and that is   worth 2 months of mortgage payments.



Wondering how we did it? Here's our secret (or I guess, not anymore):

• We use credit cards instead of cash or check on almost all  purchases. Yes, on all purchases whenever a credit card is accepted.
• We use credit cards that give us 3%-5% cash back/rewards on most purchases. It is not that easy to do this nowadays because banks scaled back their credit card rewards since the 2008 recession but we found a way to do this by carrying multiple credit cards. While they do not cover all purchases, they at least cover most purchases, and then we get 1% on others. Here are the credit cards that we currently carry:
1. BarclayCard Sallie Mae Rewards Card - This card gives 5% cash back for groceries and gas. So we use this card when we go to Publix or any other grocery stores or when we go to Shell or any other gas stations to fill up our gas tank. From this card alone, we received more than $500 last year, as we spent more than 10k for groceries and gas. Yes, that's how much we ate and drove last year...:) And half of it is probably for Sophia! =)
2. Citi Forward Card - This card gives 3% rewards for restaurants and entertainment. This card gave us about $150 in rewards last year.
3. Citi Thank You Premier Card - This card gives 1 point (equivalent to $1) for every mile you fly and $1 for every dollar you spend on  it. This adds up especially if you love to travel or when you travel for work! Imagine how much I made on my trip to India from Chicago? 
4. Citi Professional Card - This card gives 3% for rental cars and gas stations. I took advantage of this card because I normally rent a car when traveling for work.
• We also take advantage of introductory offers. When Citibank was offering 50,000 points just to apply for the Citi Thank You Card and spend $3,000 for the first 3 months, sure I applied for it. That was a one-time $500 rewards. When Chase Bank was offering 60,000 points to apply for Chase Slate Card, sure I got one. Heather did too, so that alone was $1,200.

Now, my situation is a little bit extreme and it's worth for me to do so because I am a consultant and I fly and travel almost half of the year. But an average person could still make at least $1,000 a year I think by choosing the right credit card. Keep in mind that in America, every card holder has 4 credit cards on average.

If you are not comfortable opening many credit cards or if you think it is too much to manage, at least get a card or two that can give the most rewards based on your situation. Look at the category that you buy most and get a card that gives you the most rewards. For example, if you spend a lot of money on groceries or if you commute to work, get the Sallie Mae Rewards card and get 5% on groceries and gas. Or if you are that type of person who does not cook and would rather eat out for dinner all the time, take advantage of the Citi Forward Card and get 3% on all restaurant expenses. And by the way, Blue Cash Everyday from American Express currently offers 3% CASH BACK at U.S. stand-alone supermarkets, and 2% CASH BACK on gasoline at U.S. stand-alone gas stations and at select major department stores. This could be a good start for most persons especially those Department Stores shoppers.

And if you think too many cards is too much to manage, take advantage of auto payment option so you do not have to worry about missing payments and get charged a fee.

Credit card deals and rewards change every year so keep watching for new stuff. Or follow my blog =). I will post any new deals that I find here... at least I will try!