Welcome to the January 2026 edition of our net worth tracker, where we’ll track our net worth month over month. I first started tracking our net worth when this blog was started at the beginning of September 2019. I started by creating the Net Worth Baseline report.
You can view Previous Net Worth reports HERE.
Let’s dive straight into this month’s report.
Monthly Roundup
Previously, I would go through my month and go over the highlights. These days, I’m doing it a little differently. Unless you convince me that you want to hear about my month, I’m not going to talk about it.
January 2026 Net Worth
Here’s how January compares to last month:
January Account Breakdown
Let’s take a quick look at what happened in January.
Cash (-$7,120.98)
Monthly Blurb: This is where our paychecks get deposited. All our income goes into this account and is then transferred to the appropriate accounts as set by my budget. As usual, I do the net worth report before transferring money to the appropriate accounts.
It was an average month for us in terms of income. December is an abnormal month because we cashed out the Dependent Care FSA. The balance is lower because of that getting transferred into savings.
Investment Cash ($14,873.87)
Monthly Blurb: All of our cash left over at the end of the month is transferred here and is considered part of our savings rate.
This is where our leftover income goes, plus all earnings from having the investment cash invested in an ETF. As a reminder, a portion of the investment cash is now invested in an S&P 500 index fund.
Our gains this month are mostly from transferring money from our bank account to here.
February 2024, we bought our first investment property. We put it back on the market in February 2025. It didn’t sell in 2025 like we had hoped, but we did receive an offer on the house in January. We accepted the offer and will hopefully close in February.
Remaining Cash Accounts (Emergency and Sinking Funds) (-$3,440.98)
Nothing exciting here. Just the usual, besides having to pay for property taxes. Fortunately, those dropped again this year. Now, we are back to saving up for our property tax bill for when it’s due early next year.
We are putting $200 a month into our travel fund. There is no end date set, and we are planning more vacations, so this may go up at some point. Or I may just cash flow it, like I did this month.
Speaking of travel, we paid for our cruise that we plan to take later this year. Now we just have to plan the excursions and get updated passports.
We are also putting $200 a month into car savings, rather than saving it all at once. That way, we have the savings ready when we need it and it doesn’t completely blow up our savings rate for the whole year! Check out 2024 if you don’t know what I’m talking about.
Our current cars will hopefully last us until 2030, although I’m starting to get an itch, and I’m looking at some newer EVs.
Retirement Accounts
401(k)s ($31,633,84)
January felt like an up and down month, but was overall positive. My 401k was up 5% more than all the other accounts, so I need ot go look into that.
IRA ($9,991.14)
All market performance here.
Overall, that’s a gain of 4.09% between the 401k and IRAs.
College Fund ($929.82)
The college fund is invested in mutual funds, just like the IRAs. It was up 0.96 percent.
Net Worth ($49,829.62)
January ended well into positive territory.
Utilities began to rise as we get into the cooler months, and they will continue to go up as the heater comes on more often. We had about a week of freezing temperatures in January.
There was no daycare bill, as I kept the kids home for over Christmas break. Summer should be our only daycare bill going forward. I don’t think I can avoid going into the office for all of summer.
In total, our net worth rose. We had an increase of approximately 3.30%.
We’ll see how the market performs in the last month of the year.
Accessible Net Worth ($8,204.64)
Monthly Blurb: This is the money we are able to put away, not including the tax-advantaged retirement accounts.
Our income was close to average this month, while our expenses were above average. Thanks to the extra cash in December making into our bank accounts, our accessible net worth increased.
Hopefully, soon, the cash we put into the investment house will be liquid again.
Liabilities
Status: None, as usual. They’re a burden, so I avoid them. The cars, the house, they’re all paid for. Student loans…never used them. Credit Card debt? I only use one, and it gets paid off every month, and often, I’ll pay it off multiple times per month. Just depends on how many times I think about it.
Passive Income
January and February are very boring months for dividends. Nothing exciting until March, when we get a bump in dividends.
The interest rate in my savings account decreased from 3.40% to 3.30%. The market is still volatile, as it keeps getting spooked by AI concerns.
There are starting to be talks about a rate cut, so interest rates on my savings account may take another hit.
Saving’s Rate
I track my savings rate in order to help keep my feet to the fire so that later I can be Gone on FIRE. As a bonus, you get a glimpse into my cash flow by looking at the income and expense rows.
A couple of years ago, I set the savings goal to 50%. In 2022, we barely missed that goal, but we met it in 2023!
As a result of meeting the goal in 2023, I raised the bar to 55%.
In 2024, we missed the 55% goal by about .5%, if you include our car savings in our total savings number. Otherwise, we were around 35% in 2024.
In 2025, we ended the year at just under 49%.
I want to start spending more money, so I decided to set our 2026 goal at 50%.
In January, we fell short of the goal, coming in at 40.66%. Paying for the cruise dropped our savings rate by 15 percent.
Of the 50% we are spending, we give 10%, and property tax is about another 10%, so that means we are living on 30% or less for everything else.
Housing and daycare alone used to eat up over 30%. Fortunately, property taxes have gone down, and we only have daycare during the summer for now.
Hopefully, we can get our savings rate above 50% with daycare gone and lower property taxes. Both of the kids have now dropped one of the activities, so we are left with only doing gymnastics.
Here’s how we did this month.
We were at 40.66% in January, putting us at 40.66% YTD.
Income ($13,467.85)
Right now, our only source of active income is through our full-time jobs.
This is what an above-average income month looks like for us. Each of us brought home an “extra” paycheck this month. We get paid every other week, so two months out of the year, there are three pay cycles instead of two.
Expenses ($7,991.92)
Our expenses were above average this month.
Here is a quick breakdown:
1) Home Escrow ($1,514.00)
The normal amount, $700, we put aside every month to pay for property taxes and insurance.
On top of that, we had a roof repair done.
2) Giving ($1,108.49)
The usual 10% we give every month.
3) Cost of living ($5,369.44)
This includes all our bills (Gas, Electric, Water, Internet, Phone), transportation, food, shopping, and car insurance. Home insurance is paid from our Home Escrow savings account.
As we did last year and in previous years, we will drain our dependent care account at the end of the year in one lump sum. Doing it that way saves us from having to complete more paperwork.
The biggest expense for January was paying for the cruise, and then having to pay for a roof repair.
There were no other major expenses for January.
January 2026 Vs. December 2025 Expenses
January and December were opposite, expense-wise, I feel like. The DCFSA wiped out nearly all of our expenses for December. Paying for the cruise nearly doubled our expenses in January.
Hopefully, the economy won’t completely crash, and we will close on our investment house in February.
I plan to continue funding my after-tax account at work and to do a Mega Backdoor Roth at the end of the year.
Goals Progress
Financial Goals
The Roth IRA contribution will be taken care of in February. I’ll transfer the money from our investment account.
Aside from the 401k, which is on automatic contributions from my paycheck, it’s the beginning of the year, so I don’t have much of a clue about how the other goals are going to turn out.
So far, I’ll just say, we’re looking good.
Blog Goal
I have a goal of 12 articles again this year. I’ve worked on a few, but they’re not ready to publish yet.
Personal Goals
I’m doing a reading goal again this year with two books. I’ve read 2 books each year for the last couple of years, and that seems like a good amount for me. That seems to be my sweet spot.
I’m starting this year with The Happiness Files by Arthur Brooks
There are a few I want to read: Build The Life You Want by Arthur Brooks, Cues by Vanessa Van Edwards, and Millionaire Mission by Brian Preston.
And then there is my physical health. I didn’t get to where I wanted in 2021, 2022, 2023, or 2024. But I finally made it in 2025!
I still want to lose body fat, but gain muscle mass, all while maintaining my weight. I have to make sure I’m eating healthier and exercising. I have been on target so far this year.
January 2026 Roundup
It was a good start to the year.
The kids got a couple of days off from school due to winter weather. Seems like it’s becoming an annual occurrence now.
The weather was overall nice, especially considering it was January. We had a few snow days and a few icy days where we had to worry about driving on slick roads. The good news is that the power stayed on the whole time, and we stayed warm and cozy inside, except for some playtime outside.
We had a few sick days, but otherwise we remained healthy.
I am excited as we continue into the new year. As always, there’s really a lot to be thankful for.
Stay tuned for next month’s New Worth update!
FIRE Away!
REMINDERS:
- 2 big items not included in my net worth:
- House & Cars – Their value will be added to my net worth if and when I sell them.
- 2 accounts not included in the net worth total (even though they’re listed):
- 529 – This is my money for my babies. Consider it their net worth summary.
- Home Escrow – This is Uncle Sam’s money. We don’t mess around with Uncle Sam and his money.
- Total income only includes our active income, which is currently our full-time jobs.