My goals for 2008 are:

1) Pay off $6,000 CC by May 1st
2) Pay down car 1 by Aug 1st
3) Invest $10,000 by year end
4) Invest $15,500 in 401(k)
5) Review and reallocate retirement funds by end of Q1
6) Will by end of Q1
7) Life Insurance by end of Q1

So, how are we doing? Good in some and procrastinating in others. Probably par for the course.

1) Pay off $6,000 CC by May 1st

12/31/2007 - $6,000
01/31/2008 - $3,543 ($2,457 paid)

Nice. I might be able to pay this off by end of March. 2 months early. Keep the focus.

2) Pay down car 1 by Aug 1st

12/31/2007 - $5,726
01/31/2008 - $5,317 ($409 paid)

Well, if I can keep up the pressure and the focus, I might be able to pay this off by end of May. Nice.

3) Invest $10,000 by year end

Yea, well, you know… I’ve been real busy lately. Seriously, once car 1 is paid is will get attacked. On hold now but itching to start.

4) Invest $15,500 in 401(k)

01/31/2008 - $1,451

Right on target. Looks to complete in middle of November. (A little boost in income around Christmas by not having the old 401(k) deducted from the paycheck.)

5) Review and reallocate retirement funds by end of Q1

I have reviewed the allocations and mine are all out of wack. I have set up a spreadsheet to figure out the buys and sells automatically. I am just waiting for some of the volatility to leave the market. No sense rebalancing if I need to rebalance next quarter. I like to do it once or twice a year. So ready to go, just waiting.

6) Will by end of Q1
7) Life Insurance by end of Q1

These last two items I believe go hand in hand. I might push these off to Q2 because I want to get some advice from my CPA, and I definitely don’t want to rush it. I figure work out the general plan with the CPA (how the trust and wills work together for tax purposes) and then have a lawyer fill in the blanks. Now, I’m not a millionaire; but once I throw in life insurance for me and my wife, my estate’s value goes up considerably.

All and all, I think I am pretty much on target to get all my goals accomplished this year. In fact, I have two other goals I might add: pay off a second car ($16,432) and my wife’s braces ($2,496).

The funny thing was that when I started putting together my goals for 2008 in December I thought that they were tough and it was going to be a stretch to achieve. After the first month of January, I’m ready to add more goals to the list.