Tripling My Passive Income – (October 2021 Net Worth Update)


It’s the first of the month, so it’s time for another net worth update.

In this series, I’m documenting my path towards: 

  • $30,000 in annual passive income by 2025
  • $1 million in net worth by 2027

If you’re interested in real-time updates on the numbers, you can check out my net worth tracker, which I update monthly.

Fixing My Flooded Basement 

In my last update, I talked about how our basement was almost entirely ripped up because of a serious flood.

As stressful as the past month has been, it’s now all finally repaired. 

We wound up sinking about $12,000 into fixing the basement and the sewer line that caused the floor (in short, the sewer line had a couple of holes in it right next to a basement window, and water was able to pool there during a harsh storm). 

To add insult to injury, my insurance company denied my claim.

They’re saying that this is flood damage and not backup damage. 

I currently have backup coverage and not flood coverage. Flood generally refers to any water coming in from the outside, not from within the systems in the house.

That said, I do believe that this should fall under backup since it’s directly linked to the sewer & sump system.

I’ll be arguing with them in the coming weeks (if not months). We’ll see if they grant any mercy in the meantime.

Renting My Former Primary Residence 

Flood issues aside, during the last month, I’ve been spending a lot of time towards listing and showing my former primary residence. It’s a condo about a mile away from my new townhome.

Just a couple days ago, we finally signed a lease. It’s set to begin today – October 1st.

I listed and showed this unit myself, but I will be turning it over to property management shortly. They’ll handle future leasing as well.

I now have two occupied rental properties. We’ll be receiving $600 monthly from this property after expenses, which triples our previous monthly passive income.

That’s another layer of financial flexibility. If we were to suddenly lose a big chunk of our, we have our rental property cash flow to help soften the blow.

And it can help us recoup some of those basement flood expenses in the meantime!

Anyways, let’s get into this month’s numbers.

October 2021 Net Worth Numbers

As a reminder, my net worth last month was at $91,644.27

Assets – October 2021

Assets October 2021

We saw a bit of a pull back in the stock market over this past month. My portfolio wasn’t spared.

For the past few months, I’ve been cycling money out of LendingClub, which retired as an investing platform.

I continue to average about $200 per month into cryptocurrency. This is currently split between Ethereum and Bitcoin. It’s a speculative play and makes up a very limited portion of my net worth.

But, now that I have closed the money pit that was my basement, I should be able to focus on making more investments and paying down debt.

This leaves our assets at $715,538.12.

Liabilities – October 2021 

Liabilities October 2021

I have almost $2,800 on credit cards right now, which is because I just opened up two new cards. I’ll pay them down before any interest is charged.

Now that my mortgage is on my credit report, I was finally comfortable applying for some new cards. I’m hoping to take advantage of some of the bonus offers out there right now.  

One of these cards was the Chase Sapphire Preferred – which, if I spend $4,000 in the first three months, I’ll get 100,000 bonus points. This equates to about $1,200 in free travel or something like that.

For now, I put a good portion of my basement repairs and my realtor dues on that card to try to quickly reach that $4,000 level. I expect to get there within the next month.

The other card I opened was through Associated Bank: their Visa Max Cash Preferred card. I’m already using Associated Bank for a checking account bonus right now; so I’m having a small portion of my work direct deposit go through that.

The Associated Bank card has no annual fee and is currently offering $150 for $500 spent in the first three months. I’m also getting 5% back on my Internet and phone bill.

One of the best things about having good credit is the opportunity to earn practically free bonuses through credit cards and introductory offers. I expect to take advantage of them until I have a nice portfolio of [mostly] fee-free cards.

Otherwise, not much else has changed on the liabilities side of things.

Our liabilities this month are $627,724.27.

My Net Worth – October 2021

That leaves us with $87,813.85 in net worth.

That’s a decrease of $3,830.42 from last month.

So our debt ratio is now 87.73%

And our passive income has nearly tripled to $950 per month. 

What’s Next?

My current goal is to find another real estate deal – whether that be a flip or a buy-and-hold deal. Ideally, I would love to do a cash-out refinance after doing some rehab. 

Those deals are not always easy to find, so I need to start making offers more regularly again.

With all the things I’ve been dealing with the past month, I didn’t feel like I had the time to search for those offers.

On top of that, it’s a little tough devoting tons of time towards building deal flow as I am spending most of my time towards my big law job. I just have to try and be consistent and build a sustainable routine.

Sometime in the coming months, I’m aiming to be under contract on another property.

I’ll keep you posted in any event.

This website, and any communication stemming from it, while hopefully informative, should not be taken as financial or legal advice. Assume all links are affiliate links. I am an Amazon affiliate.

Jack Duffley

Jack Duffley is a real estate investor and attorney based in Houston, TX.

Recent Posts