In today’s post I’ll be sharing my finances and investment performance over the last 3 months. I totally understand that sometimes it doesn’t feel good to read other people’s stories. Feel free to stop reading here if you are uncomfortable to continue.
Having said that, let’s dive right into the numbers. 🙂
Liquid’s Net Worth progress – March 2021
It has been an amazing quarter for most asset classes. The S&P 500 hit 4,000 points for the first time ever with large caps leading the gains. 🙂 Here’s a summary of my liquid net worth changes.
Liquid Assets:
Cash = $21,000 (+$3,000)
Canadian stocks & bonds = $309,000 (+21,000)
US stocks & bonds = $209,000 (+16,000)
Retirement = $220,000 (+17,000)
P2P lending = $26,000 (-1,000)
Mortgage funds = $42,000 (+1,000)
Total = $827,000
Liquid Liabilities:
Margin loan = $122,000 (-2000)
Total = $122,000
Liquid Net Worth = $705,000 (+$59,000) + 9.1%
All numbers are rounded to the nearest $1,000 and in $CDN at 0.80/USD
Wow. This is absolutely incredible. That’s almost a $20,000 monthly increase. As usual buying great companies at relatively cheap prices is a recipe for success. My Alimentation Couche-Tard stock purchase in January is already up 10%, outperforming major stock market indexes both sides of the border. I wrote a detailed stock analysis on why I bought ATD.B shares.
My investment philosophy is simple. Buy quality assets, be patient, use controlled leverage, and let the market do the rest. 🙂
Investment breakdown, events, & analysis
The first quarter has been a pretty busy month for me and the wife. Although we are financially independent we are both still working full time. My wife will probably transition to part time work next year. And I will do the same in 3 or 4 years. At this point we are re-investing 100% of our active incomes which partially explains the high net worth growth.
Here’s what our asset location looks like.
The biggest contribution to the overall net worth gain this quarter has been the hot housing market. 75% of our assets are now in real estate lol.
Strong real estate sales and high prices
Home prices exploded in many parts of the country. We own 2 apartments and a detached house.
Based on comparable sold homes in March, our real estate holdings are easily 5% higher now compared to last quarter. 😮 But of course real estate is not liquid. And unlike shares of a single company, every property is unique. So it’s difficult to determine what our properties are actually worth today.
High returns for the retail investor
For the longest time Wall St. had all the advantages in the financial markets. Regular folks like you and I had to pay exorbitant fees, and lacked access. Well good news. 🙂 We have reached a turning point. The regular retail investor has enough advantages now to compete with professional money managers.
Investment fees have come down to basically nothing. The markets are more accessible than ever. And anyone who has a computer or a smart phone can buy highly volatile assets like meme stocks and cryptocurrencies, while institutional investors are too big, and too regulated to freely move in and out of risky asset classes. For retail investors who understand what they’re doing, this is an incredible opportunity. 🙂
As some of you may know if you follow me on Twitter, I traded GameStop stock, and made over 50% return between Jan and Feb. 🙂 I sometimes tweet in real time what I’m trading.
A lot of people are making money in Bitcoin as well. I started buying it again in October last year.
But the first quarter of this year is when Bitcoin really took off. 😀 In December of last year I blogged about why I think the price of BTC will continue to grow throughout 2021.
If you were following me last year and decided to also buy some BTC after doing your own research then congratulations! Your Bitcoins are now worth 150% more than when I published that post. 🙂 Also, if you decided to buy BTC with my Shakepay link then thank you for using my referral. I hope you enjoy the free $30 sent your way.
Luckily the $30 bonus program is still available for new users. So if you’re looking for a platform to buy Bitcoin, feel free to use my referral code, BCIUCLK. See previous post for details.
Will Bitcoin have a price pull back soon? Probably. But from what I can gather, Bitcoin’s price will probably reach US $100,000 some time before the end of this year.
Not many fund managers even have the option to buy Bitcoin or $GME stock. But individual investors have a lot more freedom. This is what I mean by retail investors now have the upper hand when it comes to making high investment returns.
Questions to ask yourself before making an investment
Speaking of market advantages, in my most recent video I discuss the top 7 questions to ask before you make any new investment. And the 7th question is all about figuring out your edge to make better investment decisions.
You can watch the video about investment questions by clicking here or take a look below.
Looking ahead
I think we will see more of the same in Q2 – higher asset prices. But in addition, the consumer price index may increase as well. Last month I wrote a post warning readers of higher consumer prices around the corner. Literally 2 weeks after my post, the government released new information that prices for industrial products increased to a 40 year high. This price increase for raw materials, energy, and industrial goods will eventually be passed onto everybody. It’s only a matter of time. Position your finances accordingly. 🙂
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Random Useless Fact:
Congrats on the profit from GME and BTC. BTC seems like it’s gaining more traction as companies are starting to accept it as forms of payment.
That’s true. The biggest breakthrough would be for a large company to price its product or service in BTC instead of only accepting it. 🙂
The market has been on a roll, that’s for sure. Congrats on the profit from GME and BTC. Nicely done!
Thanks man. A lot of people have done extremely well financially. I think that’s why the government thinks it’s okay now to increase our taxes, lol.
Indeed WOW! This is incredible. Great Job! And very well played on BTC and GME. Maybe I missed it but what are the Mortgage Funds and do you still trust the P2P lending? Planning to keep your money there or getting out slowly?
The mortgage funds are investments in mortgage investment corporations. They pay around 7% interest a year but don’t have much capital appreciation. I have public and private ones.
The P2P lending did not have a good year in 2020 due to restrictions which affected a lot of small businesses. I am slowly withdrawal money from it until I have $25K in there and will keep it at that balance. 🙂
Nice job on the portfolios including the BTC and GME. Looking forward to reading your Q2 report.
Thanks. Hopefully real estate cools down a bit and give other asset classes an opportunity to catch up, lol. I also don’t want to see the housing market become too heated and then burst. But as the way things are going real estate may continue to grow even larger as part of my asset allocation even if I don’t invest in any new properties this year.
Thanks for the update, Liquid! Impressive results this with your portfolio this year. I like your strategy to buy quality assets, be patient, and use controlled leverage. I have used margin in the past for trading. It’s a remarkable way to build wealth if you know how to use it. Congrats on your bitcoin and GME returns. It’s awesome to see the retail investor winning.
As a retail investor I agree. I see lots of other bloggers writing about their bitcoin gains and stock market returns. I think we’re witnessing one of the largest wealth transfers in history between those who are financially literate and those who aren’t.
Nice work! It must feel so amazing that you’re both financially independent, but are able to sock away so much of your income because you don’t need it!
Thanks. We’re basically DRIPing all the dividends now. Then when we stop working we will collect the payments in cash instead. 🙂
That’s some fine liquid net worth! Almost as a fine as a Frenchman’s opinion of himself!
Lol, I suppose stereotypes are based on reality to an extent.
Just curious as to your net worth. Didn’t you post a blog about passing the $1M net worth half a year or so ago? And now you’re at $700k? Maybe I missed something that you removed from the calculation?
That’s a good question. The liquid net worth in the post above only shows my financial assets, which doesn’t include my primary residence and other properties. That’s why I call it the liquid net worth.
I stopped posting my total net worth (including my home) last year after I got married. I combine all my finances with my wife. If you’re curious, our combined net worth is around the $1.5 million mark today. But what is more relevant to readers is my liquid holdings (stocks, bonds, alternative investments, etc.) Occasionally I’ll write about the rental properties as well. 🙂
Congrats on your marriage. It makes more sense just to show your financial assets in your net worth. Thanks for clarifying.
Awesome post, congrats on all your progress! The 100% reinvestment of active income = living the dream lol
Wondering if you can elaborate a bit on that 75% of the asset pie in real estate. Is that defined as the equity you have in your multiple properties? Then taking the value of those properties to come up with an estimated $ value of the equity?
My wife and I have ~$300k of equity in our home, with a larger mortgage. Curious how do you view mortgages when calculating Net Worth?
Appreciate your transparency, super helpful!
The 75% in the pie chart includes the total value of the 3 properties we own. In terms of how much equity we actually own, it would be a much smaller slice of the pie. 🙂
The reason I like to use the entire property’s value when looking at asset allocation is because it tracks price movements more accurately. If it was only the equity, and someone used 20x leverage to buy a house, then a 10% increase in real estate will mean a 200% increase in the pie chart area, which isn’t wrong, but it throws the balance out of proportion.
When it comes to net worth I calculate the equity by subtracting the mortgage from the property’s assessed value.
So it depends on what data I’m looking for, asset allocation or total net worth.