Wednesday, October 9, 2013

The freelance life

So, for those of you who care to know how much suffering is involved with the freelance life, here are my numbers for the past 12 months:


 As you might NOT have guessed from this graph, I my net-worth has INCREASED during this time-frame.  Not substantially, but considering I had my worst-ever year for work, even staying flat would have been a triumph.

NB:  Mint.com doesn't handle investing income AT ALL for Canadians.  So this isn't a complete income picture.  So without dropping my pants online any further, I'll only say that my net-worth increased a few thousand dollars from October 2012 to October 2013.  Also, as October isn't yet done, I have a few more hundred dollars I expect to add to my income, and about two thousand dollars to my expenses.

Other notes: in February/March/April, I acquired a new 27" iMac, a 9TB NAS, and a bunch of new software to transition from my 2009 windows PC to mac.  Some of my business software included multiple OS usage, some didn't (requiring updates/re-purchasing).  Also, my car needed a new set of brakes adding up all in all to a world of hurt considering I was almost completely unemployed in March.  (Which however was very useful for getting properly adjusted to the workflow on my new mac)

So, back to the numbers...  Mint shows that I'm running an average shortfall of $1203 per month.  Which as I alluded to earlier (my net worth INCREASING) that I'm covering that with my trading/investing profits.

But without my rather modest capital base (which has taken years of painstaking personal/family austerity) I would be up the creek.

Do you depend on your consistent monthly cheques?  Would you be able to handle radical swings like this?  That's a question I can't answer.

Stay hungry my friends!
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3 comments:

  1. LiquidOctober 16, 2013 at 2:02 PM

    That's neat how your wealth is improving despite the income/expense report. Probably a testament to your option trading prowess. I would have trouble myself if my income changed that much month to month. It currently fluctuates a little bit because I have a base salary but then dividends and side hustle always varies. The freelance lifestyle seem to be very hit or miss. This girl I know in Ontario makes $20K a month. I don't know how she does it. She only works 6 months a year though. But right now she's not working because she's pregnant with her first baby.

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  2. UnknownNovember 4, 2013 at 12:42 PM

    As an actress, I completely relate to all of this. Income was really spotty this year after being good and consistent last year. If it weren't for my emergency fund I'd really be in a bad spot.

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  3. Holly@ClubThriftyNovember 26, 2013 at 8:16 AM

    I am self-employed and my income definitely swings up and down. It doesn't bother me so much because I'm married and my husband gets paid the same amount consistently.
    Good job on growing your net worth!

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