Race to $1 Million – February Update

Don’t forget to enter my $25 Amazon Giveaway before Feb 6th, 2011!

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you probably know that I’m racing The Hoff (my weekly stock picker-staff writer) to $1 million in net worth.

If you remember from back in January, my goal for 2010 was to get within $20,000 of The Hoff. He was winning by $28,192.95 as of the beginning of the year. To catch up $8,192.95 in 12 months, I’ll need to gain $682.75 a month. Here are the results from last month:

Kevin – $24,782.54 (+$5,935.49)
The Hoff – $52,225.00 (+$5,225.00)
Difference – $27,442.46 (+$750.49)

Both The Hoff and I had great months, but I did my part in catching up to him. I’m afraid I’ll lose it next month though because my rent check didn’t go through in Jan so I should really be $850 lower. However, I lent out about $500 that will be paid back next month, so that’s $500 back in Feb. I’m just preparing to lose some ground next month.

My net worth took a really big jump this month for a few reasons, but the main one being some exceptional performances in the stock market. I trade long term call options (which are highly risky investments that I will post a video on sometime), and when they do well I get a big gain in my net worth.

I have a lot of General Electric (GE) options, and GE stock was up 13.72% in January, which means my options were up way more than that. I also have call options in Citigroup (C). The common stock was up only 3.59% on the month, but it was much higher in the middle of the month. Luckily I sold quite a few options before the big drop on January 18th (due to worse than expected earnings), which was a big help to keeping my net worth high.

Looking forward, I do have one big opportunity coming up where I can gain some ground. I will be entering the Chapstick Sing Your Love music video contest shortly, and the grand prize is $5,000. If I’m selected as one of the finalists, I’ll need your help in getting votes and winning the contest. Check out my entry here.

I’ve looked through some of the other videos and there have been a few really good ones uploaded in the last few days, but I haven’t seen any that have the good ol’ Kevin McKee “charm”. There are about 150 entries so far and I just have to be in the top 10 to make the finals! I’ll know sometime before February 21st if I’m in the top 10, so stay tuned. With a little luck and your help, this could be a big win for my net worth in March or April.

Finally, here is a reminder of why I need to bring in some crazy side income or make huge investing gains:

• We both work at the same company and have similar jobs, so as far as I know (without knowing his exact salary) our primary income is about the same
• I am actively trying to build this blog into a profitable side venture. The Hoff is a staff writer for me and will share some of the profits when this blog starts making some cashola, but both my personal expense/investment and earning potential in this site are much larger than his.
• He owns a house and I rent, so while my living expenses are fixed and my home equity is zero, his living expenses are variable (repairs and maintenance) and he has equity in his house (either positive or negative, I don’t know)

P.S. If you want to join in on the race to $1 million, let me know and I’ll figure out how a way to get you involved. There’s nothing better than healthy competition (aka me beating the crap out of you) for motivation!

Don’t forget to enter my $25 Amazon Giveaway before Feb 6th, 2011!

Kevin McKee

Kevin McKee is an entrepreneur, IT guru, and personal finance leader. In addition to his writing, Kevin is the head of IT at Buildingstars, Co-Founder of Padmission, and organizer of Laravel STL. He is also the creator of www.contributetoopensource.com. When he’s not working, Kevin enjoys podcasting about movies and spending time with his wife and four children.