Updates for May 2018

On a personal level, it is a hectic month of May with Child 2 starting childcare. A lot of crying during school as expected and a lot of “activities” waiting at home when the kids are back - feeding, bathing, coaxing to sleep, follow by laundry, household chores like sweeping and mopping. Work wise still in the “do nothing much” mode as workload is considerably low and time at office is not productivity used. 

Invest wise, it is a good month with a rather handsome amount of dividends (see below) coming in and there were some buyings activities in May as follows: 

- Subscribed to June 2018 SSB of $34,000 using two accounts and this coupled with the redemption of the Feb and April SSB as a mean to switch from low interest rate SSB to that of higher interest SSB
- Added 9,000 unit of Mapletree GCC at $1.21 before XD

Total dividend received for this month is sweet amount of $4,300+. .. How 笨mummy wishes that it is a monthly occurrence. ☺️
The only bad new in May is due to Hyflux. Having $8,000 vested in its preference shares and having a possibility of writing off if things never improve is a rather painful thought but this could happen. 

Dividend / Interest for the month of May 2018
Ascendas REIT - $1,418.40 
Ascendas India Trust - $85 
DBS Pref Share - $233.07 
FLC Bond - $181
Keppel Corp - $280 
Kingsmen Creative - $75 
Mapletree GCC - $453.1 
NERA - $75 
Oxley Bond - $123.97
SPH -$120 
ST Eng - S$1,100 
Suntec REIT - $243

Dividend received in Year 2014	S$ 8,241.99
Dividend received in Year 2015	S$ 8,978.59
Dividend received in Year 2016	S$ 12,145.15
Dividend received in Year 2017	S$ 12,964.44
Dividend received in May 2018	S$ 4,387.54
Dividend received in Yr 2018 to date	S$ 7,190.94

How much a typical family spend?

A year has passed since 笨mummy’s post that detailed down her household expenses. It maybe a good time to revisit the household expenses again since the profile of the household has changed. Now there are: 

• two full time employed parents (as now 笨mummy has rejoined the workforce)
• a 4.5 years old child 1 attending full time childcare
• a 18 months child 2 just started attending full time childcare

Groceries <$500>

This is the most difficult part to estimate or budget. A family can have many options - to cook or eat out as well as what to eat and where to eat. Based on past spendings, $500 a month is a manageable sum for a family of 2 adults and 2 children below 5 year olds.

Household expenses <$289>

• Internet and phone line - $29.00
• Utilities - $200 (based on past spending, the expenses are typically between $80 to $180, so $200 is a higher estimated. It is always good to over-budget than under-budget)
• Town council charges - $60

Children expenses <$1,214>

• Childcare expenses - $470.40 x 2 (exclude enrichment and other ad-hoc expenses)
• Milk for child 1 - $17.25 (child 1 is drinking normal UHT packet milk)
• Milk for child 2 - $95.60 (child 2 is on formula milk. On average a box of Gain Similac IQ Stage 3 consists of 2.4kg of the milk powder. It is a cheaper option compare to the normal tin can one)
• Diapers - $160 (Diaper expense mainly for Child 2. She is using Pampers Pull up pants size M. Average 5 pieces a day or 350 piece a month)

Individual expenses <$783>

This only consist of 笨mummy's own expense. Mainly on transport, phone bill and insurance. 

• Transport - $50.25 (笨mummy only top up her Ez-link card once a month due to the advantage of staying at Tiong Bahru which is 2 MRT station away from  her workplace and shopping places that her family frequent)
• Mobile phone - $32 (A simple 6GB data plan without any phone contract)
• Breakfast & Lunch - $0 (笨mummy has started bringing home cooked food to office. It helps to keep her lunch expenditure manageable and reduce the waste from unfinished vegetables bought)
• Insurance - $600 (average premiums for all her insurance consisting of term life, endowment plan, medical and critical illness)
• Miscellaneous purchases - $100 (笨mummy has limited her expenses as much as possible. Getting her coffee craving from pantry's coffee machine that is free, avoid snacks which is also good to keep her weight in check, limit the buying of new clothes.)

Total expenditure estimated to be $3,572 assuming hubby also has identical expense as 笨mummy. This figure is a lowest estimated on the expenditure on the basic that there is no additional ad-hoc expense like medical expenses if anyone in the family is sick or additional expenses from school like outgoing or birthday celebration or red packets to relatives’ children and parents and in-law for CNY or things that need repair or replacement, like broken pipes, spoilt air con or light. And also that the mortgage for the house is fully covered by the CPF contributions. 

Updates for Apr 2018

Another month has passed at work. Work is boring.. almost literally as 笨mummy has the least work much amongst her peers to do on hand. There is really not much work to be keep her occupied at work. She is bored to tears. 

She attended an internal manager meeting at work discussing on staff performance. She once again feel how cruel it is to be assessed, ranked and judged by people. Although she was not the one being assessed, she could feel the pain to be inflicted to a person that is the centre of other people’s judgement. In many instance she feels that managers fail to undertake the role to nurture like a mother to a child and rather adopted the role of judge to pass judgement on people based on their own set of invisible rules. 

Just because a person is working for an organsiation and need to report to someone else above him (like a manager), it does not give the manager a right to judge him. Both persons are employed by the same organisation and both contributing in his own to the organisation. Being of a higher rank or position does not make you any better than the other. 

Anyway 笨mummy's "judgement day" is also coming soon in May and the feeling of waiting to be judged suck. Maybe she may end up deciding to go or being ask to go. 

Enough of ranting, let provide the financial update for Apr 18. Actions in this month are: 

- managed to get $10,000 Apr 18 SSB but missed to apply for the May issue as she clearly forget about the deadline

- bought 5,000 units of Ascendas REIT on 3 Apr @$2.60 and sold it on 9 Apr @ $2.70 for a quick profit. 
- Dividend this month is good. But expecting a better in May as a few REITs she owns are giving out dividends. 

Dividend / Interest for the month of Apr 2018
Hyflux Pref Share - S$89.75
Perennial Note - S$139.12 
M1 - $930.00

Dividend received in Year 2014	S$ 8,241.99
Dividend received in Year 2015	S$ 8,978.59
Dividend received in Year 2016	S$ 12,145.15
Dividend received in Year 2017	S$ 12,964.44
Dividend received in Apr 2018	S$ 1,158.87
Dividend received in Yr 2018 to date	S$ 2,803.40

Updates for Mar 2018

Mar is a depressing month for 笨mummy as the reality of going back to work trashing your self confidence was felt again by 笨mummy. Sometimes it is hard not to be affected by negative judgements on one work performance. The problem with back to the workforce is the constant judgements from peers and bosses on how one performed at work, it can range from the quality of work, the way one presents himself to the bosses and co-workers. It is unavoidable but still the feeling still suck. Being an introvert, 笨loves the research portion of her work but hate the clients facing part of her work and with a group of extrovert co-workers can be quite overwhelming for an introvert. 

She somehow missed the time when she was a SAHM where the only person that would judge her for the “work” is her own children and hubby. Maybe this is why there are so many get rich schemes and people queuing for 4D and TOTO so they could just be the lucky one who can get out of the rat race. Anyway 笨mummy is still under probation and if things do not work out, maybe she can go back to her SAHM life again end of June. And survive a bad record of not performing well for a probation. :(

After venting the frustration at work, it is time to share the cash inflow received. Overall a okay month with about $300 inflow. She also did a small trade in Mar to sell the 5,000 Ascendas REIT purchased in Feb at $2.67 and earning herself some pocket money. 

She also redeemed her 10,000 of Sept 2016 SSB and subscribed for the Apr 2018 issue, hopefully getting a better overall interest. In addition, she is keeping her fingers cross on the outcome of the Hyflux CPS and hope that the company would redeem these CPS in the coming April 18. 

Dividend / Interest for the month of Mar 2018

SSB Sep 17 - S$ 56.55
Ascendas India Trust - S$ 244.00

Dividend received in Year 2014	S$ 8,241.99
Dividend received in Year 2015	S$ 8,978.59
Dividend received in Year 2016	S$ 12,145.15
Dividend received in Year 2017	S$ 12,964.44
Dividend received in Mar 2018	S$ 300.55
Dividend received in Yr 2018 to date	S$ 1,644.53

Updates for Feb 2018

February is busy month with the CNY preparation consisting of spring cleaning, getting ready red packets, buying of CNY goodies and also an "exciting" period for the stock markets where we are seeing big dip in the stock prices and indexes. It could be quite a emotional time for some people especially those who just enter the market and never experience such huge drop in stock prices and indexes before. But it is a good thing that this “correction” ended rather quickly. 笨mummy guess that with automation, actions are taken much quicker and time frame for the “correction” is much shorter compared to the previous huge corrections that she has had experienced in the past. 

Here are the actions taken by 笨mummy this month: 

• Subscribed and received 20,000 of SSB for the Feb 2018 issue. 笨mummy treated this as a short term saving account since the first year interest of 1.55% is better than most banks FD. 
• Opened a DBS Multiplier Account in view of the higher interest rate. 笨mummy loves how DBS revamped this account. She has also blogged about it earlier. 
• Picked up 5,000 units of Ascendas REIT at S$2.57 this month using up about a portion of the fund 笨mummy reserved for stock purchases. It is always more prudent to buy in slowly as we would never know when the stock market would bottom. But 笨mummy is a bit sad that she did not manage to get ST Eng at $3.21 even though she entered a buy order for it. All she can do now is to wait for the boat to come back again so she can board. 

Dividend / Interest for the month of Feb 2018

Capmall Bond - S$ 77.63
Suntec REIT - S$ 260.40
CDL H Trust - S$ 542.72
Ascott Trust - S$ 410.30
Aspial Treasury Bond - S$ 52.93

Dividend received in Year 2014	S$ 8,241.99
Dividend received in Year 2015	S$ 8,978.59
Dividend received in Year 2016	S$ 12,145.15
Dividend received in Year 2017	S$ 12,964.44
Dividend received in Feb 2018	S$ 1,343.98
Dividend received in Yr 2018 to date	S$ 1,343.98

Spring cleaning for saving accounts, fixed deposits, SSB and debts

笨mummy always do a spring cleaning of her saving accounts, fixed deposits and SSB on an annual basis. Her way to do it is: 
1) List down all your saving accounts, fixed deposits and SSB 
2) List down your outstanding debts. 
3) Review - 

• Your reason for having the saving account and whether is the need for the account is still valid or relevant now. 
• Consider whether are there better saving accounts out there that could offer you something better for your money. 
• If the interest rate from the saving account is lower than your outstanding debt interest rates, then you may consider whether you are better off using the money from the saving account to pay off the debt. 

4) List down action items and act on them within the next 1 month. 

笨mummy has done her review and include it in this blog for sharing purposes below: 

1) List down all saving accounts, fixed deposits and SSB
Saving accounts and the prevailing interest rates (all figures round down to nearest hundreds) 

• UOB One Account - $50,000 @ 2.46% 
• UOB One Account - $1,000 @ 0.05%
• DBS Multiplier Account - $50,000 @ 1.90% or 2.0% 
• POSB Joint Account with hubby - $500 @ 0.05%
• POSB eMSA Account - $200 @ 0.05% 
• POSB Passbook Account - $11,000 @0.05%
• OCBC Frank Account - $3,400 @ 0.20% 
• SCB eSavers - $57,300 @ 1.05% (based latest promotion rate) 
• SSB Sep 17 - $10,000 @ 1.15% 
• SSB Feb 18 - $20,000 @ 1.55% 

2) List down your outstanding debts. 

Debt and the prevailing interest rate 

• Housing loan - $240,400 @ 1.30% 

3) Review
$120,000 (in UOB One account, DSB Multiplier & SSB Feb 18) out of $203,400 is earning higher interest than the outstanding mortgage and 笨mummy is fine for them to remain status quo. For the remaining $83,400 that are earning less than interest rate below 1.30%, need to do an in-depth review and see whether to close the account, reduce the balance or remain as it is or use them to pay off the housing loan. 

a) UOB One Account - $1,000 @ 0.05%
The $1,000 in the UOB one account is meant to be a float for the 3 bills payment by GIRO so 笨mummy does not need to constantly monitor the balance of her account. 

b) POSB Joint Account with hubby - $500 @ 0.05%
The $500 amount is the minimum amount to prevent any fall below fee for this account. The account is meant for salary crediting to hit the criteria for both her and her hubby's DBS Multiplier accounts. 

c) POSB eMSA Account - $200 @ 0.05% 
This account is opened during a DBS/POSB promotion and there is an early closure fee if close within 6 months of opening. So 笨mummy has to keep this account for another 2 more months. 

d) POSB Passbook Account - $11,000 @0.05%
This account is being used for accepting payments for Carousell sales and other ad-hoc online sales. The minimum sum to maintain is $500 to prevent any fall below fee. Having $11,000 in this account seems to be high given that this account is meant for receiving payment and would not have any outflow. However, 笨mummy wants this account keeps trace of her sales income from non-employment and does not want to have it mixed up with other saving accounts. Though tempted to switch to OCBC Frank account, most people in Singapore have POSB or DBS accounts, it is definitely better to use a POSB account for this purpose.  

e) OCBC Frank Account - $3,400 @ 0.20% 
The amount inside this account is meant for personal spending. Every month after receiving salary, a fixed amount is transferred to this account. Daily expenditures, such as transportation, meals, personal handphone bills, insurance premiums are funded by this account. 

f) SCB eSavers - $57,300 @ 1.05% (based latest promotion rate) 
笨mummy is unlikely to touch this as the money is meant to fund her investment in shares when there is a bargain that come about. She needs the money to be in a SCB saving account for its liquidity and ease of transfer to the securities settlement account for online equity trading. This is by far the best account she could get from SCB. 

g) SSB Sep 17 - $10,000 @ 1.15%
The interest rate for the SSB Sep 17 is only 1.15% for first year, 1.32% for second year and an average of 2.12% for 10 years.  It makes better sense to redeem this SSB and reinvest in the next one - Mar 2018 or Apr 2018 to get a better rate. 

4) List down action items and act on them within the next 1 month

• Redeem SSB Sep 17 and reinvest in the coming SSB
• Close POSB eMSA account in Apr 18 when it passes the 6 months period where the early closure penalty no longer apply. 

Have you done your spring cleaning yet? 

On board DBS Multiplier Account

笨mummy knew that she is going back to the workforce and being a salarywoman, she did some research on what saving accounts offered by the banks would be best for her salary crediting. Currently 笨mummy has a UOB one account which she earns an interest of 2.43% on her $50,000 by meeting the minimum $500 credit card spending and 3 GIRO debits per month. To maintain the UOB one card, all household expenses are charged to UOB One card - home internet, insurance premium, town council conversancy charge, the purchase of groceries, milk powders, diapers, etc and she also set up GIRO debiting for expenses that cannot be pay by credit card - child 1's school fee, her monthly donation to community chest, and payment for NTUC union. She is happy with the current status of spending via the UOB One card and does not wish to change as this is the highest interest rate she can attain for her $50,000 saving.

Given she now has a salary crediting, she was actually looking at OCBC 360 account ('360'), DBS Multiplier account ('MA'), BOC SmartSaver ('SS'), Standard Chartered Bonus Saver ('BS'). Based on her preliminary review below, MA seems to offer the best rate based on her need.

Account	Salary crediting (>6K/mth)	Other criteria	Comment
360	1.20% (no need to hit other criteria)	·       OCBC Credit spending > $500 (0.3%) ·       Investment – purchase of eligible investment products (0.6% or 1.2%) ·       3 bill payments > $150 in total (0.3%) ·       Account balance >$200,000 (1%)	笨mummy does not want to spend more money just to hit a criteria to earn more interest so credit card spending is not attainable and purchase of investment products are out. Also on the wealth bonus offer, it is quite ridiculous as who would put 200K just to get an addition 1% on the first 70K, and the remaining 130K just earning 0.05% interest. However, 3 bill payments is still something that can be attainable. Maximum possible interest rate for 70K put in is 1.5%
MA	1.90% (plus one other criteria) 2.00% (plus two other criteria)	·       DBS/POSB Credit spending ·       Investment (include dividend credited from CDP) ·       DBS/POSB Home loan ·       Manulife Insurances purchased through DBS/POSB	Home loan and insurance are out.   Credit card spending seems attainable as only need to clock any amount – buying a pack of Fisherman from Watson once a month should do the trick. Plus Investment allows dividend credited from CDP which is superb as 笨mummy has dividends inflow almost every month except for Jan and Jul. Maximum possible interest rate for 50K put in is 2.0 %
SS	1.2% (no need to hit other criteria)	·       3 bill payments >S$30 each (0.35%) ·       BOC Credit card spending > $500 or $1500(0.80% /1.60%) ·       Extra saving for meeting more than one criteria	3 bill payments is still something that can be attainable. Maximum possible interest rate for 50K put in is 1.55 %
BS	1% (no need to hit other criteria)	·       SCB Credit card spending > $500 or $2000(0.88% /1.88%) ·       Eligible Insurance Policy/ Unit Trust (0.75%) ·       3 bill payments > $50 each (0.25%)	Spending and purchase of insurance policy/unit trust are out. 3 bill payments is still something that can be attainable. Maximum possible interest rate for 100K put in is 1.25 %

笨mummy did more reading up on DBS MA by browsing the FAQ and T&C on its website and forums. To her pleasant surprise, she discovered that MA allows joint account is counted for hitting the salary credit and crediting of dividend by CDP (investment). This can be considered a huge advantage or "competitive edge' that the MA has over other banks products. For those who do not see why she is so excited, please continue to read on. For those who got it, you can close the browse now. 

笨mummy takes advantage of this above to open a joint account with her hubby and use this joint account to be her salary crediting account as well as the crediting account for CDP and both she and her hubby opened one individual DBS MA each and switched the monthly utilities bill from GIRO to hubby's POSB everyday credit card. 

In this way, her hubby can continue to earn the 1.2% under OCBC 360 for his own salary crediting and yet he can qualify for DBS Multiplier by levering on 笨mummy's salary. Now she has 50K plus 50K (hubby money) earning 1.90% or 2.0% from just one salary crediting account. 

So now 笨mummy's family has:

- $50K earning 2.43% in UOB one account

- $100K earning 1.90% / 2.0% in DBS Multiplier

- $70K earning 1.60% in OCBC 360 (as 笨mummy's hubby can only hit the bill payments critera)

by hitting:

- two salary crediting

- monthly spending of slightly more than $500

- 3 GIRO

- 3 billing payments