Updates for Aug 2018

It is another great month for 笨mummy’s wallet due to the yummy dividends received for the month and also a slightly higher interest received from her saving deposit due to the changes to UOB one account (she has moved $25,000 from SCB e-saver that gives her 1.25%  to UOB one account which giving her an effective interest rate of 2.43%).  On the bad side, it appears that she is locking up a rather large amount of cash with the banks.

笨mummy had decided to rebalance her portfolio by reducing the retail bonds that she is currently holding. She had disposed the following bonds that are trading below $1:
- Aspial (BEYZ) disposed at $0.955
- Oxley MTN (BJFZ) disposed at $0.995

Reason for doing so is that given that the interest rate is on a upward trend, the coupon payout % for these retail bonds no longer justify for the amount of risk to be taken. Secondly, 笨mummy must also admitted that the decision was in a way partially influenced by the recent Hyflux incident. Although the amount affected was considered not a lot as her total cost was only $6,800, it still left a bad taste. 

The proceeds from the sales of the retail bonds would like to be put in another high yield saving account while waiting for a chance to deploy them to buy shares when opportunities arise.

The total dividend to-date after adding Aug dividend is $10,833.20. This amount is 17% or $1,594.92 more than Aug 17 total dividend.  


Dividend / interest for month of Aug 18:  
M1 - S$ 1,040
Keppel Corp - S$ 300
CDL H Trust - S$ 456.86
Suntec REIT - S$ 247.40
Ascott Trust - S$ 351.12
Aspial Bond - S$ 52.07
Mapletree GCC - S$ 111.70
Capital Mall Bond (3.08%) - S$ 76.37
ST Engineering - S$ 550

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 Aug 2018	S$ 3,185.52
Dividend received in Yr 2018 to date	S$ 10,833.20

Updates for Jul 2018

This is the month that 笨mummy received $0 dividend from her investment. But on the bright side, she would be getting a bit of her pro-rated bonus which slightly less than half a month plus she also been told that she would be expecting an increment of 6%. Not so bad to get an increment after working for 6 months. 

Work-wise, she is also relatively busier than previous months due to more works slowly coming in. She is managed to bond better with the rest of the team and that entitled her to some updates on the latest happening. 

Investment wise, 笨mummy has not been taking actions for a while mainly due to the lack of fund as she is pouring money to her retirement portfolio, locking up some funds to maximize her & hubby DBS Multiplier Account to achieve 3.5% interest which is a relatively good return for a low risk “investment” and also to increase her saving with UOB one account by $25,000 to continue to enjoy the 2.44% interest.. With SIBOR going up, she is also looking at opening a CItibank MaxiGain Account to build up the bonus interest and moving some of her fund from SCB esaver at the later stage when the base plus bonus move above 1.5%. 

If you can get a low risk or even risk free return of 2% to 3.5%, there is really little motivation to pour the money in the market for a riskier 5% -6% return. 笨mummy is getting lazy these days...

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 Jul 2018	S$ 0
Dividend received in Yr 2018 to date	S$ 7,647.68

Mini milestones review (Mid 2018)

Since it is now mid of the year, 笨mummy feels that it is a great time to review the four mini milestones she set for herself in her journey to FIRE and check whether she is on track to her FIRE. 

1. Clear mortgage of her 4-room HBD flat (this is her only debt) 

笨mummy is left with S$235K on her mortgage loan with OCBC at an interest of 1.30% p.a. which would be adjusted up to 1.60% p.a. in few months time. She and her hubby has managed to accumulate cash that is sufficient to pay off the mortgage which is keep in multiple high interest rate saving accounts like DBS Multiplier, UOB One account and OCBC 360 account. 

2. CPF Special account to reach minimum sum of S$161K to cater for retirement 

Her CPF special Account has increased by $10K from end of last year to reach $120K. This is due to 笨mummy rejoining the workforce and her employer started to make contribution to her SA account as well as the CPF interest from last year. 

3. Having enough passive income (from dividend, interest, etc) that is sufficient to cover HER recurring expenses
Based on the latest update, the dividend income received as at June 2018 from her  investment is $7.6K and 笨mummy believes that she is on track to achieve a passive income that would cover her recurring expenses of $784 per month.  

4. Having enough passive income (from dividend, interest, etc) to cover the household expenses
This is still a long WIP for 笨mummy as the current expenses are higher as both children are enrolled in childcare and with the diapers and formula milk that child 1 and child 2 need.The current dividend income only managed to cover her recurring expenses with very little surplus. 

Workplace politics suck

It has been 6 months since 笨mummy rejoined the workforce from being a SAHM for almost 8 months. 笨mummy really starting to hate workplace politics. It is something that seems almost unavoidable at workplace and almost everyone who work face it at a regular basis unless you are a self-employed like tuition teacher, insurance agent or a grab driver.

Being new to the company and joining at a level that one need to manage junior staffs who have been in the company longer than you may seem to be an issue. 笨mummy has experienced first hand as to how then junior staffs would find excuse to not to do the work assigned by her. And these junior staff are likely, in her opinion, the smarter one. They choose works based on the managers they want to work with and in most instances those that could help them progress or promote faster. By doing / picking works selectively, they also allow themselves to more time to focus on the works assigned by those managers. As the saying goes 多做多错少做少错不做不错。While those more honest staff, often the not so smart ones are unlikely to reject works assigned but their work quality are often not that good.

Being new, 笨mummy is also often very unsure about the procedures. Sometimes she find that her peers are not actually very helpful when she tried to approach them for help or advices especially when she is very unsure of what is the normal procedure that she needs to take. It also makes it very hard for her to give work instruction to the junior staff when she herself also do not know what are the correct procedures.

Enough of rant.. 加油💪笨mummy咬紧牙关硬撑下去吧！ 看在钱份上。 As her hubby always advise her to take a step at a time and bear with what is going on for the sake of monthly salary that goes into her bank account.

Updates for Jun 2018

Another month has passed. Overall a great month for 笨mummy, as she managed to accomplished a few things:

- Career
Her six months probation has passed and she got her confirmation. And, of course, this comes with perks - extra $$$ as her Company allows staff who are confirmed by June to be entitled to bonus which would be pay out in July. 

- Passive Income
笨mummy has found a way to achieve the highest interest rate tier of 3.50% for the DBS Multiplier for herself and her hubby accounts. This method only required minimal effortl by incurring a small fee of $8 to $12 a month and playing with a float of $25K earning no interest for 6-10 days. This allows a 1.30% or $54 extra interest for each multiplier account. 

She had started in May to build up the resources needed to generate the cashflow and the result would be out in early July when the June interest is credited. But based on the Bank and Earn Summary, 笨mummy is confident that the plan works as she saw the indicator pointing to 3.5%.   

Dividend / Interest for the month of Jun 2018
OCBC - $ 206.34
Ascendas H Trust - $ 250.40

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 Jun 2018	S$ 456.74
Dividend received in Yr 2018 to date	S$ 7,647.68

5 days 4 night staycation at Thomson medical

笨mummy spent 5 days and 4 nights in a hospital with Child 2 due to bronchitis last week. The bill came to around $7.5K and with deduction from Mediasave of $1,800 and claim allowed by the insurance (a shield plan), she only needed to fork out $6 out of pocket for the total bill. She is thankful for the insurance that she took out in the first month when child 2 was born and it helps to pay the main bulk of the bill. She would definitely encourage parents with young kids to take out at least a basic shield plan. 

The reasons why the bill came back to such a huge amount is because 笨mummy has opted to switch from a two bedded to a single bedded room after first night and the hospital is a private one.

The switch from two bedded ward to a single bedded was 笨mummy's request. As the first night stay at two bedded ward was a terrible experience as the little one would be constantly disturbed by the nurses who dropped by to do their checks throughout the night for both children staying in the ward plus the constant coughing of the other child in the room. To make thing worse,  the parents sharing the ward left the light on their side on through the night and this affected child 2 as she was used to sleeping in completely dark room. On the first night, Child 2 had problem sleeping and only managed to doze off at 9.30 pm and woke up at 1 am before falling back to sleep at 3am and up again at 6 am the next day.

Hence, a switch to single ward was made the next day so that child 2 can has better sleep with less disturbance at night. And indeed child 2 did manage to sleep from 8.30 pm all the way to 6 am the next day from the second night.

As for why 笨mummy opt to stay at Thomson Medical (TMC), it was because 笨mummy brought child 2 to the 24 hours clinic at TMC and the doctor made the call to admit child 2 due to her condition. The 24 hours clinic is always the first choice when there is emergency at night or during weekend when the GP clinic is not open. 

笨mummy had rather bad experiences with KK Hospital A&E when child 1 was sick. Generally, the waiting time at KK hospital A&E was quite okay when child 1 was a newborn (i.e. below 3 months of age) but when child 1 passed the newborn age, the waiting time was terrible and one could wait for 2 hours and it is not even your turn to see the doctor. Other than the waiting time, the doctors that 笨mummy encountered at KK hospital A&E are generally young doctors that look rather fresh out of the medical school and they still need to consult the senior doctors after their examination. And it makes no difference between seeing them and a normal GP at the 24 hours clinic at TMC as their medical knowledge are on par. Plus if there is stool test of blood test that needs to be done, it can also be done in-house at TMC.

笨mummy hopes there would not be another staycation anymore.

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