About My Money Shrugged

My Money Shrugged is a journey with my personal finances, life and my future. I am a 31 year old living in North Carolina. The name is inspired by a book I am currently reading "Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand. This blog is where personal fiance meets Atlas Shrugged. The theme of Atlas Shrugged is the role of the mind in man's life and, consequently, presentation of a new morality: the morality of rational self-interest. My self interest in creating this blog is my personal finances and so it is a nod to the book.

I recently moved from Los Angeles to the east coast to start a better life for myself. Not that I wasn't having fun or anything, but I was not able to live within my means and was constantly living pay check to paycheck. I was investing in a 401k, employee stock option plan, and whatever was left over I was adding to my Roth IRA but was never able to save up and emergency fund or for anything else.

Once I moved back east I finally for the first time, had money and had no idea what to do with it. First thing I decided to do was to build a budget. Unfortunately for me I had never really created one so I searched and found a ton of personal finance blogs. With a little research I found people blogging about the same situation that I was in. I created a detailed budget and was amazed at how much I could save and really wouldn't have to sacrifice that much with the way I live. (I could have saved money in LA if I had just sat down and create a budget for myself). And this is how I got into the whole PF blogging and been throwing around the idea of starting my own blog to keep me on track with my spending and budgeting.

Some of my goals and some of the purpose of creating this blog is to track and keep myself honest about my personal finances and to track my progress of one day owning a house that is affordable. I have been double timing it to save up an emergency fund that would last me 6 months if something was to happen in this economy. I have also been working to max out my Roth IRA for the first time this year and along all this saving up as much as I can for a 20% down payment for a house.

Some of my personal interests are GOD, my relationship with my awesome girlfriend and family, surfing, cooking, any sports, art, advertising, and music, all which inspire me everyday that I am blessed to be here!

I can promise you that I don't know everything about finances and please take my words only as inspiration, motivation or anything else that might help with your own personal situation.

Please feel free to leave comments and I would love everyone's opinions on the way I am handling my finances because after all this is here ONLY to keep you and me motivated and to keep my finances in check.

I am sure you will find multiple spelling mistakes and not very good english so please skip the comments unless you just want to rant.