5 Years of Blogging Recap

5 Years of Blogging Recap | brokeGIRLrich

With all my excitement of going to Iceland and turning 34, I forgot another very important anniversary.

brokeGIRLrich turned five!

Holy crap, if it were a kid, I’d have a kindergartener. In internet blogging years, it’s more like I’ve got a sassy high schooler on my hands. So many of the blogs that were around when I started have disappeared.

And some have such incredible success stories! The Broke and Beautiful Life is now Stefanie O’Connell and she’s a millennial money expert and author. Financially Blonde opened The Financial Gym – an amazing financial planning company. Broke Millennial also led the crowd in writing a book and I see her pop up on TV as a personal finance expert too.

Sometimes I look at all they’re doing in think, “how on earth did I used to meet up with these guys for drinks to talk about blogging?” (Which, actually, I miss a lot – early on, we had our own little blogger meetups in NYC where we rambled about trying to figure out how the heck the back end of our blogs worked and what is the point of Twitter and how do we just keep writing on the same topic – and it was incredibly cathartic. #thepowerofcommunity)

Then I remind myself though that over five years, my day job has exploded and my blog has done exactly what I wanted it to – it’s given me a place to remain financially accountable and it is a financial safety net. While it’s not optimized in any sort of way, it does bring in a little bit each month and it has all sorts of untapped potential if I ever found myself unemployed.

One of the most selfish things I use my blog for is my accountability posts each month. I love reading others net worth updates, so hopefully they’re of some use to some of you, but for me, tracking my net worth has opened my eyes to a lot and helped me keep moving forward.

My first net worth update was in August 2013 and I was at $30,651.41.

August 2013 Net Worth

My last net worth update was in July 2018 and I was at $131,499.25

Net Worth: July 2018

Not a terrible increase over 5 years – especially at an average income of $35,000/year.

For me, blogging is the most perfect side hustle. I like the structured goal of three posts a week and the Financially Savvy Saturdays link up (if you write personal finance posts – stop by on Saturdays and add yours to the link up). I like think through my finances, sort out where I am and hunt for the next steps.

Oh, and I like the money.

If you’re thinking of starting a blog – go for it! I blogged for 3 months for free. The initial investment was pretty minimal and the possible returns are pretty much unlimited. My initial costs after those three months were $394.09 – and you can definitely do it for less than that.

I broke even 15 months later.

To give you an idea of what my costs and my current blogging income look like:

To set up brokeGIRLrich, I spent:

Domain Registration (it wasn’t included back then) – $22.51
Hosting – $286.56
WordPress – FREE
Technical Assistance installing WordPress – $5
Blog Header Design – $80

brokeGIRLrich Start Up Fees – $394.09

July 2013 = $0\$0.00
August 2013 = $0\$0.00
September 2013 = $0\$0.00
October 2013 = -$394.09\-$394.09
November 2013 = $0\-$394.09
December 2013 = $0\-$394.09
January 2014 = $0\-$394.09
February 2014 = $0\-$394.09
March 2014 = $0\-$394.09
April 2014 = $0\-$394.09
May 2014 = $0\-$394.09
June 2014 = $0\-$394.09
July 2014 = $107.51\-$286.58
August 2014 = $10.92\-$275.66
September 2014 = $0\-$275.66
October 2014 = $1.14\-$274.52
November 2014 = $195.80\-$79.00
December 2014 = $96.80\$17.80
January 2015 = $305.26\$323.06
February 2015 = $180\$503.06
March 2015 = $100\$603.06
April 2015 = $225\$828.06
May 2015 = $303.08\$1,131.14
June 2015 = $179.71\ $1,310.85
July 2015 = $429.06\$1,739.91
August 2015 = $0\$1,739.91
September 2015 = $779.85\$2,519.76
October 2015 = $754.25\$3,274.01
November 2015 = $508.50\$3,782.51
December 2015 = $777.23\$4,559.74
January 2016 = $475\$5,034.74
February 2016 = $637.40\$5,672.14
March 2016 = $638.62\$6,310.76
April 2016 = $132.47\$6,443.23
May 2016 = $593.81\$7,037.04
June 2016 = $685.75\$7,722.79
July 2016 = $1,439.80\$9,162.59\
August 2016 = $900.90\$10,063.49
September 2016 = $736.66\$10,800.15
October 2016 = $644.98\$11,445.13
November 2016 = $385.20\$11,830.33
December 2016 = $844.08\$12,674.41
January 2017 = $221.80\$12,896.21
February 2017 = $195.80\$13,092.01
March 2017 = $1,227.76\$14,319.77
April 2017 = $1,499.80\$15,819.57
May 2017 = $667.10\$16,486.67
June 2017 = $744.26\$17,230.93
July 2017 = $671.90\$17,902..83
August 2017 = $695.12\$18,597.95
September 2017 = $592.72\$19,190.67
October 2017 = $622.21\$19,812.88
November 2017 = $960.82\$20,773.70
December 2017 = $1,359.04\$22,132.74
January 2018 = $1,575.12\$23,707.86
February 2018 = $1,125.87\$24,833.73
March 2018 = $1,622.80\$26,456.53
April 2018 = $408.84\$26,865.37
May 2018 = $1,568.83\$28,434.20
June 2018 = $961.08\$29,395.28
July 2018 = $676.61\$30,071.89

brokeGIRLrich total income after 5 years: $30,071.89

Over the years, I’ve poured some more into the blog. I renewed everything for another three years in 2016. I’ve taken two blogging courses – Pro-Blogging Secrets and Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing (which I’m currently working on). I pay $2.99 a month for an Inlinkz subscription for Financially Savvy Saturdays and there are lots of one-offs like FinCon meetups or the occasional blogging book.

All in all though, the expenses don’t come close to what I’ve made and it’s still my favorite side hustle. I definitely prefer it to substitute teaching any day.

Recaps from previous years: