Moomin Valley

So today was the auction day for the house we were interested in buying . At this point we haven't bought it... So we got a valuation ...

So, we are thinking of getting a valuation on the house. The price of this service varies widely. These local guys charge $330. Herron T...

So, this weekend we went to see several houses in different parts of the city. We are following up in more detail on the one in the pictur...

The graph shows our monthly spending each month since moving to Australia. I've taken out some business related expenditures that get ...

Another monthly report... Much of this month was spent travelling and then catching up on work when I got back. I don't post here much ...

A belated monthly report. As June is the end of the financial year for tax purposes in Australia a lot of data only comes in a few weeks af...

The Australian Dollar barely changed this month. The MSCI World Index rose 2.21%, the S&P 500, 2.35%, and the ASX200 0.68%. We gained ...

Back in 2008 I invested in a capital guaranteed managed futures fund called Man 3 Eclipse . This didn't turn out to be a great investme...

A new investment - Cadence Capital Limited - another Australian listed investment company that basically runs a hedge fund in listed struct...

I was just thinking this morning that we need to increase net worth by $3,000 each month now just to compensate for inflation.  The Austr...

I am wondering whether to continue this blog as the only thing I have posted recently are these monthly reports and now we are above US$1 m...

The Australian Dollar rebounded this month from $US0.8742 to $US0.8933. This depressed gains in net worth in Australian Dollar terms. Stock...

As I said in the annual report, the data in these monthly reports will be by default in Australian Dollars from now on. The Australian Doll...

This year was much like 2012 career- and personal life-wise. Financially, the main difference is that the Australian Dollar fell from $US 1...

The Australian Dollar fell further this month from $US0.9124 to $US0.8928. This depressed gains in net worth in US Dollar terms. Net worth ...

Two of my Mom's managed accounts - one in US stocks and one in international stocks are finally worth a bit more than the amounts we inv...

In Australian Dollar terms we came in above the top of 2013's predicted range for net worth of $A700k-$A1 million with a final net wort...

This correlation is pretty amazing. It is also pretty clear that there is causation here too or both variables are driven by the same other...

Turns out that I miscalculated and we didn't quite reach USD 1 million last month. This month due to the fall in the Australian Dollar ...

Stock markets remained very strong globally, and particularly in the United States, this month, but not so much in Australia. The ASX 200 ac...

I have long seen the advantages of managed futures funds . The best of managed futures funds companies seems to be Winton . I previously ma...

Following hitting one million Australian dollars net worth last month , this month we reached a million US Dollars . $US1.008 million to be...

As the Australian Dollar has risen strongly in the last few days, it has pushed us over the 1 million US Dollar mark, at least intra-month,...

My taxes are not so much changed from last year as things have settled down a lot now, compared to our first few years in Australia: Sal...

I've finally done our tax returns for this year. First, is Snork Maiden's taxes. Blogpost on last year's taxes in order to compa...

E-mail from IB this morning telling us Australian investors who have margin loans with them that we have to close out our margin loans by 11...

It looks like the US markets are expecting a US default or something despite the rise in stock prices over the last two days. Of course,...

Following up on yesterday's post comparing global, US, and Australian index rates of return and my own investment performance, today...

Another way of showing just how extraordinary the performance of the Australian stockmarket has been in the last couple of decades. I've...

BigChrisB sent me the ASX200 Accumulation Index data he had collected and I have now measured my investment performance since 1996 (month...

The main news this month was passing the one million Australian Dollar net worth mark . In other news, I spent two weeks this month in Nort...

We reached the long-awaited million Australian dollar net worth level. We aren't quite at a million US Dollars yet. It was back in 2007...

It's easy to get real time information on a wide range of stock market indices and historical data on a daily basis from sites like Yah...

We have been back home all this month and spending modestly by recent standards. This month's accounts in US Dollars, as usual: Re...

It used to be that one advantage of being an Australia based investor was that you could invest in any investment product anywhere in the w...

The chart shows our annual total of investment tax credits over the last ten years. These consist of credits attached to dividends for co...

The ABC have a website called Vote Compass that is meant to help in deciding who to vote for in our upcoming federal election here in Aus...

So the consultant I met last week didn't send me any quotes... When I phoned the company she hadn't entered any of my details into...

Half of this month we spent travelling. Given that, spending is fairly modest. The Australian Dollar continued to fall, boosting returns in...

So I met with the health insurance representative on Friday and she will send me quotes next week for various plans. With a basic plan we wi...

I just saw this on the Colonial First State website : "More generous rules for excess contributions : In the past, if you went over...

I finally upgrade Moomin Valley to a new Blogger template but in the process lost my previous blog list. A lot of the links were dead anyway...

OK, so now we are not renting a house . We looked at four. Two were acceptable. But now Snork Maiden's mom says that she won't visit...

After looking at another couple of houses at the weekend and not agreeing on which we preferred we have changed direction and are now lookin...

Finally back in Australia after another long trip to Europe, Asia, and Africa. This month's accounts in US Dollars, as usual: Unlik...

Short report this month. I am travelling, currently in Charlottesville VA and about to go out to do some shopping.... Long trip from Austral...

Yes, I haven't posted anything since last month's report, but I didn't post much on my professional blog either. It's been a...

Finally, we had a slightly down month in investment returns in Australian Dollar terms though the streak of gains extended to the 10th month...

Snork Maiden's stepfather died. He was 80 years old. Her mother is much younger. Snork Maiden has gone to China to be with her mother f...

Our first auction where we were actually bidding. Some guy started the bidding at $700k and then it went up in increments of $25k. It stalle...

Yet another in 8 months of positive investment returns in Australian Dollar terms (9th in USD terms). We yet again hit new net worth highs i...

This afternoon I had the surreal experience of getting insurance on a house I don't own. We saw the lawyer this afternoon and she recomm...

We are getting ready for the auction this weekend. If we end up buying we need to give the owner a cheque for 5% on the day. So I'm mov...