I have done these types of posts for a long, long time. Unfortunately, I lost about 10 years worth when I sold my last site. I should have grabbed a back up, but didn’t. Either way I like to split this type of post into 2 parts. The first is an overarching theme that I’d like to hold myself to, almost like a crude philosophy, and the second, measurable goals that I can grade at the end of the year (and hopefully during the year too if I feel so inclined).

My Overarching Goal this year is to get shit done. I have felt a wave of procrastination recently – an overwhelming feeling of being overwhelmed with all the things that have to get done. So my goal this year is to get back to basics as it relates to getting tasks finished!

With that overarching theme I want to take a look at certain aspects of my life and give myself specific and measurable goals that I can work on through 2025:

  1. Professional Life
  2. Investments
  3. Real Estate
  4. Personal Finance
  5. Personal Life & Family

Professional Life

I have some very specific goals that I think could be life changing if I could make them part of how I operate my professional life.

  1. Read More! Whether it be finance or law, the landscape is always changing, and I have been terrible in years past of keeping up on the minor changes (major usually land on my desk via osmosis. I want to schedule time to simply go on silent and simply read trade sites and magazines.
  2. Be Better at Responding. I am working on a case with one of the groups in my office and I didn’t respond to their client fast enough, which to them, was completely unacceptable. I apologized and then thought about it and have opted to try and adopt that in my professional life. While busy, I am not busy enough where I can’t answer emails with the last 30 mins of my day every evening.
  3. Connect With More People. A large part of my job is about the relationships I have cultivated (and continue to cultivate). I need to create a system where I am proactive in reaching out to producer groups to see if there are any projects I can help out with.

Publicly Traded Investments

Retirement Accounts

  1. 401(k) – I found out I am my 401(k)’s largest participant, and as such, I need to make sure the investments are finally changed to low cost, reasonable funds. Our last HR individual basically put her hand in the sand when it came to this. Unacceptable and easily fixed, but I need someone else to do it. It is my goal to ride that individual until it is done. Once completed, I will review how much I am contributing and if there is room in my budget to add more (if not fully maximize it).
  2. Wife’s Retirement Account – It has been a few years since I put anything into my wife’s retirement accounts. If the budget allows after January, I may start up her SEP IRA contributions again, even if that means less coming to the family’s checking account. My goal is to make this decision by the end of February.

Non-Retirement Accounts

  1. Naked Put / Dividend Growth Account – For the past 6 months I have dealt with being assigned a ton of DG and DLTR. I have been selling covered calls to reduce my cost (and partially pay the margin costs). A couple of goals here:
    • Get back to my daily put goal. Last year, until the assignemnts, I was averaging about $65/day. I want to bring this to $20/day until I get rid of my assignments.
    • Once the assignemnts are gone I want to increase the daily goal back up to $60/day.
    • Once that happens I want to create an application of the profits like I have done in the past. While I still have a margin balance this feels premature, but once I get out of those trades – this is priority number one.
  2. Inbestment Club – I have been very quiet within my investment club in the past 6 months because I have been dealing with the assignments. This year, I’d like to bring more ideas and thoughts to the club.

Real Estate

Last year I paid off my HELOC only to use it a few months later to buy a boat. Nonetheless, I don’t look at the HELOC as part of my real estate holdings as it is personal debt not associated with my partners. Either way, once I paid off the debt I was supposed to keep up on a spread sheet and add the gap between the mortgage and the rent into a cash account. I failed hard last year.

My goal is to go back a few months and get my spreadsheet up to date (and quick), and then keep my minority partners more aprised of what is going on. This is especially important because I have to put in an egress window in Q1 per my township’s ridiculous demands.

I don’t have any other active goals and objectives. I don’t think I am in the market for a new property in 2025 unless things drastically change, so the idea of me picking one up in this market is close to zero.

Personal Finance

  1. I want to track and attack debt. Every month I share my net worth updates. I want to do the same for pure debt. I haven’t come up with specifics yet, but I will before my first post around 1/15. I want to really kill off debt this year – I am thinking about a tiered approach.
  2. I have gotten very, very lazy when it comes to monthly charges. I want to go back through Q4 and optimize this by the end of Q1.

Personal Life and Family

Everything above is done for the benefit of my family. Without The Wife and Kids all the categories above do not mean shit.

Family Goals

  1. Continue to work closely with my children on their homework. I truly believe that this goes beyond helping them understand the material. It helps build trust between us working on a common goal.
  2. Last year I had a goal to plan a trip with just The WIfe and I without kids and it worked out really well. I’d like to plan something similar this year.

Health

  1. Fitness – I was doing well for some of the year last year, but for 2025 I’d like to work out actively at least twice a week and track those workouts. In addition, I want to throw at least one non-group work out into the mix such as a stretching or mobility class via peloton.
  2. Sleep – I am absolutely horrible at getting into bed early. I want to be in bed before 12 on those nights I am not out.
  3. Organization – I felt so overwhelmed towards the end of last year with my ADHD out of control. Completing a small orginzation project helps me clear the clutter and puts me back back in control of at least one tiny part of my life. My goal is to pick something attainable and completable on a weekly basis (and track it). There is a

Conclusion

I am really excited to start 2025. I am not sure why but I am very optimistic starting this year thinking it is going to be a measurable pivot point to another level.

Goals and Objectives

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