Welcome to my income report for May 2020

In May I have earned $153.51 in total. About 16% more than in the previous month.

What I Did In May

So what happened in May?

Finished Real Estate Deal

Remember my series of articles about my experience with real estate agents? Well, it has been a long time. And since then, a lot has happened.

After initial failures with deals being snatched under my nose, I didn't give up and scouted the market every day. My custom-tailored website, that monitors the whole real estate market and calculates every metric helped a lot.

And finally, half a year and many many apartment-tours later, I found a good deal. Of course good deal in the sense of a skewed real estate market in the Czech Republic.

Last time I checked, the Czech market is on the bottom of the pole when it comes to profitability. Yielding only 2% annually. While at the same time having the highest expense ratio compared to all other European countries.

A poor Czech citizen has to save 14 annual salaries to get to his apartment. Compare it to only 6 years you need in western countries like Germany and you will correctly come to the right conclusion, that it is not worth it.

Well, it is not that simple. Unfortunately, my family lives here and so far, my income is in Czech Crowns. And rule number one in real estate is never put money into a location, that is further than one hour's drive from your home.

I could invest in high yield neighbors in Chisinau, Moldova. After all, I have seen it myself last year during my Ukraine-Moldova trip. There are some nice neighbors for a very cheap price, around 40000 EUR for a very fancy upscale apartment in the city center.

And judging by the number of Ferraris driving around, there is a group of high net worth individuals who would have no trouble paying rent. But there are several risks I have to take into account.

Geopolitical - What if the government seize my property?
Financial - I won't be able to finance it from the Czech bank nor Moldavian bank. I would have to pay it outright in cash.
Practical - I would have to hire a property management company to look after tenants. And that would eat up my profits.

As you can see, there is not much I can do and I have to accept the fact, that I have limited resources and that I live in the Czech Republic.

Never the less, the deal is done and I am waiting for the registration process. My guess is, it will take another month before I get the keys. That is all I wanted to share with you, I don't want to jinx it, because many things can go wrong in the registration process.

Still Procrastinated During Lockdown

Since the deal took most of my mental energy and I had trouble churning more than 2 hours of productivity every day, I have spent most of my free time procrastinating and doing busywork, that has no significant value.

I guess the best way to be productive at home is to start with mentally exhaustive tasks in the morning and shift exercising and writing to the afternoon. Then continue switching tasks based on the mood.

This way, I can build enough momentum and get into the zone, that last until late evening. Unfortunately, I am not able to replicate the schedule every day.

On rainy days it goes better, while on sunny days, I get more distracted. Since I stopped drinking coffee, this state of productivity is my new normal and I should listen to my body and brain, instead of pushing it over the limit.

In June, my work schedule will be more variable so I am expecting somewhat lowered performance due to the changes in my environment.

Started a Half-Marathon Training

My friends and I have decided to take a challenge and train for a half-marathon. I never enjoyed running, but the challenge and group motivation is intriguing.

Moreover, it has been on my bucket list for a long time, and since I am 34 years old already, now is the best time to cross it off once and for all. I will keep you updated on my progress in the next posts.

Live projects

The Hustle App

I managed to finish a few mockup screens using TailwindCSS. In June, I want to start working on the Django back end and tie the Rest framework with React-Redux.

Finding the motivation to work again on a side project is so hard after so many failures, but It's finally time to work on fully functional MVP.

Good House Music

At the time of writing this post, my channel grew to 91 subscribers. A 26% increase over the previous month.

Since I started posting every day, all metrics jumped to all-time highs. Unfortunately, the number of subscribers is not growing proportionally to the number of views.

I will continue the schedule until I reach 100 uploads and then I will reevaluate my growth strategy. The music niche is the hardest niche with the lowest engagement rate ever and there is no way around it.

Financia

To my disappointment, I discovered I have multiple indirect competitors, who are doing something similar - aggregating market data and providing analytics to the public.

One of them launched a web app in May with a strong PR campaign behind it. Others started two years ago covering more data than I do.

There is also one direct chrome extension competitor, who provides superior features and even give it for free. No wonder his extension is sitting at 370+ installs.

So I plan to first fix my extension. It has been broken since I refactored backend in April. Then I will match features one by one until my extension is fully competitive.

The competition is always good, it proves that there is a demand in the market. Unfortunately, I can forget my monetization plan, since I cannot monetize something that is given for free.

The guy who made it has a well-paid full-time developer job so he can afford to work on it in his free time. I would say I had bad luck this time and completely underestimated the market. At least I got more experience with jQuery and learned how to make a chrome extension.

Income Report Breakdown

P2P Lending

Nothing has changed since May.

My P2P strategies are turned off and I am still waiting on the sideline. Once the second wave of the sickness will prove to be false, I will restart my strategies.

In the meantime, I will silently watch the situation and collect principals and interests.

Savings Accounts

Savings accounts in the Czech Republic are dead. The best ones now give 0.5 returns, which is 2% less than consumer price index inflation. I have nothing else to add other than screw Czech national bank. They screw up the currency and they screwed all depositors.

Used Stuff Sales

My path to life minimalism went well in May. I got rid of a phone holder, a frisbee, and a collection of house music CD compilations.

I am very happy, that I can pass stuff further and won't have to throw it out. Except for the CD compilations. I grew up on that music and it brought me a lot of great memories.

But since I don't have a CD nor DVD player anymore, it is pointless to keep it stored. Furthermore, It is unlikely CD compilations will gain value in the future, at least from what I have seen on eBay.

Plans, dreams, and wishes

My goals for June are following. Work on Hustle pivot, fix chrome extension, and train for a half-marathon.

That would be it. Thank you so much for following me on this journey and see you in the next report

Income Report May 2020 – Finished Real Estate Deal