Net Worth - APR 2024

Chart updated to end of April in sidebar.

Stocks/cash increased $3,139 (+1.23%) to $258,822. My portfolio was actually down during the past month, but I remembered that I have a small amount invested in an unlisted company and they emailed an updated valuation last month, so I have included that figure in my stock portfolio valuation.

Retirement savings (SMSF etc) decreased by -$51,415 (-2.88%) to $1,731,778 in line with the market trend and our asset allocation.

Est. valuation of our home (my half) increased by $10,624 (+0.93%) to $1,150,713. The 'Other real estate' (my 'lake house' and the investment apartment) increased by $77,656 (+3.67%) to $2,191,735. It appears that one of the '12-month trend' figures for median apartment prices in the suburb where my investment apartment is was recalculated, so this component of my estimate increased suddenly and pushed up the overall price estimate. I've no idea if this is a more or a less accurate estimate of what the market value of my investment apartment is,  but the estimate is what it is.

The outstanding balance of the investment property mortgage remains at $999,993 during the 'interest only' period of the mortgage. Another ~4 years remain of the 'interest only' period. During that time I will accumulate as much cash as possible in the offset account to reduce the effective loan balance.

Other assets (my online depository bullion account at Perth Mint, and the bullion value of my gold and silver proof coin collection) increased by $1,672 (+4.02%) to $43,232.

Overall, NW increased by $41,676 (+0.96%) to $4,384,287 during April.

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End of Week 11 of '90 day transformation challenge'

Only two more weeks left in the '90 day transformation challenge' period. After that I will commence the next 3-month 'phase' where I will increase caloric intake slightly and put more emphasis on weight training to try to only lose fat. That had been my original intention for the '90 day challenge' period, but I think I put a bit too much emphasis on caloric restriction and walking, and didn't do enough resistance training.

I didn't do any weight training sessions at the gym at all last week, so it isn't really a surprise that I am continuing to losing some lean mass and my body fat % isn't dropping as fast as I would like. I'll make sure I go to the gym tonight and also try to ensure my weight training sets are done to failure so I can check that the reps and/or weight is showing progressive increase over time.

Last week's stats were more in line with what I would expect for my current level of caloric restriction, so I don't need to adjust to meal plans or walking for this week, but do need to ensure I get enough sleep and do the three planned gym sessions each week. On the 'gym days' I'll probably aim for 15K steps rather than 20K.

Week 11 results: Weight Change during week: -1.5 kg

Avg Weight: 104.2 kg

Avg Body fat %: 32.2%

Avg BMI: 33.6

Avg daily cals: 1,592

Avg daily steps: 20,748

Avg daily caloric deficit: -1,238

Avg g protein/day: 168

Avg % cals from carbs: 30%

Avg % cals from fat: 24%

Overall I have lost 14.8 kg during the past 10 weeks. This is a rate of 1.39% of initial body weight per week, which is higher than the recommended 0.5%-1.0% per week for fat loss without losing lean mass at the same time. So far my weight loss appears to have been split between 75% fat loss and around 25% muscle loss. Hence the need to both ensure I go to the gym three times a week from now on, and also increase my caloric intake slightly (since just a 60 minute weight training session will require an extra 200-300 calories). Looks like adding an extra 150g portion of grilled chicken breast daily would be a good idea (which would provide an extra 50g of protein).

If my weight loss continued to be around 25% lean mass (muscle) and 75% fat, then by the time I reach my target weight of 78kg I would have lost another 25kg, but only 19 kg would be due to fat loss and 6 kg from loss of muscle mass. I would still end up with a respectable body fat of 18% in that scenario, but I would like to retain more muscle and get my body fat down to around 13%.

If my next 25kg of weight loss was entirely fat loss, I would reach 78 kg with a body fat of only 10%, which is quite a drastically low level (and probably unrealistic, unachievable, and probably not healthy at my age). But to reach 78 kg with 13% body fat my future weight loss (over the next 9 months or so) still needs to be about 90% fat loss, and only 10% muscle loss. So I need to focus more on retaining muscle mass. That is probably achievable if I just ease up slightly on the caloric restriction by eating a bit more protein and do a sufficient amount of resistance training each week.

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End of Week 10 of '90 day transformation challenge'

Seemed to hit a bit of a 'plateau' this past week. I did two weight training sessions at the gym, and on two other days did a stint on the waterrower, plus I did quite a lot of daily walking - averaging 19,640 ste[s [er day. I also stuck to my planned caloric deficit and macros, averaging 1,554 cals/day with an average of 162 cals/day of protein and 29% of the overall calories from carbohydrates and 27% from fat. Due to the increased amount of walking, the average calculated caloric deficit vs BMR was -1,256 cals/day. Howver, my weight loss for the week was only -0.9 kg and my body fat (according to the bathroom scales) actually increased by 2.2% from a week ago! Comparing the 7-day average weight and BF% for this past week vs the previous week gives a slightly more positive outcome -1.3kg change in average weight and -0.34% in average body fat reading. I suspect the normal week-to-week calculated changes were thrown off by getting woken up unusually early Sunday morning, so I only had 5 hrs sleep. That might have thrown off the morning weigh-in results somewhat. Anyhow, I won't change my diet or exercise routine this week, just keep sticking to 'the plan' and hope to see more typical results next week.

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Exercise snapshot

I've gotten into a routine of doing my daily walking in multiple blocks of 2K to 4K steps in a 15-30 minute sessions. Spread throughout the day this makes it quite easy to achieve my goal of at least 14K steps/day (up to around 20K on some days). I went to the gym for weight training yesterday, as I am now losing 1 - 1.5 kg/wk fairly consistently, but would like to rmitigate the lean mass loss from the current ~25% of the overall weight loss to under 20%. And the only way to achieve that is to do regular weight training sessions to achieve muscle hypertrophy. On the days I don't go to the gym for weight training I will do one (or more) 5 min 'high intensity' sessions on my Waterrower to boost aerobic fitness and VO2max. My performance is (so far) improving with each day of rowing, but I still tend to run out of 'puff' after about 5 mins (around the 1.4 km mark). Hopefully this will slowly improve until I can do the 2km distance in under 7 mins. Apparently the Waterrower is about 15% faster than the Concept2 machine used for competition events (and WR times), so achieving 2km in 7 mins on the Waterrower would still be considerably slower than the WR for the 60-64yo male category of around 6.5 mins.

I remembered to wear my Fitbit watch while rowing today, so did a record of a 5 minute rowing session and the start of a walking session about 30 minutes later:

It was interesting that my 'resting' heart rate while sitting in my home office working was around 72-78 bpm prior to the rowing session, but after the rowing it only dropped back to the 88-94 bpm range. This is why doing HIIT training is good for weight loss, as boosts your metabolism long after the brief exercise period has ended. The indoor rowing HR falls into the 'hard' exercise intensity band (for my age bracket), while the walking is 'light' exercise (which is good for fat loss without losing muscle mass).

While weight training my heart rate tends to sit in the 115-135 bpm range, which would be 'moderate' to 'hard' intensity for that hour or so.

From: https://www.heartonline.org.au/resources/calculators/target-heart-rate-calculator

I plan on sticking to this exercise routine from now on. But I will increase my caloric intake as I approach 80kg to slowly transition into 'maintenance' mode (this has been my biggest issue when previously losing weight -- I would tend to revert to 'ad libitum' eating after finishing (or giving up on) a diet, with snacks and junk food leading to a rapid regain of excess weight.

In the long term I hope to stick around 76-80kg body weight with around 12%-15% body fat, and ideally would do this on a modest 15%-20% 'CRON' (caloric restriction with optimal nutrition) food intake (for the possibly lifespan benefits). Just keeping to a healthy BMI and doing regular exercise will be a major improvement.

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