May EOM Update

Total dividends received was: $422.94. This is 161% over my May 2015 dividends received of $161.60. I am currently less than $20 behind my goal progress, so I should be ok going forward.

 Charts:

Purchases

Taxable:

• added to BRS 
• I also added one single Dec 2016 PUT to protect the position

Loyal 3:

• added to TSLA (looking to add more sub $200)
• added to TGT

IRA

• none    

April EOM Update

Total dividends received was: $263.77. This is 140% over my April 2015 dividends received of $109.68. I am currently less than $100 behind my goal progress, so I should be ok going forward.

 Charts:

Purchases

Taxable (none --sitting on $$ for the adjustment apocalypse)

Loyal 3:

• added to AXP
• added to DIS
• added to INTC
• Initiate TSLA @~$252 (wish I had decided to do this when it was sub 200. I plan to add monthly. If for some reason this tanks after earnings I'll throw some extra bullets I've been saving at it)

IRA

• added to STWD @ 18.46
• added to PFE @ 29.59 (March)           

February EOM Update

Total dividends received was: $399.93. This is 185% over my February 2015 dividends received of $140.28.

Charts:

Purchases:

Taxable:

• BAC @11.91
• Sold LCI for loss bought BAC
  

401k:

• none 

Loyal 3:

• added to KO
• added to DIS

IRA

• none

January EOM Update

Total dividends received was: $187.33. This is 423.31% over my January 2015 dividends received of $35.79. 

Charts:

Purchases:

Taxable:

• BRS @19.3378 and @16.59

401k:

• none -- new job and 401k has no brokeragelink option so this will drop off until/if/when they add the option.

Loyal 3:

• added to  DPS
• added to UL
• added to DIS

IRA

• added to STWD @20.53
• initiate position in CMI @88.65
• added to RY @52.23
• added to STON @27.014
• added to BP @30.509    
• added to EMR @45.75       (should have put the buy limit lower :-/)
• added to PID @12.18 with CB money*

CB merger ended up selling original CB and giving me .60 shares of new CB.    Not sure how to approach this on the Dividends for the month front.  I had 10.x shares now i have 6 and $663.13. As I received  a regular dividend payment for CB I'll just count that for the time being. I suppose its irrelevant as I don't list the value of any portfolios.


If you got this far. Thanks for reading!

2015 Reflections

Wanted to do a post to wrap up my first full year with DGI.

Buying Stocks

1. Averaging down or paying shitting prices is only awesome if you plan to buy that stock monthly or quarterly, so its ok to wait for a good entry.  To facilitate this I've 1) noted in my "want to buy" list what the price was when I was interested in the stock. In some cases the stock is way down (example CMI), others its way up (CLX), 2) I've added a very simple calculation to my monitoring sheet to show if the stock is a fair value or not.  I'm doing this by multiplying EPS x PE to determine a very rudimentary Fair Value price. If the stock is below this price it highlights the "Buy" box in green.

I'm not sure if this will make any difference over the year but I'm going to use it to help allocate additional funds throughout the year if I'm unsure what to add to or have no strong opinion between a few stocks I'll add to the one that is below the fair value. I also use Daily and Weekly squeezes. Reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbmUfauTGkU



2. I'm not going to front load my IRA in January. Last year I bought a bunch of stuff in January and have stared at it being red most of the year. So using #1 I'm going to space out IRA purchases this year and see how it goes.  A few things I'm interested in have some squeezes to the downside setting up. I've set up some alerts on most and a GTC limit order on some others.  Lots of buy orders kicked off. I ended up front loading the IRA.  Guess I'll see later how that turned out.

Taxes

Mo' Money Mo Problems was the phrase for 2015.

Mo' Money Mo' Problems dawg

I made the most I've ever made this year and didn't have nearly enough taken out for taxes. End result; big fat tax bill (estimated). Which leads me to deductions.

1.  I'm a big believer in the Rich Dad Poor Dad philosophy of learning how businesses save on their taxes and putting that to work in your own life.  So I have a LLC and usually get at least one 1099 job a year in order to take the business deductions, home office deductions, and the other tax breaks that come from running your own business.  I highly recommend everyone look into this.

2. Using its deductible is great for itemizing and getting the most out of de-clutering but you have to put the effort into categorizing everything and entering the results into the web site.  When I got lazy and tried to remember later or by looking at pictures I didn't get near the deduction value over when I enter the amounts of goods into the site BEFORE I take stuff to goodwill/salvation army. When you owe, every dollar of deductions count.

3. I have a ton of computer books that I have read/don't need. Its been a real chore to get rid of these things.  I've sold some at my local used book store in town which gives either cash or store credit (more value than the cash). The kids like books so I usually take the store credit and let them pick out books there instead of B&N. Save that $$$.  For newer books the Amazon trade-in program is pretty good. You send in the books and get Amazon credit.  Lastly, and why it's in the taxes part of this post is you can donate them for pretty nice values.

Book donation values in itsdeductible

Moral of the story, if you can't get cold hard cash...cold hard deductions are pretty ok.

Being Frugal

Gonna keep working on it.  Its a fine line between delaying life later for when you are too old to enjoy it and banking that cash.  Big goal for 2016 is cutting the cord which should save me over 100 bucks a month.

December EOM Update

Total dividends received was: $384.23. This is 832.37% over my December 2014 dividends received of $41.21. Total dividends received in 2015: $2,747.18.

Charts

Actual vs Goal Dividends for 2015

Dividends by month for 2015

Purchases:

Taxable:

• added to POT @18.48
• added to RDS.B @43.90
• added to EBGUF @20.47
• sold CSD

401k:

• added to GE @30.55
• added to T @33.23

Loyal 3:

• added to UL
• added to KHC
• added to FTR

Goals for 2016

Going to keep it simple for 2016

1. According to the spreadsheet I have a 1 year forward dividend estimate of  $4100 so the goal for next year will be $4200, which puts me in at  $350 dollars a month in dividends. This should be easy enough to achieve but I wont be seeing growth like this year next year due to a job change (losing equity and 401k match).

2. Two blog posts a month. One will be the EOM wrap-up which leaves one "real" post to impart thoughts or anything I've learned.

3. My savings rate for 2015 was 28%. I'd like to beat that next year.  I've spent a bit of work this year reducing expenses and plan to continue doing that this year where I can (at least one contract is up and can cancel without penalty).  The plan to achieve this is to spend less money on crap I don't need. YNAB has been helping with this throughout the year but it is still tough.

4. Consolidate wife's old 401k's into her current 401k or a IRA.


Thanks for reading

-CG

November EOM Update

Total dividends received was: $336.74. This is 1760.44% over my November 2014 dividends received of $18.10. 

Charts

Purchases:

Taxable:

• initiate position in OZRK @54.15 per share
• initiate position in NVDA @31.12 per share
• initiate position in POT @19.68 per share
• initiate position in BBL @24.60 per share
• initiate position in RDSB @50.49 per share
• add to LCI

401k:

• no stock purchases, only added to target date fund 

Loyal 3:

• added to HSY

October EOM Update

Oops I've been traveling for work and failed to do an update. So here it is. Better late than never.

Total dividends received was: $193.16. This is 838.58% over my October 2014  dividends received of $20.58. Like I mentioned in last month's update I started this DGI journey 2nd half of 2014 so I'll receive less giant % differences starting in January 2016. Also not sure if I've mentioned it before or lately but I have exceeded my 2015 goal of $1500.00 in dividends.  I've set a pretty aggressive target for 2016 ($3600.00) so we'll see how I do.

Charts

Purchases:

Taxable:

• added to CAT @65.53 per share
• initiate position in LCI @46.60 per share
• initiate position in SBNY @142.3999 per share
• initiate position in WMT @60.065 per share

401k:

• no stock purchases, only added to target date fund 

Loyal 3:

• added to KO
• added to KHC
• bought FDC @16.00 per share (speculative - no plans to add more)
• bought WMT @59.00 per share

WMT Purchase

While I'm not a fan of Walmart personally, I like deals.  So I bought

12 shares @$60.73 in my taxable account  (10/14/15) and  8.4746 shares @$59.00 in my Loyal 3 account (10/16/15).

This adds $40.13 to my yearly forward dividend income.

September EOM Update

Another month down. Like everyone else the portfolios are in the red which is no fun but it did open up the possibility for buying opportunities and I took a few during the downturn. I actually wish I had more cash to deploy, everything I like is on sale.

Total dividends received was: $234.72. This is 4904.69% over my September 2014  dividends received of $4.69. This isnt super interesting as I started the DGI journey late in 2014 but I'm excited to finally start having data to compare against and I'm excited to compare 2015 to 2016.

Charts:

Purchases:

Taxable:

• added to XOM @72.55 per share
• added to TEF @13.75 per share
• initiate position in IDV @28.69 per share
• initiate position in EMR @47.10 per share
• initiate position in CAT @73.90 per share

401k:

• bought OHI @33.20 per share

Loyal 3:

• added to TGT 
• added to UL
• added to KO

August EOM Update

Another month down. Like everyone else the portfolios are in the red which is no fun but it did open up the possibility for buying opportunities and I took a few during the downturn. I actually wish I had more cash to deploy, everything I like is on sale.

Total dividends received was: $300.74 -this was the first month I received over $300 in dividends. I'm not counting July with the Kraft special payment. I'm officially over my goal for the year this month which is awesome since we have another quarter to go.

Charts:

Purchases:

Taxable:

• added to KO @38.17 per share
• added to BMO @50.77 per share
• added to WPK @23.40 per share
• initiate position in GSK @44.05 per share
• sold BBL at a loss - not happy about the emotional decision :-/ 
• considering a reentry due to dividend yield but have to wait the 30days to not have a wash sale, plus i had buyers remorse since i bought it hence the sale. dunno. thoughts?

401k:

• initiate position in STAG @19.39 per share

Loyal 3:

• added to DIS 
• added to HSY
• added to INTC
• added to BUD
• added to FTR

Reading: I have a lot of DGI type blogs in the feed but my favorite reads this month are:

http://theconservativeincomeinvestor.com/2015/08/28/2207/

and

http://www.dividendgrowthinvestor.com/2015/09/the-value-of-dividend-growth-in.html

http://www.dividendgrowthinvestor.com/2015/08/a-dividend-portfolio-for-early-retirees.html

Thanks for reading

-CG

Keeping Your Eye On The Prize

Before last year I never really had a budget.  Starting in 2014 I started using YNAB.

I won't go so far as to say it changed my life but establishing an amount of money to spend each month for a category and then watching that allocation get adjusted multiple times per month has really helped me.  I really don't like seeing when I spend over my allocation (because I manually enter all my transactions) and the YNAB method puts it squarely in your face so you can be really aware that you went over.

Couple this with Loyal3 where I get to send any money for the month I didn't use there to buy more stock == double win.  This year I've been able to see and track my net worth grow and even though everyone's portfolios took massive hits this month, my net worth increased. It's really a good feeling.

Net worth tracking since May 14 via YNAB

July EOM Wrapup

Survived another month!

July was especially fun with the unexpected KRFT payment. I was going to be on the bubble to reach my $1500 yearly goal but now I'll far exceed it.

Charts

Purchases

Loyal3
-Normal buys
BUD
DIS
KO
UL
INTC

-Took a speculative position in FTR. I mostly took the position due to dividend yield and that i can buy it commission free and DRIP via Loyal3. Its also nearing all time lows. I don't insist on waiting for a bottom but this one was near lows so figured I'd take the purchase.

FTR

Taxable

Canadian Banks are/were on sale due to a rate cut announced in  July. So i purchased:
BNS
RY
BMO

Ford  (F) was cheap, so I added some additional shares

I also averaged down on :
IPPLF
EBGUF

Lastly,  a speculative position on CSD http://guggenheiminvestments.com/products/etf/csd  CSD is a spin off ETF and allows me some exposure to companies i wouldn't want to buy individually or too difficult (for me) to track.

Of course all the above (with the exception of F) is in the red with how the market is :-/ I'll keep looking for opportunities when sectors are on sale.

I've updated the portfolio spreadsheet Google doc.

June EOM Wrapup

yeah i'm behind...bunch of kids...summer break...

I received $143.22 in Dividend payments

Charts:

Loyal 3 purchases:

I buy what's in the red each month to average down.

HSY
KO

Taxable:

BBL is mining exposure (UK), TEF and TU are foreign telcos, XOM, IPLF, EBGUF are US and Canadian Energy.

BBL      Yield: 6.37%
TEF       Yield: 5.91%
TU         Yield: 3.89%
XOM     Yield: 3.52%
IPPLF    Yield: 4.93%
EBGUF  Yield 4.33%

I've updated the shared portfolio spreadsheet to reflect the additions.

May EOM Wrap Up

May EOM Wrap Up

May was my biggest dividend payout to date at: $161.60 :-)

Charts:

Dividends by Month

2015 Dividend Goal Progress

Purchases:

I had a side hustle pay out some money plus an equity grant so I made some purchases in taxable accounts

This month I bought:

F @$15.53  for a starter position.  Weekly chart is looking pretty weak so I'd be willing to add more in the 14.00-14.50 area. 

Some reasons for the purchase: 

http://www.thestreet.com/story/12993172/4/8-recession-proof-stocks-to-prepare-your-portfolio-for-the-next-cycle.html?startIndex=0 and 3.92% dividend yield.

WBK @$25.64 for some foreign (AUS) financial exposure. Weekly chart is looking weak (you'll detect a trend here) Looking to buy more below $25.00. Did miss the ex-dividend date though :-(

Reasons:
One of the four big banks in Australia, but the only one on NYSE and 5.72% dividend yield. I want to continue to get more foreign exposure although I will probably primarily do this via PID or IDV


HSY @$93.37 in my Loyal3 account  I would love for it to get back down to $90/91 area and i'll buy more.

Reasons: 

chocolate!

NVDA @$20.54 

Reasons:
I'm bullish on NVDA for long term with their attempt to become the NFLX of gaming.  Its also a tech company that at least pays a little (1.53%) to own it.


PG @$80.28

Reasons:  it was $8 dollars cheaper than i bought it for my IRA back in Dec/Jan.  Its on sale at the moment.  Weekly chart is looking weak though. I plan to add more between $75-$78. 3.34% dividend yield.

JNJ @$100.91  

Reasons: I own it, like it, its 6 dollars cheaper than I own it in my IRA.  Looks like it found its bottom around 98 for the time being. 2.97% dividend yield.

Normal Loyal 3 purchases for May:
K, KO, DPS  

Reasons: I buy whatever is red on my tracking chart for that month to average down.

Things I wish I knew in my 20's

Continuing on from my first post on things I wish I knew when I started working are things I wish I knew in my 20's.

At this point I was getting a steady paycheck and was in the military. Some topics I really had no clue about include:

1. The key to saving is living on less than you make.

To anyone that practices any sort of frugality you know this one already but I think it is lost on the majority of people in their 20's.  Now to be fair I had several bosses that told me to live on my previous salary and save the difference. I mostly heeded this advice but banked the cash only to piss it away on other things later.  Plus I was mostly brought up to equate stuff with caring/love. So buy all the things!

To be fair its suuuuuuuper difficult at that time in your life not to blow all your money on stuff.  Going out with friends, traveling, eating out, you can finally afford a nice-ish car, etc.  Happy to hear advice on how you bypass this stage to pass on to the little ones.

Either way, its true, the key to saving is living on less than you make.

http://www.successwithmoney.com/live-on-less-than-you-make/
http://www.thesimpledollar.com/rule-1-spend-less-than-you-earn/
http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/06/01/raising-a-family-on-under-2000-per-year/

The part that's missing in that advice is to properly do something with that extra money. I touched on this in the previous post about wishing I knew something...anything...about retirement accounts but understanding the power of compounding is also key.  After a brief stint with FirstCommand where I was sold high load funds and life insurance I didn't need I eventually did end up with a Roth IRA in an S&P fund.  Unfortunately I put the financial education journey on pause there and really didn't pick it back up for 10+ years.

2. Avoid credit card debt at all costs.

This should be obvious but sometimes it is not.  In college everyone is throwing credit cards at you. You need to strike a serious balance between building credit and buying crap you don't need or have money for on credit.  It took me many many YEARS to finally get out of credit card debt.

Credit Cards are a tool that can be used to build credit and earn reward but they must be used appropriately and not as a way to buy things you don't have money for.


3. Establishing a budget

What the heck is a budget?! The key to #1 and avoiding #2 is the budget. AKA why I can't have any fun :-)

To be serious though, I never could understand why I made OK money in my 20's (and now good money) but never had any. It wasn't until I started tracking where it all went that I had my answers.  The One-Page Financial Plan by Carl Richards is an ok place to start. Its very simple, lay it out there and track the money just to see where it goes. Then go looking for things to cut out.  When I decided to try to meet with financial planners many of them asked if  I had a budget and the better ones would only see me after I had it to bring in with me :-)

 If you want some more ammo Dave Ramsey's books are ok as well.  Plus there are tons and tons of resources on this now on the interwebs.

I do this religiously now with YNAB. The manual part is what works for me but its ok to try a few tools to see what sticks and fills the need.


4. Understand Roth vs Traditional IRAs.

TLDR;
**Do the Roth until you make too much**

Reference: http://www.investopedia.com/articles/retirement/03/012203.asp

Where to put the money?

• No idea:  Target Date Funds via low fee mutal funds or ETFs
• Some idea: Proper mix of domestic, foreign stocks and bonds via low fee ETFs
• Lots of ideas: ETFs and dividend growth stocks (see below)

Also understand lower the management fees the better:

Reference: http://www.thesimpledollar.com/why-fees-matter/

5. If employers do any sort of matching, make sure you contribute enough to get that match no matter what.

You want that free money to accumulate as much as you can for as long as you can.

Relevant blog posts:
http://blog.mint.com/saving/goodbye-college-hello-future-why-retirement-savings-matters-in-your-20s-051215
http://www.bankrate.com/finance/retirement/5-retirement-savings-ideas-for-young-people-1.aspx
http://www.kiplinger.com/article/saving/T063-C006-S001-10-financial-commandments-for-your-20s.html
https://www.millersmoney.com/money-weekly/free-money-for-your-401k

6. Understand dividend growth investing or at least the buy and hold mentality.

-Learn basic stock analysis

-Learn what a trend is and wether a stock is in an uptrend and downtrend
-Learn about timeframes and how we care about Daily..really more  Weekly/ Monthly charts when it comes to investing.
-Learn about the Dividend Aristocrats and its ok to devote a portion of saving/investing to these Dividend Growth stocks
-Read A Random Walk Down Wall Street: The Time-Tested Strategy for Successful Investing by Burton G. Malkiel
-Read The Intelligent Investor: The Definitive Book on Value Investing. by Benjamin Graham

Motif rebalances & creation of a new Motif

For end of April and May I did some motif rebalancing and created a new Motif.

First up was:

 

Only change here was to add BUD to the Motif.

Up next is my betting on the future Motif, which I think is all red at the moment :-/

I rebalanced this Motif to add a bunch of solar companies. I really liked the Tesla powerwall announcement and it spurred me to look into some of the other solars.  I plan to dollar cost average this Motif over the next few quarters until it hits full position and then I'll just wait and see what happens. This is a long term bet portfolio and I think I've mentioned that I'm willing to ride this one out and really have no plans to sell anything in the portfolio (for now).

 

If you are curious as to which solars and why, here you go:

TSLA (why cars + batteries)
SCTY (why walmart partnership)
SUNE (why Kohls partnership)
FSLR (why Apple partnership)
SPWR (why warren buffet involvement && J&J + many others)
VSLR (why up on the year)
CSIQ (why up on the year)

Lastly with some cash back from uncle Sam I created a simple credit card companies motif consisting of V, MA, AXP, and DFS.  Long term I don't see the world doing better with credit card debt (meaning I think we will continue to pile it on) so I think they are a good buy and hold opportunity.

 

April EOM Update

Total dividend income for April was: $109.68.

It is pretty fun to watch these grow since Jan's income was 35.79 (mostly because i had missed the ex-dividend date on most of the purchases when i rolled over the old 401k).

Excel skillz chart:

This month I took refund money and added money to my two Motif's see:
http://hackyourfinances.blogspot.com/2015/04/march-update-2.html

The majority of the cash went to the one that is performing well vs my "bets" one but I'll continue to add to that one until it reaches my max position/bet size. I'm still bullish on 3D printing long term.  I may also rebalance to add in some solar stocks, still thinking about it.

I also made contributions in my Loyal3 portfolio to:

DIS
UL
KO

For the most part Loyal3 doesn't dividend reinvest, but did for KRFT. I just take any dividends and add it to the next purchase i make.

That's all for now, thanks for reading.

Things I wish I knew when I started getting a paycheck

Things I wish I knew when I started getting a paycheck

1. I wish I knew retirement accounts existed and the power of compounding && time doing its magic

My first entrance into any sort of investing was in my military days with First Command (http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/First-Command-Reviews-E37701.htm). In retrospect it was better than nothing but if you do some Googling it wasn't a great service. They put you in high load mutual funds and sell whole life insurance (which i really didnt need with Army Life insurance). I got half the message that they were less than optimal advisors but decided "it was too hard" or "I didn't have time" to learn a better way to invest my money. I ended up purchasing a S&P 500 Roth IRA  but not putting nearly enough  in (aka the max every year).

What I plan to do about for my kids:
I've already started trying to educate my oldest on investing with her Motif. I also **plan** to initially fund her IRA once she starts working as well as do more education on the power of compounding. I should have some good ammo by that point with my own retirement accounts plus this blog. Hurray for fancy graphs and mad excel skillz.


2. I wish I knew that even saving $100 a month or per paycheck would have probably made me a millionaire now.

I started working at 14, so over the course of my life so far there were tons of opportunity to bank cash into an IRA for the future but I didn't.  I have little to show for it except for maybe some hazy  memories of nights out on the town.   There are many many resources on compounding both in IRA and with dividend growth investing. Here is one that is a decent example:  http://www.businessinsider.com/amazing-power-of-compound-interest-2014-7 and another http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2008/04/02/the-extraordinary-power-of-compound-interest/


What i plan to do about for my kids:
See above

3. I wish I knew/understood that buying stuff is really a waste of money.  Most of my life I spent every dollar I made mostly on stuff i didn't need instead of stashing it away.  This is mostly a result of upbringing and my parents views on money.

What I plan to do about for my kids:
Education when we are shopping, reminding grandparents to not equal love with **stuff**, tell stories about my shitty finance habits once they are old enough to understand better.