All About Interest

One man's journey to financial independence.

Monthly Update – April 2014

by

freedom

Another month has come and gone. Tax time is finally over and I’m one step closer to financial freedom!

Below is a summary of my activity for the month:

New Purchases: $2,650 (net):

$1050 of ESV
$550 of V
$400 of DE
$400 of FDO
$250 of BDX

Posts about new purchases can all be found by following the “Buys” label here.

Sells:
none

Options Trades:

I decided to close out my option position in PM. PM went on a run and I was able to close it out and make a cool $557. You can find that post here. My options trading should gradually pick up now.

My total profit for the year is $675.00.

I’ve updated all of these trades on my Options tab and you can find these trades on my options label.

Dividends:

KO – 67.50
NVS – 187.67
MO – 79.29
PM – 110.07
MDT – 25.98
TD – 60.12

I earned $530.63 in dividends for the month. This is an increase of 128% from the same month last year. My total year-to-date dividend income is $2790.41. This is 27.9% toward my goal of $10,000 in dividends for the year.

I’ve updated my dividend income on my Dividends tab.

Forward 12-month Dividends:

My expected forward 12-month dividend income has increased to $10,114.55 from $9894.99, a 2.2% increase since last month. I hope to be able to increasing this number much faster now than I can contribute more with tax season being over.

However, I do still need to be careful with my money because tax season will be upon us again before we know it. It’s a nightmare really, personally, I found a great way to save on tax season by using coupons from websites like Raise, but it’s the businesses that I feel most sorry for.

My friend who is a business owner worries all year about tax season and his bookkeeping and he soon forgets what it’s like to actually be a business owner and the enjoyment he can have. Thankfully, he soon got in touch with one of these accounting firms in phoenix and they’ve taken over all of these responsibilities so now he has a bit of freedom on his hands.

Good for him! If you can find the help you need for your finances and taxes, then why not go for it? I definitely would. And I’m just glad it’s over for this year, and I can focus on more of my contributions.

I also posted a Milestone post about me hitting the $10k Mark in forward dividends.

Forward_Dividends_04_14
You can find all of my monthly dividend information from the Dividends page.

Dividend Increases:

The following 6 companies in my portfolio increased their dividends this month.

CVX – 7% increase announced on 04/30
RDS.B – 4.4% increase announced on 04/30
JNJ – 6.1% increase announced on 04/24
SO – 3.5% increase announced on 04/21
OHI – 2nd increase this year announced on 04/18
CSX – 7% increase announced on 04/15

I’ve now had 18 companies increase dividends so far this year.

These increases can also be found on my Dividend Increases label.

Goals:

I completed my first goal in April of closing on a 3rd rental property!

These goals can be found on the Goals tab.

Real Estate:

Everything is moving along on my office condo to be able to move in by June 1st. We’ve already rented less than a third of the space to a new tenant to cover over half the entire monthly payments. The rest of the space we’ll be using.

I was able to lease my new rental for the $1300 estimate that I started with. The whole process went really smoothly and I’m thinking about a possible 4th rental for this year.

I posted my electric bill for the third month of 2014 and the city owes me $35! Yes my bill is still in the negative. We’ll see how long that lasts. It looks like I’ll pay next to nothing for electricity over the next couple of months at this rate. So far I’m happy with the results.

All of my real estate posts will be found on my real estate label.

Net Worth:

I’m now at $654k, up from $644k. The smaller increase this month was due to a large tax bill that was due.

You can find the details of this on my Net Worth page.

Looking Ahead:

My expected dividends for May are $642.79. This would be over a 100% increase from May of last year and slightly higher than this past month.

I will be contributing more to purchases in May than the last couple of months. I now feel a little behind and will need to ramp up my contributions heavily if I’m to meet all my goals.

The leasing of my third rental property went so smoothly that I’m contemplating going for a 4th later in the year. This would obviously cause me to miss some of my dividend goals.

How was your month?

Comments

    • FFdividend,

      I appreciate the support. I have some catching up to do to make up for two months of lower purchases in order to meet my goals. Haha, I can’t wait to be in that picture!

      Take care!

  3. Holy crap! You are all over the investing space. Dividends, purchases, dividend increases, rental property, solar credits. From all the blogs I have seen so far you seem to have all the angles covered. Awesome job. Will be following your progress. Gives me inspiration to follow along the great passive income ride.

    • DivHut,

      Thanks for the kind words. Putting my investment ideas to words on my blog is great motivation for myself and I’m happy to inspire others as well.

      I appreciate you following along on my journey!

  4. You are truly rocking my friend. Your forward 12-month dividend income is impressive to look at.

    Also, you make your options trading look like a breeze. Solid looking commissions. I am looking forward on more articles on options.

    Till next time, take care.

    DividendVet
    DividendVet recently posted…April 2014 Dividend IncomeMy Profile

    • DividendVet,

      Thanks alot! It’s really chugging along now and I can feel the difference that the extra dividend income makes each month.

      I’ll continue posting all of my options trades. I previously wrote an introduction to selling puts. I definitely need to follow that up with some additional articles when I have a chance.

      Thanks for stopping by!

    • Hi Gareth,

      Thanks! I hope to double pretty much every month from last year. I won’t be able to hold that kind of increase for much longer though. It’s definitely motivating though to see results like that.

      Cheers!

  6. Good job! Looks like you have a pretty solid set of income streams. I am pondering trying to find a rental, but that won’t be for a while =) I will just have to go with my job and dividend portfolio for the time being.

    Take care!
    ILG recently posted…April Portfolio HighlightsMy Profile

    • ILG,

      Thanks! It’s worth taking your time and watching watching/researching your local rental market. Every market is different and presents different cash flow opportunities. I’m currently looking in the suburbs due to the high cost of housing in the city. You are doing great on your end as well.

      Thanks for stopping by!

  7. Great job on diversifying your net worth… I need to work on that!

    April was a quieter month for me, dividend income-wise, but I did cross the $4,000 mark in projected annual dividend income. Still a ways to go to cross $10,000!

    Don’t you just hate it when taxes get in the way of investing? We had a significant tax bill, too. I guess one good thing about it is that we’ve earned a lot (including dividends!), hence the bigger than normal tax bill.

    Take care!
    DivGro recently posted…Monthly Review: April 2014My Profile

    • DivGro,

      Thanks and congrats on crossing the $4k mark! You should really start seeing the difference the additional income makes.

      The only thing that’s certain is taxes and death right? I hate paying taxes but I suppose I’m fortunate to have high earnings to offset them. It sounds like you are doing well on that front also.

      Thanks for stopping by!

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