May 2016 Recap

Here is my dividend income for May. As you can see, I reinvested the divvys back into HCP.

I was pretty active this month with investing as well. Here is the summary of my purchases.

Total capital invested is $18,677.81 and these purchases will increase my yearly dividends by $620.10.

DEFY MEDIOCRITY

More buys --- VZ, SO, & MSFT

Here are a few more additions to the pipeline.

• VZ:  50 shares @ $49.62 --- Yield 4.55%
• SO:  50 shares @ $48.53 --- Yield  4.47%
• MSFT:  50 shares @ $50.92 --- Yield  2.83%

Total capital invested is $7474.20.  These purchases have a combined yield of 3.93% and will add $293.50 to my yearly dividends.

My gut is telling me that I might be a bit early with telecoms and utilities, but I have been wrong with these two industries for a while now. Maybe my purchases will cause the values to drop. If so, I'll gladly add to both positions.

In any event, these are ho hum companies that will be good income producers if nothing else. I'm creeping back up towards $2,000 in annual dividend income. My plan is to gradually reach $3k by the end of the year. Knowing how impatient I can be at times, I may reach that level next month. :-) 

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Recent Buy --- TGT

Today I add shares of Target to my portfolio.

• TGT:  40 shares @ $66.81 --- Yield  3.35%

Total capital invested is $2679.31 and my yearly dividends will increase by $89.60. 

Target is dealing with all kinds of "shit storms" right now....tough retail environment, Amazon, and fucked up trans-gender issues. The last of these almost made me opt for WMT or KSS instead. Anyway, hopefully TGT will come out of this much like they did after the security breach problems a couple of years ago. I'll likely add more shares if we drop down into the $50s.

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Recent Buy --- ABT

Today I initiated a position in Abbott Labs.

• ABT:  100 shares @ $37.59 --- Yield  2.77%

Total capital invested is $3765.94 and this purchase will add $104 to my yearly dividends. It's been another crazy day in the markets today with the Dow dropping 200 points so far. It seems like these 200 point swings have been happening every day recently. UNP and PG were on my radar today, but I opted for ABT instead as it's seem more "beaten down" at the moment. 

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April 2016 Income & Expenses

The amounts below are cash amounts and are net of taxes, insurance, 401k contributions, HSA, etc. In other words, the amounts are what get deposited and withdrawn from my accounts.

Day job (take home pay) --- $9390 
Dividends/Interest --- $0 

Total net income --- $9390

Expenses --- $7158 (Taken from Mint)

Savings  $2232 --- Rate  $23.77%


This is my first income update in a quite some time. While am still making really good money, this year has been night and day vs the first half of last year. My day job take home pay is down about $4000 vs last year and my dividend income is down over $1000 as well. Overall I am down about $5000 from last April.

The drop in pay would have been more pronounced if most of my pay wasn't guaranteed. Last year the company I work for made over $300,000 in net income for April and this year it lost money. It's great that I have such a large percentage of my income guaranteed, but it is also a bit nerve racking making a lot of money while the company swings into a loss. Spotlights definitely start shining when you have a big base salary and the company is performing poorly.  Still, things appear ok and it looks like May is picking up steam around here. Obviously falling energy prices continue to have a serious impact around Houston, but it looks like things are stabilizing a bit.

While income was down unfortunately expenses were a bit high this month. About $3500 of the expenses were because of a fantastic road trip I took that included stops in Charleston, SC, the Smoky Mountains, Gatlinburg, TN, and Nashville, TN. Those were some amazing stops and I had the time of my life!

May Outlook

I have really shut things down on the expense side so far this month. I hope to keep overall expenses below $3500. The only major expense so far has been a tax preparation fee of $825.

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Recent Buy --- WFC

Today I initiated a small position in WFC.

• WFC:  50 shares @ $48.41--- Yield  3.14%

Total capital invested is $2427.45 and this purchase will add $76.00 to my yearly dividends. This is my first ever purchase of Wells Fargo. The only other banks that I have owned are TD and BNS.

WMT, CSCO, AAPL, INTC, SHELL, & CAT are on my radar.

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Let the "toe dipping begin" --- AAPL Purchase

Today I decided to re-initiate my AAPL position.

• AAPL:  25 shares @ $92.96 --- Yield  2.45%

Total capital invested is $2330.91 and will this will increase my yearly dividends by $57.00. AAPL is currently trading about $40 per share below its 52 week high and I think offers decent value here. I started of with a fairly small position and will gladly add more in the mid $80s if that happens.

I was close to buying CSCO or ABT as well today and still may. I think both look attractive especially CSCO yielding around 4%.  

I still have a desire to keep $300k in cash and am within $14k of that number right now. I am really pleased with my restraint during the past few months, so I decided to reward myself with a small purchase. Knowing me though, this is probably a break in the dam that will have me going "bat shit crazy" with more purchases in the near future! 

Stay tuned!

DEFY MEDIOCRITY