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Passive Income:Dividend Investing
Feb. 23rd, 2025 06:07 amBack around 2019/2020 I decided to start building up a brokerage account. I had bought some stocks about a decade earlier and then practically abandoned my account afterwards to focus on spending money elsewhere. But late 2019 I dusted it off a bit and started buying a bit.
No real focus to what I’d add, but at the start of the pandemic I bought what I hoped were stocks that would bounce back after appearing to dip. Some did, such as Exxon and Tesla, some didn’t like Kodak and Boeing. But I never bought any particular stock in abundance, maybe twenty shares was the most I’d buy before turning my eye to some other company.
I’d say sometime in 2023 was when I decided to focus on high yield dividend stocks, YouTube channels such as Dividend Bull and Chris Invests caught my interest and exposed this opportunity to create an income stream. Up until this point I was basically socking all my extra cash into my 401k and only really starting to add a Roth IRA to my retirement savings.
Long story short, I’ve been selling off all my stocks that don’t provide much dividend income and moving that money into stuff that does pay. Last year I started adding $500 a month into my account to buy more shares plus reinvesting all dividends I take in. It’s been a pretty big bump, earned about $1k in dividends in 2023, $3k in 2024, and my account estimates I’ll get about $6,500 this year. I mean a lot of that is due to recently selling off stuff that paid little to nothing in dividends into stuff that has dividend yields of 5% to 12% yields… so I expect the growth to level off after this year. But it’s really cool to expect something like $500 a month in dividends off what I currently own.
I don’t see this as ever fully replacing a paycheck, but it is something I’m hoping can provide a bit of a buffer in case I ever take a break from working. I see it as creating my own pension… would love if it allowed me to retire early or take a sabbatical between jobs.
My portfolio highlights, and obviously do your own research if any of these interest you:
SCHD is my highest holdings even though it only has about a 3% dividend yield and pays quarterly. But I decided to buy into the hype because practically every channel I listen to pushes it and talks about its dividend growth potential… plus it pays qualified dividends which have some tax benefits.
Second my recent reaching second highest holding is SPYI, pays about 12% dividend yield and monthly at that which helps with the dividend reinvesting.
The rest of my holdings come out to be represent about 5% or lower of my portfolio. I decided to try and not let any on stock or ETF get too much focus, so I am currently adding shares to one one month then shares of another the next.
I own about 30 different names in my portfolio, don’t want it to get any larger because then you’ll never really be able to focus enough to have an impact.
I’ll post follow ups if much changes.
As an fyi, my ROTH IRA which I’ve only been contributing to the past few years I decided to use to invest into different stocks from my taxable brokerage account. There is overlap with both including SCHD, but stuff in my IRA but not brokerage account includes JEPQ, QQQM, and VOO. Two of those three don’t pay much in dividends but have good value and growth potential… just trying different strategies for my different accounts.
No real focus to what I’d add, but at the start of the pandemic I bought what I hoped were stocks that would bounce back after appearing to dip. Some did, such as Exxon and Tesla, some didn’t like Kodak and Boeing. But I never bought any particular stock in abundance, maybe twenty shares was the most I’d buy before turning my eye to some other company.
I’d say sometime in 2023 was when I decided to focus on high yield dividend stocks, YouTube channels such as Dividend Bull and Chris Invests caught my interest and exposed this opportunity to create an income stream. Up until this point I was basically socking all my extra cash into my 401k and only really starting to add a Roth IRA to my retirement savings.
Long story short, I’ve been selling off all my stocks that don’t provide much dividend income and moving that money into stuff that does pay. Last year I started adding $500 a month into my account to buy more shares plus reinvesting all dividends I take in. It’s been a pretty big bump, earned about $1k in dividends in 2023, $3k in 2024, and my account estimates I’ll get about $6,500 this year. I mean a lot of that is due to recently selling off stuff that paid little to nothing in dividends into stuff that has dividend yields of 5% to 12% yields… so I expect the growth to level off after this year. But it’s really cool to expect something like $500 a month in dividends off what I currently own.
I don’t see this as ever fully replacing a paycheck, but it is something I’m hoping can provide a bit of a buffer in case I ever take a break from working. I see it as creating my own pension… would love if it allowed me to retire early or take a sabbatical between jobs.
My portfolio highlights, and obviously do your own research if any of these interest you:
SCHD is my highest holdings even though it only has about a 3% dividend yield and pays quarterly. But I decided to buy into the hype because practically every channel I listen to pushes it and talks about its dividend growth potential… plus it pays qualified dividends which have some tax benefits.
Second my recent reaching second highest holding is SPYI, pays about 12% dividend yield and monthly at that which helps with the dividend reinvesting.
The rest of my holdings come out to be represent about 5% or lower of my portfolio. I decided to try and not let any on stock or ETF get too much focus, so I am currently adding shares to one one month then shares of another the next.
I own about 30 different names in my portfolio, don’t want it to get any larger because then you’ll never really be able to focus enough to have an impact.
I’ll post follow ups if much changes.
As an fyi, my ROTH IRA which I’ve only been contributing to the past few years I decided to use to invest into different stocks from my taxable brokerage account. There is overlap with both including SCHD, but stuff in my IRA but not brokerage account includes JEPQ, QQQM, and VOO. Two of those three don’t pay much in dividends but have good value and growth potential… just trying different strategies for my different accounts.
