One of the best months of dividend income to report. As dividend investors, we love the quarter ends, due to being the most popular month, as well as an even better month for those that have mutual funds and/or ETFs. The busy season is slowly slowing down, gosh I wish it would end, but dividend income always keeps me at least going for the time being.
Dividend Income
I received a total of $1,498.12 in dividend income in March. This is a solid increase from last year, which I will talk about in the next section. There were really no surprises, only one changed the quarter the pay, as it relates to timing, and everything went smooth. The 401(k), Health Savings Account (HSA) and all dividends are automatically invested/reinvested and helps take the emotion out of timing & making a decision. Also, to find out why I max out my 401(k) and HSA – please refer to the 3rd part of my tax series, as that describes the magnitude of benefits to increase the amount you can invest due to reduction in taxes.
Here we have a solid 30 different entities sending checks to me this month (Up from 27 last year). The fact that I’m up 3 positions last year, actually surprises me. The new faces are Delta (DAL), DowDuPont switching here (DWDP) and Kroger (KR). So many different companies and it’s cool seeing that 24 companies were in my taxable account too! Further, I purchased Dominion (D) two different times and that dividend will churn for me by the end of the second quarter.
Similarly, I have split out between the individual stock amounts and the retirement accounts, as the ” – R” indicates a retirement account dividend (or the furthest column to the right). I separate these two, as I like to know what portion of my dividend income is coming from those retirement accounts that I cannot touch until 59.5 (barring any other usage rule I could use). Here, it shows that I received a total of $599.84 (up from $457.42 last year) or 40% of my income from retirement accounts and the other 60% was from my individual taxable account portfolio. Additionally, this shows from retirement accounts that I’m all ready for my set it and forget it mentality to keep that income going. To see my portfolio – one can go to our portfolio summary page.
Dividend Income Year Over Year Comparison
2017: 
2018: 
So what are the differences here? To start and I noted, that DWDP moved to the quarter end vs. an “off-month”. Lastly, Delta (DAL) dividend has been introduced and am hoping that continues to grow by a significant double digit growth for the future. Then, Kroger’s (KR) dividend is coming full circle as well. Year over year, the dividend income increase was 22.43%. I wonder if June’s dividend income summary will be better than this one. If that’s the case, December’s could be a real treat. I will gladly accept a 20% increase each year, as next year, at the same pace, this could be $1,827.
I won’t go into details about the dividend increases. Realty Income (O) was the only one for me and they increased their dividend 0.23%. This did not impact my forward income by a significant amount.
Dividend Income Conclusion & Summary
The name of the game is to learn and act in the right manner to what you have learned. The plan is to maximize every dollar for investment opportunities and live a balanced life. My hope is that my month of dividend income above shows the community that one can use dividend income as a revenue engine to take back control of your life. Dividend investing, once you learn the right way, becomes easier to do and starts to make quite a bit of sense : )
As I discussed with my updated – normal monthly expenditures at the moment, this dividend income would cover over 100% of my average $984 monthly expense for my house, including utilities. This is very nice knowing that my dividend income covers the month of expenses, and them some; which the goal is to have that happen each month! In similar fashion – all of the investing from last year and moves this year, shows that my aim to save 60% of my income, and making every dollar count, has allowed promising results already this year.
Another month down and it was a fun, record-setting March! I am sure there are many more who established new highs for the month and even for your lifetime, to this point. If only each month could be like this, but that’s what makes this a journey. I am excited to read the comments and thank you, the community, for stopping by; as you are helping me on my journey to financial freedom!