Monthly Report: August 2017

I post an update every month on the taxable dividend income I receive in my brokerage accounts, the non-taxable dividends I receive from my Roth IRA accounts, the market value of my taxable brokerage accounts, the market value of my Roth IRA accounts, the market value of my 401(k) account, and my savings rate.

Below is the monthly report as of August 31, 2017:

Taxable Dividend Income (Total: $68.00)

• Air Products and Chemicals, Inc. (APD) - $4.78
• AT&T Inc. (T) - $4.90
• The Clorox Company (CLX) - $8.50
• Colgate-Palmolive Company (CL) - $13.27
• General Mills, Inc. (GIS) - $4.90
• Kinder Morgan, Inc. (KMI) - $4.93 (Increased 0.20% YOY)
• The Procter & Gamble Company (PG) - $10.43 (Decreased 0.38% YOY)
• Realty Income Corporation (O) - $6.05 (Increased 7.08% YOY)
• Time Warner Inc. (TWX) - $4.46 (Decreased 2.19% YOY)
• Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) - $5.78
• Total taxable dividend income of $68.00 increased 214.96% YOY.

New positions I added fresh capital to this year are APD, GIS, T, and VZ.  Existing positions I added fresh capital to this year is CL and GIS.  All other dividend increases are from dividends reinvested and dividend raises from the companies.  The reason for the decrease YOY for PG and TWX is due to the liquidation of my partial shares when I consolidated my brokerage accounts.  I'm very happy with the total year over year dividend increase.

You can see a schedule of all the taxable dividends I have received here.

Non-Taxable Dividend Income (Total: $115.15)

• Air Products and Chemicals, Inc. (APD) - $7.65
• The Clorox Company (CLX) - $7.65
• Colgate-Palmolive Company (CL) - $6.84
• General Mills, Inc. (GIS) - $8.89
• HCP, Inc. (HCP) - $13.10
• Hormel Foods Corporation (HRL) - $5.64
• Kinder Morgan, Inc. (KMI) - $7.72 (Increased 1.45% YOY)
• Omega Healthcare Investors, Inc. (OHI) - $23.48
• Welltower Inc. (HCN) - $14.96
• Vanguard Long-Term Bond Index Fund (VBLTX) - $19.22 (Decreased 80.41% YOY)
• Total non-taxable dividend income of $115.15 increased 8.91% YOY.

New positions I added fresh capital to this year are APD, HCN, HCP, and OHI.  All other dividend increases are from dividends reinvested and dividend raises from the companies.  On 8/4/2017, I exchanged all my shares of VBLTX for VGHCX, which is why VBLTX has a large decrease YOY.  VBLTX was paying a decent dividend yield, but the monthly distributions varied from month to month with some months showing a decrease YOY.  Additionally, the rate of return was not the greatest and I feel that I may get a better return on my money if I invest in VGHCX.  VGHCX focuses more on capital appreciation versus income so the objective for the money invested into this fund is different.  The money invested in VGHCX will be focused more on growing the money quickly over a long period of time.  I didn't want to completely sell everything and buy dividend growth stocks since I still want to have some money invested in mutual funds just to hedge my risk in case my dividend stock picks don't pan out as well as I would like.  Overall, I'm happy with the total year over year dividend increase.

You can see a schedule of all the non-taxable dividend income I have received here.

Market Values (Total: $453,547.54)

• Brokerage Accounts - $127,247.37 (Increased 2.72% from prior month)
• Roth IRA - $87,462.65 (Increased 1.23% from prior month)
• 401(k) - $238,837.52 (Increased 1.35% from prior month)
• Total market value increased 1.71% from prior month.

I'm not too concerned with the market value of my taxable brokerage accounts since the investment strategy with that is solely to generate a growing stream of dividend income.  As long as the dividends keep coming and are increasing, I'm not too worried.  Nevertheless, it's still interesting to see how it is performing.

You can see a schedule of the market values for my brokerage accounts, Roth IRA account, and 401(k) account as of the end of every month here.

Savings Rate

• 59.01%

Savings rate was excellent for this month!  This is the highest so far year to date.  50% or more in savings rate is definitely a big achievement for me.

You can see a schedule of my savings rate by month here.

How did you do this month?