January Stock Purchases: HCP, PG, SO, WELL

Life has been really busy for me the past few months, but I will try to catch up on my posts to keep everyone aware of my dividends I've been receiving, my portfolio, my stock purchases, and my savings rates.

Below are my stock purchases for January:

• I purchased 20 shares of HCP, Inc. (HCP) at $25.5799 per share in my taxable brokerage account.  This is a dividend yield of 5.79%, adding $29.60 to my taxable dividend income.
• I purchased 10 shares of Welltower Inc. (WELL) at $60.75 per share in my taxable brokerage account.  This is a dividend yield of 5.73%, adding $34.80 to my taxable dividend income.
• I purchased 24 shares of The Southern Company (SO) at $46.75 per share in my Roth IRA account.  This is a dividend yield of 4.96%, adding $55.68 to my non-taxable dividend income.
• I purchased 13 shares of The Procter & Gamble Company (PG) at $86.50 per share in my Roth IRA account.  This is a dividend yield of 3.32%, adding $37.31 to my non-taxable dividend income.

After these purchases, my taxable dividend income will increase by $64.40, and my non-taxable dividend income will increase by $92.99.

What do you think of my January purchases?  Do you own any of the same companies?

Bought: CAH, GIS, GWW, HCP, HRL, K, KHC, KMB, T, WBA

It's been a while since I've posted on here... Life has been crazy hectic with work and trying to raise two kids haha... August and September seemed to have a lot of great buying opportunities in my opinion as there seemed to be a lot of dips in a lot of decent companies.

Below are my stock purchases for the months of August and September:

Bought: GIS, GPC, GWW, K

Everything has been pretty crazy for me recently... I've been swamped with work while simultaneously being sleep deprived and trying to raise two kids.  Props to all the bloggers out there who work full time, have children, and are able to blog consistently.  I don't know how you guys do it, but I have much respect.  I've been behind on my posting as I've been trying to spend as much of my free time with my kids as possible.  You only live once, and they only have one childhood, so I'm trying to make it count.

Anyways, below are the companies I purchased for the month of April:

Bought: APD, GPC, HCN, HCP, TGT, XOM

Wow, it's been a while since I've posted.  Life has been extremely hectic for me with work and family responsibilities.  March was a month with lots of great buying opportunities, and as such, I capitalized on those opportunities to invest in many different companies.

Below are the companies I purchased for the month of March:

Bought: APD, D, OHI

The stock market continues to be very interesting these past couple of months.  Some days, it's up a lot; other days, it's down a lot.  My plan is to continue investing every month, although there are times where I struggle whether to hoard up cash until there's a huge pullback so I can buy good quality stocks at huge discounts.  But the opportunity cost could be that the stock market does not have a huge dip anytime soon, and my money would just be sitting there earning pretty much nothing and getting eaten away by inflation.

Thankfully, I found a few companies in the month of February that I decided to purchase:

Bought: CL, MMM, VFC, WMT

With the start of a new year, I've decided to kick it off by investing very aggressively in the first month.  There were several companies that had a slight pullback, and I was able to invest more capital in said companies.  It makes me glad that I can put money to work for me and start the compounding process sooner.

Without further ado, below is a summary of my recent purchases for the month of January:

Bought: CL, HRL, MDT, VFC

Today marks the end of 2016.  While there seems to have been many celebrity deaths this year and an "interesting" presidential election, this was a good year for me.  I paid off my mortgage, welcomed a second child into the family, and was still able to invest a decent amount of capital into dividend stocks.  With the increase in interest rates and a new president elect, it will be interesting to see where the stock market goes in 2017.  Either way, I'm looking forward to the new year.  Cheers!

Below is a summary of my recent purchases for the month of December:

Bought: CL, CLX, GIS, MDT, UL

Things have been crazy hectic recently as we just welcomed a new child into the family.  With the first child, everything's all new so the challenge is learning everything for the first time.  With the second child, the challenge is learning how to juggle two children simultaneously while being sleep deprived.  It's definitely been a blessing having another child; I'm just extremely tired and running on a few hours of sleep every day.

In any case, I've made some recent purchases for the month of November which I'll quickly summarize below:

Bought: ADP, CLX, PEP

The stock market has been really interesting these past few days... There was a huge pullback where many companies saw a drop in their share prices.  But then in just a couple of days, the prices are pretty much back where they were.  During the slight market sell off, I made a few more purchases to my Roth IRA account, maxing out my Roth IRA contributions for the year.

On 9/16/2016, I invested in three companies in my Roth IRA.

Bought: TGT, VFC

I have been contemplating back and forth recently about whether or not to max out my Roth IRA and my spouse's Roth IRA since I am aiming to achieve financial freedom as soon as possible.  Financial freedom is the point in which my passive income can cover my living expenses.  In terms of retiring, I believe I won't be able to retire (quit working in corporate America) until I'm 56 years old.  The main reason for this is because I would like to pay for my children's undergraduate education, or help out as much as I can so they don't graduate with a ton of student debt.

For this reason, I had considered maxing out only my Roth IRA account and investing the rest to dividend growth stocks in a taxable account.  After weighing out the pros and cons further, I think I am going to max out both our Roth IRA accounts before investing in the taxable account.  Why?  Because of the tax advantages.  Lord willing, I will eventually turn 59.5 year old so I'll still need money from that age and onward.  All the dividends coming out of my Roth IRA account at that time will be tax free.  Another important factor is that my beneficiaries will be able to take out distributions tax free until the money runs out.  So from a legacy planning point of view, the Roth IRA is an excellent tool.

Bought: ADM, KMI

I purchased the following stocks on 12/3/2015 for my Roth IRA:

Bought: CVX, EMR, XOM

I purchased the following stocks on 8/20/2015 for my Roth IRA:

Big Decisions Finally Made

The good thing about this blog is that it chronicles my life and my thoughts along the process to retire by age 56.  Hopefully, one day when I look back, I will see the decisions I made, the actions I took, and the fruits of my decisions.  And hopefully this blog will be a source of encouragement for others as well.

After much contemplation regarding how to deploy my cash and how to invest in my Roth IRA, I have come to the following decisions: