Another month has gone by. Life is tough at times but the one thing I can count on is my dividend machine consistently working hard for me in the background. Dividend growth investing is one of my favorite forms of investment strategy. It’s the epitome of passive income. Over the long-term, I get the benefit of compounding growth and I hope to one day have enough dividends to supplement my income. Until then, I will continue to invest in my dividend portfolio, month after month. Not only that, but the dividends I receive will be used to purchases more shares of my portfolio. The growth is slow at first, but the dividends grow exponentially like a snowball rolling down a hill. It gets bigger and bigger and bigger! So, without further adieu, let’s see how much dividends I earned in August 2023.
Dividend Income
In August, I earned $10.68 in dividends broken down as follows:
$10.68 is slightly more than I spend at Starbucks everyday. So, the amount is small right now. But that’s not the point. Over time, this amount will get larger and larger. As I increase my contributions to my portfolio, the amount of increase will also get bigger. It just takes time, discipline and patience.
Annual Income
Here is a graphical representation of the dividends earned in August in relation to the dividends earned in previous years:
Here is the raw data:
As you can see, I earned 52.32% LESS dividends this year compared to last year. It may take a few more months, but I anticipate being in positive territory soon – hopefully by the start of the new year!
Forward Annual Dividends
At the time of this writing, the forward annual dividends is $224.44. A month ago, my forward annual dividends was $176.10. This represents a 27.45% increase from the previous month. This double-digit increase is mainly due to my increased contribution to my dividend portfolio. More importantly, I fully expect the trend to continue in the next few months.
Finally, the Dividend Tracker, has been updated. As you can see from the tracker below, I’ve made $108.93 in dividends since the beginning of the year.
What Expenses Would Dividends Cover?
Here, I visualize what expenses my annual dividend income could pay for. This is one of my favorite parts of pursuing dividend growth investing.
$224.44 per year is $18.70 dividends per month, on average. At present, I earn enough in dividends to cover Acorns and Amazon Prime. I’ll take it. Next on the list is Netflix!!!
The following is a list of expenses I am targeting:
I’ll mention that the cost per month for my credit card bill is more than $154 (currently about $300). Since I’m far away from covering that amount with dividends, I won’t worry about updating this figure every month. Quite frankly, by the time I reach the point where I can payoff my credit card bill with my dividends, I will likely already have a zero credit card balance. As you may be aware, I track my credit card debt payoff on a monthly basis on this blog.
Final Thoughts
There’s a lot going on in my life right now. I just became officially unemployed. Moreover, my health has taken a turn for the worst. Honestly, it’s sometimes tough to find the motivation to continue to invest in dividend stocks, especially since my portfolio is low. The good news though is that I just don’t think about it. My investments are on auto pilot and I look forward every month to see my portfolio grow.
Of course, there is a lot more to life than my portfolio balance. But, despite what’s going on, at least I know I can rely on my dividends coming in consistently every month.
Be sure to stay tuned for future posts. I’ll be providing updates on how the condos are doing, especially after Hurricane Idalia.
How was August for you? Did you break any records? Did you reach a new milestone?
What did you think of this post?
Let me know your thoughts by commenting below.