Sunday, May 15, 2022

MORTAGE BALANCE (May 2022 Update)

                   


If you have viewed our family's Net Worth Page, you probably already know that it does not include equity in our home.  Although we do realize that it is technically part of our overall net worth, we decided that since our home equity is not an asset that we can count on for income (unless we sell and buy something cheaper) we would exclude it from our net worth calculation.

For the purpose of this blog, we are more interested in documenting our loan balance rather than our home equity.  With that said, we will use the current Zillow value as our estimated home value and use it to figure out the percentage we owe on our home. For those interested, we will include the amount of our home equity but know that we are less concerned with the equity since we have no plans to cash out or otherwise sell our home. Our main goal is to pay off our home on or before my retirement date. 


HOME VALUE:
It's official! According to Zillow, our home is currently worth $1,425,400 (up $47,171 in the last 30-days). Not sure if everyone else is seeing the same but the housing market is still out of control here in Southern California. 



AS OF MAY 1, 2022:

Mortgage Balance:

$156,809 (down $2,593 from last month)

Percentage Owed:
11.0% (down .7%)

Home Equity
$1,268,591 (up $75,293)

   

Mortgage Background:
For those that have not read the Preface on our home equity, we currently hold a 15-year fixed-rate mortgage at an awesome rate of 2.875%.  My goal is to retire within 5 years and 4 months (64 months) so we are setting out to pay off our mortgage on or before my retirement date. Right now we are a few months behind the target retirement date. Currently, we have approximately 5 years and 10 months (70 months) left on our mortgage. Personally, I would like to have it paid off before I retire, and ideally a couple of years beforehand. If we accomplish that, I plan to use the money we use to pay our mortgage and aggressively build our passive income to help supplement our retirement and defer tapping into the 457K for as long as possible so it can continue to grow. 

With my wife back to work, we are blessed that we now have more money to both invest and through towards the mortgage. We did some home improvement projects last year but this year has been all about building wealth and decreasing our mortgage payoff date. We are actively buying dividend stocks again and thereafter throwing unspent monies towards the mortgage balance. At a certain point, we may consider using some of the money from our dividend stocks account to wipe out the remaining mortgage balance. The dividend stocks account is roughly 65% of our mortgage balance so there isn't enough just yet. But the idea is to build the dividend stocks account while simultaneously decreasing the mortgage balance until both numbers are equal. At that point, whether we decide to do it or not, the option would exist to wipe out the mortgage using the dividend stocks account. 

Sunday, May 8, 2022

BUYS/SELLS & DIVIDENDS (April 2022 Update)

      

After a brief pause to do some home improvements, our family resumed active trading. With the recent market pull-back, we have been pretty active lately. In March, although we sold some shares to cash out some profits, we had bought 10 companies!  

This month, we continued the buying spree. Although we no longer post full details of our buys and sells activities, we had 2 sells and 5 buys. 

Sells (decrease in Fwd Dividends: $51.00/yr)
  • BMY (BRISTOL MYERS SQUIBB CO) - $21.60
  • CAH (CARDINAL HEALTH INC) - $29.40
Buys (increase in Fwd Dividends: $85.00/yr)
  • IQ (IQIYI INC ADR) - N/A
  • CMCSA (COMCAST CORP) - $27.00
  • DIS (DISNEY WALT COMPANY) - N/A
  • VZ (VERIZON COMMUNICATIONS COM) - $38.40
  • TSM (TAIWAN SEMICONDUCTOR MFG CO LTD ADR) - $19.60
With the activities seen above, our forward annual dividends decreased by roughly $34.00. Wow! We knew our forward dividends would be falling due to the recent sales but have to admit, I didn't think they were going to go down by this much. Look for our April buys because we made a few purchases that helped get some of these forward dividends back. :)

What is everyone else doing? Are you buying anything right now?   

Now for what you all came to see, below is a list of the dividends/partnership distributions that we received from our family's dividend stocks portfolio.

DIVIDENDS 
During the past month, 10 companies/ETFs/Partnerships/Cash In-Lieu. The total monies received from those 10 companies/ETFs/Partnerships was: $199.45 

Below is a breakdown of the dividends/partnership distributions received this past month:


WELLS FARGO INVESTMENT ACCOUNT:

4/11/22 - WBD (
WARNER BROS DISCOVERY INC): $10.29 (cash in-lieu)
4/18/22 - (REALTY INCOME CORP REIT): $4.20
4/18/22 - ONL (ORION OFFICE REIT INC): $0.10
4/18/22 - OXY (OCCIDENTAL PETE CORP): $15.60
4/18/22 - LADR (LADDER CAPITAL CORP): $20.00
4/18/22 - CAH (
CARDINAL HEALTH INC): $17.18
4/18/22 - BRMK (BROADMARK REALTY CAPITAL INC): $3.50
4/29/22 - LTC (LTC PROPERTIES INC REIT): $7.60
4/29/22 - EIX (EDISON INTL): $10.50

EDWARD JONES INVESTMENT ACCOUNT:
4/27/22 - CMCSA (COMCAST CORP): $110.48

OVERALL DIVIDENDS TOTAL THIS MONTH: $199.45

How did you all do? Hopefully, you all continue to see your dividends growth month after month, year after year! 


In case you are interested, our family's dividend stocks portfolio 
may be found by clicking on the link below:


Friday, May 6, 2022

March 2022 - Buys/Sells & Dividends Received (LATE POST)

     

Happy Friday everyone!! Well, this year hasn't been great for our investments in general but our family's dividend stocks portfolio has surprisingly performed well due to our somewhat heavy exposure to oil-related stocks. But with the recent pullbacks in the market, we have taken the opportunity to cash out some of our gains lately. We are hoping to spend a little of that on some income and growth stocks since we don't need access to the money in our dividend stocks account for at least 8-10 years.

After a brief pause to do some home improvements, our family resumed active trading in May of last year. We have since resumed active trading activities each month.  Although we no longer post full details of our buys and sells activities, we had 9 sells and 10 buys this past month.

Sells (decrease in Fwd Dividends: $479.08/yr)
  • OXY (OCCIDENTAL PETE CORP) - $44.20
  • MO (ALTRIA GROUP INC) - $162.00
  • RIG (TRANSOCEAN LTD) - N/A
  • ENB (ENBRIDGE INC) - $68.80
  • BMY (BRISTOL MYERS SQUIBB CO) - $20.16
  • HES (HESS CORPORATION) - $10.52
  • CAH (CARDINAL HEALTH INC) - $127.40
  • PNW (PINNACLE WEST CAP CORP) - $30.40
  • AEP (AMERICAN ELECTRIC POWER INC ) -$15.60
Buys (increase in Fwd Dividends: $85.00/yr)
  • WDC (WESTERN DIGITAL CORP) - N/A
  • GILD (GILEAD SCIENCES INC) - $20.92
  • GM (GENERAL MOTORS CO) - N/A
  • COF (CAPITAL ONE FINANCIAL CORP) - $12.00
  • BAC (BANK OF AMERICA CORP) - $14.28
  • BABA (ALIBABA GRP HLDG LTD ADR) - N/A
  • POSH (POSHMARK INC CL A) - N/A
  • IQ (IQIYI INC ADR) - N/A
  • CITI (CITIGROUP INC) - $30.60
  • YUMC (YUM CHINA HOLDINGS INC) - $7.20
With the activities seen above, our forward annual dividends decreased by roughly $394.08. Wow! We knew our forward dividends would be falling due to the recent sales but have to admit, I didn't think they were going to go down by this much. Look for our April buys because we made a few purchases that helped get some of these forward dividends back. :)

What is everyone else doing? Are you buying anything right now?   

Now for what you all came to see, below is a list of the dividends/partnership distributions that we received from our family's dividend stocks portfolio.

DIVIDENDS 
During the past month, 18 companies/ETFs/Partnerships/Cash In-Lieu. The total monies received from those 18 companies/ETFs/Partnerships was: $345.17 

Below is a breakdown of the dividends/partnership distributions received this past month:


WELLS FARGO INVESTMENT ACCOUNT:

3/01/22 - PNW (
PINNACLE WEST CAP CORP): $25.50
3/01/22 - BMY (PHILLIPS 66): $7.36
3/01/22 - ENB (ENBRIDGE INC): $67.68
3/02/22 - ARMK (ARAMARK): 4.40
3/10/22 - IBM (
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINE CORP): $24.60
3/10/22 - XOM (EXXON MOBIL CORP): $35.20
3/10/22 - AEP (AMERICAN ELECTRIC POWER INC): $11.70
3/15/22 - (REALTY INCOME CORP REIT): $4.19
3/15/22 - BRMK (BROADMARK REALTY CAPITAL INC): $3.50
3/18/22 - LUMN (LUMEN TECHNOLOGIES INC): $75.00
3/24/22 - EDIV (SPDR S&P EMERGING ETF MARKETS DIVIDEND): $4.14
3/25/22 - NOV (NOV INC): $6.00
3/25/22 - LMT (OCKHEED MARTIN CORP): $8.40
3/28/22 - SHEL (SHEL PLC ADR): $28.80
3/29/22 - YUMC (YUM CHINA HOLDINGS INC): $1.80
3/30/22 - HES (HESS CORPORATION): $3.75
3/30/22 - GILD (GILEAD SCIENCES INC): $25.55
3/31/22 - LTC (LTC PROPERTIES INC REIT): $7.60

EDWARD JONES INVESTMENT ACCOUNT:
March - N/A

OVERALL DIVIDENDS TOTAL THIS MONTH: $345.17

How did you all do? Hopefully, you all continue to see your dividends growth month after month, year after year! 


In case you are interested, our family's dividend stocks portfolio 
may be found by clicking on the link below:


Mortgage Balance - March 2022 (LATE POST)

                  


If you have viewed our family's Net Worth Page, you probably already know that it does not include equity in our home.  Although we do realize that it is technically part of our overall net worth, we decided that since our home equity is not an asset that we can count on for income (unless we sell and buy something cheaper) we would exclude it from our net worth calculation.

For the purpose of this blog, we are more interested in documenting our loan balance rather than our home equity.  With that said, we will use the current Zillow value as our estimated home value and use it to figure out the percentage we owe on our home. For those interested, we will include the amount of our home equity but know that we are less concerned with the equity since we have no plans to cash out or otherwise sell our home. Our main goal is to pay off our home on or before my retirement date. 


HOME VALUE:
It's official! According to Zillow, our home is currently worth $1,352,700 (up $32,400 in the last 30-days). Not sure if everyone else is seeing the same but the housing market is still out of control here in Southern California. 




Mortgage Balance (As of March 1st):
$159,402 (down $2,631 from our February balance)

Percentage Owed:
11.7% (down .6%)

Home Equity
$1,193,298 (up $35,031)

   

Mortgage Background:
For those that have not read the Preface on our home equity, we currently hold a 15-year fixed-rate mortgage at an awesome rate of 2.875%.  My goal is to retire within 5 years and 5 months (65 months) so we are setting out to pay off our mortgage on or before my retirement date. Right now we are a few months behind the target retirement date. Currently, we have approximately 5 years and 11 months (71 months) left on our mortgage. Personally, I would like to have it paid off before I retire, and ideally a couple of years beforehand. If we accomplish that, I plan to use the money we use to pay our mortgage and aggressively build our passive income to help supplement our retirement and defer tapping into the 457K for as long as possible so it can continue to grow. 

With my wife back to work, we are blessed that we now have more money to both invest and through towards the mortgage. We did some home improvement projects last year but this year has been all about building wealth and decreasing our mortgage payoff date. We are actively buying dividend stocks again and thereafter throwing unspent monies towards the mortgage balance. At a certain point, we may consider using some of the money from our dividend stocks account to wipe out the remaining mortgage balance. The dividend stocks account is roughly 65% of our mortgage balance so there isn't enough just yet. But the idea is to build the dividend stocks account while simultaneously decreasing the mortgage balance until both numbers are equal. At that point, whether we decide to do it or not, the option would exist to wipe out the mortgage using the dividend stocks account.