What’s the best way to start saving money and make my bank account grow?

 Once you know that you want to save your money.  Just how do you go about saving?

First you will need to know what you spend all of your money on.

Do you spend it on living expenses? Rent? Food? Transport to and from work? Credit Card payments? Student loans?

This may sound tedious and non too glamorous, it is. It is a necessary part of gaining control of your money. You need to know exactly where your money goes when you are not looking after it.

Start on your pay day.  Make a note on everything that you spend money on for the whole of the next pay cycle, from payday to payday. Big or small make a note of what you spend money on and where you spend your money.

Once you begin to gather all of your data, you will start to find your patterns of spending.  You do not need to cut out any spending at the gathering data stage. You just need to know your cash spending habits right now.

After the first pay cycle is done, you will have a lot of information about how you spend your money.

Look in detail at what you spend your money on. Do you even remember the purchases? It can be surprising how much money we spend without even noticing. A dollar here or dollar there, we tell ourselves that it doesn't matter, but it does it is a loss of your time and cash. You spent your time to earn those dollars, now they are gone, forever.

Look for items in your spending log that are wants and not needs. You need shelter, you need some food, so rent or mortgage are things that you have to pay for. Do you buy a sandwich at the store everyday, then this is a want, try to make several sandwiches per month at home or cut back on your food spending if you throw lots of your food out during the month. Making your food at home is generally less expensive and healthier than food bought in a store or restaurant.

When you go out, do you buy a $20 cocktail to drink? Then choose a less expensive drink.  It'll probably be less loaded with gimmicks and sweet sugary syrups which may taste good but they make you crave even more sweet drinks later in the night.

As you begin to cut back on all of the wants in your life, you'll see you have money left in  your bank account at the end of the month.  You might be tempted to spend it on a one time splurge if you leave it in your main bank account. So, open a high interest savings account with an online bank.  Transfer some of your left over cash at the end of the month to this account.

The high interest savings account will take all of the money that you have to spare and lock it away. You can only take money from these accounts six times per month, and having the money away from your main bank account will mean that you are making extra steps to access your money. As a human you will generally want to do the easiest thing, that is in this account, leave the money alone, it's hard to access.  

Soon, within a month or two, you'll see the savings start to build. As you save, you'll find it gets easier and easier to save.

Saving becomes a habit.

Soon you'll begin to set goals for yourself. "I'll save X dollars by my birthday." 

As your savings build, you can spend some of the money on planned purchases.  But it's also fun to look at things when you have a cash balance and say, "I could buy that. If I wanted too. But I don't need to buy it today."

One of the major killers of savings is credit card debt. So pay off all of your credit cards as soon as you can. Once paid off, try to never carry a balance on your card. Pay it off as quickly as you can. Credit cards can be useful for their insurance value, when you make a purchase, if there is a problem and the seller won't help, report the seller to the credit card company.  Their intervention on your behalf can move even the most reluctant seller to action.  Other than that settle your bill in full every month if you can. Never make just minimum payments unless you are working on paying off several credit cards using the debt snowball method. i.e. paying a lot off one bill while making minimum payments on the other cards, as you pay off one card, move the high payment over until that card is paid off, until all cards are paid in full.

Once you have paid all credit card debt, and built some savings. You can think about investing, to increase your assets and income.To read about creating a Dividend Savings Ladder CLICK HERE.

 

You may support this blog by going to our Amazon Store.  Thank you.

 

 You can also read my regular contributions at "Stream of Income." A Quora free space about increasing your wealth.

 

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How to Create a Dividend Income Ladder From Scratch.

 One of the commonest complaints I hear from people about dividend investing is "But I would only receive occasional income from dividends. What do I do between dividend payments to make money?"

Well of course, in the United States most dividends are paid quarterly. in other parts of the world you receive only semi-annual dividends every six months or so.

One of the first investing tricks I learned back in the 1970's at the very beginning of my investing career was to create a dividend ladder.

With a dividend ladder you can create a sequence of dividend checks coming in, almost daily.   I personally receive on average more than seven dividend payments per day.

March, June, September and December still actually see me me receiving more dividends than any other months. But this is just a product of the way U.S. Corporations pay their dividends.  I still receive dividends most week days.

How I begin creating a Dividend Ladder:

First of all, the dividend ladder only works if you use dividend paying stocks and Interest paying Bond funds. You can include growth stocks if you wish, but they will not contribute to dividend income for some time, if ever.

I begin with a framework.  In the last few days of a month, many Mutual funds and ETF pay a dividend. While some companies, Coca Cola ( KO ), Aflac (AFL ) and Allstate Insurance (ALL ) like to pay on the first day of the month.  So one can mix in some monthly paying Mutual Funds and blue chip single company dividends here, choosing companies which pay on the first day of different months helps . So Allstate pays in June, Cocac cola pays in July, Verizon (VZ ) pays in August, then back to Allstate to repeat the cycle.

Week two of the month can be a little sparse, unless you have some Bond funds, Bond funds generally pay out around the seventh of the month.  

There is often a quiet period until about the fifteenth of the month when many monthly paying Real estate investment trusts (REITs ) pay out, One might also include Business development corporations here too BDC likn Main Street Capital ( MAIN ) pay out at this time.

The third week of the month or beginning of the last week sees the paying of dividends from many covered call investment companies.  They generally pay about one week adter the monthly options period closes, that is the third Friday of the month.

After one has created this frame of investments which will pay you a regular monthly income, one only needs to fill in the gaps with dividend paying stocks.

It is a simple method of generating almost daily income from periodic payments.

Build a Dividend Ladder with M1 Finance. Get a Bonus when you start investing.

 

 With M1 Finances automatic investment program you can set your investments and almost forget.  M1 Finance will reinvest the dividend income into your pre-selected stocks to automatically keep your portfolio balanced in the way you wish.

Your dividend ladder can grow and grow with little effort from you.

As your dividend ladder starts, you only see small increases in dividends at first.  But if you continue to add a little new money, your investment grows, increasing your dividends.  This effect is often call the "Dividend Snowball"  Before long your dividends can be in the tens of dollars per month.

For instance, I opened my account with M1 Finance on January 15, 2020.  I began with just $100, I added $10 per week. My first dividend came just three weeks after opening the account, I received 1 cent from the LQD Corporate bond fund. Afew days later other dividends began to come in.   Today in November 2021, I have earned over $102 in dividends. and my account has grown to over $4,600.  In the next year I expect to earn $12 per month, that is for doing nothing but, monitoring a portfolio occasionally and adding a dew dollars per week.

Amazing.  The power of investing in dividend paying stocks.

Thanks for reading.  I hope that you might try to create a dividend ladder from scratch.

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"Earn Cash While You Sleep."

 It was once said that you are doomed to work forever unless you find a way to earn whilst you are asleep.

Some say that Warren Buffet once said those words, I am not sure if it was him, but how often do you earn money?

I took a look at my investments.

I have two crypto accounts, Block Fi and Coinbase. They pay me monthly and Daily. So 377 times per year.. These accounts are new and have grown mostly by means of capital growth.  I am staking my coins and tokens, that is lending them so earning returns of up to 9% in my block Fi account.  5% in coinbase.  But the incoming cash flow is increasing my funds daily.  So the snowball is starting to grow.

I have a twenty-two month old M1 Finance account.  That is generating over $70 per year in dividends.  In the current quarter I am earning over $25 so will be earning over $100 in the next twelve months.  I have 98 dividend paying stocks in that account, those pay me more than 392 times per year.

In my E*Trade portfolios, there are a whopping 1,933 payments per year!  I was stunned by these numbers.

So in just four accounts, I get paid  Wait for it.  Two thousand Seven hundred and two times.That is ppper year.  That is I receive 7.4 payments every day of the year, including Saturdays and Sundays.

These totals do not include payments in my Emergency fund, my regular income from my work nor income from any affiliate links.

Of course I am investing a little more new cash into all of these investments, plus allowing all dividend income and interest to compound.

All of these payments have accrued over the last fifteen year since I came to the United States in 2006, and invested my first $50 in August 2006.  Since then I haven't earned more than $15 per hour from my own personal labor.

So now, I can say, "Yes. I do earn most of my income as I sleep."

Read Creating a Dividend Income Ladder

Read "Why I am Now Investing in Crypto"

Please like, share and follow these posts.

My various affiliate links in this post have some special offers for you. Coinbase and Block Fi, have Free Bitcoin for you, M1 Finance will give you $30 if you fund a new account with $100, that's a 30% bonus before you even start investing. So take a look at those great offers and boost your income ready for next year.

Take a look at this great Wallet available from Amazon.

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$100 Milestone Reached Today 4th November 2021

 For several days now, my M1 Finance account has been creeping towards the $100 in earned dividends mark.

Today, Thursday 4th November, 2021, the latest trenche of dividends hit the account.  79 cents worth, pushing my earned dividends for the lifetime of the account to $100.45.

Now I know that just a few cents over $100 is not impressive to many.  I earn much more in other stock portfolios.  But this account was set up to show that earning dividends from fractional shares is a viable form of income.  I began investing just $10 per week on January 15th, 2020.  I added occasional cash deposits, items such as loose change found around the house, birthday cash.  I have also increased the regular deposit in recent months from $10 per week to $15 per week, now $18.31 per week.

 

Slowly increasing the deposit or savings rate allowed me to adjust my own feelings about saving and investing in this account.  As I became comfortable with the reduced spending I increased my savings level.  Now at $18.31 per week I am at about my limit for saving and investing rates for this account.

 

I may increase the account savings rate to $20 next year, maybe more.  That will depend on income.

 

The First Dividend

 

The first dividend in this account was   received in the first week of February, 2020.  That dividend was just one cent.  It was paid from LQD, a corporate bond fund which pays monthly, in the first few days of every month.  LQD has been a stalwart of this portfolio.  Every dividend from every one of the dividend paying stocks has been reinvested into the portfolio.  With this reinvestment and regular weekly inputs the portfolio has grown to approximately $4,600

You can see the portfolio at   My Dividend Portfolio

The above link is an affiliate link.  You may open an M1 account for yourself, if you do, you will receive a $30 cash bonus when you fund your new account with $100. I will receive a small cash payment too if you open a new account using my link.  Thank you for supporting me.

Attaining the next goal of reaching $200 in earned dividends should take me a lot less time.  This milestone took me  a few weeks short of twenty months.  Looking back over recent months, I now have a dividend return of about $23.56 per quarter, this varies as days pass, but $23 suggests that I should reach $200 in earned dividends in less than twelve months.  Watch out here for regular updates. October is one of my weakest months for dividend receipts and this account received only $6.52, so my minimum I can expect to receive over the next twelve months is about $72.

But bear in mind that as the whole account grows, every fraction of a share has increased earnings power.  Many of the stocks in this portfolio are expensive stocks, Home Depot, Costco, NVDA, Microsoft.  The overall rate of return is just 2.5% but many of the stocks and ETF in the portfolio are dividend growth stocks.  Some like Johnson & Johnson are dividend kings.  Which means that they have paid increasing dividends over decades.

My largest single holding is Apple,  This stock took a big boost in the portfolio when Apple split in August 2020.  I went from about 0.5 shares to 2 shares.

Since then the rest of the portfolio has been playing catch up.  Not a bad thing for an increasing needf or diversification.

Take a look at the latest offers in our Amazon Store.

To read about my Crypto Currency Investments goto Why I am Investing in Crypto.

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Why I am Going to Invest in Crypto

 For a while now we have all been hearing about investing in crypto currencies like Bitcoin, Etherium and alike.

It has grown so big now, everywhere I turn I find my mailbox full of e-maills from scammers promising me riches if I invest with them, andpromises of all the riches I have missed out on.

Well, this may be a warning for the rest of you. After saying for years, I won't invest in crypto.  I am now investing in crypto.

This follows my great investing insight in the late 1990's to never invest in the Dot Coms.  Then deciding in 2000 to, you've guessed it, invest in a couple of Dot Coms.  And no I didn't go for Microsoft or Amazon.  I went for Imagine Games and a couple more that died in a complete wipeout of the British dot coms in 2002.

They lived short, but burned bright in the dot com firmament.

So maybe forwarned.  The crypto market is about to implode, William Elliott is in the market. Everyone duck!

So how much will I be investing?

I will be investing about 1% ( one percent ) of my portfolio.   of my total portfolio.  I have begun small, an initial opening of $60 growing to $5,000 over the next few months.

So a hit in my crypto portfolio will hardly affect my overall portfolio.

I will be investing with Coinbase initially.

So Why Invest with Coinbase?

I decided to invest with Coinbase because at the moment they have an offer to give new investors $10 in Bitcoin for just registering a new accountt with them.  Using the link here will allow you to claim $10 for just opening and authenticating and account, you don't even have to send any money.

Once you have authenticated  your new account you will be able to add funds, from your bank or via PayPal, and buy hundreds of varieties of Alt Coins.  You can also take lessons in various forms of crypto investments and CoinBase will pay you in crypto currency just for taking a series of classes. At present there are about $25  worth of classes for you to take.

Imagine in less than one hour you could have a small $35 portfolio of crypto, and it coast you nothing.

Become a knowledgeable investor.

As crypto currency investing becomes a more prominent form of investing, it is your duty to yourself to learn more about investing in this new market.

I am now using this time to learn about crypto currency investing.

At least by learning about the reality of this investment I am arming myself against the claims of those scammers.  I now have skin in the game and an increased motivation to learn what I can about crypto investing.  In the few days that I have been investing, I have not lost any money.  My current investment of $35 cost me nothing out of pocket, it all came from taking advantage of free offers.

So why not give it a try?

For your initial free investment  to claim your free crypto  Click Here

 

  Earn interest on your Bitcoin with Block Fi.

 

Read "Earn Money While You Sleep"

 

 

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What Did I Sell and Buy In My M1 Portfolio October 12th, 2021?

 Last night I came to the decision to sell out of my Astra Zeneca (AZN )  holding in my M1 portfolio.

I had about $30 worth of fractional shares to sell and as the dividend was not the best I decided that even though I used to own a lot of the stock when I lived in the U.K.  My family had worked for Imperial Chemical Industries Plc (ICI ) for generations it is time to let go.  So this morning I sold all of my holding of AZN from my M1 account.

I do still hold a couple of the American Depository Receipts (ADR ) in my small fun money account with E*Trade.

So with the cash burning a hole in my browser, where did I put it?

The answer is still in a pharmaceutical company.  I put the $33 that I had spare into Abvie Inc. ( ABBV ).

The new ABBV holding will eventually be around 13% of my Pharma pie.  To see my Pharma pie holdings Click here.

If you want to open a new account with M1 you can use the link to start you off, plus you will receive a bonus. $30 extra in your account when you fund your new account with $100. I will receive $30 too.

So there you are fund your new M1 Account with $100 and we both get $30 as a thank you from M1.

See my M1 Pharma Pie, and open a new M1 account for yourself here.

I chose to swap Astra Zeneca for Abbvie Inc, simply because I think Abvie is a growing company. It has a good dividend payout, it doesn't pay out a lot of its cash in dividends but it does pay over $4.00 per year in dividends per share and has grown its dividend for 11 years now.

The stock is not cheap by any means, but quality costs. I think this is a quality stock.

The company is the daughter of Abbott Labs ( ABB ) I also own that stock in my M1 portfolio too, but Abbott specialises in medical products aimed at the diabetes market.  I personally use the  Freestyle Libre 14 Day Continuous Glucose Monitoring System.  It's good, easy to use and comfortable to wear on the upper arm.  It is not quite as accurate as a blood test, but using a traditional finger prick to test blood glucose four or five times everyday was painful, awkward and caused lots of problems for me.

Abvie has quite a nice stable of products itself and an expanding road of new products in its pipeline.

So that was my shopping list for today.  I hope you enjoyed reading.

 

While  you are here, Why not take a look at our Amazon Gift Store?

 

 

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Columbus Day 2021

 So here we are, October 11, 2021.  What a year!

Today is Columbus Day in the United States.  Monday, I have lots of cash transfers from my bank to various brokerages and of course, though the markets are open no bank transfers will take place until tomorrow.

Sadly, the markets are going up this morning. That means that I will not be buying some of the stock that I was hoping to buy, because my cash is in limbo. Waiting in that no-man's land between bank account and delivery to brokerTheage.

The Columbus Day holiday is possibly the most confusing in the repetoire of Federal Holidays in the U.S.

In some ways it is a holiday, in others it isn't.  Some public organizations take the day off. The Bond markets and some banks for instance.  The stock market, well no to hell with looking to have a break, let's make money.

It is not a problem for me.  I don't mind people having a day off, but what is annoying that even computer systems in the U.S. get the day off too.  If all of my banking information is held on computer and all of my brokerage information is held on computer, how come those two computers cannot talk to each other on a Federal Holiday?

It makes no sense.

Well possibly it does make sense to American legislators, who take a break at the drop of a hat.

I always wondered in my time working in a public library here in California, the end of March has a Cesar Chavez day.  Famed agricultural workers leader, his name now marked as a state holiday for state and local government employees.  Who can drive into the mountains or drive to the beach, passing all those farms, orchards, vineyards and fields bustling with migrant farm labor working hard on a day set out to celebrate their deceased leader, a holiday which means only a day off for people who hardly know the difference between a lettuce and a cabbage.

Plus of course the computers get that day off too. When contacting anyone in California.

W

What am I Wanting to Buy Tomorrow?

I am hoping to buy a new stock, it is Horizon Financial (HRZN ). Horizon specialize in lending to technology businesses in the first stages of growth.

They pay a monthly dividend of just 10cents as of October 11, 2021.  A stock which changes hands around $17.00.

I am only going to look at buying a small portion of my holding right now. Analysts are looking at a future price more in the region of $14.00, presumably as interest rates rise that will put a squeeze on this stock.

I like the look of the stock for cash flow.  10 cents in my pocket every month per share is going to add nicely to my monthly cash flow for general stock purchases.

Another stock I am looking to add to in my portfolio is Community Heathcare Trust ( CHCT ) this is a quarterly paying REIT.  Over the past five years the stock has moved very little price wise, staying stubbornly around $40  but it has thrown off some nice cash flow with regular dividends.

I like this one because people will always need hospitals and doctors offices.  Exactly what this REIT owns all across the U.S.

That is all for today.  See you again soon.

 

 

 

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What has Experience Investing In The Stock Market Taught You?

 With over forty years of investing in the stock market behind me there are lots of things that I have learned.

Maybe not how to dress well. The one key to investing is to know yourself.

I know that I am not the best dressed, but I love my Black Lab, Leif and this shirt is pretty comfortable.

But  anyway.  Investing.

Well investing requires self knowledge.

Why?  I tell you in this video.

Beside all the information in the video.  I have learned that you need to consider investing as a long term plan for wealth creation.  There are hundreds of people a day who will tell you that they have the answer to get you rich overnight.  Well generally their get rich quick schemes mean you give them your money to learn something that you could have got for free.  No one looks after your money as well as you do.

Always look for quality stocks, they pay well in the long run.

Feel free to set aside some play money, but don't play with your main investment accounts.

Play only with money that you can afford to lose.  Protect your core accounts.

 

 

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I have created a core brokerage savings account with M1 Finance. This account is for doing fun stuff.

 

M1 allows me to buy fractional shares, so I can afford to buy high priced stock like Amazon (AMZN ), Alphabet (GOOG ) and others.  I built a core account of just over thirty stocks in January 2020 starting with just $100, plus a $30 bonus because I followed an affiliate link like this one.  Now that core holding is worth in excess of  $1,400 and is paying me regular dividend income.  I invest just $17 per week and everything is invested automatically. Simple

 

You too can open an M1 account and earn a $30 bonus when you use this link. 

 

 

What am I Buying on September 7, 2021?

 Today is the first day of trading after the Labor Day Holiday.  September is often seen as a bad month to buy stock.  But today I was off to my brokerage accounts and buying quite briskly.

In my M1 account I had several purchases.  Now these were pre-programmed purchases. My cash balance was over $25 and so the brokerage account went out to buy some of the stocks at the bottom of my various pies.

In my Thirty Share fund I bought both Visa and Mastercard. I hold both of these stocks because they are the powerhouse stocks as suppliers of credit and debit cards.  Between them they have over 85% of the market.  They are not the greatest dividend payers, instead putting a lot of their free cash back into their business.  But they do pay small dividends which will never make me rich but I do get a respectable return which I do not see being cut any time soon.

Another automated purchase was for shares of stock in Medtronic.  This stock had lagged a little, possibly due to the reduction in elective surgeries in hospitals over the past eighteen months. Now as I believe corona virus cases will soon fall to more balanced levels, thee virus is with us now and we will have to live with it forever.  But heart and circulatory surgery will come back and this is where Medtronic earns its daily bread.  I personally have a Medtronic pacemaker and have for eight years now.

Take a look at the bestselling investing books at my Amazon Store ( Click Here ).

I also took a wander to see my Fidelity account.  Now this brokerage has had no additional cash added for a while now.  All my spare cash goes  to my M1 account.  But the Fidelity account does have some dividend paying stocks.

To my surprise I had built up almost $56 in cash.  I saw that my account there, at Fidelity, has the ability to buy fractional shares for free.  Last time I looked this was only available on the iPhone app.  Not wanting to put more cash in the stocks I already hold there I thought a while and decided to buy VOO, the Vanguard S&P 500 exchange traded fund (ETF ).

I already own SPY, the State Street version of this ETF in my Roth IRA account. So didn't want to own that again.  The VOO will add more stock to my Fidelity account, much of it is based in California Tax Free  Municipal Bonds. In the form of CMF.

As VOO was over $450 this morning and I only bought $54.88, I get only a small fraction, a little over 10% of a share, so only 10% of the dividend later this month.  That is okay with me.  It's an opening position and now I know that I can buy those fractional shares at Fidelity as well I will certainly be back.

Should I as a New Investor Buy Cheap Stocks?

 Should a new investor buy cheap stock?

 The straightforward answer is no. It is just a false economy to think of cheap stocks as a good investment.

I want to have lots of stock quickly. So I make lots of profit!

Believe me, it is normal to want lots of stock quickly. I have been in your shoes, not much cash to buy stock, so buying cheap stocks, also known as "Penny Stocks" looks like the right thing to do. They are cheap, you don't have much money, and buying them gives you lots of stock, quickly so you can say that you own dozens of shares in Junk Corporation.

Who wants to own Just one share of Amazon or Tesla?

Ok just owning one stock of a good company may not seem impressive.

But you are just beginning to own stock. Time is on your side and what you want to do is to use time to accumulate good stocks not waste valuable time and money  on buying cheap worthless stocks that will take you nowhere.

Today you don't have to invest a lot of money. Consider Fractional Shares.

 

When you buy fractional shares you get all the benefits of owning a stock. When the price goes up and down, so does the price of your fractional shares. You can put in as little as $1.00, and use dollar cost averaging to build a position.

 

I have used M1 Finance to build some high value positions over the last year or so. I began with an initial investment of just $100 in January 2020. Now in June 2021 my portfolio is worth over $3,000.

 

 

You can open an account with M1 Finance with just $100 yourself and when you fund your account for the first time you will receive an additional $30, just for opening a new account. here.

 

 

Claim your  $30 for a new M1 Account Today. Click Here.

 

When you open your new account with M1 Finance, you will be able to choose to buy fractional shares in hundreds of different, top notch companies, exchange traded funds (ETF) and Fund companies like Vanguard and iShares.

I personally own a mixture of growth stocks Apple, Amazon and Google. Vanguard funds like their total stockmarket fund and also steady dividend payers like Johnson & Johnson, Verizon and Union Pacific Railroad.

M1 allows me to build my position a few hundredths of a share at a time. Collect the dividends and re-invest those dividends in other stocks over time.

I add just $15 per week, which re-invests when my cash balance goes over $25. All invested in preset proportions across my whole portfolio.

Let's have a coffee together.

Say Thank you for this article.

Buy me a Coffee

Read as much as you can about investing. 

Nothing pays you back as much as learning from books. Books on investing will teach you about how to read financial pages. How to read a profit and loss statement.

Read about financial crashes of the past. Read about how top ranked investors have invested their and other peoples money.

If you want to learn about Foreign Exchange markets, read about those. If you want to learn about options trading, read about them. Learn the language of those markets.

Gather all of the knowledge you can. It will pay you dividends later.

The more you know now the better.

Take a look at Amazon for some books to start with.

Always Buy Quality Stocks.

Always follow the rule to buy quality stocks.

If you buy quality, you will prosper. 

Learn to find quality stocks, you can learning by reading lots of books. 

Cheap stocks are not neccessarily bad stocks, they may just be out of favor with Wall Street. But as a beginner, you need to recognize your limitations. Beginning with fractional shares, lets you buy quality stock for a lower price, a price that you can afford.

Take advantage of the power of fractional shares to build a quality portfolio.

Take care. 

I wish you all the best with your investing.

Be sure to like and share this post with your friends on your favorite social media.

Thank you.

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What Can I Do About New Tax Legislation?

 Lately there is a great deal of talk about new tax legislation, increasing Capital Gains Tax and taxes on corporations possibly rising to 28% thereby reducing profits and so starting a bleak period for stock market investors.

What can I do as an investor?

First don't Panic. 

At the moment it is just talk. As we know talk is cheap and the politicians are merely grandstanding for their supporters. This is just throwing some fear into the market and causing some selling of perfectly good stocks, actually making them more attractive for long term buy and hold investors, like me.

So not to look a gift horse in the mouth I am going out with a shopping list this week to buy in some good stock.

Changes in tax legislation will take months of negotiation so there is no immediate cause for alarm.

When the politicians finish with their  pontification to their base, there will be some adjustment to their promises as the Bill writers come on the scene, then lobbyists will get the politicians to change a little here and there. Scrap a pork belly from the barrel in one or two places. Then the whole plan will have to go through committees and votes.

If we only knew how that would go.  

Then finally in a year or two, a new tax Bill may be signed into law, heralded as a triumph of fairness over greed.

Then the company accountants get to play with the loopholes.

In the end we will all adapt to the new legislation.

All the worry will have been for nought.

So don't worry until the legislation has passed. But even then what we know will be less fearful than all of the talk we are hearing now.

This is not tax advice. I am an individual investor not a tax expert. This is merely my own opinion and you should consult your own tax advisor or financial planner before acting on any item in this blog post.

All the best.

Scared of Heights? Stock Market at New Highs

 Over the years, I have often been scared in the market.

You see I don't like heights. Both in the real sense, standing near a sheer drop makes me sick, and stock market highs make me  frustrated as the number of stocks that I am willing to buy dwindle.

Now is a time when I just look at the market and weep. 

I can't really buy very much.

I am happy that my stock portfolio is increasing in value. An 11 percent rise in the S&P this year is good, one of my portfolios has increased by 10per cent, another by 12 per cent and my M1 portfolio has grown 18 percent.

See my M1 portfolio here.

If you like M1 why not open an account using the link above. When you open an account and fund it with $100 you will receive a $30 cash bonus to invest from M1. That is a 30% boost to your portfolio, straight away. Just for using my link.  I will also receive a small introductory fee from M1 at no cost to you.

The one truth that I continue to hold in my mind right now is this is a cycle. We are on the up trend. Sometime we will level out and come to a down trend.

I am not talking of a stock market crash.

The stock market will go up. Economies grow. 

Think of the wheel of a bicycle. Put a mark on the wheel rim. As the mark goes around it appears to rise and fall. The mark is the stock market. Now ride the bicycle along a road, the road may go up and down too. The road is the world economy.  If the road goes in an upward trend, then even though the mark on the wheel is going down, it will continue to go up relative to the last point on the road where it was at its lowest point.

So while it may be scary to invest in individual companies right now. I am moving to invest in mutual funds and Exchange Traded  Funds.

These stocks and funds spread the risk a little more and give me some diversification. I am going with VYM the Vanguard Dividend ETF  and PREMX the T. Rowe Price Emerging Market Fund.

Both give a decent return, monthly income from PREMX and quarterly distributions from VYM.

I believe before the end of the year we will see less of the lock step rise in individual stock prices. Stock rising and falling at varying rates across the market is more the norm. More to my liking too as individual stock volatility brings more opportunity to make more profits for us as investors.

Till that time comes. Maybe take a look at M1. It is a simple way to invest.

Stock Investor Bullish Bull Sweatshirt
by Shirtoe

Dividend Income With M1 Finance Tops $50

 In January 2020 I opened a brokerage account with M1 Finance.

I opened it with just $100 on January 17, 2020. Today on March 31, 2021 the account is worth just over $2,700 and since opening I have received $50 in dividends. That is some nice growth from the one cent of my first dividend at the beginning of February 2020.

You can see in the graph above the way my account has grown in just fifteen months. It was of course helped by the huge market sell off in March 2020, during which I continued to buy in more and more stock, investing about $10 per week every Monday together with occasional cash windfalls, such as proceeds from my zazzle.com sales and referals. I also began investing $15 per week in September 2020 continuing through until today.

 

The Portfolio Set-up.

 

My portfolio was set-up with 100 stocks and ETF's (Exchanged Traded Funds) you can see them in detail at My Dividend Portfolio.

 

It comprises of a large body of 30 favorite stocks, plus smaller portfolios of stocks such as railroad and last mile delivery stocks, defense contractors and Real Estate Investment Trusts.

 

 Ninety seven of my stocks pay a dividend right now. Boeing (BA) has a suspended dividend. Amazon (AMZN) and Google (GOOG) are pure growth plays included because M1 allows the purchase of fractional shares, the only way I can afford to buy these two great but highly priced stocks.

Special Offer For YOU

M1 and I are offering you a chance to make $30 instantly when you open and fund a new account.

All you need to do is follow this link to M1 Finance. 

Register your account by providing M1 with your details.

Fund a brokerage account with $100 or a Roth IRA with $500

When that cash hits your new account you will receive an extra $30 free from M1. I will also receive a small payment as a thank you from M1 Finance at no cost to you.

$30 Bonus for YOU when you open a NEW M1 Account Here

 

My Current Investing Strategy.

 

I have developed a regular investment strategy  with this account.

1. Invest $15 per week on Monday.  This goes to my cash deposit float.

2. If the Cash float is $25 or more, I let M1 buy stocks according to my pre-set levels. If less than $25 I buy individual stocks as new dividends come in down to a cash balance of $10 on the Friday.

3. As $15 will be added on Monday morning I let the $10 sit in my cash float over the weekend.

5.Rinse and repeat, buying any new individual stocks as I like when new dividends come in.

I hope that you might try investing with M1 Finance. It is a wonderful tool in my investing tool kit. I am sure it will help you on the road to gaining passive income.

 Remember my account grew from zero to over $2700 in just over fourteen months, investing $60 or less per month.  If I can do that so can you. Now I will be adding over $50 per year in passive dividend income. This will only grow in the future.

Try M1, I am sure it will work for you as you build wealth for your future.

How to turn $9 into $100 in One Year

 How do  you turn just $9 into $100 in just one year? Then repeat over and over again for year on year growth?

My technique for growing my investments by hundreds of dollars per month using only passive income is to set a minimum dividend payment level at $9.00 per month or $25 per quarter.  

For example take a monthly dividend paying stock such as Realty Income (Ticker O) purchase the stock in a large enough quantity to pay  about $9.00 per month. In one year this stock will pay more than $108. If you use a drip to increase your stock levels you will be returning more than $108 in twelve months.

At current dividend rates of 23 cents per share per month you need just 35 shares to pay over $9 each month.

Notice I own Realty Income stock in my long term hold portfolio.

Use this technique with several stocks and you quickly see returns of several hundred dollars per month. 

With stocks which pay dividends on a quarterly basis, you need to think in $25 increments to pay $100 per year. This can be expensive as the compounding of dripped dividends is slower, but you can use those dollars provided from monthly income paying stocks to build a cash flow to more expensive stocks.

In a few months you can quickly grow a cash flow stream that can buy new stocks for growth and more cash flow, use to pay bills and everyday expenses or grow your retirement fund by setting your army of dollar bills to work for your more efficiently.

Try this technique, I promise you it works. I have used it for over thirty years and I see returns of 13% per year year after year.

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