Dividend Growth Portfolio - Objective: Retire by 50

[Rasec]

Hi everyone,

This post will serve as introduction and investment strategy (I need all the advice I can get so don't feel shy)!

I'm quite a newbie in investments in general and dividends even worst. Up until now I was busy paying out my house (done) but now I have no debt and a sustainable source of income which I decided to invest in high quality stocks that provide dividends (my limited knowledge comes from reading a couple of books and several blogs for the last few months).

So last month I finally started, opened my first investment account (Vanguard) and invested in EVT (mostly influenced by my boss), I bought 2000 shares, this month got my first dividends (reinvested) and I was .

I want to have EVT running on the side and maybe keep buying more but also invest in individual stocks, I have some cash and I'm looking for a diversified portfolio, I was looking to buy:

3M Company
Aflac Inc.
AT&T
Caterpillar
Chevron
Coca Cola
Colgate-Palmolive
ConocoPhillips Co.
Consolidated Edison, Inc.
Dow Chemical Company
Emerson Electric Co.
Exxon Mobil Corporation
General Electric
Health Care Property Investors Inc
Johnson & Johnson
Kinder Morgan
Norfolk Southern Corporation
Pepsi Co.
Procter & Gamble
Realty Income
Union Pacific Corporation
United Technologies Corporation
Verizon

Or maybe just half of these for now. I want to start of with 10-15 balanced stocks.

What do you think?

[Dividend Watcher]

Rasec,

First, welcome to the United States. Second, welcome to DGF. You've come to a great place with lots of smart people.

Interesting list, I own many of them and some that I'd like to. There are also a couple that don't interest me: Dow and GE, for example. I'm still contemplating what to do with my GE holding now.

How did you come up with this list? What price do you want to pay for each company; in other words, what do you think is a fair value to buy each of them at? I'm asking not to be a wise guy but because I am concerned you, being a new investor, made this list up because they are talked about often. Why these companies? How are you going to feel if they drop 20-30% or more in the next year?

What are your goals for this portfolio? What time frame are you looking at? I'm guessing at least 30 more years before your retire. What are you going to do if a company freezes the dividend for a couple years? How about if they cut it? What about eliminating it?

That being said, and as I said above, you've got a great starting lineup for the most part. I'd pick a few and open a starting position in a few until you get a little more experience and the add along the way as you learn more.

Looking to hearing more from you. In the meantime, there's a lot of good information here to skim through.

[Rasec]

Then you so much for the reply!

Funny you say that about GE, can you please expand on why you think it's a bad bet? It was actually on my top priorities based on
http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/ge/analyst-research

The list came up by reading stuff here and there, but you are right, it's mostly stuff others own and have talked about recently.

My idea is to accumulate/compound a couple million for 25/30 years and let it be a source of income for retirement and for my kids when I'm gone. And yes, I'm aware of the idea that if the market drops it's an opportunity and not a risk as I'm looking for the dividends and not just growth.

(08-01-2015, 11:09 PM)Dividend Watcher Wrote: Rasec,

First, welcome to the United States. Second, welcome to DGF. You've come to a great place with lots of smart people.

Interesting list, I own many of them and some that I'd like to. There are also a couple that don't interest me: Dow and GE, for example. I'm still contemplating what to do with my GE holding now.

How did you come up with this list? What price do you want to pay for each company; in other words, what do you think is a fair value to buy each of them at? I'm asking not to be a wise guy but because I am concerned you, being a new investor, made this list up because they are talked about often. Why these companies? How are you going to feel if they drop 20-30% or more in the next year?

What are your goals for this portfolio? What time frame are you looking at? I'm guessing at least 30 more years before your retire. What are you going to do if a company freezes the dividend for a couple years? How about if they cut it? What about eliminating it?

That being said, and as I said above, you've got a great starting lineup for the most part. I'd pick a few and open a starting position in a few until you get a little more experience and the add along the way as you learn more.

Looking to hearing more from you. In the meantime, there's a lot of good information here to skim through.

[rayray]

DW is right, you need an investment strategy. The biggest question you have to ask yourself, IMHO, is:

What am I going to do if my investment(s) drop 30/40/50 percent?


The reason why I say this is because this happened to me two times in my investment life, during the dot.com bubble and during the 2008/09 financial crisis. A lot of people that I personally knew behaved in many different ways, from rational to irrational, some very intelligent people made very poor decisions that had a permanent affect on their investments. I guess, one doesn't really know how they'll react until it happens? I know, for me, personally, I continue to evolve as an individual investor.

Good luck and welcome aboard!

[Rasec]

I can't say now what will happen in my life in 10 or 15 years, but the strategy is to keep buying high quality stocks regardless of the price of the stock and focus on the yields and yield growth. Hence the purchase of EVT (it's been at $20 for 10 years). Curious to hear your opinion on it btw...

Now if a company decides to stop their dividend program then yes, I'll leave my position on that ticker.

I have a few concerns for the future but they are more related to taxes and if/when I decide to move back to Europe than the drop of the value of my book.

---

BTW, how do you track your investments? Excel? Google docs? Just via your trader page? Paid tools?

I'm trying to create a spreadsheet in Gdocs but I'm finding it hard to come up with a perfect tool that can include trades, valuations, dividends, etc.

[Rasec]

Spent my Sunday creating my magical spreadsheet to track my dividend portfolio, 401(K), company equity, etc. 8h of my life invested in it but I got to say I'm pretty proud of the end result!!

The best of it, 8h busy and entertained without spending a penny!

[Rasec]

Looking to buy "a chunk" tomorrow (waiting for the funds to clear at the broker), in as many stocks and sectors as possible, to set the grounds for my DGP portfolio. For some positions it might not be the perfect time to enter and I'm aware of that but I have to start somewhere and someday and I rather start with solid stocks I understand, after this acquisition I'll be a bit more selective with my future purchases:

3M Company MMM Conglomerates
AT&T T Telecom
Chevron CVX Energy
Coca Cola KO Consumer Staples
Colgate-Palmolive CL Consumer Staples
ConocoPhillips Co. COP Energy
Consolidated Edison Inc. ED Utilities
Emerson Electric Co. EMR Industrials
Exxon Mobil Corporation XOM Energy
General Electric GE Industrials
Health Care Property Inv. HCP Financials
Johnson & Johnson JNJ Healthcare
Kinder Morgan KMI Energy
Procter & Gamble PG Consumer Staples
Realty Income O REITs
Verizon VZ Telecom

Hopefully the market doesn't go in turmoil tomorrow (and if it does, hopefully it'll go down) and I can go ahead with the plan.


EDIT: Just realized I'm too heavy on energy (hard to resist discounts) so I might make some adjustments for some Tech, Materials or Consumer Discr which I'm still missing out. Any discounted ideas in these sectors?

[Dividend Watcher]

(08-02-2015, 01:13 AM)Rasec Wrote: Funny you say that about GE, can you please expand on why you think it's a bad bet?

(08-01-2015, 11:09 PM)Dividend Watcher Wrote: ... There are also a couple that don't interest me: Dow and GE, for example. I'm still contemplating what to do with my GE holding now.

As you can see, I didn't say GE was a bad bet. I said it didn't interest me and, which I didn't add, was it didn't interest me at this time.

I'm in my late 50s and have some qualms with GE's performance and dividend performance. I have some replacements which I'm thinking about but for now am just thinking and evaluating.

At your age, you have time to change course and make corrections with less consequences should the need arise.

[Rasec]

So I went shopping as planned:





Now I'll sit tight for at least 30 days.

[EricL]

Well done Rasec, good luck with your buys!

[Dividend Watcher]

Yes, it looks like a good start. Are you planning to DRIP the dividends or collect & buy?

[Rasec]

Yes, for the time being the plan is to drip everything