March Dividend Income

After 34 years of clocking in and out of work and religiously saving 10% annually in my 401K every year, in good times and bad, I have decided to share my monthly dividend income to show what regular saving and investing can accomplish.

Last month I received my annual review and after several paychecks with the new raise I was able to increase my weekly investment into my M1 Finance account by $10.  This improved my annual saving rate from 24.6% to 24.9%. Not a massive increase but it always feels good when I can save more than I did yesterday.

	2021	2020	2019	2018	2017	2016	2015	2014	2013	2012
401K	11%	10%	10%	10%	10%	10%	10%	10%	10%	10%
Brokerage	4.5%	4%	3.7%	1%	0.8%	0.5%			0.7%	0.2%
Roth IRA	9.4%	8.3%	5.4%	1.9%
Total Saving Rate	24.9%	22.3%	19.1%	12.9%	10.8%	10.5%	10.0%	10.0%	10.7%	10.2%

10 Year Personal Annual Saving Rate

For the month of March I made $4,238.43; an increase of 27.51% versus this time last year. From now till August I should be seeing significant YoY increases as that was the bulk of the COVID cuts from last year. This month would have been slightly higher but my BEPC dividend did not credit my account until April 1. This was kind of odd as I received my BEP dividend on March 31, maybe BEPC had border crossing issues from Canada to the U.S. 😊.

Overall market valuations continue to remain high. I kept my buying for the month limited to $200 lot buys to keep invested. I have been receiving dividends at a faster rate than reinvesting and unintentionally building a pile of cash.  Going into April I have no favorites on my watch list and instead will monitor a little over 50 dividend stocks for any opportunity that arises.  Unless there is a pullback, I plan on staying with small $200 buying lots for the foreseeable future.

Date	Symbol	Company	Amount
3/1/21	ALE	ALLETE INC	$126.00
3/1/21	PSX	PHILLIPS 66	$25.30
3/1/21	SJM	SMUCKER J M CO	$4.04
3/3/21	FAST	FASTENAL	$11.35
3/4/21	BLV	VANGUARD BD INDEX FDS LONG TERM BOND	$13.47
3/4/21	CMI	CUMMINS INC	$37.67
3/4/21	DFS	DISCOVER FINANCIAL SERVICES	$11.40
3/4/21	VCLT	VANGUARD SCOTTSDALE FUNDS LONG-TERM COR	$13.97
3/4/21	VLO	VALERO ENERGY CORP	$35.28
3/5/21	HYG	ISHARES TR IBOXX HI YD ETF	$18.66
3/5/21	PFE	PFIZER INC	$222.81
3/5/21	PFF	ISHARES TR PFD AND INCM SEC	$50.84
3/8/21	SO	SOUTHERN CO	$60.78
3/9/21	JNJ	JOHNSON &JOHNSON COM	$175.26
3/10/21	CVX	CHEVRON CORP	$21.77
3/10/21	IBM	INTERNATIONAL BUS MACH CORP	$143.97
3/10/21	UPS	UNITED PARCEL SERVICE INC	$227.85
3/11/21	MSFT	MICROSOFT CORP	$61.03
3/11/21	PRU	PRUDENTIAL FINANCIAL INC	$471.27
3/12/21	MMM	3M CO	$56.89
3/12/21	WBA	WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE INC	$43.15
3/15/21	AVA	AVISTA CORP	$131.16
3/15/21	FAF	FIRST AMERICAN FINANCIAL CORP	$145.13
3/15/21	NWL	NEWELL BRANDS INC	$25.56
3/16/21	DUK	DUKE ENERGY CORP	$58.50
3/17/21	UL	UNILEVER PLC SPON ADR NEW	$9.36
3/18/21	BHB	BAR HARBOR BANKSHARES	$43.91
3/18/21	PSEC	PROSPECT CAP CORP	$155.54
3/19/21	CMP	COMPASS MINERALS INTERNATIONAL INC	$137.52
3/19/21	R	RYDER SYSTEM INC	$52.38
3/25/21	QCOM	QUALCOMM INC	$153.82
3/26/21	BP	BP PLC SPONSORED ADR	$8.26
3/26/21	KHC	KRAFT HEINZ CO	$9.20
3/26/21	LMT	LOCKHEED MARTIN CORP	$5.20
3/26/21	WM	WASTE MANAGEMENT INC	$41.50
3/30/21	TROW	PRICE T ROWE GROUPS	$16.44
3/31/21	ARCC	ARES CAPITAL CORP	$470.39
3/31/21	BPYU	BROOKFIELD PPTY REIT INC CL A	$50.85
3/31/21	GATX	GATX CORP	$53.15
3/31/21	GRMN	GARMIN LTD	$61.81
3/31/21	NEWT	NEWTEK BUSINESS SVCS CORP	$397.89
3/31/21	PEP	PEPSICO INC	$52.18
3/31/21	WEYS	WEYCO GROUP INC	$24.85
3/31/21	BEP	BROOKFIELD RENEWABLE PARTNERS PARTNERSHIP	$266.35
3/31/21	M1 Finance	M1 DIVIDEND GROWTH ACCOUNT	$34.72