Monthly Update - April

April is over and I've made some great progress in meeting many of my goals!  I have earned $1141.88 in dividends and $2257 in options income so far in 2013.

Below is a summary of my activity for the month:

New Purchases (Approx. $13,900) :

150 shares of PAAS
100 shares of CSX
$1150 of CAT
$2550 of WFC
$1750 of TD
$3502 of APD
$500 of TEVA

Posts about new purchases can all be found by following the "Buys" label here.

Sells:
none

Options Trades:

I sold puts in COP, CAT, PAAS and INTC.  I closed or had expired puts in INTC, DRI, LO, RTN and WM.  I earned $779 in profits from puts that I closed out or that expired this month giving me a yearly total so far of $2257.  I've updated all of these trades on my Options tab.

Dividends:

I earned $232.57 in dividends for the month.  My total year-to-date dividend income is now $1141.88. I've updated my dividend income on my Dividends tab.

Forward 12-month Dividends:

My expected future 12-months of dividend income has increased to $5295.61 from $4750.25, an increase of 11.5% in one month.  I've broken the $5k barrier and look forward to hitting $6k or $500/mo. 

Goals:

I've already met two of my goals so far this year.  I'm well on my way to meeting most of my goals.  All of my goals can be found on the Goals tab.

Real Estate:

The condo rental is coming up for renewal in the next couple of months.  I hope to increase that rent by $100 also just like I recently did with the house rental.  I will be looking into a refinance of my primary residence towards the end of May if interest rates cooperate.  All of my real estate posts will be found on my real estate label here.

Looking Ahead:

I expect to have a little better dividend month in May than April.  My goal of $5000 in dividends this year will be tough to make.  I'm barely over $1000 with four months already gone so I really need to accelerate my contributions so that the second half of the year can catch me up.

My options income is still way ahead of my dividend income.  It's almost exactly double of my dividend income.  I don't know if I can hold this pace with options but it won't be until the second half of the year that my dividend income has a chance to catch up.

I've set some aggressive goals for my dividend growth.  In order to meet my goal of $6500 of forward dividends then I will need to contribute another $34,400 to my portfolio this year at an average yield of 3.5%.  I'm currently averaging about $9000/month in contributions and I plan to increase that more in the second half of the year so this goal should be fairly easy to hit.  The $5000 in 2013 dividends will be a much harder goal to achieve.