IRA

Financial Independence Progress Report for October 2017

/ humblefi / 1 Comment

It is one of those slow dividend months again….not much action (which is good) but not much money coming in either 😐 So, lets directly jump into the numbers for October 2017. This time, I will post a bit early as I will be heading out for a work related assignment and will not have the time until well into next month.

10/29/2017
Emergency Fund $60K Done
College Fund (80K) 58.61% 59.62%
Passive Income (2016 vs 2017) $551.80 (10/2016) $528.04 (10/2017)
Retirement Fund 78.74% 79.39%
Roof for our Family($750K) 00.00%
Medical Fund (via HSA) 5.86% 5.70%
Life Insurance Done (term life insurance policy)

Main Takeaways this month

  • Passive Income Stream
    • My passive Income for October 2017 is approximately 4% lower than October 2016. The only reason for this decrease is that I re-positioned my investments to provide more dividends in the months of Mar, June, Sep and December instead of my older investments that used to have a dividend stream in Jan, April,  July and October.
    • My total dividends at this point in time are actually up compared to last year
      • At this time in 2016, average dividends per month was $603.4.
      • As of now in 2017, average dividends per month is $709.60.
      • So, appx a 17% increase in average dividends per month.
    • I also captured some capital gains from one of my US mutual funds. The stock markets are reaching new levels every day and the only thought that comes to mind is: greater the rise, the greater fall. So, I am staying invested in the US market, but capturing some gains as well.
  • Additional Investments
    • Investments in tax-deferred account (IRA)
      • In July, I sold portions of some funds to capture accumulated capital gains and created a cash fund inside my IRA.
      • In August and September, I deployed some of the cash in the cash fund into two international mutual funds to avoid the super expensive valuations of US stocks. In October, I continued more of the same and invested in the same funds again.
        • VTIAX: Vanguard Total International Stock Fund
          • Lower expense ratio
          • Covers the entire international market (large, medium and small caps)
        • VIHAX: Vanguard International High Dividend Fund
          • Higher expense ration
          • Covers a portion of the international market only (mainly large caps)
      • The curious reader may ask: why not just invest everything in the cheaper VTIAX? I am following my old rule of risk diversification….in the same class of mutual funds (international market), I always have two funds compete for your money. So, both VTIAX and VIHAX will now compete with each other to make more money for me 🙂
    • In addition, I noticed now that in my IRA, the percentages of US and International stocks are almost even. I will pile up on US stocks over time in the following ways:
      • Periodic 401K investments are always dollar cost averaging into US stocks (70% of money goes into US funds)
      • In the next recession, I will invest some of the leftover cash fund into mainly US stocks and pick them up at cheaper valuations.
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Financial Independence Progress Report for May 2017

/ humblefi / 2 Comments

May is a one of the super-special months in the year. Why? Because it comes before June….one of the two biggest dividend months in the year 🙂 Other than that, May was a dull month. And I have missed my update for April 2017….I do remember writing it…but I guess I forgot to publish it…I found it in my Drafts folder. So, it is going to be a 2-month update for some categories!

Let us look at the numbers for May 2017.

06/02/2017
Emergency Fund $60K 84.135% 84.73%
College Fund (80K) 51.35% 53.24%
Passive Income (2016 vs 2017) $371.51(05/2017) $470.72 (05/2017)
Retirement Fund 71.45% 74.27%
Roof for our Family($750K) 00.00%
Medical Fund (via HSA) 2.6% 2.6%
Life Insurance Done (term life insurance policy)

Main Takeaways this month

  • Passive Income Stream
    • Passive Income for May 2017 ($470.72) is appx 26% higher than May 2016 ($371.51).
    • I have stolen as much money I can from all my other goals to fund my passive income streams…especially from our home down payment fund. This has resulted in double digit year-over-year gains. But, next year, I will not see this kind of gains…I will enjoy them while they last hey!
  • Additional Investments
    • International exposure
      • Just like prior months, I have continued to increase my exposure outside the US market. Dividend investors are not supposed to look at the stock price…but US stocks seem so overvalued that I just can’t bring myself to add to it.
      • On the other hand, I want my passive income streams to come from many countries all over the world to spread the risk of a single part of the world going through a bad phase. So, I added some more funds to my existing investments in Emerging markets (via VEIEX) and Euro-Pacific Developed Markets (via VTMGX).
  • Build a tiny cash fund again
    • I am accumulating some money in a money market fund. I want to have a small cash fund accumulated to take advantage of any market dip(s) in the US market.
  • Capture gains in my IRA/401K
    • Seeing the insane manner in which the US market stocks are going up, I can’t shake the feeling that we are at the top. I see all the signs of a big drop except the market is going up and up. It is tapering now and I feel that a major dip is quite near.
    • My IRA lost a lot of its value (total return) in the 2008 downturn and I had to wait almost 6 years for it to come back up. I was a financial fool at that time and did not even attempt any corrective actions….I could have moved to preserve some of my gains…but did not know any better.
    • For the upcoming downturn, I do not want to lose the gains in my IRA. So, I cashed out most of the gains accumulated in my IRA over the last few years and have parked them in cash inside my IRA. When the next dip happens, I will put them back to work. Until then, I am okay with losing 2-3% in dividends versus losing 10-20% of the stock price.