Hello again CommonStockers!

I’m always up for the challenge of broadening my horizons and learning new things. With that, I want to really focus on trying to learn options and how they work.

That’s where you all come in! I’d love to hear from you guys on a few things:

As the title states, the biggest account goal I set for myself this year has been achieved 5 months early.

At the beginning of the year, my taxable account was sitting just under &7,500. Teetering each day at that number depending on how the market was swinging. I set a goal for myself to get my taxable account to the $10,000 mark by the end of the year.

And would you look at what’s been completed. Picking up some nice overtime at work, without draining myself of course, that account opened today at $10,032. And it was done with 5 months still left in the year.

With that, my contributions to that account will slow as I shift my focus to my IRA to take full advantage in attempting to max that out (which I have yet to do once in my life) and enjoy those tax benefits that come along with it.

A lot of this progress also comes for you guys. I’m about 2 years into my investing journey and still have a lot to learn and mistakes to be made. But reading everyone’s articles, the responses to my questions, and the overall feedback from the community has given me the ability to shift my accounts from my rookie mistakes, into a strong foundation that’s only grown these few months.

So thank you all, and here’s to goals being checked off 🍻

Hey all!

So I’m still considering my self very new to investing, let alone dividend investing and fully understanding everything it has to offer.

With that, I’ve been attempting to read up on the differences between $JEPI and $JEPQ.

Currently I hold both of these in my taxable account, but I am considering consolidating into one of them and would love everyone’s feedback.

I know both are dividend heavy, but which one is more on the growth side? I’ve made mistakes investing in the past where I was early on and chasing those high yields. I like the dividends of both of these and believe they both are sustainable, just looking for the one with a better growth structure.

I’d like an honest opinion from the smart Dividend Gurus and Retirement Experts on CommonStock.

Based on this information, am I at a good standpoint for my future if I keep pushing?

I see many posts giving a multitude of different numbers and statistics, and want to know from the people that have been through this already what they’re thoughts are.

The first, and probably biggest, change to my portfolio right now just happened.

I’ve decided to change my dividend distribution settings from reinvesting directly into the stock/ETF that gave the dividends to depositing it directly into my account, allowing me to choose where it goes.

The main reasoning behind this:

~ I still hold some stocks in my portfolio from when I first started investing that are not stocks I see in my future portfolio (just waiting on a good time to get out of those positions).

~ Majority of those positions have been reinvesting their dividends, making me lose out on strengthening the foundation of my portfolio.

~ Changing this will allow me to reinvest IF it’s a stock I wish to keep or move the funds elsewhere into something I see a future in.

What settings do y’all use, if your brokerage has those options? And why?

As my final dividends hit my account today, let’s look back at the numbers and do some comparisons.

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Sadly, fell just short of my $300 total goal, but there’s always positives to take from this!

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2021 Total Dividends: $88.82

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2022 Total Dividends: $299.63

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Dividend YoY Increase: 237.35%

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Highest Dividend Month in 2021: December @ $13.47

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Highest Dividend Month in 2022: December @ $65.26

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All-in-all, very great year and it’s only going up from here!

EDIT:

With a last second dividend from $SPAXX giving EXACTLY $0.37, my 2022 total dividends received comes out to…..

$300 EVEN.

Following my previous post regarding my position in $O :

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~ Sold approx 10.9 shares last week.

~Transferred funds from that sale to my IRA account.

~ Repurchased shares using that amount and ended up buying 11.3 shares.

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Win Win in my eyes.

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Sold 10.9 and used the SAME AMOUNT to buy 11.3 in a better taxed account.

~ Reallocate my position in Realty Income, $O , to my IRA account to take advantage of the tax benefits all around.

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~ Start removing some of my beginning stocks that I did no research on and have underperformed with a weak foundation in my portfolio.

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~ Build up a cash position to start taking advantage of Cash Secured Puts on top of my slowly growing Covered Call positions.

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~ Reach a total portfolio worth, Taxable Brokerage + IRA, of 5 figures (currently about 86% of the way there).

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Sounds like a solid plan. Gonna take some work, but is 100% achievable.

What’re your ending ‘22 and beginning ‘23 goals?

So I had noticed a new option within my banks mobile app, labeled as “Digital Investor”. As everyone says, curiosity killed the cat, and it sure got my attention.

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After setting up an account and depositing some money to start, I had noticed they had “preset portfolios” one could use to begin investing. Of course, the one labeled “Dividend Bundle” caught my eye.

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Here’s what they had inside it:

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What do you guys think of these 10 stocks they choose?

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What would you add or remove from the list with the criteria they picked from?