Goal Update: End of October 2015

At the end of each month, I post an update of my goals, including a brief discussion of any notable events that might have occurred during the month. The latest month's figures can always be found under the Featured menu in the menu bar at the top of the blog.

Last updated: End of October, 2015
Current value: $18,142
Change from last month: +$1,676
Percent of Goal:  16.68%

Note that the funds in this account are invested in stock, so there will be fluctuations in value that are outside my control. I never withdraw money from this account, so any dips are purely due to stock price changes.

Events Of Note Last Month:

Income this month from my online courses sales was $363. I also received $100 from blog advertising. That's the first advertising payment I've received in over 2 years, so yeah, not making a lot of money from my blogs. Of course, I'm not really trying to. I don't do any SEO and have very, very limited ads, so this isn't too surprising. On the other hand, when I do get a payout, it comes as a nice surprise. Another nice surprise was a $150 quarterly bonus payout from my work. And one more nice surprise was a $100 check from a class action lawsuit settlement against a tour bus company in New York City. We had bought tickets for a bus tour when we went there for Thanksgiving in 2013. Apparently, there are two big tour bus companies in New York, but they are actually owned by the same company, so they were creating a false sense of competition when the company really had a monopoly on the business and kept the prices high.


Once again, my account had a nice jump in value due to the rising stock price of Realty Income (O). This month I crossed the $17,000 and $18,000 marks for the first time - the second month in a row of hitting a record high!

My plan all along has been to shift my investment from stocks to a hard money (real estate) loan once I hit $20,000. I'll keep funneling new funds into stock, but I plan to move money into higher paying mortgage loans in $20,000 chunks. Right now, my partner can get between 7% and 8% interest, whereas the Realty Income stock dividend is yielding about 4.5% (yearly dividend of $2.286 per share, at the current share price of about $50). Now that doesn't take into account stock price increases, of course, but since the stock price fluctuates, I'm just using the dividend payout as my gauge. (This isn't the most accurate measure, but it will work for my purposes. I'll do a post about this in a few weeks.)

I have been a little concerned about this plan over the last 6 to 12 months. My partner had seen the deals coming his way dry up and he had more money to invest than places to invest it. I was glad to hear this month that that situation has now reversed - he now has more deals than he has money for. It's looking like I might be able to start lending with him in a few months. Looking forward to that, as it means I'll almost double my monthly income. Things will really start to snowball then.


I'll also take this moment to point out I have added a contact page here so you can send me an email, if you so desire. Just click "Contact" in the menu bar.