December 2014: Income and Expenses

    December and 2014 have come to a close as a new year begins. Throughout my Christmas shopping I have kept track of all my spending and managed to stay close to my general budget for presents and entertainment. This month in particular was trickier for me than others due to a large one time expense of paying for a trip in March, which is why my savings rate for the month is actually negative; although not too bad if you take away that one expense.

   My income this month was pretty good considering it gets a bit slower during the holidays and can be difficult to pick up hours, along with me wanting some extra days off here and there. I expect though January may be a bit lower, but it is hard to tell at the moment. Dividend income was pretty solid, with all my monthly payers comprising of most of the income and my first dividend payment from Suncor that month. My total dividend income this month also represents a nice 2.5% of my total income, which is a nice little raise from myself.  And my 'bonus's' in tips did nicely as well. For January I expect that category to be higher as well once I received payments for selling my restricted stock units, as well as including a GST rebate which I hope to be putting towards a new stock purchase to continue building my portfolio.

Happy New Year! Cheers to Another Year of Dividends!

   Just like to wish everyone a quick happy new years! Have a fun and safe night with friends and family! And also to the start of a new year of dividend investing, portfolio growth and getting paid to sit on our butts and hold our quality companies.

   Coming up on my blog in the new year will be my December Income and Expenses post and I am working on an overview on using D.R.I.P's and the position of mine which I will be activating a DRIP for. Also an evaluation of the stocks that I have used in my Next Buy Watchlist's to see how those stocks would have performed had I bought them on the day of the post.

December 2014 Dividend Update!

    It has been an interesting month for my portfolio as 2014 comes to a close. I am quite thankful for (most likely) ending the year positive and extremely happy to have now received from last dividend of the year from Suncor which has helped to push this months total dividend to $37.76, which is $8.70 more than the last comparable month! This months dividends were primarily from just my monthly payers, with Suncor chipping in $5.6 as the only quarterly payer.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays Everyone

    Its Christmas Eve and a nice Wednesday to start off a long weekend for many who are now on holiday. So I would just like to wish everyone a nice, safe and happy winter holidays. And to say thank you for all those who have stopped by to read my posts and comment. Thank you for following my journey thus far into investing and I hope to have inspired some with my shared journey, experience and knowledge.

    Cheers! And a toast to a better 2015!

Portfolio Update: December 22nd 2014

    I realized its been a little while since my last Portfolio Update at the start of November, and there have been some changes to it since then. As I mentioned in my last Recent Buy post, I sold my small position in iShares 1-5year laddered Government of Canada Bond ETF to bolster my purchase of 28 shares of RioCan REIT. Which keeps my total number of positions in the portfolio at 13, and also boosted my overall dividend income by $32.40.