Look At Your Portfolio Every Day

Yes, I am serious. Actually, look at it multiple times a day. As a dividend growth investor, you will need to get used to your capital moving a lot. It can move both up and down quite a bit over the course of even a day. When your portfolio gets larger, you will want to be mentally prepared see big swings in capital. And here’s the kicker, you should be happier when it goes down. What? Yes, when it goes down you will be able to buy more shares which results in more dividend income. Again, the goal is to live off of the dividends and never touch the capital itself. Even if you are not actively investing more of your own capital, you will likely still be buying more shares with dividend reinvestment.  You want to reinvest dividends cheap too.

Here’s a couple analogies:
If you were buying steak at the grocery store, would you be happier when the price increased $2 per pound or would happier when the price went down and is on sale by $2 per pound? Remember, you are buying steak, not selling.

If you owned a house, it was rented, and generating a steady income stream, would you sell the house if it increased 10%? Would you sell the house if went down 10%. Since you originally got into real estate for income generation, you would likely just keep the house and the income stream.

To this day, I still can’t help but get a little happy when I see the green on an up day and a little upset when I see red on a down day. Just look at your portfolio, think about how you feel, but don’t touch. It’s a behavior I am still trying to master and definitely requires a lot of practice. It’s fun to watch when it goes up, but I get more excited when it goes down and I have capital waiting to buy more shares and get more dividends and more income.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope the post helps.

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5 Responses to Look At Your Portfolio Every Day

  1. Alex Vinson says:

    Excellent analogy and philosophy.

  2. Good post Steve. I also look at my portfolio daily just to mentally orient myself to expect changes. Bouncy principal is something we all must get used to.

  3. Pingback: Up $44,675.26 This Month – January 2017 Investment Update | Financial Independence Warrior

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