Saturday, June 28, 2014

DEALING WITH MINOR SETBACK TO MY INVESTMENT PLAN

I had some unexpected expenses this month and needed some work done on my car, so I had a minor setback in my investment plan.  I was forced to sell a few shares of stock to meet all my financial obligations for the month.  Something I do not like to do.  However, I was able to meet all my expenses and rearrange some of my finances to make things better going forward, so things are looking up.

One of the changes I made was to switch from AT&T to Virgin Mobile for my phone service.  With Virgin Mobile I get unlimited texting and anytime talk for half of what I was paying for 450 anytime minutes with AT&T.  While I'll continue to hold my AT&T stock, I'm glad to get a better deal on my phone service.  Perhaps I can use some of the money I save to purchase more shares in AT&T or even Virgin Mobile.  

Otherwise things are moving right along.  It was the biggest month of the year for dividend income.  Even though I sold some shares, I minimized the effect it would have on dividend income so I shouldn't see too much of a reduction in monthly cash flow.  I plan to replace the money by purchasing new shares as rapidly as possible.  But to avoid another situation like I found myself in this month, I'm going to put aside more cash.  So I may not be buying much stock for the next couple of months.  Of course reinvested dividends will continue to increase my stock holdings every month. 

Haven't seen the crash in the market yet, but I don't think we're out of the woods.  Seems a lot of people are expecting bad things to come of Obama's new legislation which kicks in in July.  We'll just have to wait and see.  Since the market has been on a tear lately, I'm looking at any drop as a buying opportunity.  

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