I always love reading blogs about other investors’ investment income. Watching other people’s investment income rise is my second favorite thing (the only thing better is watching MY investment income rise!)
Here is our investment income for February, 2020. This report includes income from dividends, interest, mutual funds, and rental properties.
Overview
Wow, what an end to February! We saw a big drop in the stock market in the last week of the month, and as of early March it’s seesawing up and down from day to day.
The good news is that the valuation of the stock market doesn’t affect our passive income, and that’s what’s most important to us.
Without further ado, here’s what our investment income looked like for the month:
Dividend & Interest Income
Total dividend income for the month was $1,908.42. This is down 40% from last February. This is due to our sale of OHI, which paid a massive ~8% dividend.
Although our dividends for the month are down year-over-year, our cumulative dividends for the year through the end of February are still up 12%.
We would be happy if our dividends end up 12% YOY for the whole year, so this is a solid start to the year.
Overall, a good month.
Rental income
This category includes net income from the 6 rental properties that my wife and I own, plus 50% of the income from 4 rental properties that we own with my mom. This number does not include appreciation of the properties or the decrease in the mortgage balance (those numbers show up in the net worth report).
However, this income is net of all mortgage, tax, and insurance payments. That is, this is a true cash flow report for our rental properties.
February was an ok month for our rental income. Total rental income for the month was $3,064.78. This is up 412% from last February’s meagre income of $598.50.
Our average rental income for the last 12 months is $2,178.52, which is the highest trailing 12-month rental income we’ve ever had.
For the year, our cumulative rental income through the end of the month is up 138% over last year.
As with the dividend income, this is a solid start to the month.
Total investment income this month
Total (dividend + rental) income = $4,973.20
Our trailing 12-month income hit a new high of $103,200.91. This means we are 86% of the way to our short-term goal of passive income of $120,000/year.
In the table above you can see that our cumulative total passive income through the end of February is up 53% over the same period in 2019. This is impressive growth, but I don’t expect it to continue at the same rate for the rest of the year.
Looking at our trailing 12-month total income, you can see that our passive income has been doing exactly what we want it to do – it’s been trending up and to the right.
This is a good start to the year and our goal to hit $115,000 in passive income.
Changes
No changes to our portfolio this month. We are still holding $400,000+ in cash, waiting for an interesting investment at a reasonable valuation. Given the volatility, it’s certainly possible this opportunity will come sooner rather than later.
Recap
February was a great month. We hit a new high in trailing 12-month income and our passive income for the year is well ahead of 2019.
How did everybody else do with their investment income this month?
Are there any investments out there trading at reasonable valuations that I should be looking at?