My name is Kevin Bae. I’m an amateur investor.

I retired early a couple years ago with a plan to live off my savings and investments. I had a nest egg that was big enough to supply my wife and I income to live a decent life. Nothing extravagant… the plan was to live modestly, travel a little for fun and family, and to work here and there when we felt like it.

My assets, at the time, consisted of an IRA which held stocks and index funds, a small brokerage account invested in growth stocks, a few high interest savings accounts, and our home. Our house is not giant, and we only own one expensive car (a 2014 Land Rover Range Rover Sport HSE). If things stayed on a normal track our savings accounts were protected by FDIC insurance and earning a good enough 2.1% or so in interest and my brokerage account was getting about 3.5% in dividend income. That plus the meager income I get from some outside consulting meant we would be okay with a conservative budget. Then COVID-19 hit, the government cut interest rates to nothing, and the world economy shut down. Suddenly my income dropped dramatically, and I had to take action if I had any hope of maintaining our plan.

In the span of 6 months the majority of my cash was moved out of savings to my brokerage account, I rebalanced my IRA to be a little more aggressive, and we moved from Illinois to Georgia. The move will pay for itself in a couple years with the savings on property tax (it’s 2/3 cheaper in Georgia) and the lower cost of living. Our home in Illinois was worth about 33% more than the home we purchased in Georgia that provided us with a net profit on the move.

I read about Dividend Yield Theory before all this happened and was playing around with a couple play portfolios for about a year and didn’t expect to implement the new plan for another 2 years. Switching from savings accounts to investing in dividend producing stocks is risky. But, the idea is to invest in solid companies where I don’t worry too much about the stock price. If I choose correctly the price of the stock won’t go up or down too much. The business models of the companies tend to be boring and steady. The key to this method is the amount of dividend they pay per share.

This is where I am now. I was able to replace a good portion of my lost income by purchasing dividend stocks and I’m still learning as I go.

I hope you find some value from what you read here. If you do, I would appreciate a donation to help keep this going. You’ll find a donation button near the top of the site.

Thank you and I wish you much success!