My Conservative Investment Portfolio

By Floyd Saunders, The Author of Five Paths To Wealth, Family Financial Freedom and

Figuring Out Wall Street.

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Some of the followers of this blog and readers of my book, Five Paths to Wealth, has asked me where I invest.

First let me say I am primarily a long-term investor focused on building a conservative portfolio of quality dividend paying stocks that I can hold for at least 10 years and continue to invest in over time.

I believe this is the best way to build wealth over time.

I believe in holding a portfolio of passive index funds that essentially cover the entire stock and bond fund. You can do yourself with just a few index funds that touch on the entire stock and bond funds. Or you can let professional fund managers do it for you with a simple roboadvior like Acorns, Betterment, Wealthfront or Axos Invest. Each of these can be accessed via a smart phone app and all four will establish and manage your account for you with several passive index funds. (I hold funds in Acorns and have used the other three in the past).

For some investors this might be considered a core portfolio from which they can do more aggressive trading in other investments that might considered speculative (cryptocurrency would be a good example, but it could be an options trading strategy).

I am an investor in several dividend growth stocks and plan to increase my stocks from this very select set of stocks. I hold these stocks in my M1 Finance account. Just because it is an easy app to invest with and create your own portfolios. Some of these stocks are included in the list of stocks that have paid dividends for over 100 years.

All of my picks are companies with a strong history of increasing dividend payouts and three of my picks are listed as a part of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Each of these seven stocks are Dividend Kings. Some of these stocks make the list of Dividend Kings you can hold forever. You can get a list of all of the Dividend Kings from SureDividend.com.

Note of caution: At current prices, several of these stocks are considered overvalued. One approach for buying into stocks is to use dollar cost averaging, spending the same amount each month, results in buying few shares when prices are up and more shares when prices drop.

My picks include:

1. Procter & Gamble (a Dow index stock) has paid a dividend for 131 years and raised them for 65 years in a row.

2. 3M Company (a Dow index stock) has paid a dividend to its shareholders without interruption for more than 100 years and increased the annual dividend for 63 consecutive years.

3. Johnson & Johnson (a Dow index stock) has increased its dividend for the past 59 consecutive years.

4. Hormel Foods has paid a dividend since becoming a public company in 1928, without interruption. Hormel has also rewarded shareholders with 55 consecutive years of rising dividends.

5. Genuine Auto Parts has paid a cash dividend every year since going public in 1948, and 2021 marks the 65th consecutive year of increased dividends paid to shareholders

6. Cincinnati Financial has paid an increasing dividend for 58 consecutive years to shareholders, a streak matched by the other seven U.S. companies included in this list.

7. Federal Realty Investment Trust has been paying monthly dividends throughout its 52-year operating history

and has increased its quarterly dividends to its shareholders for 53 consecutive years, the longest record in the

REIT industry.

All of these stocks fit the definition of being a Dividend King. Most of these companies have a dividend reinvestment plan that allows to start buying shares for a small monthly contribution deducted from your checking account. Automating your investing in this manner makes it really simple to build a portfolio of excellent stocks over time.

Most of these companies use computershare for their dividend reinvestment plans. A dividend reinvestment plan is another simple way to get started with investing by buying shares directly from the company. These plans can often get started with a monthly transfer from a checking account for as little as $10 (as is the case with 3M).