Extra Money

This is part eight of a series on how to make extra money with stock dividends.  At this point we are doing research to decide which stocks we want to invest in.

If you find a stock with a high yield you need to determine why the yield is high.  If the yield is high because the stock price has gone way down than you need to look at what has caused the decline in the stock price.  Although we are focusing on companies that have a long streak of consistently increasing dividends these streaks do sometimes end. We need to determine if a dividend cut might be coming which would defeat the purpose of our purchasing the stock.

Bank of America provides an example of this. Last year Bank of America cut its dividend after a long history of consistently increasing dividends.  It wasn’t exactly a secret that financial stocks were being hit hard but many people still bought this stock for the yield only to see the dividend significantly cut later in the year.  You won’t always be able to predict when a dividend cut is likely but if you are worried a stock might cut its dividend you should probably pass on that stock.

I am going to take a break from my series on stock dividends and share my extra money income for 2009.  Some of you might have thought this blog was only going to be about stock dividends from now on but rest assured it will continue to cover a variety of ways to make extra money.

In 2009 I made a total of $7067.18 in extra money.  The biggest portion of this money came from online income which totaled $4644.28.  It will be very difficult for me to come up with a larger total of extra money made in 2009 but that is going to be my goal.  My eventual goal is to be able to live off my extra money income and $7067.18 isn’t near enough.  I am a frugal person but I’m not quite frugal enough to live on $7000 a year.

I recently wrote that Zecco would be changing their minimum balance requirement for receiving free trades in March.  I plan to keep my Zecco account but it still makes sense to see what alternative low cost stock brokers are out there.

Here are a few low cost stock brokers that have come to my attention.  I do not have an account with any of these companies so I can’t provide a personal  recommendation.

Wellstrade from Wells Fargo offers 100 free trades a year if you keep a balance of $25,000 or more.  There are also some additional requirements.  Based on my experiences with the Wells Fargo bank I would pass on this one.

Interactive Brokers offers trades for $1.00 per 100 shares with a minimum balance requirement of $10,000.

Sogo Trade has $3 trades with a $500 minimum.

Just2Trade has $2.50 trades with a $2500 minimum.

Bank of America offers 30 free trades per month if you keep a combined balance of $25,000 or more in your Bank of America deposit accounts.

There are probably some more low cost stock brokers out there that I am not aware of but that should give you some options to consider.

In my series about investing in dividend stocks I recommended opening an account with Zecco to take advantage of the 10 free trades a month they offer.  Since then they have announced a change in the requirements to receive the free trades.  At the beginning of March they are increasing the minimum level of assets needed to earn 10 free trades per month to $25,000. They are also adding a new way to get free trades. If you make at least 25 total trades per month you will qualify for 10 free stock trades per month.  Otherwise you will have to pay $4.50 per stock trade.  That is still a good deal but I wanted to make sure any of you that might be thinking of opening an account were aware of the change.

I have not added a blogroll to this blog yet.  So far the only blogs I have listed are the other blogs that I write.  I am going to change that and start a new blogroll that will feature other Today.com blogs that have Entrecard on their site.  This will allow us to cross promote our sites and increase traffic.  I have a small list of sites already and I will add them to my blogroll today or tomorrow.  If you have a Today.com blog with Entrecard on it and it is not already on blogroll please let me know and I will add it.  I am not a real frequent dropper but I will try to visit every site on the blogroll at least once a week.  It depends on how big my blogroll gets and how much free time I have whether I will be able to visit the sites more frequently.

In case you are wondering what this has to do with making extra money I will tell you.  Writing a blog is one of the main ways I make extra money and to make money with a blog you need traffic.  More traffic does not always equal more money made but in general the more traffic you receive the more money you make.

Here is a summary of the extra money I made in December 2008.  I made $450.12 in online income.  I made $9 from surveys and $25 from mystery shopping.  I made $26.16 in cash back.  I made $53.10 from stock dividends.  I made $16.96 in interest from high-yield online savings accounts.  And lastly I made $44.10 in bonuses from banks and peer to peer lending payments.  The total of all my extra money income sources added together comes to $624.44.  This is a very good total but it is not enough to live on.  I keep my expenses very low but I do not think I will get them that low.  I need to increase my extra money income so that I will eventually meet my goal of being able to live on the income from my extra money sources.

I hope you all are having a Happy New Year.  I plan to sit around all day watching football, drinking beer, and snacking.  That sounds like a pretty good holiday to me.  After that it will be back to working on my goals for the new year.  One of those goals is to increase the amount of extra money I make.  You might have guessed that one.  I made a pretty good amount of extra money last year so it will not be easy to increase the amount this year.  I guess my first step will be to calculate exactly how much extra money I made last year so I know what my amount to beat is.  I have lots of plans on how to beat the goal.

What are some of your financial goals for the year?

I have noticed that the number of comments left on this blog has dropped off recently.  This is probably because I have not been very active lately in the Today.com community. To try to rectify this situation I am instituting a new policy.  The policy is that if you leave a comment on this post I will visit your blog and leave a comment on one of your posts.  I will try to continue this policy as long as it does not take up an inordinate amount of time.   This should work well for both of us.  I’ll receive more feedback and be exposed to more blogs and you will have more activity on your site as well.

Also I am planning on putting together a bookmark list of Today.com blogs that have the Entrecard on them.  If you have a Today.com blog with an Entrecard on it please leave a comment so I can add it to my bookmark list.  I will not be able to drop on this list every day but I hope to do so at least a couple times a week.   Thanks.

I hope everyone is having a Merry Christmas.  Or did have if you’re reading this after Christmas.  I am going to enjoy taking the day off.  You can’t be focused on making extra money every day.  Although if I receive more in Christmas presents than I give I guess that would be like making extra money.  I am just kidding about that.  Don’t take me too seriously.  I will be back tomorrow with more ideas on making extra money.  I am sure many people will be needing extra money after spending too much over the holidays.  I hope I can help.

This is not a way to make extra money because it is actually just getting your own money returned to you.  I think it is worth posting about though because it is possible readers of this blog have a tidy sum coming to them they don’t even know about.

Most states have a website where you can search and find if you have any unclaimed money that is due you.  These are typically forgotten bank accounts, utility deposits, insurance policies, etc.  A great, free site that lets you search for money from many states is MissingMoney.com.

I used the site last year and found $13 that was due me from a canceled credit card account.  How they couldn’t find me to return the money when they always had my address I don’t know.  After filling out a simple form I received a check from the State for my money.  It wasn’t much but for about 10 minutes of time it was worth it.  Go ahead and do a search, you might find some money.