One Raise at a Time | Ventas

Getting a pay raise while sitting on the couch?  Sign me up!  Thanks Ventas for the dividend increase!

Something I love about dividend growth investing is that each month I get to hear about companies I own deciding to pay me more money in dividends.  Just for owning a small portion of said companies.  Not going and doing R&D for new products or technology.  Not selling any products.  Not managing any employees or inventory.  Not making sales calls.  All I had to do was have the foresight to invest some of my savings in excellent companies.  That's dividend growth investing at work!  I mean who doesn't like getting a raise for doing nothing?  Dividend growth investing is far from a get rich quick investment strategy, rather you need to remain focused on the long term goal to be successful.

On Monday of this week the Board of Directors at Ventas (VTR) approved an increase to the quarterly dividend payment.  The dividend was increased from $0.79 to $0.7925 per share.  That's a rather disappointing 0.32% increase.  Ventas is a Dividend Challenger with 9 consecutive years of dividend increases.  Shares currently yield 4.89% based on the new annualized payout.

Since I own 24.412 shares of Ventas in my FI Portfolio this raise increased my forward 12-month dividends by $0.24.  This is the 3rd dividend increase I've received from them since initiating a position in March 2015.  Cumulatively, the organic dividend growth from Ventas has totaled just 0.3% over that time.  According to US Inflation Calculator the cumulative rate of inflation over that same time is 6.7%.  

A full screen version of this chart can be found here.

I have to admit that the slow dividend growth from Ventas is a bit disconcerting.  When I initially invested in Ventas I was expecting annual dividend growth to be in the 4-7% range.  Unfortunately Ventas hasn't met that bar as the last 3 increases, in reverse order, have come in at 0.32%, 1.94%, and 6.16%, respectively.  This is definitely a reason to reconsider Ventas' spot in my portfolio and re-check on their "story" to make sure the business is still chugging along fine. 

The 1-, 3-, 5- and 10-year rolling dividend growth rates since 1999 can be found in the following chart.  

A full screen version of this chart can be found here.

Wrap Up

This raise increased my forward dividends by $0.24 with me doing nothing.  That's right, absolutely nothing to contribute to their operations.  Based on my portfolio's current yield of 3.00% this raise is like I invested an extra $8 in capital.  Except that I didn't!  One of the companies I own just decided to send more cash my way.  

That's how you can eventually reach the crossover point where your dividends received exceed your expenses.  That's DIVIDEND GROWTH INVESTING AT WORK!  The beauty of the dividend growth investing strategy is that you build up your dividends through fresh capital investment as well dividend increases from the companies you own.

So far in 2018 I've received 55 dividend increases from 47 of the companies in my FI Portfolio combining to increase my forward 12-month dividends by $465.61.  

My FI Portfolio's forward-12 month dividends increased to $6,724.92.  Including my FolioFirst portfolio's forward dividends of $91.28 brings my total taxable accounts dividends to $6,816.20.  My Roth IRA's forward 12-month dividends remain at $402.37.

Do you own shares of Ventas?  Does slow dividend growth concern you?

Please share your thoughts below.