If you've been following this series, you'll notice that the last time I wrote about managing my 401(K) was this past April. That's not a mistake; while in the past I had been making purchases of new shares of an ETF every two months, on account of having four pay periods' funds accumulated, because of the modest increase in my salary and (more importantly) because I increased my withholding for my 401(K) from 5% to 6% every paycheck, it has become viable for me to use the accumulated shares from every three paychecks to make an ETF purchase. By that I mean that the amount that accumulates in three paychecks is enough that the $7.95 in commissions that Fidelity charges me for each transaction doesn't hurt enough for me to wait until I've got four paychecks' withholdings accumulated.

Once again I've decided not to add to the number

Since the last time I wrote about activity in my wife's tiny IRA, enough funds had accumulated from dividends to make a small purchase. I decided that the funds were too small to try to initiate a new position in her account, so I needed to pick one of her existing positions to which to add some fresh shares.

Of course, to figure out where to spend the accumulated dividends, I used her worksheet on my copy of the My Mad Method [MyMM] spreadsheet. Here are her current positions, and their percent allocations relative to the total value of her portfolio prior to the purchase I made this month:

In my last article about how I manage my IRA using what I call My Mad Method [MyMM], I talked about how I had selected where to put the dividends that had accumulated over about a month's time based on which stock had the lowest percentage allocation of my IRA's total balance, combined with the MyMM indicators and rankings. In that case, my goal was to try to bring a particular stock, Harris Corporation (HRS), closer to what I like to call "parity", which is the target percentage that represents any one position out of the 30 positions currently in my IRA, having just enough value to equal 1/30th of the total value of my portfolio (less cash). That target parity number turns out to be 3.33%.

For this month, I considered a similar approach, and concentrated on those positions that had the lowest percent allocation and were,

My last article about my IRA and how I use My Mad Method [MyMM] to help me manage it was a recap of how things turned out at the end of Q1 of this year. I ended that article by saying that I "[didn't] expect to make as many trades in the current quarter", meaning this quarter, Q2. However, I did leave the door open to potentially take a small amount of profits from some positions that have had some impressive gains and which were substantially (or even just somewhat) over the parity percentage allocation of 3.45% that I've been trying to get all of the 29 stocks in my IRA to.

Well, as it turns out, I did indeed book some small profits and deployed them to further my goals of turning my IRA into the best income producing machine that I can make it before I

It's hard to believe it's already been two months since I last made a purchase in my 401K, but maybe it's because of the "February Effect" of it being a somewhat shortened period. Regardless, the time has passed, the funds have been withheld from my paycheck and accumulated, and it was time once again to decide where to allocate those funds across the three ETFs that I currently still hold in my 401K account.

Once again I've decided not to add to the number of positions in my 401K, but to keep things simple and continue to add to what I already have. As a recap, here are the three ETFs and one mutual fund that I currently hold in my 401(k):

• iShares High Dividend Equity Fund (HDV)
• iShares FTSE NAREIT Mortgage Plus Capped Index Fund (REM)
• Utilities Select Sector SPDR (XLU)
• Yacktman Focused Service Class (YAFFX)

As a

The first quarter of 2013 is but a memory now, but before I can start writing more articles about what I'm doing monthly (or more frequently) to manage my growing IRA, I need to review what happened in the last three months since the 2012 End of Year report that I published here on Seeking Alpha.

Welcome to the Family, Phil!

To start with, there was some trading going on in my account during March that I wasn't able to write about until now. So to get you caught up, I decided to fund my IRA with a second quarter's worth of contributions a bit early so that I could take advantage of one of the downturns in the market that was taking place during March. In addition to the one quarter allotment of $1,625 from the $6,500 that I'm allowed to contribute to my IRA this year, I

It's been quite a while since I last wrote about what I've been doing to manage my wife's IRA, but that's not too surprising given that it's a very small portfolio with a very small value, generating very small amounts of dividends that I can then re-invest into it. However, having said that, it's actually been a busy couple of months for this Little IRA That Might. Without further ado, let's jump into the details.

Goodbye/Hello

To start off with, just like I did with my own IRA, I sold off the positions in Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. (ARLP) and MV Oil Trust (MVO) from my lady's IRA. I won't re-hash the reasons for these sales here, as you can read about why I came to the (personal) understanding that holding a Master Limited Partnership [MLP] such as ARLP in an IRA may not be the best way to

This past February was a lot busier for me in terms of selling and buying stocks for my IRA's portfolio than I had thought it would be when I last wrote the January installment of My Mad Method: What Next To Buy, And Why? First of all, I got the larger of my two annual bonuses at the beginning of the month, and while it wasn't as great as last year's, I'm not complaining at all! (I know it's March already, but work, business travel and cold and flu season have delayed me in getting this article written about February's activities to monitor and maintain my IRA.)

Looking back at my past expenses and looking ahead at my household cash flow projections, I decided that I could afford a $1,500 contribution to my IRA out of my bonus, which I thought was one quarter of the $6,000 that

This is a great time of year for me, because it's when I get the larger of my two annual bonuses. Bonuses are not, of course, guaranteed, but we had a nice one again this year, and that means 5% of the gross went into my 401(K). Combined with the money that got withheld from my paychecks since last December, that gave me a nice chunk of change with which to grow my positions in my 401(K).

At this time I've decided not to add to the number of positions in my 401(K), but to keep things simple and just plump up what I already have. As a recap, here are the three ETFs and one mutual fund that I currently hold in my 401(K):

• iShares High Dividend Equity Fund (HDV)
• iShares FTSE NAREIT Mortgage Plus Capped Index Fund (REM)
• Utilities Select

In Part 1 of this 2-part article, I explained why I felt the time had come to remove four Master Limited Partnerships [MLPs] from my IRA. To recap, those MLPs and the yields they were producing at the time I sold them last week were:

• Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. (ARLP) - 7.01%
• BreitBurn Energy Partners, L.P. (BBEP) - 8.78%
• Linn Energy, LLC (LINE) - 7.68%
• Vanguard Natural Resources (VNR) - 8.73%

The average yield of these four positions ended up being 8.02%, the loss of which would have a significant impact to my IRA's overall average yield if I couldn't find stocks to replace them with sufficient yields themselves.

After selling these four off, I was left with a healthy chunk of cash with which to work. I knew I wanted to replace these MLPs so that I could maintain the 28 positions in my IRA, but I also have

There has been a lot of discussion in the Comments of a couple of my recent articles about the problems associated with holding a Master Limited Partnership [MLP] in an IRA account. While MLPs can be a great source of income, they really are not designed to be held in a tax-deferred vehicle, something, I was not aware of when I added several of them to my IRA last year.

A lot of folks are aware of the possible tax consequences of having Unrelated Business Taxable Income [UBTI] reported by the MLPs they hold (in any account) exceed the $1,000 annual exclusion each of us are allowed every year. Many are also concerned with the headaches of working with the K-1 forms that MLPs use for tax reporting to unit holders.

Investopedia defines UBTI as:

Income regularly generated by a tax-exempt entity by means of taxable activities. This income is

I first wrote about how I've taken an active role in managing my wife's IRA and the positions in it in late November of last year. Since then, I've been waiting for dividends to accumulate so that I can make some additional purchases for the account without burning through the 100 free trades that we get from Wells Fargo (WFC) too quickly. In addition to the small amount of dividends that have accumulated in her IRA since late last November, I was able to make a $1,500 2012 contribution to her account last week after receiving part of my semi-annual bonus, which gave me a bit more cash to work with. So the time has come to do some trading and see where we stand with this little nest egg.

So Long, MAKO, and Best of Luck

To start off with, I decided that after watching MAKO Surgical (MAKO)

Golly, I haven't written one of these articles since mid-November of last year. OK, it wasn't that long ago, but I'd maxed out my contributions to my IRA and hadn't really accumulated enough in the way of dividends through the end of December to do anything worthwhile, so it's taken until now to get enough cash stashed up to make a few purchases. Let's take a look at what I've gotten myself into this time:

Same Old Song And Dance

To start off with, Yes, I continued to add to my position in Prospect Capital Corporation (PSEC) last Thursday. I'm still trying to get it to the "parity" level of a 3.57% allocation of my IRA's total value, and am almost there, but not quite. With an addition of 12.3% more to my existing position, I've brought my holdings in PSEC up to a 3.18% allocation of my

Well, after a prolonged holiday vacation and catching up with the inevitable landslide of emails and tasks that accumulated at my day job, I've finally been able to get around to writing an end of year article about how things turned out for my IRA's portfolio in 2012, and how I see things going with My Mad Method (MyMM).

To start off with, let's see what positions I had at the beginning of 2012:

This is a continuation of the series I started with the article "My 401k - Exchanging a Mutual Fund for ETFs". My, how time flies! It's already been two months since the last installment of this series, and I'm ready to make my next purchase. Question is, what next to buy, and why should I buy it?

At this time I've decided not to add to the number of positions in my 401(k), but to keep things simple and just plump up what I already have. As a recap, here are the three ETFs and one mutual fund that I currently hold in my 401(k), along with some relevant data:

• iShares High Dividend Equity Fund (HDV)
• iShares FTSE NAREIT Mortgage Plus Capped Index Fund (REM)
• Utilities Select Sector SPDR (XLU)
• Yacktman Focused Service Class (YAFFX)

(Click to enlarge)

Like pretty much everything else on the market, my

As you may know from reading previous articles of mine, while I was able to move my IRA from my old brokerage house over to Interactive Brokers [IB] last April, we left my wife's rather small IRA at the old brokerage for a while longer. Now that the latest semi-annual dividends from the various international investments they had her in have been received, we've also moved her IRA out of the old place and, this time, into a Wells Fargo Advisors IRA, where she receives 100 free trades per year. This should be plenty to allow me to manage and grow her account going forward.

When my wife's positions finally made it over to Wells, she was left with a number of stocks that I didn't feel met our goals of investing in Dividend Growth [DG] stocks in order to aggressively build her portfolio in terms of number of

Since the last time I reported on what I would be buying to add to my portfolio, the elections have been held and the market has reacted the way I thought it would given the outcome. Also in that time, enough dividends have accumulated that I am once again able to make a modest purchase of some stock to either bolster an existing position in my IRA's portfolio, or attempt to initiate a new position in my portfolio in my efforts to get my IRA up to a total of 50 positions.

As it turns out, with what I currently hold, the middle of November is a real gold mine of dividend payments. On either November 14th or 15th, I will receive dividends from the following companies:

• Alliance Resource Partners, L.P. (ARLP) - 7.750% yield, Quarterly
• BreitBurn Energy Partners, L.P. (BBEP) - 10.268% yield, Quarterly
• Crescent Point Energy Corporation

The passage of time can be a wonderful thing, especially when it comes to dividends. The more time that passes, the more dividends roll in from one's investments (assuming one is invested in dividend-paying stocks, which I am in my IRA, exclusively). Since I last wrote about what I would be adding to my IRA's portfolio, a sufficient amount of dividends have accumulated that I felt it was time to make a decision or two and put that cash to work. This I did last week, but due to unforeseen circumstances, I am just now able to write about it and report back to you, Dear Readers.

Recently, I've been concentrating on adding to my existing position in Prospect Capital Corporation (PSEC), trying to bring the allocation of it as a percentage of my total portfolio up to what I've termed "parity", the percentage that each of the 28

When I last wrote about which stocks I would be buying next as October unfolded, I only expected to be adding to one position due to the somewhat small stash of cash that I expected to have by this time. However, once again circumstances have allowed me to alter the makeup of my portfolio slightly, providing me with a bit more cash than I had anticipated I would have at this point in the current month.

What? Yet More Cash To Work With?

Initially I thought that I would only have enough cash to work with so that I would be able to double up on my position in Prospect Capital Corporation (PSEC). This was the result of dividends that hit my account on October 15th, as well as some incremental contributions to my IRA that were the result of prudent household budgeting and fortuitous timing.

Back in August of this year I wrote a four part series of articles about how I was going to transfer money out of a mutual fund that I had been exclusively invested in with my 401k into a number of Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). I wrapped up Part 4 with the intent to report back once I had accumulated enough payroll withholdings to purchase the last ETF that I had selected, iShares High Dividend Equity Fund (HDV).

Well, time marches inexorably onwards, and as of my last paycheck I had withheld enough money that I could make a suitable purchase of HDV in my 401k, one that was within a few dollars of the other two ETFs I had previously purchased, iShares FTSE NAREIT Mortgage Plus Capped Index Fund (REM) and Utilities Select Sector SPDR (XLU). The fourth bucket into which I'm automatically investing a