Picture supply: Getty Photographs
The concept of retiring early appeals to many individuals. Whether or not it’s financially potential nonetheless, can generally be a really completely different query as to whether it sounds engaging.
As a substitute of working myself, what if I may put my ft up and profit from the exhausting work of employees at FTSE 100 companies like Vodafone and BP?
The reply is, I may. However how? My method can be to construct up passive earnings streams by way of a diversified portfolio of high-quality blue-chip shares.
Let me dig into the main points of how that may work in observe.
Shopping for particular person shares, not the index
The FTSE 100 index at the moment provides a mean yield of three.6%. One choice can be merely shopping for into an index tracker.
However that might expose me to some shares I don’t wish to purchase in any respect and others I believe are overvalued. As a substitute, I might construct my very own portfolio of particular person shares. That would additionally let me earn a yield properly over 3.6% whereas sticking to giant, profitable corporations.
Within the present market I believe a 7% yield, although properly above the FTSE 100 common, ought to be achievable.
How I may purpose to retire early
How a lot passive earnings that generates will depend upon what I make investments. That may range for every particular person. If I needed to focus on £20,000 yearly to retire early, for instance, I may hit that by investing £286,000.
A special method to the identical goal may very well be to start out placing away £1,000 a month. Compounding that at 7% yearly, I should have a £286,000 portfolio in underneath 15 years. I may then use that to generate passive earnings.
That mentioned, dividends are by no means assured. So personally, I might wish to construct in a margin of security between my projected monetary wants and passive earnings. At a decrease common yield, I would want to speculate extra to attain the identical passive earnings as within the illustration above.
Discovering the correct shares to purchase
What kind of FTSE 100 shares may assist me obtain my goal? One that might is Phoenix (LSE: PHNX). I don’t personal this however can be glad to purchase it if I had spare money to speculate.
The corporate shouldn’t be a family identify however a few of its working models are. Principally, it owns various giant insurers, so has a buyer base of round 12m. The truth is, it’s the nation’s largest long-term financial savings and retirement enterprise, administering some £283bn of property.
That may be a profitable enterprise. Phoenix has grown its dividend yearly in recent times and goals to maintain doing so. The 9.4% dividend yield is definitely engaging to me.
One threat to these payouts persevering with at their present degree is a extreme property market downturn. If that occurred, the worth of Phoenix’s mortgage e book may very well be negatively affected, consuming into earnings.
However that’s exactly why I don’t plan to place all my eggs into one basket. I reckon a diversified basket of carefully-chosen FTSE 100 shares may supply me rewarding and, hopefully, pretty resilient passive earnings streams!