$100 a month in five dividend stocks for 30 years: $250,910 reinvesting, $181,445 without

Take five companies from five different sectors that have paid dividends for the past 30 years: Procter & Gamble (consumer staples), Texas Instruments (technology), Medtronic (health care), Aflac (insurance) and Realty Income (a real estate investment trust that pays every month). Put $20 a month into each, $100 in total, at the last close of every month from October 1996 to September 2026. That is 360 contributions and $36,000.

At the October 16, 2026 close, the portfolio was worth $250,910 with every dividend reinvested in more shares, and $181,445 with the dividends kept in cash instead — $143,358 in shares plus $38,087 of dividends that were never put back to work. Reinvesting added $69,465, or 38%.

Where reinvesting mattered most

Realty Income gained the most from reinvesting, because its dividend is high and paid monthly: without reinvesting, $12,295 of its $27,833 is dividends sitting in cash. Medtronic gained the least. Since nothing was rebalanced, the weights drifted with performance — with dividends reinvested, Texas Instruments ended up as 34.9% of the portfolio and Medtronic as 8.0%.

None of the five cut its regular dividend payment between 1997 and 2026. Some calendar years show three or five payments instead of four — or eleven and thirteen instead of twelve for Realty Income — because an ex-dividend date moved from late December to early January, not because a payment was reduced.

The crisis, and the milestones

With dividends reinvested, the portfolio fell 43.5% from its November 2007 peak to February 2009. Even then it was worth more than the money put in, as it was at every month-end of the 30 years, in both versions. Reinvesting, it passed $100,000 in July 2018 and $200,000 in August 2024. Without reinvesting, it passed $100,000 in September 2019 and has not reached $200,000.

The income it pays now

Over the last twelve months the five stocks paid $7,211 in dividends to the reinvesting version — about $600 a month, or 20.0% a year on the $36,000 contributed — and $3,729 to the version that kept its dividends in cash, about $310 a month.

Against the S&P 500

The same $100 a month in the S&P 500 (the SPY ETF) would be worth $243,127 with dividends reinvested and $192,281 without. With reinvesting, the mini portfolio ended 3.2% ahead and was above the index at 354 of the 361 month-ends, though the lead changed hands nine times and the index was ahead from October to December 2025 and again in September 2026. Without reinvesting, the mini portfolio ended behind.

Three corrections to the price data, checked against SEC filings. Procter & Gamble’s June 2002 “dividend” in the price history is the spin-off of Jif and Crisco, one J.M. Smucker share for every 50 P&G shares; it counts in the portfolio value but not as a dividend. A $0.50 Medtronic dividend from September 2018, declared in its 10-Q, was missing and was added. Realty Income’s November 2021 spin-off of Orion Office REIT is reflected in the price history as a 1.032 adjustment.

The figures are before taxes and trading costs, which would lower the result, especially for dividends taxed every year. The five stocks were chosen knowing they had paid dividends for 30 years, which the investor in 1996 could not know. This is a description of what happened, not a forecast and not investment advice.