01 · Why this planner
Built for the paycheck, not the price tag
Most investing tools ask one question: what is your portfolio worth? This one asks a better one: what does your portfolio pay you? REITs collect rent from thousands of properties and mail it back to shareholders every month or every quarter, making them one of the most dependable income machines in the market. The BIG REIT Income Plan is built entirely around that paycheck. Whether you start with $1,000 or engineer a full $100,000 portfolio, every number on this site exists to answer the question that matters most — in retirement, in a downturn, on any ordinary Tuesday: how much income did my money actually produce?
02 · How the math works
The price does the driving
Nothing here is assumed — everything is computed. The engine is honest share math: investment ÷ price today = shares bought, then shares × declared dividend = actual income. If Realty Income (O) trades at $61 and you invest $5,000, you own 81.967 shares — and 81.967 shares paying $0.2705 a month puts roughly $266 a year, about $22 a month, into your pocket. Type a new price into any table and the whole plan recalculates instantly: shares, yield, income, and every projection down the 20-year ladder. Your income doesn't come from a percentage in a spreadsheet. It comes from real shares of real companies paying real dividends.
03 · How to use it
A five-minute habit with a twenty-year payoff
Start on the Income Ladder — prices and investments are editable right in the table, and your income updates as you type. Add any REIT in seconds with its ticker, price, dividend, and payment frequency; your plan saves automatically in this browser and never leaves it. Visit the Summary tab to see which of your holdings climbed best over the past month, quarter, and year, dividends included, and tap Log today's prices now and then so the planner builds its own performance history. Then set a monthly income goal and let the progress bar tell you exactly how much more — invested at today's prices — closes the gap.
04 · The long game
Watch small checks become serious income
Dividends taken as cash grow with the payout. Dividends reinvested grow on top of each other — and that difference is where portfolios quietly turn into paychecks. The Income Ladder projects your income at 1, 3, 5, 7, 10, 15, and 20 years as the dividend grows. The $100K Build shows what a full allocation pays in actual dollars. The DRIP Scenario shows the snowball: the same portfolio paying about $5,500 a year today can be paying nearly $18,000 a year twenty years from now. These are planning scenarios, not promises — verify prices, dividend declarations, debt, and taxes before you invest. But a plan you can see is a plan you can follow.
Plan the income. Compound the climb.