How to Earn $272 a Month From Realty Income (O) Stock (That's $3,264 Per Year)

Source The Motley Fool

Key Points

  • Realty Income is a respected dividend payer, having made 675 consecutive payments to shareholders.

  • It's been growing its payout, too.

  • 10 stocks we like better than Realty Income ›

If you're seeking dividend income, and a lot of it, take a look at Realty Income (NYSE: O), whose dividend recently yielded a hefty 5.95%.

It's a real estate investment trust (REIT) -- a company that owns lots of real estate, leasing it to tenants. And it's one of the relatively few companies that pays its dividend monthly instead of quarterly. Better still, its dividend is rather dependable -- and you can depend on it to grow over time, too. Its last dividend announcement was its 136th increase since 1994, and its 675th consecutive dividend.

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The Realty Income logo is shown against a red background.

Image source: The Motley Fool.

So, how much income might you generate from Realty Income? Well, let's say that you can buy 1,000 shares. At a recent stock price of about $55 per share, that will cost you about $55,000. Realty Income's latest monthly payout was $0.2715 per share, so your 1,000 shares will kick out about $272 in the next month.

If that doesn't seem like much of a reward for your sizable $55,000 investment, remember that it's a monthly payment. Multiply it by 12 and you're looking at an annual income of around $3,264 -- and, likely, more than that since this is a growing dividend. Indeed, its payout has grown at an average annual rate of 4.1% since its listing on the New York Stock Exchange in 1994. If that $3,264 yearly total grows at just 3% over the coming years, it will become nearly $6,000 in 20 years.

Your next question might be whether you should invest in Realty Income. I would encourage you to consider doing so. (Full disclosure: I'm a shareholder.) It's not likely to be a heady growth stock for you, but it is likely to deliver reliable income for the foreseeable future.

Should you buy stock in Realty Income right now?

Before you buy stock in Realty Income, consider this:

The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the 10 best stocks for investors to buy now… and Realty Income wasn’t one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years.

Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $375,240!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $1,403,292!*

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*Stock Advisor returns as of October 2, 2026.

Selena Maranjian has positions in Realty Income. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Realty Income. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Disclaimer: For information purposes only. Past performance is not indicative of future results.
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