The importance of dividends to investors can’t be understated. This example from the US market says it all:
Over the last 100 years the S&P 500 rose 273-fold, but adjusted for dividends it rose 18,520-fold.
Dividends are a massive component of long-term investing results. If you’re interested in income-producing, dividend-paying shares, you may be interested in the payout on offer from one of the UK’s leading homebuilders.
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The house builders have fallen heavily recently on fears of what a “Brexit” could do to the London housing market. There have also been concerns over the scarcer availability of labour for housebuilders that may result from a Brexit.
However, according to bookmakers Betfair, the odds of a Brexit are three to one. “Staying in” remains the strong favourite by the odds, and while an upset could occur, the bookmakers rarely get it wrong.
This could be good news for the house builders, and might represent an opportunity — especially as UK housing fundamentals remain strongly in favour of further building. Demand is still outstripping supply by a distance, in the south-east especially.
If you’re looking for income, most of the house builders have already paid their bumper special dividend payouts for the year. According to data from DividendMax, there is one exception — and that is Taylor Wimpey (LSE: TW), which is paying two dividends between now and 2 June.
On 7 April they go ex-dividend for 1.18p and on 2 June they go ex for 9.22p, for a total of 10.4 pence. With the shares trading at 172 pence this means a total dividend yield of 6% from the maintenance dividend (as Taylor Wimpey like to call it) and the special dividend.
Taylor Wimpey has net cash of £223m and in its recent financial results said that 2016 had started strongly, so the outlook seems bright. They built 7.5% more homes last year than in the previous year and the average selling price was 8% higher. This resulted in a 34% increase in pre-tax profits to just shy of £604 million, which is fuelling these healthy dividend payments.
(And if you are really worried about Brexit, you could always hedge your position by having a punt on Betfair to treble your money… just kidding!)
