Very important to know what kind of investor you are. Some of us never find out. I am not much of an investor, either. My early retirement was based far more on being a good saver than being a good investor.
But you don’t HAVE to be have just a single style of investing. You can always put a portion into growth and the rest into a more comfortable style.
As people will say here, the problem with value investing is that in t he end this is based on the discounted value of estimated future returns and predicting is difficult, “especially with regard to the future”.
Dividend growth has the same problem, but is maybe more predictable. Slow growth, higher dividend companies can be o.k., as long as you turn of Seeking Alpha and the constant barrage of warnings that the dividends are not sustainable.
I still own a few companies that pay well covered dividends in the 2%-4% range. There are some that have attractive call options so that the div’s plus calls yield, say, 6%–and the strike price is high enough so that if they get called away you get 10% or more.
But I wouldn’t abandon growth entirely. One passive way (for example in a 401(k) with limited options) is to invest in the cheapest small cap index fund available. I doubt that a small cap growth fund with higher costs would beat a plain small cap index fund.
The first, most important step is to save. Next is to invest savings in a comfortable way. But you know that. Good luck finding your comfort zone. Doing anything well, better than most, takes concentration and practice so maybe keep the growth portfolio on the smaller side and nurture the skills.
KC
