Hey guys. So I'm still focusing on building my side business this week, but I also don't want to let my primary goals go either.

Today, I've been getting things set up for taxable investing. Last week, I set up a brokerage account with Vanguard for this very purpose and went through the trouble of transferring some money over only to learn that, for an account the size of mine, they only allow $7 trades for the first 25; after that, they become $20 each. So I decided to use Scottrade in the mean time while my Vanguard + Brokerage add up to more than $50,000. After that point, the trades become $7 each with no limit.

Once that happens, my plan is to consolidate everything over to Vanguard so that both my taxable and non-taxable accounts are there. Whether that will actually happen is up to future me and how much it will cost me. Ideally, it would be nothing since I'd want to hold on to the same stocks and such. Worst case, I can keep trading with Scottrade.

On the other hand, the reason I'd like to keep things with Vanguard is that once you have $500,000 with them, all trades become $2! I'm sure there's something even more amazing out there, but for someone who's as green as I am to stock trading, that seems like a pretty great deal.

And as some of you are probably paying close attention, you'll note that I already have a brokerage account through Chase, but my plan is to also consolidate that. I hate having so many accounts all over the place. I'd rather have everything set up simply so there's less for my simple mind to worry about.

All that being said, my account with Scottrade should be ready for funding this week and I should be ready to get things started with some dividend growth stocks. From what I've read recently, Coca Cola isn't a bad one to start with, so I'll probably go with that and a few other familiars just to get things rolling. I'm only starting with $2500, so I'll probably invest in a handful of stocks in addition to KO (most likely borrowed from the amazing Dividend Growth blogs I follow). I'm still trying to come up with my own vetting process which, admittedly, is also largely borrowed from the blogs I read.

For those of you who I'll be stealing from, please accept it as flattery more than outright theft! I just want to be more like you fine people.

I'll probably update once things are actually set up and I'm ready to start buying, but while we're on the subject...

Any recommendations for my first five or so stocks?

Any links to a checklist I should go over to vet each one before buying?

Any general advice?