ARMOR Residential REIT (ARR) posted $156.3 million in quarterly net income and offers an impressive annual dividend yield of 17.34%.
Dynex Capital (DX) generated $150.388 million in net income in the third quarter of 2025, and its annual dividend yield of 15.12% is paid monthly.
Including the TSMY, SNOY, and FBY ETFs can significantly improve your passive income generating potential.
If you’re thinking about retiring or know someone who is, there are three quick questions that make many Americans realize they may retire earlier than expected. take 5 minutes to learn more here
Listen up, dividend beaters! With as little as $2,500 per stock or exchange-traded fund (ETF), it’s entirely possible to generate $3,500 of passive income per year.
To sweeten the deal, we can develop a master plan that will allow you to pay you monthly and maybe even weekly. The trick is to look at the realm of real estate, where stocks can pay surprisingly high returns.
You can then round out your portfolio with a handful of YieldMax ETFs, known for their sizable and frequent cash distributions to shareholders. You’ll have to be able to tolerate some risk, but that’s the price of entry if you want to follow this plan to earn $3,500 per year.
In short, the idea is to invest $2,500 in five stocks or ETFs, for a total of $12,500. To earn $3,500 per year in passive income, your average annual return will need to be at least $3,500/$12,500 or 28%. With that in mind, here comes the first stock pick.
To get started, you could invest $2,500 in ARMOR Residential REIT (NYSE:ARR), a real estate investment trust (REIT) focused on residential mortgage-backed securities. Many REITs pay solid yields, but ARMOR Residential REIT will write you a check (or at least deposit a dividend payment into your account) every month.
A crucial question is whether ARMOR Residential REIT provides enough capital to fund its dividends. It turns out that ARMOR Residential REIT reported GAAP net income available to common shareholders of $156.3 million for the third quarter of 2025. So, it appears that the company is currently in an adequate financial position.
Additionally, ARMOR Residential REIT pays a cash dividend every month and provides a forward annual dividend yield of 17.34%. This falls short of our goal of achieving an average annual return of 28%, but we’re just getting started. Very soon, we will be adding some mega performance funds to increase your purchasing power.
In the future, you could invest another $2,500 in shares of Dinex Capital (NYSE:DX). Like ARMOR Residential REIT, Dynex Capital is a REIT that specializes in residential real estate assets. Additionally, Dynex Capital distributes its dividends monthly.
Is Dynex Capital on a firm enough financial footing to continue paying dividends? A quick look confirms Dynex Capital’s ability to generate profits, as the company generated $150,388 million in net income in the third quarter of 2025.
While Dynex Capital’s annual forward dividend yield of 15.12% is generous, it still doesn’t lift our average annual yield to 28%. However, we will reach our goal after presenting several YieldMax funds for your consideration.
Getting to the heart of the matter, you can buy $2,500 in three different YieldMax ETFs to significantly increase your passive earnings. Just be sure to monitor the share prices of these three funds, as they can be volatile.
The first of today’s featured funds is the YieldMax TSM Option Income Strategy ETF (NYSEARCA:TSMY). This and the other two ETFs on this list pay weekly cash distributions, so you won’t even need to wait a full month to start seeing passive income.
Using sophisticated options trading strategies, possibly including writing covered calls and establishing synthetic put and call positions, the TSMY ETF derives income indirectly from Semiconductor manufacturing in Taiwan (NYSE: TSM) shares.
Since Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing YieldMax is a world-class semiconductor producer, the TSM Option Income Strategy ETF seems like a good option for passive income seekers. Additionally, the YieldMax TSM Option Income Strategy ETF’s 37.33% annual distribution rate will get you closer to earning $3,500 in total annual payments.
Now we can add a share of $2,500 in the YieldMax SNOW Option Income Strategy ETF (NYSEARCA:SNOY). This is another YieldMax fund that uses options trading strategies to extract weekly income.
The SNOY ETF is based on the price movements of Snowflake (NYSE:SNOW) and as you may know, Snowflake is a renowned software developer. Right now, the YieldMax SNOW Option Income Strategy ETF announces a whopping distribution rate of 51.79%.
Continuing with the large-cap tech theme, the last $2,500 can be allocated to the YieldMax META Option Income Strategy ETF (NYSEARCA:FBY). It is encouraging to know that the FBY ETF trades stock options Metaplatforms (NASDAQ:META), an ultra-profitable technology titan.
If you are wondering how much income you will get from the YieldMax META Option Income Strategy ETF, it has an annual distribution rate of 37.78%. And, like the other YieldMax funds mentioned here, FBY will distribute cash payouts each week.
He now has $2500 positions of the same size in ARR, DX, TSMY, SNOY and FBY. To reiterate, we aim for a minimum average annual return of 28%. This would give you $3,500 in annual passive income from a total investment of $12,500.
Adding the returns and then dividing by five, we get an average return of 31.87%. That’s great news, as you can now start your path to $3,500 in anticipated annual income with just five stock/ETF positions.
You might think retirement is about picking the best stocks or ETFs, but you’d be wrong. Even large investments can be a drawback during retirement. The difference comes down to something simple: accumulation versus distribution. The difference is causing millions of people to reconsider their plans.
The good news? After answering three quick questions, many Americans find they can retire earlier than expected. If you are thinking about retiring or know someone who is, take 5 minutes to learn more here.
