Well, you can both sell puts and buy stock in whatever proportion seems right to you. Also, if the stock drifts up, you can buy back the puts at a profit and buy more stock. I really don't use puts for the purpose of building a long term position though, sometimes it can happen by chance, rather than design, though. I use the puts to generate cash flow during the interminable periods where the stock truly represents dead money. No one wants to miss a big announcement, but in this market, an announcement really has to be extraordinary to push a stock up materially and then keep it there.