[CA renter]

Personally, I would always opt for a price reduction vs a seller’s credit because you will otherwise be paying property taxes for this credit. The only reason to request a credit instead of a price reduction of the same amount is if you don’t have enough financial resources after the down payment, closing costs, etc. to do the work and still have some wiggle room.

Depends on how much you’re talking about, but in some cases, the amounts can be substantial, and you’ll be paying taxes on that amount (plus 2% a year, compounded) for as long as you own the home.

[CA renter]

Seriously, you should go for it. Do you have any nursery experience, or at least a “green thumb”?

[CA renter]

[quote=flyer]It still amazes me that only around 5% of the US population have a sustained net worth of over a million or more–which is really the “bottom
line”–regardless of age–or how you got there.[/quote]

I’m not at all surprised, unfortunately. Most people, even in the upper-middle class, are living paycheck to paycheck. IMO, this is because previous generations have had family or traditional pensions to rely on, so they didn’t have to save up so much money for their latter years…and their offspring are just carrying on their family traditions. Also, people have been led to believe that the future will always be brighter…that incomes and asset prices always rise, and that they will be the beneficiaries of these trends. Even other Piggs are hoping for this, as noted above.

And you have to remember that most people today are not nearly lucky enough to belong to unions which have benefited so many people — like your family and mine — over the decades . Even union members today are seeing much lower overall benefits than people who were retiring 10+ years ago. And both of us have benefited from having family resources in addition to union benefits. Many others have not had this opportunity. We have to acknowledge the role of luck and timing in our good fortunes; many/most others are not in the same boat. For that, we need to be more compassionate and we need to work hard every day to improve their outcomes, as well. That’s what I’m always fighting for.

Admittedly, I’m a long-term deflationist, and I think that we are in for a rude awakening. We need to reverse the trends that have brought us to this point (reforming taxes and trade agreements would be a good start). Keeping interest rates so low is not helping at all. We need people to spend more because their wages are rising, not because debt is expanding.

[CA renter]

[quote=zk][quote=CA renter]

Way too easy.[/quote]

Yeah, I agree. But it’s kind of how we do things, if you think about it. I’ve always wondered why attempted murder carried so much less of a penalty than murder. Your aim is bad and that somehow makes your penalty less? I don’t understand that. If you’re out there trying to kill innocent people, you should be in prison forever, whether you succeed or not.[/quote]

Was thinking some more about this last night and thought that she could easily have had not only a rape/sodomy, but also a murder on her hands. Either the person who answered her ad could have murdered the victim, OR the victim (or someone else in the house) might have had a gun or been strong/trained enough to kill the guy who came in to rape her. If it were me, and this person came in to brutally rape me or my kids, there would have been a murder of one sort of another, guaranteed.

Anything less than prison is totally unacceptable.

[CA renter]

Awesome job, flu!

Personally, I would report both the dealership and the smaller shop to the B.A.R. Even though it was a long time ago, if people don’t report it, nothing will be done. At least it’s worth a shot.

https://www.dca.ca.gov/webapps/bar/complaints.php

FWIW, I always ask them to save the parts (especially the expensive parts) that were replaced and have the mechanic return them to me. As someone else noted, you can put a small mark on it to make sure it’s your part that was replaced.

[CA renter]

[quote=spdrun]Not doing as much as you think — only have a couple so far.

Honestly, my goal is to at least be able to sit and not have to lift a G-d damned pinky as far as buying or working (renovating is fine because it’s fun), not to slave away till I’m old, limp-dicked, and crippled.

If I end up making $100k per year from investments, essentially indexed for inflation, what more do I need? I don’t have expensive or refined tastes. I travel more like a student, haven’t bought new electronics in years, and have never spent over $3 grand on a car.

As far as the waistline thing, it’s actually a consequence of lack of time between white collar workers. No time to cook healthy food or buy a good lunch. No time to go for a walk in the park with family after hours. No time to visit a national park on one’s vacation, because they only take a week.

France is looking awfully good, even after recent unfortunate events there.[/quote]

+1, spdrun

[CA renter]

[quote=The-Shoveler]”AND who were one of the last generations to do better than the generation ”

IMO this is going to be proven so wrong I don’t know where to start, except that was almost the exact same thing they were telling us in 1976-9 LOL.

First The millennials are going to inherent at least twice as much from the boomers as the boomers got from their parents LOL.

The USA is in a so much more better state than we were in 1980 it is laughable when I hear people talk about the demise of the U.S.A.

Anyway this is pointless so I give up arguing about this anymore.[/quote]

I sincerely hope you’re right, Shoveler.

[CA renter]

[quote=livinincali][quote=The-Shoveler]”AND who were one of the last generations to do better than the generation ”

IMO this is going to be proven so wrong I don’t know where to start, except that was almost the exact same thing they were telling us in 1976-9 LOL.

First The millennials are going to inherent at least twice as much from the boomers as the boomers got from their parents LOL.

The USA is in a so much more better state than we were in 1980 it is laughable when I hear people talk about the demise of the U.S.A.

Anyway this is pointless so I give up arguing about this anymore.[/quote]

As long as you ignore the liability side of the balance sheet.[/quote]

Exactly.

Still want to hear about the things that will offset these negative trends.

[CA renter]

[quote=spdrun]It’s not much of a challenge to find 6+% cash-on-cash in the US, as long as you don’t let fripperies like paying some parasites 8% of your income for management fees or paying some incompetent to maintain what you can do yourself eat into your bottom line.

If you’re a wimp who can’t handle tools and tenants on his/her own, you shouldn’t be buying rentals.[/quote]

If you’re buying out of state/town, or if you have a very busy schedule which makes it entirely unworkable to do all the maintenance yourself, how does that work?

[CA renter]

[quote=FlyerInHi][quote=CA renter][quote=spdrun]It should stay steady in value, at least (IMHO). People who worked should be allowed to keep their savings, not run on the fucking treadmill like hamsters their whole lives.[/quote]

Agree with this
[/quote]

How does that speak to “idle capital” ?[/quote]

It’s not “idle” if it’s being invested, either directly or indirectly. Even if it’s kept in a savings account, the bank gets to loan out multiples of this money.

Of course, that is (a big, IMO) part of the problem.

[CA renter]

[quote=The-Shoveler]OK sure that might work.

But really I would still want my own car.

Call me a throw back but I like going to Costco, loading the back of the car to the Gills then driving home and hitting the clicker to open the three car an unloading the stuff the 15 steps into the kitchen LOL.

Starting the Bar-B-Q in the yard etc…

I love living in the burb’s LOL.

to each their own, I just don’t like living in a crowded City.
A Honolulu Burb I could take however,[/quote]

Right there with you, Shoveler.

[CA renter]

[quote=harvey][quote=CA renter]You’re naive if you think that speculators don’t control markets. And some of that does involve conspiring with and against other speculators. That is a fact.[/quote]

Of course you have inside knowledge about how the secret economy works.

You read all about it in Rolling Stone magazine.[/quote]

Wrong, once again.

[CA renter]

[quote=flu][quote=svelte]Sentencing:
– 1 year electronic home surveillance
– 5 years probation

http://www.10news.com/news/mother-of-the-year-to-be-sentenced-in-rape-prank

– Pleaded guilty to stalking
– Felony solicitation of rape, solicitation of sodomy, and ID theft charges dropped in return[/quote]

imho she got off easy.[/quote]

Way too easy.

[CA renter]

I have, and made some money with it, but that was after the dot.com crash.

Some people seem to do really well with that strategy, or something close to it.

[CA renter]

[quote=spdrun]It should stay steady in value, at least (IMHO). People who worked should be allowed to keep their savings, not run on the fucking treadmill like hamsters their whole lives.[/quote]

Agree with this.

———–

AN,

I don’t think we’ll see a repeat of the 70s and 80s. Why?

1. We went off the gold standard in 1971.

https://history.state.gov/milestones/1969-1976/nixon-shock

2. The credit market began expanding at all levels.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/TOTALSL/

http://useconomy.about.com/od/usdebtanddeficit/a/National-Debt-by-Year.htm

3. The Baby Boomers — who were the largest population bulge at that time AND who were one of the last generations to do better than the generation before them — began reached peak earning/purchasing years.

http://investing.covestor.com/2014/05/will-retiring-baby-boomers-derail-economy

4. Women entered the workforce en masse. This brought additional purchasing power to many households (but it also increase prices and lowered wages, which has reduced purchasing power over the years…because of this, more women are now leaving the workforce)

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/more-women-are-quitting-the-workforce-2014-10-03

——————————-

All of those things have already pushed prices up, and we are now at a turning point where things are about to reverse (or have already started), IMO.

What do you see that will manage to not only offset these declining trends, but to reverse them altogether and push things back up? Yes, getting more money into the hands of the masses (workers and consumers, especially at the post populous levels) would help.

I sincerely hope that this happens, and I write/call/volunteer to make it happen, but still doubt that we will be able to shift the power back to “the people” anytime in the near future. People are very gradually beginning to wake up, but we have a long, long way to go. Glad to see you are more optimistic about this than I am.

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