Gold Jumps $40 Today,...Stock Market Loses A Year's Worth Of Earnings Today.

[Badgersmilk]

One thing that may be slipping the reality check here...  My rent is almost exactly HALF what he pays a month for a house in the same quality of neighborhood.

But I'll leave it at that.  I learned years ago with him this arguement is pointless.  The pride of saying "I OWN A HOME" is all that matters.  This is american dam# it!  

[twyacht]

It's about good financial planning, and a bit of control. Sure I want a Barrett, a fat ZO-6 and a boat,....have wanted them for a long while.

My Father gave me a scenario I witnessed first hand many times....

Young married couple, combined make $250,000 a year,...with that, they bought a McMansion in an exclusive neighborhood, he drives an Escalade, she drives a BMW, together they have 10 credit/dept. store/ gas/ etc,.. credit cards,....Oh,...and the kids go to a pricey private school.

They keep up with the "Jones's" and owe on everything.....Their disposable income, at the end of the month, is nothing.....

YET, a couple/person,...who lives modestly, car is older but paid off, credit card debt is nil, or insignificant, and has no other debt, besides a modest mortgage, ACTUALLY LIVES RICHER than the "rich folk"...

I try to adhere to the latter....My car, (and wife's) is paid for, my CC debt is nil. Child support, (for another 1 1/2) and mortgage/utilities is all we pay....

No fancy dept. store cards, or gas cards,....use our debit card,...stay on a budget,...and have some financial control.

I must admit, in a SHTF scenario,...renting is more practical. But my house is on a corner lot and ranges to 500yds. are easily obtained.

 
 
Each one of us, has our own deal,...what works for you, may not work for me,...the point is,...get out of debt, live within your means, (unlike our Gov't),,,,,and keep your stocks up.

[Timothy]

I'm with TW.....I have less debt than most but not nil, (I had a really bad year), but, I understand better than most what spending beyond my means can do!

I have fifteen good years to work, I'll be dept free in two or three with the plan I've devised.  There may be some bumps in the road but I have no choice but to persevere and drive forward!

I would love a few more firearms but I have enough to perform the duties required and will wait for a more suitable time.

I will say this TW, a pedicure isn't too expensive.  I've noticed that you've got some pretty substantial big toes pal!

 

[tombogan03884]

I just couldn't resist posting Nicholson 

TW mentions "we all have our own situation" true, I'm not talking about individuals, there are still laborers who help their kid become a Dr , but its darned rare.
I'm talking about trends for society, and in that BM actually reinforces my point. His parents bought and paid for their own home, plus raised kids, on a third what he earned.
Home ownership, your own land, and house, pretty much was the American dream, there have always been some who couldn't swing it, or city dwellers where the space just does not permit it. the point is that the percentage of those who can't make it has sky rocketed over the last few decades.

[twyacht]

Home ownership, your own land, and house, pretty much was the American dream, there have always been some who couldn't swing it, or city dwellers where the space just does not permit it. the point is that the percentage of those who can't make it has sky rocketed over the last few decades.

+1 Underlying cause, I will attest, is lack of serious commitment to obligations. Back in the day, a handshake, a handwritten napkin contract, a verbal agreement, meant what it meant.

Now,...times are tough, The deal now is, a lot of folks  bought a $185,000 house as a part-time Waffle House Employee, and got laid off, underwriters approved it, and than they walked away, after gutting the house,....or short sales, or foreclosure,...which dragged down the other houses values.

Carter started it,....no really he did,...look it up...Clinton expanded and ran with it, Bush 1&2, ignored it until the end, and Barney Frank said all is well...

Check my post on current foreclosures/ and economic sit. since 09.....

[Sponsor]

[1911 Junkie]

I lost a house under eminent domain. I made out rather well. 

[tombogan03884]

Don't talk about the burger flippers who tried to buy a house through Fanny and Freddy, a lot of those bad loans were to people who put their faith in companies like Enron, Wang, and Lucent.

That only addresses a short term part of the problem. The long term problem is a major decline in economic upward mobility.
When BM's parents bought their house and raised their kids it was still fairly common to spend a career with one company.
My Uncle started as a janitor after school at a Ford dealership, He retired as South East Regional sales manager for their parts division (Delco ? )
In My career I have worked for both large and small companies and the longest I've been with one was 8 years, I worked at T/C a total of 6 years, neither of those companies exist any more, they were victims, not of poor product, or poor management but simply of modern economic realities.
Upward mobility requires a stable economy, it is not possible when you have to keep starting over as "The new guy" every 5 - 10 years.
I read in Monster that it is now common to change careers 3 times during a working lifetime, that type of instability leads to an effective caste system, a stratification of society where the level you start at, if you work hard and do good, is where you'll be when you die. With the general trend of change being downward.
Fortunately the house of cards is beg

[Solus]

I am confused. How is owning your home, even if you have a REASONABLE mortgage stupid? I can understand if you get sucked in with a predatory lender and talked into a mortgage that you couldn't afford. But paying a mortgage on a modest house with payments that you can afford is never a stupid investment. Especially if you consider that (in my area at least) a crappy 2 bedroom apt. costs more to rent than my mortgage. And I live in a pretty nice house.

Also consider this. (a better example) A house on the next street from me is being rented by 3 of my friends. They pay $1900 per month in rent. (combined)  For basically the same house that I have a $1000 a month mortgage on. Plus I have the benefit of owning a little bit more every time I make a payment. So at the end of the day, who is better off?  Best part, there will come a day in about 12 more years that I won't have a mortgage, but they will still have that rent, and dollars to doughnuts it will have gone up by then...

I had a rich uncle-in-law.  Many millions rich.  He talked of a man who really was able to accomplish something...started as a pauper and now was one of the richest men in the country....not my U-I-L, but the man he was talking about.  I asked my U-I-L how the guy did it.  U-I-L said  "He had 10 million to invest and he turned it into a fortune."  Let me know two things....that this U-I-L traveled in different circles than I do, and, second, why I'd never be rich.....I'd stop working at it, satisfied, well before I became a $10 million pauper.

But he did say something that made me think.  

He was talking about owning your own home.  He said "Owning your own home is like taking $250,000 (or the value of your home) and burying it in your back yard."  He would invest the money tied up in the house in what every he was working on and "turn it into" another fortune.  Yes..he considered a loan for a house as wasted potential.  If he could borrow that money, he'd put it to work, making more on it than the interest paid...and he knew how to work that one too.  

Yes, few of us will have the drive or expertise to "turn" cash into a fortune, but his point still stands.  You are burying your cash in your back yard.  

Now it used to be a good investment and likely might become one again....sometime.

[billt]

Certainly this is not the same as the recessions of the 60's, 70's and 80's.  The dynamics are far different.  We actually have people in office running the country who want to crash the system to build some kind of European style utopian government paradise.

Not to mention, look at the idiots graduating from today's public schools, or the current drop out rate compared to what it was 40 years ago. People back then were not void of any and all financial common sense the way they are today. The housing crash never would have happened 40 years ago. Hussein would have never been elected in a 1960's or 70's America. He would not have received 3% of the vote. George McGovern was a flaming liberal in his day, and he was slaughtered by Nixon. JFK would be a right wing conservative in comparison to Hussein. The people who elected idiots like Hussein, Pelosi, and Reid have changed the way they think.

In today's "Generation X", a strong work ethic has been replaced with an attitude of entitlement. THAT in itself is what is destroying this nation, not the liberals they elect. They are simply the product of that thinking. Here is a good example:

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/08/07/blame-game-vitriol-demonstrates-sp-disgust/

Liberal John Kerry blames the Tea Party for the nations recent credit downgrade because they prevented more taxes from being levied, not because the government is spending too much money. That is typical liberal thinking. The problem is there are far too many who believe him! There in lies the problem. A government is a sum of it's people, not the other way around.  Bill T.