Investments

[RogerB]

I do real estate. Best gain and very slight change of loss/
There's no way I'll touch gold. It's not an investment. It's just cold cash.

What are you investing in what type of real estate assets, markets and what is your strategy/financing?
I’m in real estate pretty heavy my self but seeing a correction across 200 U.S. markets is making me look elsewhere , have been expecting this correction for some time so kind of like a fire sale as well.

 

[TyroGyro]

Makes sense if some of the predictions I heard of it hitting $35mill a coin are true in ~10 years

Just 1% of that "prediction" would make me very happy, and enable me to buy another couple of the latest gyros (among many other things).

So, it seems an asymmetric bet...

DYOR

 

[RogerB]

Just 1% of that "prediction" would make me very happy, and enable me to buy another couple of the latest gyros (among many other things).

So, it seems an asymmetric bet...

DYOR

Why sell to buy a gyro when you can take a loan against your asset and keep your asset

 

[TyroGyro]

Why buy when you can take a loan against your asset and keep your asset

If you're talking about BTC as the asset, the track record for loans isn't great. "Not your keys, etc"

BTC is VOLATILE. No denying it.

Risks with Loans: Loss of your BTC as the collateral, via a margin-call, plus the IRS (in the UK, HMRC) also coming to tax your gains on the "disposal" [the loss of your BTC collateral]. Owwwwwch !!!!

One day BTC loans will be the norm for the super-rich, but they are too risky ATM, IMHO.

I HODL my BTC until that day. Patience....

 

[Aaron R]

Has anyone used the online FDIC insured savings accounts ? Some offer 5.45% but, I’m curious about customer service issues.

I opened an account with UFB Direct earlier this year. It has been paying 5.25%. I just transfer $ to and from my local credit union account as needed. The credit union rates for savings are quite low, even for CDs IIRC. UFB Direct has been seamless so far. It's all online, so I haven't needed customer service. If I ever do, it's probably a bad day.

Anyone buying Bitcoin? Expectations? Why/why not?

I bought some. It went down. I bought more. It went down more. I had to stomach paper losses of over 50% before it returned. It eventually did, and I was able to sell it for a decent profit. However I'm not inclined to do that again. It was actually shares in a bitcoin ETF called BITO, bought and sold using a brokerage account.

 

[WaspAir]

Sounds like a doomsday survival strategy, what exactly are you anticipating?
You’d basically need to become a general store or trading post to make anything liquid.

I'm not anticipating any doomsday, and not preparing for one. I was just trying to imagine canned goods and ammo, as some suggested, and it sounds awfully bulky snd heavy. It occurs to me that pharmaceuticals are compact and light, and people really need them. If networks all go down in a Mad Max world, bit coin will cease to be, but people will still need their pills. If I were to script a post-apocalyptic movie, somebody would be trading little pills for food and shelter.

 

[TyroGyro]

I'm not anticipating any doomsday, and not preparing for one. I was just trying to imagine canned goods and ammo, as some suggested, and it sounds awfully bulky snd heavy. It occurs to me that pharmaceuticals are compact and light, and people really need them. If networks all go down in a Mad Max world, bit coin will cease to be, but people will still need their pills. If I were to script a post-apocalyptic movie, somebody would be trading little pills for food and shelter.

The internet was designed to survive WW3.

BTC exists on the internet.

It seems, therefore, that BTC will be one of the last things to go.
USA, Russia, China, Europe taken out? No problem.
The blockchain will still exist somewhere... New Zealand? Namibia? Jersey? Singapore? Outer Space?

 

[WaspAir]

Riiiiiight.
I can just see making that argument to purchase a ham sandwich in a region with no electricity.

 

[TyroGyro]

Riiiiiight.
I can just see making that argument to purchase a ham sandwich in a region with no electricity.

In that case, you'll probably be dead already, or about to die.

Ham Sandwiches, or Bitcoin for that matter, will be the least of your problems.

 

[WaspAir]

I thought that was the scenario you were describing with "USA, Russia, China, Europe, taken out" but bitcoin surviving.

 

[TyroGyro]

I thought that was the scenario you were describing with "USA, Russia, China, Europe, taken out" but bitcoin surviving.

So, be ahead of the curve, and rather than think that you might win a battle against "The Walking Dead" in your own country, post-Apocalypse - using guns and tins of baked-beans - plan now your escape to a more congenial place.

I have - primarily for tax reasons - explored alternative places, coincidentally less likely to be targets in the final conflict...

 

[RogerB]

So, be ahead of the curve, and rather than think that you might win a battle against "The Walking Dead" in your own country, post-Apocalypse - using guns and tins of baked-beans - plan now your escape to a more congenial place.

I have - primarily for tax reasons - explored alternative places, coincidentally less likely to be targets in the final conflict...

What are your top three places?

 

[Sv.grainne]

If the shit really hits the fan it won't matter!

 

[TyroGyro]

What are your top three places?

Cyprus
Greek Islands
Perhaps parts of Italy
Perhaps Portugal (Algarve)
Perhaps the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands

Being tax-friendly is more of a realistic priority for me than being apocalypse-proof, although I think these places may also fare better if the SHTF....

 

[RogerB]

Cyprus
Greek Islands
Perhaps parts of Italy
Perhaps Portugal (Algarve)
Perhaps the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands

Being tax-friendly is more of a realistic priority for me than being apocalypse-proof, although I think these places may also fare better if the SHTF....

Hmmm… Greek islands maybe Sardinia I could see that as long as you could grow your own food raise your own animals but why not further away from the epicenters of chaos like South America ( I know a number of people that moved to Costa Rica including a few gyro guys) or Eastern Europe ( I considered Serbia or monte negro personally)? To do something like what you’re describing you’d need to have land and a place to call home now not when shtf.

 

[RogerB]

The thing for me with investing is on one hand investing if things stay normal (high growth and medium growth index funds or mutual funds) and on the other if they dont / as a hedge (gold/silver and btc) then there’s the extreme like a Natural or man made EMP event —> grid down short or long term scenarios, virus or banking system disruption short or long term and preparing for those types of scenarios …. If you actually look at a lot of the risks out there and try to plan to make sure your family is financially secure it makes for some difficult choices.

This is a nice summary of risks we all face :

 

[SpyderMike]

Odd, but being in some mutual funds for the last 20 years have worked just fine for us during banking meltdowns and viruses and wars....we just don't try to time the market and we let experts in the field do what they do. Never hit the low level alarm...

 

[Sv.grainne]

Odd, but being in some mutual funds for the last 20 years have worked just fine for us during banking meltdowns and viruses and wars....we just don't try to time the market and we let experts in the field do what they do. Never hit the low level alarm...

Same here!

 

[j4flyer]

Mutual funds are a good long term investment. However, you need to be prepared to ride out the storms. I had one mutual fund drop to 10% of value over a three year period. After that it grew very well.
What I didn’t like during that period is to see my funds adjusted constantly by my fund manager. He was rolling the stocks to gain commission on the sales. I understand he had bills too but, come on. I had a real issue with his actions.
I called him (mistake 1 not doing it in writing) and told him I wanted my funds placed in a moderate grow vs high grow portfolio. He said he would make the change. I continued to watch my investments plummet. When it hit the 10% level I received a letter stating my advisor was no longer with the company and I was assigned a new manager.
When the new manager contacted me he suggested I move out of aggressive growth and into a moderate growth portfolio. I explained I had instructed my former advisor months prior to take that action. I was told only one stock was moved out of the hundreds represented by the mutual fund. I had my new advisor register a complaint with the fund.
I then made a complaint with the SEC. After a month of investigation I received the results. The SEC, in a letter, told me that since my former manager changed one stock, he met the burden of their requirements and no further action could be taken. The fund sent a duplicate letter.
After suffering the paper loss, I worked with my new manager (still my friend). He advised me to go all in while everything was down. I did what he suggested and the fund eventually rebounded.
What did I learn ? Use a fee based manager. The fee based manager takes his or her money once. They don’t shuffle your portfolio to make additional money in lean times.
Lesson 2
Buy when the market is down. It will recover. If you think the market will stay tanked and won’t recover, we will have more problems than stock growth !

 

[SpyderMike]

Hmmm. I don't use a manager. I don't adjust my funds.