It's a scam

First, watch the video.

Then work on becoming unscammed. I'm leaving the corporate slave life soon. 

We are in a housing bubble

But it's not as bubbly as the last one, which is to say there are significant supply and demand issues that make this bubble appear as good 'ol market forces doing what they do. 

Disclaimer: I'm a complete amateur when it comes to the housing market, but I know what I've seen and experienced the past several years, compared that to other reports and observations, and well, I'm confident I'm not horribly wrong.

Unless my financial situation dramatically improves soon, or housing prices approach affordable levels soon, I have given up on buying a house. With respect to wealth creation, I'll focus on investing, saving, and entrepreneurship. Maybe I should buy a house I can barely afford, sell it a couple years later and profit. But that's a bigger gamble than what I do with my other investments, plus hassle & ownership headaches, plus nothing ever goes according to plan. So right now, screw buying and living in a house, I'm not playing that game.

But there is a huge demand for housing:


I think it's a combination of many things: cheap money the last several years, the high and climbing prices stirs up the hornet's nest of speculators and flippers further driving prices, high wood prices and supply chain issues, an explosion of remote workers, inflation, etc.

When supply can't meet demand, prices go up (as they should, and that is not a bubble) and the market balances things out. But it's not balancing out.

The below is for an average-sized single family home (3 bed, 2 bath) in a suburban area in northern Utah (where we had water shortages last summer because there are too many people!):

It's listed for nearly $500k.

This is what you need to make to reasonably afford the average single-family house here (click image to enlarge):

 $110,000 with 10% down, and that is with little existing debt. Welcome to the real estate game; you cannot play! Something that cannot go on forever, will not.

Job-hunting

It sucks. 

And it doesn't help that these days you absolutely have to job-hop every 2 years just to keep your salary at market level, or your employer can and will underpay you. 

The boomers had it easy when companies actually rewarded loyalty. Today, even as employee loyalty is demanded, it is rewarded with significantly lower pay and a boot in your ass the first sign of trouble.

Over the course of your working life, that adds up to a not insignificant sum, without which probably would include many more unhealthy incidents of stress due to not having enough, a lower standard of living, and fewer opportunities for you and your family among others. Being a good provider now necessarily includes job-searching on a regular basis for most Americans and much of the modern world.

With that in mind, you think the job-hunting process would be easier. In some ways it is a little, but in others it is very much not. I could go on, but many of you already know each and every way the job-hunting process horribly sucks and eats away at your soul with every edit to your resume, every tailored cover letter, every bullshit "aptitude" test. And despite all of this, we all know there are many companies who are not actively hiring, they just collect resumes per their SOP. 

There is a massive, overdue opportunity to disrupt the job-board market. Indeed has pretty much a monopoly and they really, really suck at it.

/rant 

Here's a video.

Financial independence: movie day

It's one of those days, like in a questionably competent public school where the teacher is lazy and makes the class watch a plausibly educational movie.

But I think I found some good videos and I do want to share. Enjoy:

And this one gave me a chuckle toward the end:

Financial independence: the hard part

For over a decade, I have increasingly thought about starting my own business. Many nights I just brainstormed ideas, writing things down, trying to think of anything that might work. What was in demand? What was thriving? What things do those thriving businesses need? And what do they need? A lot of what I came up with is probably just meh. I might have a few good ideas; maybe even be several which would be successful with a lot of hard work.

But I was never motivated to follow through because very few seemed like a real winner, or if it was, I was lacking some crucial ingredient.

The hard part for me was simply picking an idea and actioning it, I couldn't decide which idea to make real. The longer I sat failing to start my own business, or even a side-hustle, the more I felt like I let opportunity slip away. And then it finally dawned on me. 

Start something, anything. Make something a reality, even if it is small, and keep it going. The experience alone is worth more than all the ideas you have come up with. If it fails, try something else. If I started something 10, even 5 years ago, I would damn sure be a lot more comfortable starting a new business today. And I'd probably be a lot better at it than I am actually about to be.

There are related idioms which come to mind. In my experience, these have proven to virtually be on par with the immutable laws of nature:

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. A good plan today is better than a perfect one tomorrow. Actions speak louder than words. I'm sure there are many more.

So that is my plan, and probably one of my best pieces of advice: start your own business or side hustle now. The experience of that alone is worth more than 10 years of thinking about it. If it fails, try again--you're still way ahead of most people. Go out and make that money.

In the coming months, I will be making things real. I am starting very small, however, and my first "sale" will hopefully happen within a few weeks. But I am taking real, concrete steps toward owning my own business, and with any luck, financial independence.

I hope the bear is gone

It's been a rough couple of months in cryptocurrency. I just hope things are turning around as they appear to be [knocks on wood]:

Click to enlarge. From coinmarketcap.com

Financial independence: exposition

 I've already spent too much time searching for one video that partly, but meaningfully motivated me to metaphorically get off my ass and do something. I cannot find it. I did find his channel, and it is not for everyone, but check out Bushradical on YouTube. 

Maybe he deleted the video, but he had one where he went on this epic rant about how he could afford to buy land and build cabins. He started with very little and worked (and bought and sold) his way up to owning a lot of land and nice cabins. Mostly by spending well under his means and only buying cheap & used, but reliable stuff that most people wouldn't. If you do find that video, let me know.

Off-grid living isn't for me, at least not for my family, so I'm not going that route anytime soon. Plus I don't want to give up fiber internet and gaming. But the principles behind a lot of his videos can easily be applied to almost anyone. Essentially, spend less than you make, save money, and work towards accumulating wealth (ideally in assets that do not depreciate, and note "work" isn't just your place of employment).

But perhaps the biggest reason I am pursuing financial independence is that I am getting and feeling older. Plus working the daily grind for the man, in jobs that pay little and consistently fail to appreciate your hard and quality work, year after year really wears a person down. I am so sick of that and life would be hell if I had to do that the rest of my life (if you're good at marketing yourself, you might be able to negotiate far better jobs and raises than I--something I was not good at, but am improving upon). The rat race is an adversarial environment, and your compensation is always the least amount they can get away with. That's not a condemnation, that's the nature of commerce--who would want to pay more for something than they have to? Relatedly, I learned a lot of lessons Joshua Fluke talks about from experience, and agree with him on most things with respect to employment: a big one being company loyalty only goes one way.

I could go on, but millions of people feel similar, and I suspect everybody would like to be financially free. So back to the rat race for me, for now at least. Here are some related links that I've been looking at:

https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/

https://blog.cheapism.com/last-minute-retirement-saving

 

https://cryptoonews.com/crypto-staking/

 

https://wellkeptwallet.com/make-50000-passive-income/

Financial independence part 0.5

So I've set some goals recently. Well, they're probably every person's goals, but intensified. I got a late start in life, as in getting a decent job and settling down. While my situation has improved, the future is still not nearly as hopeful as I'd like if things stay the same (pretty much meaning financial independence and retirement before I go crazy from working for cheap jerks). And well, not having enough money is increasingly something I very much do not want (plus being consistently angry, frustrated, and depressed from working).

I should quit, but I'm not that crazy and people depend on me and my income. Thus, I have begun to heavily research other income options, investments, cryptocurrency, side-hustles, anything legal I can do to get that F-you money and live comfortably the rest of my days.

I'll try to provide consistent updates; another one of my goals is to blog almost daily. Right now I'm in phase zero-point-five. Still researching, made some minor investments, and job-hunting (for a temporary income boost, and to leave one cheap company for another--hey, they need consequences for cheapness). 

Tomorrow I'll have something more.

via coinmarketcap.com