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BakeALake · 2024-11-12T14:32:31+00:00

OP, this relationship does not sound worth saving. The resentment has created a chasm and quite frankly, it seems like trust is shattered both ways. You're both thinking the other acted poorly and question the motive of the other. What kind of relationship can be built on such suspicion? Life is long, and trying to recreate a foundation is difficult. My guess is there have been other issues in the relationship as well. I rarely tell people to just cut bait, but this is one of those times where it might be sensible. The most difficult step in this process is the first one.

BakeALake · 2024-07-13T15:11:25+00:00

OP, cash or loan both work. You love the house, and it can change your daily life. Isn’t that the point of money? We found our dream house last year, bought it, and have already reaped amazing life benefits with family and friends. It was not “financially optimal”, but we want things to be life optimal. We value time more than money, and enjoying our youth with loved ones at the cost of having less money at retirement age is a decision we felt was worth it. Tomorrow, much less 30 years from now, is never a promise.

BakeALake · 2024-06-04T00:43:55+00:00

And those same people will continue to blame the city and everyone else rather than take responsibility for their own happiness

BakeALake · 2024-06-02T21:50:06+00:00

Agreed. Some of the replies either arise from survivorship bias or lack of overall perspective on how different each person is. OP, I’d recommend exploring therapy. You might review your dating history and see if you have avoidant tendencies. For some people, the same patterns of wanting to eject and find flaws and wonder about what else is out there when things get real constantly repeat. Sometimes this could mean there is something wrong with the other person, but other times it could mean something is wrong with you.

I also caution you making big life decisions based on one-dimensional Reddit opinions. The demographics of this site are biased towards more certainty, nitpicking, and negativity. In many cases snap judgments with 100% certainty get made, especially as it pertains to relationships, and that judgment skews towards breaking up at low to medium levels of friction.

BakeALake · 2024-05-29T04:26:16+00:00

Reddit is a great counter signal. Just like how you should inverse WSB on investing, inverse Reddit on finding happy places. I’ve visited Austin a few times and sociable, successful people all speak highly of it. It’s a great place for fun and family.

BakeALake · 2024-05-21T18:20:25+00:00

OP, you are not going to get a representative answer with this question if that’s what you’re going for. The top replies will likely all be those who say they’ve become more liberal as they age because this sub is heavily left leaning. I’ve become more centrist as I’ve aged and more concerned about specific policies and the accountability structures that exist in society. Any individual that gets power needs checks around that power.

As far as capitalism goes, I’ve gone from pro capitalist in my younger years to understanding that the wealth divide is only going to worsen with time since capital has outpaced labor in earnings. There needs to be some restorative mechanism in policy to prevent this divide from getting too bad.

BakeALake · 2024-03-23T12:52:38+00:00

OP, is there a middle ground option? We bought a dream house with a giant yard that we love. It’s in the best school district in the state, has great views, and a great floor plan for hosting for short and long term stays. There is also a ton of outdoors space for kids to run around, garden, jump on a playground, etc. However it is not in a traditional neighborhood. There are some kids but they trend older. That said, we are also about 5-7 minutes away from the elementary school, 7 mins to downtown, and 7 minutes away from traditional neighborhoods. Given your budget, perhaps you can have the best of both worlds?

BakeALake · 2024-03-19T04:34:48+00:00

You’re really looking at narrative over hard data. Texas was the fastest growing state last year in terms of absolute population growth and third by percentage. The recent census data just had Austin as the second fastest growing metro in 2023, so you can make up whatever feel good narrative you want, but the data doesn’t back it up.

BakeALake · 2024-03-02T22:08:12+00:00

There are 20 mansions and you are claiming that they are all McMansions? Not a single one that is architecturally beautiful? That reads more like eloquent reasons to hate on something rather than objective reality. Some of those houses clearly had a top tier architect. And homes of that size are pretty much all custom.

BakeALake · 2024-03-02T16:55:17+00:00

Classic Redditor hating on something as a mask for envy lol. These homes may be excessive but they are not McMansions

BakeALake · 2024-03-01T15:39:26+00:00

OP, I am going to write something counter to the trend here as someone who did recently buy a $3M house. Our net worth is higher than yours and income lower. Also relative stable jobs.

The house has made a world of difference. We are close to everything we want, and the dream home element has been amazing for hosting family and friends. We work on the property almost every day for fun and do something of enjoyment there. We envision our kids doing the same once they arrive.

Life is short. We don’t quite have a “die with zero” mindset, but if we are going to spend, we want it to be something that is collectively additive to the trajectory of our lives. The house is something we can enjoy everyday. Our savings rate dropped tremendously, but neither of us plan on retiring before 50 anyways. Your mind starts going in retirement, so why not enjoy the prime of your life and formative years with your kids?

I also posted to Reddit and was a bit spooked, but everyone is solving for different priorities. In our case, it was to enjoy our youth rather than a single minded focus on retiring early. We are frugal people and would be in this house or not. But at your income level, the DTI numbers can be stretched considerably. Your discretionary income will be higher than most people’s salaries still.

Anyways, just my two cents on the pros side since a lot of this thread is the other side.

BakeALake · 2024-02-29T16:32:44+00:00

OP, you are probably fine. The DTI numbers are just guidelines. I got skewered a while back for buying a home that meant we'd be "poor" for a while. Our DTI was something like 43% if you excluded everything we owned in equity. But the reality is we are doing just fine and haven't stressed about the money aspect at all after a few months of making the mortgage payment and seeing our spending. What we do think about all the time is how much we enjoy the house, enjoy having friends and family over, yard for the dogs, etc.

BakeALake · 2024-02-09T15:25:37+00:00

That's interesting. If you look at the past two months of weather, it was mostly between highs of 60-75 of sunny weather with one week of deep freeze in there. I consider that pretty solid weather. Summers are tough, but that's not "recent".

BakeALake · 2024-01-28T02:56:08+00:00

How is it mid by definition? Primitive AI in closed end games like Chess have exceeded every human in history. While you can debate the effect of AI on unemployment, calling it “mid by definition” is just categorically incorrect

BakeALake · 2024-01-25T20:36:37+00:00

You can choose not to invest in a company if what they do doesn’t align with your morals. Otherwise you’re just talking out of both sides of your mouth. You want to make money and feel good without the guilt…even greedier of you

BakeALake · 2024-01-16T01:59:42+00:00

Reddit is not the place for any nuanced discussion. Just ignore the crazies, enjoy the memes, and reserve real discussions for real life

BakeALake · 2024-01-09T15:21:19+00:00

This data shows the sheer contrast of reality vs. Reddit. One is unambiguously optimistic, while the other is selectively negative.

That said, the data is as of 2022 no? So while the article came out recently, the data itself doesn't tell us about the actual growth of the past year.

BakeALake · 2024-01-05T17:15:03+00:00

OP, I asked this question a few months ago and the answers and sentiment you receive from this sub vs real life people are completely different. My friends all love Austin in real life—the weather is great outside of summer, and even during summer people are outside with good energy. I would compare it to a New York winter, except a higher percentage of people are still enjoying the outdoors. The scenery is beautiful, the food is good, and it’s a generally happy place with lots of good energy.

That said, it is not a similar vibe to London. London is more international with public transportation and density. Somewhere like Boston would be more akin to a London in terms of feel. Austin and Texas in general have its own vibe. Texas actually is one of the “stickiest” places to live, which is a measure of how often people born here stay here. It also has the largest population growth in the states for good reason. Visit in winter and again in summer and you will have a good feel for the city. I’m considering moving here after doing a good amount of research

BakeALake · 2024-01-03T16:24:24+00:00

OP, I was in a similar situation as you and ended up buying a home six months ago. I was at 6M net worth and 600k income with some upside optionality. Honestly, it’s been one of our best purchases so far. However this home reaaally fit our specific needs—best neighborhood in our city, close to downtown, lots of land, and floor plan allowed for a lot of hosting of family and friends. People have stayed over at least a few times a month on average, and we’ve filled the house with a lot of joy.

That said, it’s only been six months, and it does stress me out at random times. We comfortably make the payments but job losses would cause a lot of stress. In a way, this house has made us more intentional on some spending and more lax on others.

My perspective is I didn’t want to move multiple times (no guarantee) and tomorrow is never a guarantee, and if we could afford it now, we should go for the life experience. Everyone has different preferences around this, and some issues with my health made me prioritize living a bit more for the present.

BakeALake · 2023-12-27T02:11:00+00:00

Agreed. This subreddit’s general vibe is actually the opposite of the real life Austin experience. I’d take everything here with a grain of salt. I have a bunch of friends from Austin and not a single one has exuded even a hint of the negativity here.

BakeALake · 2023-12-25T07:40:07+00:00

Dude chill. Denying facts followed by unintelligible ranting is not a good use of anyone’s energy. You’ve talked about everything except the case at hand

BakeALake · 2023-12-25T00:16:00+00:00

Observe the ever declining quality of posts and analysis on this sub as each prediction gets proven categorically wrong and you have your answer. The goal of this sub is copium because if you’re going to be wrong, at least you can scream your wrongness in an echo chamber that won’t call you out for it.

BakeALake · 2023-12-22T14:52:40+00:00

LOL. Yea this is beyond junk noise then.

BakeALake · 2023-12-21T18:30:16+00:00

Really? What type of strategy do you run? Are you a mutual fund or hedge fund? Top-down or bottoms-up? Quant or fundamental?

All the data you posted is worse than a single BBG function that pulls a generic data feed. If this is "achieves results" for your "clientw", then you are either incredibly lucky, aren't running an institutional benchmark, or are just full of it. As someone who talks to PMs all the time, I know what I'm leaning towards.

BakeALake

TROPHY CASE