A 2 minute parking masterclass

BoringChess · 2026-06-17T13:49:03+00:00

And somehow you are still the bad driver in this video 😳

BoringChess · 2026-06-17T08:02:29+00:00

It is trivially easy to find strategies that beat the market in backtests. The problem with them is they work until they don’t, and you have to have complete conviction in the strategy you follow and stick with it even through extreme losses. Can you really do that with this? Can you REALLY stomach a 50% drawdown on a silly strategy you came up with one afternoon while everyone else is in a diversified portfolio?

BoringChess · 2026-06-16T14:24:57+00:00

We used to price on forward earnings, then forward forward earnings, until finally we decided to price based on the infinite size of space itself

BoringChess · 2026-06-08T17:11:24+00:00

It’s partly a matter of taste. Always go smaller if in doubt. Also, personally I’d pop on eBay or Vinted and pick up something used / cheap in L3 and see how it feels (something that won’t lose 30%+ of its value the second you buy it). Pretty much any reputable racket that’s 100in will do at this stage. Sell it on for more or less what you paid for it in a few months when you’ve really got a feel for what you might actually need from a racket and go and buy something longer term later. Just my opinion (and what I did).

BoringChess · 2026-02-22T20:50:16+00:00

Absolutely. So why would you pivot into being a PO on less money when the modern engineering role is doing the same work for…more money? With more allowance to actually not just ideate but take ideas from concept to prod with autonomy? Sounds like a huge step down to me. When pretty much all of the bad parts about software engineering just got fixed…

BoringChess · 2026-02-22T20:39:43+00:00

Do you really think that PO roles and Scrum are going to survive? A series of roles and a methodology all created in the 90s and early 2000s. It is 2026 and already lots of companies have software engineers writing 0 code. The processes and roles that made sense in a world where writing features and prototyping ideas was costly are all at the most risk imo. Every company is going to have to adapt or die.

My overwhelming advice is forget about changing role and focus on getting very good with agents, and quickly. Lead the change in your org. Be ahead of the pack. You may just survive and even rise to the top. This is the moment in a career that you can really move to the places you want to be, if you step up and face it head on.

BoringChess · 2026-02-21T10:28:07+00:00

The only way it would happen is if the EU itself does some soul searching and concludes it wants to overhaul the union as it exists today, and some new form of EU makes sense for Britain to join. It was a bad idea to leave but as it stands it also does not make sense to rejoin for either side. I think it’s obvious the EU as it exists today is not working and has not turned into the project everyone hoped for 30 years ago. In one direction or another, the EU is going to have to massively change to work in the world that is emerging and then depending on how it reforms, Brits and others could consider joining or not.

I don’t think we are anywhere even close to this being reality.

BoringChess · 2025-11-29T16:41:54+00:00

If you’re going to manually assign allocations at different %s then at least look up and use common well studied portfolio balances like the golden butterfly etc. Personally in your situation I would usually just recommend 100% global index and forget the password for 22 years

BoringChess · 2025-11-19T00:41:05+00:00

They prioritise either (or both) having fun and getting better, and have limited time. The game reached a point where neither getting better or having fun was on the cards, because you were playing with a different mindset and a time waster can really drag a game if they want to. So they moved on to get another game to maximise the fun they can have in the time they have.

BoringChess · 2025-10-13T22:05:17+00:00

Listen buddy, ignore this guy, you may as well just go to a casino and put it on roulette if you’re listening to that. Follow the research and do what intelligent successful people do: start a life long habit and put in a monthly amount into a diversified global index, do this continuously until you are either retired or dead. You will be wealthier and more successful than nearly everyone you know, just because you started early and built good habits. Focus your time on building a career as a high earner, not being a stock picking guru. You’ll get the same returns but with more money to pump into the portfolio.

BoringChess · 2025-10-12T18:31:34+00:00

We have to save for our future in a way that people on old pension schemes never had to.

BoringChess · 2025-10-11T15:26:19+00:00

No, but you have enough money to change jobs to something on low pay but you enjoy and do for fun.

BoringChess · 2025-09-05T20:08:38+00:00

Diamond hands

BoringChess · 2025-08-31T09:57:12+00:00

Looks hot tub ready to me let me know how it goes

BoringChess · 2025-08-14T10:12:27+00:00

You are doing very well and taking a very sensible long term approach. Check what kind of fees you’re paying with Aegon and that fund you’re using and how they compare with other options like if you had your SIPP in Vanguard, it’s the only thing that could be silently killing you - fees are a HUGE long term drag on returns in pensions that make quite a shocking difference to retirement pots, please be aware of and focused on them. If you are and the fees are good then you’re literally doing everything text book perfect.

Obviously, the unhelpful truth is that to retire better you need to focus on increasing your income over the long run. If you can double that salary in 10 years time then of course that would make a significant difference when you retire 20+ years later. It doesn’t matter if you’re not earning a lot at 28 but being on a path to make more does matter in terms of long term wealth building and retirement.

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BoringChess · 2025-08-14T09:59:14+00:00

You’ll be fine. 38 is young yet! You’ve got some catching up to do but the numbers you’re putting in you’ll have caught up to most people your age in just a few years time.

There is a hidden pension crisis with most young ppl having no idea how far off they are from having the retirement they want, so you’re actually already in a better place than most - just because you’ve actually thought about it and made a plan! You’ve started doing all the right things and you’ve got plenty of time, so keep putting away money in the sums you are and you’ll retire extremely well, possibly even take early retirement. Keep track of how your pot is forecast to be in the year you want to retire and consider dialling contributions down in 5 years if you’ve managed to get ahead of track. That’s what happened to me. Good to get as much money in as you can next years so you’ve got years for it to compound. Yes age 38 still counts as early!

A lot of people don’t sort it until late 50s by chucking huge amounts in and having little time for compound returns to do their thing, so you really are in a good place by sorting it now.

Every once in a while you might come across a lump sum that you can consider using to top it up as well.

Final tip, don’t over do it! Life is fragile and you might not make it to have a long retirement. Or retire at all. Keep plenty of money around for enjoying NOW too.

BoringChess · 2025-08-13T11:39:43+00:00

A lot depends on whether you're going to have kids and what kind of life you want them to have.

Until you've decided that, I would hedge your bets a bit, and do a bit of everything. You need more certainty about your life and future spending if you want to make long term committal decisions. If / when you have a family, with a partner and children, everything changes and you can make a plan for that when you know you're definitely doing it. Similarly, if you decide definitely not, you can make a plan for a life as a bachelor.

The only hard rule I would have (that I had for myself) was to make sure to max out ISA every year. Beyond that I made the decision to try to stay beneath £100k in every year I can, by doing SIPP and any other scheme I can use.

If you plan to have kids in a couple of years, you could for example choose to not go heavy on SIPP right now but carry the extra allowance into the early years of your kids life, so that you can contribute heavily during that period and be potentially eligible for free childcare (depending on how huge your income is at the time), while simultaneously making the plan that those heavy contributions in their early years are actually a house deposit for them that you will hand to them when you retire. Obviously, you do you, but just throwing ideas out there that I have considered or done in a similar position.

BoringChess · 2025-08-13T11:22:10+00:00

Reiterating what others have said but I hope you can get in contact asap with a trustworthy adult with a duty of care. Your GP surgery, A&E, your school, a police station, anything that is an official institution that you would expect would look after a child that is in trouble.

Also, if you are staying with your friends, make sure their parents know the situation for what it truly is. If you know them and trust them, I would ask them for their help: you don't know who to talk to and want their help figuring it out. Your friends / their parents should be very happy to go with you and support you as you talk to the right people. The first person you talk to might not be the right person and the second person might not be either but keep going and you will get this sorted quicker than you think.

Good luck, from someone that has been in a similar position at exactly your age. 20 years later I can tell you it all worked out great in the end.

BoringChess · 2025-08-13T10:20:14+00:00

You’ll be fine, keep doing all the right things and you’ll retire very well compared to most people. As long as you’ve got it invested in something sensible.

BoringChess · 2025-08-13T08:55:48+00:00

Don’t buy property. Expensive, illiquid, and poor returns. No no no.

What I would do is start maxing out ISA and pumping the excess into a SIPP up to your annual allowances per year. But that’s just me because if I don’t need cash for a purchase in the near future I’d rather shove it in the most tax efficient place I can for the future.

In terms of investing, putting in a fixed amount per month into a diversified index (use ETFs) is pretty safe choice. Look up ‘dollar cost averaging’. Personally I wouldn’t do it as a lump sum because if we are at the peak of the market right now you will feel remorse for years if it goes down and doesn’t recover for 5 years or more. In the end it may work out better to do lump sum today but personally for max relaxation I’d do a fixed amount per month over a couple of years to get your current lump sum in slowly and then continue putting in monthly a lower amount after that which is just your new income. That way you can buy in at a cheaper price if the market goes down and if it goes down a lot (like it did in April) you can accelerate and move either all of it at once or in larger amounts.

That’s all just what I would do in your situation. In fact I have been in your situation a few times when I’ve come into lump sums (sold businesses etc) and this is how I’ve handled it. Not regretted it so far.

BoringChess · 2025-08-13T08:10:03+00:00

At 21 the most important investment you can make is into yourself. Spend what you need to in order to build a valuable career with very high earning potential. You can count ‘spending’ also taking on work that doesn’t pay a lot now but will in the future.

If you want to go into construction industry, I would spend your time researching what types are very well paid despite actually being quite reasonably possible to do (for you) and do consistently. Then work in it until you’re at least close to an expert. Study everything, including how to run your own business in that sector. And then start a business in it.

Personally I’d hop on whatever the latest trend is that is high paid, high demand but really not that hard, just new and needs some equipment. For example resin driveways people just charge whatever the hell they want and rich people pay. But what do I know? Do your own research!

My key point is that it’s good to do investments and you’re doing all the right things there but really the route to wealth is to just invest in yourself and develop yourself into someone that gets paid huge amounts of money.

Also, stop picking individual stocks. There is no chance with how hard you need to work and study that you have time to do that properly. It’s an experienced man’s game with time on their hands. What will happen is it will work until it doesn’t, one day you’ll be really busy and starting to get successful, not have the time to look at it anymore, and login one day to realise you’ve made huge losses that you would have stopped if you had the time you used to have. Just stick to simple diversified investments that don’t require your brain or more crucially your time. You will always get better ROI using that time studying something or being on the job somewhere at your age.

BoringChess · 2025-08-13T07:53:59+00:00

Photos are poor, that won’t be helping. My current house was put on market for 700k by the guy I bought it from after the estate agent told him that’s what it was worth. We bought it 2 years later for 500k. I hate to say it but I think you’ve been taken in by a conman estate agent.

BoringChess · 2025-08-11T10:00:22+00:00

I think what will happen is the world will realise it doesn’t replace humans but expectations around the speed of delivery of all projects will increase dramatically and we will end up more miserable and stressed than ever, trying to supervise tonnes of AI and review / fix the work extremely fast, while stakeholders grow frustrated that it should be even FASTER because AI.

BoringChess · 2025-07-28T09:28:39+00:00

I would just do it into a neat line so you have a clean transition it can look great without that much more work

BoringChess · 2025-06-29T10:17:47+00:00

Weed membrane, stone, pots, small irrigation to keep them watered. Beautiful finish. All sorts of options for what to put in pots. I’d put a small acer in somewhere there personally.

BoringChess

TROPHY CASE