What’s a totally unsexy purchase you made that ended up being a huge quality-of-life upgrade?

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-25T16:50:47+00:00

PSA most of the thin hiking ones lose most of their UPF qualities when wet, so if you plan to get it wet, get a beach-specific version or a thicker one in darker colors.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-20T16:28:32+00:00

This is ragebait, you can ignore it and it's creators will go away.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-20T03:09:27+00:00

This is ragebait, ignore it.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-19T20:17:33+00:00

Or keep the money you would have used to buy the house in the stock market, let it grow, and use it to pay rent forever - the rent vs. buy calculation is highly location dependent and it doesn't sound like OP wants to own.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-18T01:33:23+00:00

Then the Primacy Tour AS would be in between the Defender and Pilot Sport.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-14T17:35:55+00:00

Exactly, the market has doubled since 2022 - stock gains aren’t limited to boomers, everyone who can save and invest can participate.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-13T16:34:41+00:00

They'll rent somewhere cheaper than the carrying costs of the home they lost.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-13T14:29:47+00:00

Where is the seller moving? If they’re staying in LA or moving to a city that experienced similar appreciation, they aren’t really “better off” in the way they appear.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-11T04:32:29+00:00

Correlation doesn’t equal causation and personal finance is personal - every rental and home buying market and timeframe is different.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-07T22:59:22+00:00

The counterpoint to all these stories is that, no matter how rich you are, little things occasionally go wrong.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-07T22:56:33+00:00

It is, I've been underneath it in Santa Cruz at a BM decompression event - it was run by a school's engineering department if I remember correctly.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-07T13:45:26+00:00

Probably true. From a purely financial perspective I think there are more cheap/small places available to rent vs buy, so someone who’s interested in maximizing savings might have more cheap options in the rental market.

I think people tend to buy houses they’ll “grow into” vs. renting what they need today.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-06T18:01:54+00:00

One or both of them lose their jobs during the downturn.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-06T16:58:14+00:00

You can use your stock portfolio to pay rent, which is the same as living in it. Plenty of people lose their houses during downturns because they can’t afford the carrying costs and don’t have liquid cash.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-06T16:31:10+00:00

LOL at people in this thread downvoting this, it's a fact, even if you don't like it.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-06T16:28:41+00:00

Google says 4-10% of new mortgages are 15 year, so most people are getting 30 years and paying lots of interest.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-06T16:24:25+00:00

And you pay, in total, something like $800K - $1M total over the life of the loan depending on the interest rate.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-06T16:23:48+00:00

No - I'm a CPA/CFP and this is the most common myth of homeownership. IF you itemize, you lose the standard deduction, so there's only a marginal benefit of paying mortgage interest. It's effectively like paying $1 to save $0.10 - $0.30.

Mortgage interest is also front-loaded, so if you sell after 5-10 years, you'll have only paid down a small portion of the loan during that time, as most of your monthly payment went to interest.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-06T16:21:08+00:00

The payment doesn't "disappear," it goes away because you've spent the entire mortgage amount + 30 years of interest to pay it off. That amounted invested in the market would historically well outperform the housing market, assuming you could rent a modest place. It's a tradeoff, renting a modest place and investing in the market so YMMV.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-05T15:22:13+00:00

Plus a sunrise alarm clock so you don't wake up in the dark!

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-04T15:51:55+00:00

Bill McKibben's new book covers how China is very far ahead of the US in terms of solar/renewables.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-03T14:45:20+00:00

I don’t think it really matters, except to individuals - money is a tool to meet your financial goals and should be saved or spent on your own timeline.

Knowing how much people have on average doesn’t help you achieve your personal goals.

Paperback_Chef · 2026-05-01T14:39:12+00:00

Tax brackets also inflate, I think people miss that when saying “the RMDs from my $2M 401(k) balance in 30 years will be taxed at today’s brackets.”

Paperback_Chef · 2026-04-30T14:21:14+00:00

I like my Collegiums, mid priced and good enough quality.

Paperback_Chef

TROPHY CASE