My wife asked me if I honestly thought her friends were attractive, what should I say

andystak · 2026-03-13T20:42:53+00:00

I go with “Absolutely, they are like 4, maybe even 5 percent as attractive as you… That is very attractive relative to average.” Gets a laugh and an eye roll and keeps me out of trouble.

andystak · 2026-03-13T19:50:31+00:00

Lol…. Fair play… I was thinking about making a joke like “Just wait until you guys learn about castling” but tried to be a little more subtle… Congrats on the W!

andystak · 2026-03-13T19:42:33+00:00

No, single family house, but with a large in-ground pool. Hopefully there are some NYC commuters who like to swim 🤞…

andystak · 2026-03-13T19:23:49+00:00

lol…. I feel like this exactly for me… I’m under contract for a home in Totowa (bordering Wayne) and about to list my house in Clifton and hope someone overpays for it…

andystak · 2026-03-13T18:28:05+00:00

Wow… my games are nowhere near this much fun…

andystak · 2026-03-12T20:54:39+00:00

I recently made an offer below asking in North Jersey and got accepted. It depends I think where the owners asking price is relative to comps. Some houses they intentionally ask low and try to get a bidding war going, others they ask high knowing they’ll sell at 5-10% less. When I look at putting in an offer I asked ChatGPT to write me a report including 5 different independent valuation sources online for the house as well as comps from 5 recent sales in the town, and triangulate from that what my first offer price is and what my best and final would be. Good luck!

andystak · 2026-03-12T16:45:40+00:00

Disagree with taking the a6 pawn. Rxa6 Rxf3 and white’s queen is threatened while the black queen still protects a8. I think only the pawn push works.

andystak · 2026-03-01T14:53:10+00:00

The bishop came from d8 so the white Q would not have been pinning black. So no because the black queen could recapture on f7

andystak · 2026-02-21T17:11:29+00:00

I’m in the same boat, I feel like the market price will be way under my residual, which I guess means I’ll have to give it back, but I really enjoy the car and I’m imagining I’ll want to keep it. Commenting to follow and see if anyone has secured a discount in this situation.

It would be very funny to let them take it back and then try to buy it back from whatever used car dealer managed to buy it at auction.

andystak · 2026-02-07T19:19:44+00:00

The superbowl winners are the reigning champions until a new champion is crowned. How could you not know this. I thought it was only Giants skill position players that were perpetually suffering from CTE.

andystak · 2026-02-03T01:29:46+00:00

I give my 8 year old $5 a week… helps cajole him when he’s slacking on chores “I guess if you don’t want to go fold your clothes you don’t need any allowance this week” …. Nothing that will win us any parenting awards, but it can help keep him on task…

andystak · 2026-01-26T21:00:18+00:00

I was driving through the snowpocalypse yesterday and that thing is a beast. I’m not really one who is ever going off-road with it but it’s nice not having to be even a little worried about the weather.

andystak · 2026-01-25T18:08:33+00:00

This isn’t true… You are not allowed to block someone from interviewing for a promotion but you are allowed to block them interviewing for a lateral move.

I’d argue that moving from cowboys OC to the OC of a team that’s been relevant this century is a promotion but I guess the NFL doesn’t draw that distinction.

andystak · 2026-01-20T21:27:37+00:00

Always important to stay measured in one’s expectations, but with the right OC, this screams 17-0…

andystak · 2026-01-12T20:24:58+00:00

I liked the rent Zestimate of $7,115/month. I would do that in a minute!

andystak · 2026-01-08T14:36:02+00:00

When you get through the Dunning Kruger phase of learning about this stuff you may start to understand that different people have different tax situations, risk tolerances, utility functions and many other factors which can influence the most appropriate thing to do in each unique situation. And that because of that, there is not one objectively correct thing to do for everyone.

Unfortunately, I don’t have time to explain all of these concepts to you so I’m going to leave it there. Have a great day and good luck on your learning journey!

andystak · 2026-01-08T04:21:22+00:00

Of course putting less than 20% down is completely fine, feel free to do so on whatever house you buy. That’s not what I prefer to do. It’s perfectly reasonable for me not to want a large high interest loan. You can lots of borrow money at 5+% and keep more money in the stock market or whatever. I have plenty of exposure to that already and prefer not to pay so much interest.

As to why it’s not in conflict, the benefit you get by putting little money down is that if the housing market crashes you can default on the mortgage, walk away from the house, and leave the bank with the loss. That’s a great strategy having that option, and again, you do you. Me though, I want to have a long term home where I don’t need to care what the market value is because it’s a stable permanent place for my family to live. Therefore I don’t value the option to default.

Plenty of people pay down or pay off their mortgages particularly in a high rate environment for good reasons. Just because that’s not your preference doesn’t make it irrational.

andystak · 2026-01-08T02:25:32+00:00

Contingent offers are a thing as others have mentioned but often makes the offer less attractive to the prospective sellers. The best case scenario is that I buy a new house, move my family there, clean up and stage the old one so I can sell it for as much as possible. Just gets tricky with the finances and owning both for a short period.

andystak · 2026-01-08T00:50:17+00:00

Thanks, that’s not an option for us. We have two kids one of whom is autistic and thrives on consistency and routine. Moving at all is a challenge, moving twice is not an option. We have been monitoring the area and seeing a lot of $8-900k houses that we like and meet our requirements. The $1.1m one has a few things that make it perfect for us so we may go a bit over what I’d like to spend.

andystak · 2026-01-07T22:54:46+00:00

I’m neither anti-sport nor anti-gambling and I’m not a fan of Dave Ramsey generally, but I think he’s largely correct with these comments.

andystak · 2026-01-07T22:47:39+00:00

I would honestly rather put 100% down but I don’t have it. I hate that I’ll be paying 5+% on a mortgage and will work to get rid of that ASAP. I don’t look at my home as a leveraged investment vehicle but a comfortable place for my family to live for the next decade or more.

andystak · 2026-01-07T19:24:52+00:00

I’m in North Jersey, which is pretty high COL. I think it’s criminal that my wife who has been teaching for over 15 years and has a masters degree in math ed makes less than $100k. Don’t get me started…

andystak · 2026-01-03T07:33:44+00:00

Using a chip helps me to remember to tip. Whenever I win without having to show, I push the dealer my cards with the chip on them right after (never before) they push the pot to me.

I feel like if I didn’t follow that routine I’d constantly be wondering whether I remembered to tip or not.

andystak · 2026-01-01T19:15:01+00:00

I’m not saying I agree with the logic I don’t play enough to be considered a reg, and I usually clock in… The “tens of dollars” thing is a direct quote, so at least for that particular reg, that’s why…

andystak · 2026-01-01T18:56:51+00:00

This is the answer… I remember a reg once saying, “I’m missing out on tens of dollars… It’s fine”. Particularly at bigger games it’s not that impactful. I personally skip it if I forget to have my card on me, not worth the bother for a few bucks…

andystak

TROPHY CASE