S&P downgrade

[allagash]

After the clean out and cleanup, I listed the property for $39K  (way below market value) and within 4 DAYS had it sold to a rehab contractor for $79,000.....We received 17 offers on the property in 4 days.

Jake,

what type of smokin' MLS verbage do you use....to get these properties sold in record time....and to get them bid UP.....like this.....

Thanks,
-Mike

[fdjake]

To be honest.....The PRICE does most of the heavy lifting....I ALWAYS put these properties on the market for super low numbers....I also add....NOT A FORECLOSURE or SHORT SALE....NO BANKS INVOLVED....Property will be sold.

That does it.....Investors are TIRED of dealing with MORONS at banks.  They wait MONTHS just to hear the property they've been bidding on is being RE LISTED. .  THEN they WATCH as the re listed property sells for LESS than their original offer 6 months later.

With my properties they are told on DAY ONE.....Bring your best offer because this property is being sold in exactly 7 days.  I reserve the right to end the sale at anytime and that usually happens when someone steps up with a BIG number and a fast close.
Buyers LOVE knowing they can not only BUY the property in 7 days or less, but they can start working on it in as little as 10 days later because I make SURE my properties have good, clean titles with NO PROBLEMS...

AND.....More importantly.....I leave MONEY on the table for these guys....I could put a BIGGER number on these properties and WAIT for a HOMEOWNER that will pay more than an investor....BUT WHY????  I'm in and OUT of these properties before I ever get a UTILITY BILL!!!

[allagash]

thanks buddy....as usual......

worthy of a printout.

-Mike
btw....have you ever been to this event:
http://www.mainelobsterfestival.com/

[fdjake]

Never been there but I hit this place every summer.

www.thesagamore.com

Beautiful, NOT CHEAP, but worth every penny!  If you go...Be sure and stay in the Historic Hotel (Big white building in picture)....They have cheaper rooms, but you have to take a shuttle to the Historic Hotel for water access, the marina, and restaurants.....Figure about $500- $700/night for the Historic Hotel...But it's worth every penny!

Boat rentals right at the Hotel marina, the chiefs at the restaurants will pack you a lunch for your boat.  We always get a party boat with a tube....We anchor in one of the small coves on Lake George...Fish, swim, go tubing, and just enjoy crystal clear, cool water with 30 feet of visibility.

[allagash]

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/while-everyone-watching-paint-dry-waiting-chairsatan-either-kill-market-or-send-it-soaring

lmfao....

-Mike

[allagash]

Figure about $500- $700/night for the Historic Hotel...But it's worth every penny!

ouch!

will stick to the remote canoeing for the time being....still debating a trip for September.....

We always get a party boat with a tube....

Was out on a SeaRay 30 the other night.....fun watching a 7 year old holding on for dear life....

-Mike

[rookieNYC]

Nasdaq is down %17
DOW is down %17
SPY is down %17....

All this happened in the last 10 days....Blood...

In a way Im very happy that Im pretty much a bystander during this...I made a handful of trades and maybe Im up %2.3 for the 10 days...But the main point of any money manager/investor/trader is capital preservation..The wealth that has been wiped out from investors is staggering...This market downturn is just another stripping of the middle class's equity and future..It bothers me to see the losses because I know there are many people just trying to save and invest..These are the people who typically get hurt the most...

My buddy was over today as I was watching the close of the markets..He is 41,married with 2 daughters...His wife lost her job working for a demolition company when the RE market collapsed..He has a mortgage on a house that is surely upside down..He went on to tell me that the stock market has wiped out all of his savings for the *third* time ..First was 9/11, second time was 2008/2009 collapse, and now...He has $20,000 saved toward his retirement,2 young kids,an upside down overpriced house,a wife that doesnt work and worse,cant...To make matters even worse he has a plumbing/heating/boiler repair business that is dead as a door nail...

And Im sure there many many more far worse off than my friend...All the same I would be petrified if I were him..

[justin0419]

Is this guy selling out of fear on the downturns?  He should have a 20 year horizon.  Couldn't he just wait it out?  Am I wrong to think of this as a buying opportunity when looking long term? 

[fdjake]

I think we are on the brink of a generational change as far as Wall St goes.

Here's why....

Years ago this country used defined BENEFIT pensions as the financial tool used for retirement.  The funds for these pensions came from the companies people worked for (like a 401K match) and the employees. The difference was the employee had no control over what was done with their money.  Those funds were RESTRICTED as to what and how they invested.  Municipal Bonds, Treasuries, some DIVIDEND paying stocks and that was basically it.  VERY BORING STUFF.

The PROBLEMS started when GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS changed and allowed corporations to use the then new 401K tax code laws to provide "retirement funds" for their employees.   WALL ST. Lobbied for DECADES to get their hands on that locked up pensions money via the 401K code.  The BEAUTY of the new 401K law for Wall St was this......

THE CHURN!!!!!!!

In a traditional pension, employees have NO CONTROL....Their money was MANAGED ACTIVELY for them.   In most cases they held stocks in companies for DECADES and held Municipal bonds for the same length of time....NOW.....these people are given a LIST with hundreds of funds and told.....DIVERSIFY!!!
Wall St. LOVES IT......People CHASE returns....They MOVE money in and out of various instruments, Usually at the WORST TIMES.....and the FUNDS get their "fee's" regardless.

We are now entering into the HARVEST PERIOD for the first retirees that had been converted to 401K based retirement systems.  So how did the 401K "fix" work out????

THESE PEOPLE HAVE NO RETIREMENT!!

This was the very argument used to END traditional pensions.....the 401K would FIX everything that was wrong with defined benefit plans....

At some point in the near future the HERD is going to walk away from STOCKS.....There will always be big money in the stock market....But I fear that the day is coming when the average American will have been whip sawed so many times on Wall St. that they'll just walk away.  NO PARTICIPATION.

Watch what happens when the CHILDREN of BUSTED BABY BOOMERS have their parents moving back in with them in retirement years because their 401K has $15,000 in it and they have NO RETIREMENT.
As those parents become BURDENS on their children. while those children are raising children....The complete JOKE Wall St. has become will be made abundantly clear to these people.  And they will RUN AWAY from anything to do with "401K's"

But have no fear.......WALL ST. will come up with a NEW and IMPROVED retirement product that they can screw another generation with.

It's up to YOU people.....YOU...Not a 401K, not WALL ST, not your employer, not the Government.....
YOU control your retirement....and if you think for ONE SECOND that some BULLSH*T 401K is going to do that????

You need to rethink what you're doing......N O W !!!!

REAL ESTATE provides INCOME.....REAL, LONG TERM, REPEATABLE.....I N C O M E.   If the market CRASHES.....People still pay RENT.....Especially SECTION 8 RENT......Real Estate provides MORE leverage than a 401K could ever DREAM of providing.  People KID THEMSELVES when they talk about company matches in their 401K program....MATCHING WHAT????  The LOSSES???   How's 20% of YOUR MONEY plus 80% of someone else's= you have a rent producing property that if it gets WIPED OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH.....Your INSURANCE company will pay to REBUILD it for you....All for about $1000/year and tax deductable....Add in depreciation and other TAX benefits and a REAL STABILE retirement becomes a GUARANTEE...Not some Wall St fairy tale.

WAKE UP people.......YOU control your future....Don't follow the herd....The HERD is walking to the SLAUGHTER HOUSE!!

[rookieNYC]

Justin,
 I think the average investor buys high and sells low..He is also probably like every other novice investor,meaning he buys stock in companies that he likes...Which are probably dogs...Im sure he didnt have a long term plan to dollar cost average through the ups and downs in quality blue chip stocks...Like Warren Buffet says." Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful"...Its tough to do this but it works well..

In all fairness if I didnt shift my wife's 401k and my accounts to and from stock to cash at will Im sure I myself would have substantial losses..Infact I calculated had my wife and I had our portfolio in the equity markets during this meltdown we would have lost about $300,000 the last 10 trading days..Its ugly for any investor involved and while I do agree to invest during the bad times..I cant change my methods and way of thinking..Rule #1 for any money manager...Capital preservation..

I have watched the stock market ruin many people who are hooked into that buy and hold forever mentality..Be careful and know your limits..The reason why I feel this is different this time is simple..I cant rationally give a reason why the market ever went to the recent highs..Hedge Funds control this market...

[fdjake]

Thanks for the insights Rookie....As always, great perspective.

You've been warning people here for MONTHS to stay out of stocks.

[allagash]

REAL ESTATE provides INCOME.....REAL, LONG TERM, REPEATABLE.....I N C O M E.   If the market CRASHES.....People still pay RENT.....Especially SECTION 8 RENT......

Still miss hearing from Mike in Ohio....(Propertymanager).

Last time I spoke with him.....I had sent him a couple of books:

http://www.amazon.com/Section-Bible-Vol-Succeed-Industry/dp/0980175909/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1313068189&sr=8-1


http://www.amazon.com/Section-8-Bible-Michael-McLean/dp/0980175917/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1313068349&sr=8-2

The authors of these books built up a nice little Sec 8 "empire" in the Philly area....pretty good stuff.

Has any one seen the latest stats on SNAP participation rate? Freakin ridiculous....you've got to admit...Mike sure had it right with the Sec 8 direction of this country...

-Mike
btw...it ain't Rossi....he knew better than that...

[allagash]

It's up to YOU people.....YOU...Not a 401K, not WALL ST, not your employer, not the Government.....
YOU control your retirement....and if you think for ONE SECOND that some BULLSH*T 401K is going to do that????

You need to rethink what you're doing......N O W !!!!

REAL ESTATE provides INCOME.....REAL, LONG TERM, REPEATABLE.....I N C O M E.   If the market CRASHES.....People still pay RENT.....Especially SECTION 8 RENT......Real Estate provides MORE leverage than a 401K could ever DREAM of providing.  People KID THEMSELVES when they talk about company matches in their 401K program....MATCHING WHAT????  The LOSSES???   How's 20% of YOUR MONEY plus 80% of someone else's= you have a rent producing property that if it gets WIPED OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH.....Your INSURANCE company will pay to REBUILD it for you....All for about $1000/year and tax deductable....Add in depreciation and other TAX benefits and a REAL STABILE retirement becomes a GUARANTEE...Not some Wall St fairy tale.

WAKE UP people.......YOU control your future....Don't follow the herd....The HERD is walking to the SLAUGHTER HOUSE!!

as usual.....fdjake rules with some of the best advise out there....

-Mike
dido:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TO48Cnl66w&feature=relmfu

[allagash]

Nasdaq is down %17
DOW is down %17
SPY is down %17....

All this happened in the last 10 days....Blood...

Bloodbath audio from last May's flash crash:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jUzigCDavU

-Mike