Many times the creative wellspring runs a tad dry and I go for the low-hanging fruit which, often, is a gun post. And, evidence to the contrary notwithstanding, I really don’t like doing more than one or two gun posts a week because, as I’ve said before, I don’t think of this as a gun blog but rather a preparedness blog that throws in some gunstuff as it relates to preparedness.
So other than spending stupid amounts of money on boomtoys, whats going on in my brain these days in regards to preparedness?
Well, probably the most front-of-mind thing is the ‘housing crisis’ that seems to dominate the news cycle. The news shows us homeless encampments everywhere, gives us tales of bold squatters ‘seizing’ houses, and stories of people who make what most normal people would think of as ‘very nice incomes’ who somehow still can’t afford a home. Part of me wonders if this isn’t stage-setting for some sort of .gov legislation. After all, it is an election year.
My take on it comes down to this: the non-mentally ill homeless are homeless because they just don’t want to stop huffing spraypaint and get a real job. Squatters need to be dragged out of the house by baseball-bat-wielding family members of the homeowner and given percussive therapy to remind them what happens when you steal. If you make $150,000 a year and cant afford a home, you have a spending problem not an income problem…stop trading up to a new car every three years, stop eating out, stop having kids, and stop looking for homes in areas you can’t afford.
Unfortunately common-sense solutions don’t count for much in this world of abdicated responsibility and imagined oppression.
Survivalism isn’t about changing the world, its about surviving the world. I can’t change the direction things are heading…not really. I can’t repair the hull, but I can make sure I have a lifejacket and warm clothes on as I pre-stage my lifeboat. Watching the news pushes me more and more into believing that the end of the world won’t be as dramatic as something we see in the movies but rather a slow descent into a world of Soviet-style oppression and bleakness, usually in the name of ‘equality’, ‘justice’, or ‘democracy’.
When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion–when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing–when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors–when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you–when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice–you may know that your society is doomed.
I won’t tell you who wrote that because, as a learned, literate, and well-read man of the world, you should know.
I’m very much of the opinion that the classic survivalist scenarios are becoming statistically less likely when compared to some politically-driven economically-based episode of grave outcomes. Guns and ammo are certainly going to be a factor in pulling through that sort of situation, but probably not nearly as much as food and supplies, and definitely not as much as carrying no debt and having a good stash of cash and ‘cash like instruments’ (cough*metals*cough).
Guns are a very important part of survivalism, but I’m starting to think that their utility, while undeniable, may take a back seat to a pantry full of food and a buried mason jar full of krugerrands. Only time will tell, I suppose, but as I’ve said…I’ve need $50 bills far more often than I’ve needed .50 BMG. But, having both makes me feel safer.
I will give Ayn Rand the credit she deserves for that quote. Nobody seems to be talking about one of the main reasons for this housing issue. All of those illegal border jumpers need a place to live and our tax dollars are renting them homes anywhere they desire. Millions of housing units are being occupied by the criminal invaders intent on destroying our way of life. See the Cloward / Pivens strategy for the plan on replacing our Republic with a Totalitarian form of rule.
i would normally agree but tptb seem intent on popping off thermonuclear war. then again nobody can ever be really prepared for that one. i just pray every night that putin’s missiles are accurate and catch tptb in the open.
The “tptb” openly state that they will reduce the worlds population by about 80%.
Not as openly,seems someone was able to bypass the Sherriffs office 24hr security cameras and blow up the Georgia Guidestones that stated their goals,top men are investigating
Remember a decade ago when deagel.com said the 2025 USA population would be 70% less?
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/04/deagel-population-forecast-of-nearly-70-percent-fewer-americans-by-2025-is-starting-to-look-prophetic/
Maybe they had a plan back then?
yeah, i remember back then that “overpopulation, omg !” was the crisis of the moment. then we zipped right on past the 7 billion red line to something like 9 billion now.
I try to explain to the gen zers that this isn’t Capitalism, it’s the Aristocracy of Pull, it’s Oligarchy.
Inexpensive firearms will trade at an unbelievable premium to otherwise unarmed people when ‘the wheels come off’.
Yup. But so will a lot of other things too.
The avg Joe isnt prepped in any substantial way nor do they have a reasonable savings account to handle emergencies. I work for a well established, large coin shop that has been part of the small business community in our area for over 4 decades. Just like McDonalds…many have been served. Long story short, for the last 4 yrs customers having been lining up to sell their coins, gold and silver scrap jewelry, ect. Most are middle to upper class customers. due to their lifestyles, its safe to assume most arent preppers or savers.
People now want to start with homes that even 20 years ago you could not buy until you were in your 50s.
A neighbour’s Son and his Girlfriend of two weeks went looking to buy a home a few years ago and only looked at four bed houses. In the end they rented a one bed flat and my neighbour paid the rent. I still have no idea what he does with his money as he has a very well paid job.
I’m in the UK and on the news (Channel 4) a few years ago their was a story about a London Fireman who lived in Wales as in his words “I can not afford to buy in London” it turned out he had 20 acres and had Horses but wanted to be paid the kind of money that ment he could do this in London.
A relation near me bought his 3b 2ba house in the 1990s for 200k usd on a 50k usd salary. That same job now starts at 70k and 2b 1ba houses in our area start at 400k. The local radio was telling people to move where houses are cheap, like Detroit, where 200k gets you a 3b 2ba. I don’t know how the UK is, but in the us it’s not great.
Absolutely a Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous mindset,everyone is Entitled to a 10,000sf mansion without working. Am coming up on my first anniversary of escaping the peoples paradise of Illinois. Due to circumstances I found a fixer upper in a not great part of Indiana for about 6 months of income and with my disabled veteran status I will pay no property taxes unless valuation dramatically increases (2x-3x). Not a forever type of property but a real starter home as it used to be understood. Plus side is a lot more freedom but the racist and communists in local gov have a lot less to work with.
First off this So called housing crisis doesn’t exist. Yet. Thry need to build these places to house all the new Democrats old stupid is bringing in. Commiefornia is buildin a complex that will feature $600,000 homes to house migrants. It will very plush. My idiot Governor is starting a program to build housing. Again. With the number of people leaving Michigan there isn’t any need. Unless they turn this place into a penal colony.
Commiefornia is totally broke. A month ago they revealed they needed $55 billion in immediate need to pay some bills. The comptroller of the currency revealed the state is flat broke. I think if an individual did this it would be called fraud. But the Marxist occupied states can do what they want. Till people start to lose their businesses because of cash flow.
I’m hoping to be able to leave my current state. Go some place where intelligent beings actually exist and run things. Which is where I’m at at the moment.
“My take on it comes down to this: the non-mentally ill homeless are homeless because they just don’t want to stop huffing spraypaint and get a real job. Squatters need to be dragged out of the house by baseball-bat-wielding family members of the homeowner and given percussive therapy to remind them what happens when you steal. If you make $150,000 a year and cant afford a home, you have a spending problem not an income problem…stop trading up to a new car every three years, stop eating out, stop having kids, and stop looking for homes in areas you can’t afford.”
VERY WELL PUT. Our society has become accustomed to moving into Dream Home while driving your Dream Car as quickly as possible. No years of building up reserves of $$$, sacrificing Fun Now for Security Later. Eating Out is a contest of do you want to eat a $20 burger meal or just buy the $40 steak dinner because you had a hard day. If you and your family of three didn’t spend at least $100 for your supper, you are slumming !
Well you need to go back even further. When Jimma Carter gutted the funding for mental health. The solution was to close the doors and kick the patients to the curb. They tried to blame the bag ladies on Reagan. Nope. Those were Mr Peanuts screw up.
Today’s politicians are extremely stupid. Having been educated in Ivy League Shit holes that pass of higher education. Today that means smoking crack and passing courses because of your DEI score. DEI btw means Didn’t Earn It.
All you need to do is listen to C-Span to see the morning speeches. It’s nothing more an idiot fest.
Our colleges started being infiltrated by Communists in the 30s. Later those idiots became the teachers of the doctrine they had been bathed in for years. It got worse from there. In the 60s the SDS and Weather Underground were front groups for the KBG who funded their anti war and anti-American activities. The children and grandchildren of the hippies are now entering Congress. Like AOC who has a degree in economics but hasnt a clue how the economy is supposed to work. So she is just another rich brat running her mouth like Joe Biden used to do when he was pals with the racists and Segregationists in the Senate. Men like James Eastland and Robert Sheets Byrd. He is still a racist and you can add antisemite to the list of his political sins. As bad as things are now. It’s going to get worse. Warnings are being issued by Republican members of Congress that with 2 million military age men from all over the world terrorist attacks will start at anytime. Red Dawn style attacks like in Is real on Oct 7, 2023. The Biden Regime has no clue where these people are. Or what they are doing. But attempts to penetrate US military bases is up. One ended not to long ago when a spec ops guy shot and killed a Chechnian National in his house. Those are the idiots Putin likes to use because they make war like few groups can. They absolutely vile. So. Do what we do best. Get ready.
Oh. Almost forgot. Southern Commiefornia is the new entry point for the Chinese military age border jumpers. I’m sure Governor Hair gel is just tingling all over.
You are wrong,it was Ronnie Raygun who started the trend of closing public facilities in Cali, btw didn’t you have someone by the name Romney who really screwed up things in Mich? BTW my family hails from GR and started leaving in ’70’s
Don’t forget that many areas, mostly urban but far from all, have made permitting and approvals to build so expensive and time consuming that the value of existing homes is pushed up and there is no such thing as “affordable housing” anymore.
Studies claim the average new house in the US spends $90,000 in permitting and approvals before ground is broken.
Look at the price difference between jurisdictions that complicate building and those that don’t – for example, new houses in the Houston area start around $300k – in NYC, LA, etc they are at least double that and in some areas triple to quadruple!
Speaking of preparedness, how about a review of the Civil Defense manuals you got recently, Would like your opinion of them. They are pretty pricey .
I know, I know…I’ve just had so little time for actual reading these days. Mabe this weekend I can get some of it under my belt.
Housing:
I’d recommend everyone saying there isn’t a problem look at what the average typical home in their area is. Ditto a pretty typical apartment. Also look at what wages are.
The gap between wages and housing costs has been growing for years and has exploded since Covid.
Boomers played life on easy mode where they could buy a nice house on a job they got with a HS education. Kids today are playing on hard mode.
Im a professional with an advanced degree and a solid job. I can’t afford to buy the type of house my mom bought in 2000 while working as a secretary.
It doesn’t really matter about price. Nobody can afford it anyway. Bidenomics is the watch word for FDRs New Deal part 2. Which is really the RAW deal. I see no new homes being built in my part of Michigan. Old homes are being acquired as the longtime owners pass away. Then they slap some paint on and a new roof and jam a for sale sign out front.
I do think people are getting sick of hearing about all the tax free bennies these border jumpers are getting. Debit cards with anywhere between 10 and 12 thousand dollars on them. Free health care. Free housing. All the while crime is taking off like on of Elon Musks Space X rockets. Just this week illegals have raped and killed to young girls. And a mother of 5 children. That blood is on Biden’s hands. Him and that round headed asshole Myorkas. And it’s getting worse. And thanks to Biden Airlines it’s no longer just a southern border issue. New York, Philly, Chicago. And dozens of other blue cities run by the CPUSA/DNC.
Rome fell from within. And the cause was to much regulation and taxation. And open borders with unfettered immigration. Sound familiar.
Anybody wanna make any bets as to whether old Joey makes it through the 90 minute debate without down loading into his diaper. He is up to three layers now.
I wish I had a debit card with 12 grand on it!!! lol I know it’s a typo but still would be nice.
It’s not just the communist Democrats keeping our borders open, the communist Republicans also voted for this treason when they supported funding for Ukraine. Two wings on the same corrupt bird.
You can thank the Turtle and insane stupid shit referred to as the Uniparty. Folks in Kentucky need to send his ass to the showers. We would still control the Seante if it wasn’t for that useless bastard. He has cost us control of the upper chamber 3 times in the last 18 year’s. He needs to go and go now.
Learn a trade and make some real money. I showed my neighbor how to weld when she was in high school. Now she makes $300-$400K working for oil outfits. Another neighbor cleans drains and makes more fiat than most MDs.
I won’t argue over what this one particular gal makes welding but welders definitely don’t consistently make 300k plus. That’s an utter fantasy.
Workin oil patches is real moneybit not stable,in-out collect a check. Lived with welders build bridge for Mississippi river,make half that but expense free with weekends home,10 year plus program.
Studies claim the average new house in the US spends $90,000 in permitting and approvals before ground is broken.
— I think you might have added a zero to that. The economics don’t work for one third to be pure overhead. A rough guide might be 1/3 for the lot, 1/3 for the house, 1/3 for profit. In Houston IDK what “average” is but my neighborhood (50 years old, 3/2 and 4/2 single story homes 10 miles from downtown) houses are selling from the low 400s to mid 500s depending on upgrades. They were built as “move up” houses for families as they added kids and made more money.
It’s possible to buy new construction for less than that, with a bit more drive to downtown, and it’s also possible to spend double or triple that within a couple of miles of me.
One thing that sux rox is that developers are trying to meet the need to house all the newcomers to Texas so a LOT of mega sized multi family is going up, and any modest single family home on a 1 acre lot will sell for a million because they can build 16 homes on an acre (technically 22 iirc but that’s super crowded and gets into duplexes or quadplexes.)
You can still buy a modest home outside of town for $200k, sometimes even less. And if you don’t care about schools or security, there are plenty of “changing” neighborhoods where you can still get in cheap. I just looked on zillow and only 2 miles from me, there are crapshacks going for $130K to $280k. That is in a neighborhood that WILL gentrify and has 7000 sqft lots. There were 9 available in that range.
No way a $300k selling price would support $90K in sunk costs.
n
In regard to the quote… yes I do. And boomers did get a good deal (if they saved). My wife and I bought a nice home in a good neighborhood for $79,900 (30 plus years ago) where homes are now selling for $400,000 plus. I also remember my mother telling us she grew up eating lard sandwiches. I learned from her that you needed to be frugal to survive. I fear America is to soft now to survive. So it goes.
“If you make $150,000 a year and can’t afford a home, you have a spending problem not an income problem…stop trading up to a new car every three years, stop eating out, stop having kids, and stop looking for homes in areas you can’t afford.”
You may wish to revise and amend your remarks.
For arguments’ sake, let’s say I make $150K/yr and can’t afford a home.
Even though my newest car is now five years old, the one before that was 12 years old, and the one before that was 16 years old. All purchased used when they were new to me.
The median home price in this area (that’s anywhere within about 40 miles of work) is $1.3M.
The median price.
Including the homes in sh*thole ghetto ‘hoods.
We’re not talking beachfront real estate, either.
We’re talking 10-40 miles from the beach.
As in “you can see it from here…on a map”.
So please, going by your economic advice, tell me how I’m going to come up with two years’ salary (5 1/2 years take-home) for a purchase with 20% down, and take on a mortgage that will amount to $9887/mo, for the next 15 years, at 7% interest, on a take-home salary of around $6K/mo, (at 50% above the median salary for my career, with only about 30 years job experience under my belt).
For some reason, banks hereabouts are a tad leery of lending people the money to buy a home when their monthly mortgage alone comes to 164% of their take-home. YMMV.
Maybe it’s different in MT? Or somewhere else? Anywhere?
Now, I could swing it in Missoula, of course, where the median listing is a “far more reasonable” $645K. So that would put a home down at only one year’s salary, and drop my monthly mortgage nut to only $4638 for the same 7% 15 yr fixed, thus only taking about 77% of my imaginary monthly take-home.
But the 1800-mi. commute twice a week is going to be a cast iron bitch, suck up most of the rest of my salary, and airline peanuts twice a week will comprise the bulk of my diet until around the year 2039.
Of course, I could move to Montana, and cut out the commute.
But the median salary for me there only comes to $64.7K/yr.
Take home on that would be about $53,500, or around $4K/mo.
So my new mortgage there would amount to, once again, only 116% of my available income for the next 15 years.
Maybe I could work two-and-a-half to three jobs, 90-120 hours/wk, and almost get back to my base salary hereabouts up there until that home is paid off. We’ll assume that amount of work, and sleeping 5 hours/night for 15 years, wouldn’t kill me, directly or indirectly, long before the house was paid off.
To afford a house around here, I’d need a salary only 10x higher than the median.
To afford a house in Missoula, I’d only need a salary 4x the median.
Both of those are using the Rule Of Thumb that home price should be about 3x your annual salary.
Any tips on places that pay multiples of the median salary that high would be appreciated.
Alternatively, a listing of which jobs in MT pay $210K/yr and up would be similarly interesting.
My research indicates I’d only need to become a dentist, a physician, or a cardio-thoracic surgeon, or purchase a fleet of trucks costing $5-$25M, would be a smart move in that regard. So 4 years for med school (once I get in), another 5 years of residency, and in only 11 years, I can swing that home loan.
Or 10 wks of truck driving school, and 10-30 years to learn the business, and acquire a fleet of trucks and drivers.
Easy peasey.
https://www.indeed.com/jobs?q=Jobs+Pay+That+%24250%2C000&l=Montana&from=mobRdr&utm_source=%2Fm%2F&utm_medium=redir&utm_campaign=dt&vjk=5dcd97117acfd317
At your stated $150K, the only viable areas to live in this entire state are the 7 biggest sh*tholes extant, with average poverty rates from 10-20%, crime is off the charts, and my salary would be cut in half, so literally nowhere.
https://www.houzeo.com/blog/cheapest-places-to-live-in-california/
Moving out of Califrutopia, as 57 retards will suggest in comments, only moves that needle from impossible to recockulous, for the exact same median price/salary problem.
No offense meant, and this was all great good fun, but I presume to know you (electronically) well enough that you didn’t mean to suggest anything so wildly recockulous and economically farcical.
Care to take another whack at those numbers, good sir?
I think they need a wee re-adjustment.
If, for one example, you meant to say something closer to “”$300,000-500,000/year”, you might be a tad bit closer to ground reality in most of 50 states, for anyone not living in a self-built log hut on homesteaded property in BFE.
IDGAD what you paid for your house 20-30 years ago, on what salary.
Go look at current home prices, and then who makes the nut to pay that mortgage, and get back to me.
If I hit the lottery I could probably buy some rustbelt ghost towns, lock stock and barrel, for $150K.
Ditto for some places downwind of Frenchman’s Flats in Nevada.
And live in Rustbelt Sh*tholia or Nuclear Cancer Springs as the richest (and only) idiot still in town.
Anywhere else that isn’t an effing ghetto, not so much.
Back-of-the-napkin math shows that a $150k salary, after taxes, is about $120k. Assuming that we don’t put more than 30% of our take home into housing, that gives $36,000 for housing/annual, or $3k/month. At 7% on a 15-year, a $3000/mo. payment would give you a loan of $333k~. Since you’d want to put 20% down to avoid PMI, that means that $333k is 80% of the actual price. $333k is approx. 80% of $416k. A down payment of 20% is $83k~. Average rent in my town, I am told, is $1400. With a $3000/mo. budget for rent, a person renting at the average price of $1400/mo. wouuld have $1600 ‘extra’ to tuck away for that down payment. So, paying the average rent in this town, while earning $150k/year, it would take approx. 52~ months (4.25 years) to save for the down payment, assuming you didnt throw any other money at it other than what your 30%-for-housing-budget is. This also assumes that a) the income stays static for that period and thus doesnt reflect increases like raises, bonuses, gifts, etc. and b) that the no ‘belt tightening’ or ‘extra work’ is done to add to the monthly saving. While a 30-year mortgage opens up a lot of possibilities (including a mortgage for a large part of your life), a modest 20-year mortgage would drop your monthly payment by almost $500/mo. This $500 would cover, in my town, property taxes for the year although you’d still be out-of-pocket for the insurance. What does $416000 buy in Montana? Running Zillow for places like Kalispell with a minimum price of $125k (to weed out the slums) turns up some nice results. Same for Missoula. Drop into a place like Butte and your dollar goes quite far. If a person is willing to live outside of the ‘big cities’, there’s many more options for that kind of money and many properties that can be had for less than $416k. Its just a matter of where a person is willing to live, and what they are willing to live in…a person who absolutely ‘must’ have a 2/2 is going to have a more difficult time than someone who is fine with a 2/1. A person who can’t live without a two-car garage is going to have fewer options than someone who can get along fine with a one car, etc, etc.
Again, this is back-of-the-napkin math but I think its fairly on.
I have to agree with Aesop. I make about that much, but although I could technically afford a mortgage, it would be financially foolish for me to do so with interest rates and prices so high. 2019-2020? Sure, I should’ve bought in. Now? Not a smart financial move. There’s being able to afford things and being good with your money. I can afford nice things like night vision (which you should buy if you don’t already have) because I don’t have debt.
I know deputies that have to work almost the entire month to afford to support their families in a traditional, middle-class lifestyle and pay for a house. I’m incensed at the idea that Southern California has become unaffordable to natives. Well, I’ve already relocated to someplace cheaper. I hate the idea that I might have to move to someplace. I have no connection or interest to simply to afford to live in a house.
Anyway, gripe over with. I’m trying to emulate the Commander Zero example (which is a great one) but I just wish I had 15 more years to do it with.
I respectfully suggest you re-check your numbers:
The problem with that analysis, good sir, is that 20-30 yrs from now, according to the actuarial tables, is when I’ll already be dead, or very nearly so, barring an actuarial anomaly. I had hoped to pay off any mortgages I acquired while I was still living.
If that nominal $150K/yr. salary was something I had been earning for decades, since my twenties or thirties instead of the tail end of my working years, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Salaries then, however, were in the neighborhood of $20-30K and eventually maybe $50K pre-tax, not $150K. When homes were “only” running $500K@.
And you overlooked that you’re figuring mortgage prices based on my SoCal salary of $150K, not a MT salary of hopefully $65K, less than half of that.
This is where that calculation fail moves from egregious to snortworthy, which, again, I assume was not your intent.
Yes, I could save for the down payment here, over the next 4-5 years, and paying less in rent hereabouts now than is customary there (imagine that surprise).
But at some point, I’d have to move and make a mortgage nut there that would start at nearly 70% of my vastly reduced income for the first few years, and approach or become well over 100% of it for years into retirement.
So, cat food, mice, squirrels, and whatever pigeons I could catch would be my diet until I died. Probably years to decades before the mortgage was paid off.
For a 30-year mortgage, for a cheaper-than-median home. Miles from work (which I imagine makes a commute “interesting” from about November to March. Just spitballing there.)
In short, the market is absolutely upgefucht, and “You’ll own nothing, and like it” isn’t just the future, it’s at least a decade in the rear-view mirror.
My co-workers just starting out down here now are already only making MT-level salaries.
Which don’t even cut it in MT, let alone Califrutopia.
And which explains why childbirths are at negative replacement value for most of society, into oblivion.
The only way I’ll ever have a house is to build one from scratch on dirt somewhere before I retire (which is precisely the current plan), by myself, or do title theft on someone else’s. Lottery jackpot is a distant third choice.
That’s reality. It’s also why kids now stay with their parents, hoping to inherit the house when mom &/or dad dies.
A house on $150K? As if.
The average US salary is $59,428/yr.
For an RN, it zooms all the way to $82,750.
I could afford a house, all right.
If only there were three to four of me.
Multiplicity, anyone?
And the only standalone 1+1 I could find hereabouts that wasn’t literally a trailer home or a senior ghetto condo was going for $1.25M, at 400ft².
For reference, a conex box is 320ft².
I could save the $1.25M, and just live in a camper or van.
A house?
Fuggedaboudit.
Which is why I don’t think you’re coming at this from where most peoples’ reality is.
My parents bought their house with Uncle Sam’s help for $25K in 1947, with one of the (then rare) two-income households pulling down about $8-10K/yr.
They sold it for $100K in 1981.
The new house was $140K, so they had a mortgage again, into retirement, for several years.
Mom sold that one for $175K in 1990, and moved to a double-wide in a no-tax state, only 400 miles from the ocean, and 6 inches from desert cactus.
The 1960s cracker-box house she sold then lists right now for $981K.
I make well over 5x what either of my parents made in their best year, much more than what both of them made combined in any year, and even if, by some miracle, I could scrape up 20% for a down, and got that house at list price, my monthly mortgage for the house I lived in when I was starting college would now be only 120% of my current total monthly income, on a 30-yr note.
Adding a spouse’s notional income would only require polygamy as an option, and at least three wives with salaries equal to my own, along with stable 30-year marriages.
Somewhere in this discussion, one or both of us needs to submit for drug urinalysis to test for substance abuse.
I’m doing my damnedest renting, working, saving, and planning to build a house to retire and die in.
Absent a Powerball miracle, I’ll never buy anyone else’s home in my entire life, nor ever be able to do so, unless it’s a shotgun shack in BFEgypt on an acre of desert jackrabbit ranch, 100 miles from anything.
When Powerball is a better bet than working a decent profession your whole life, someone has seriously fucked the pooch so hard it’s bleeding.
This is why we hold physical gold and silver instead of fiat. My precious metals purchase the same amount of goods and services today, as they did 20 or 200 years ago. We were all fooled into selling our labor for debt, instead of money (gold & silver).
Aesop: Quit yer whining. Kansas needs your skills… might not be as exciting as your land of milk and honey, but the rural life is way affordable and will welcome you with open arms. And yes some zips away from the 4 lanes are stunning.
I seem to remember commenting on WRSA how your people were polluting Colorado with their retirement pensions, specifically Colo Spgs. You, as normal, ridiculed a given comment. Well, mi amigo, welcome to the the present.
PS. We all still love you but we turn up the music sometimes to drown you out…..
Soapweed
I wasn’t whining.
I’m doing the math with blistering precision, which is why I noted it doesn’t add up. Still doesn’t.
Which is why I won’t be Californicating up anyone else’s state with my retirement pension. Most of them are far too liberal for me anyways 😉
And BTW, the overwhelming majority of the folks retiring to CO Springs aren’t and never were, “my people”. They are and ever have been the gypsy toothless banjo-playing kinfolk from 47 other states and 20 other countries who just happened to plop there and 100 other towns after crapping up California last. (Google origins for Sen. Boxer and Nancy Pelosi some time, and get back to me. 😉
BIG difference.
You think KS is the way to go? Fair enough. I’ve had family there. Thanks for the invite. Now let’s do the math.
Avg ER nurse salary in Kansas City KS is $71.4K/yr.
So that would make take home $54K; that’s $4500/mo.
Median home price is $246K, making the monthly mortgage nut $2,075, or 46% of my likely income.
Do-able, provided I had the 20% down payment, but getting the loan would be highly unlikely at those numbers. They’d look at my likely useful employed years, factor in the increasing likely health issues down the road someday, and say “Thanks, but no way in hell.”
Nice try, and thanks for playing.
I could probably find a barn to renovate 50 miles outside town, and only have to contend with snow in the winter, bugs all summer, and Africa-level humidity all year long, plus tornadoes, and a crime rate in the city 2.3x the national average, which would be as bad as moving back to L.A. from where I am now.
On the plus side, I could go fishing without making it an all-day pilgrimage, and the PC/LGBTQEIEIO Rainbow Diversity annoyance quotient is much lower, so it’s not a total loss.
The time to buy an abandoned Titan missile silo thereabouts would’ve been about 50 years ago. That’s about the only way I’d make the trip. If I could make CA wages there (which isn’t possible), I’d probably think about it seriously. But daydreaming won’t get anything done.
And I went with the KS side of K City there, because you said Kansas, and I figured home prices would be a better fit than on the MO side.
If you like Kansas, you keep it, with my sincere best wishes.
Your beef, corn, and wheat are world class.
Do CA a solid, too? Spread the word among your relatives to stay put. I’m glad you’re happy there. Truly. I hope that feeling catches on nationwide. I’d like my state back from the out-of-state idiot yahoos that f**ked it all up over the last 50 years, at some point before I’m gone.
Aesop: I’m not in Kansas.
You are stretched thin on your knowledge of toto’s stomping ground. Take a deep breath before expounding on EVERY topic my young friend. You know little of what the situation is per various zips outside metroplexes.
Here in the west there are decent med facilities generaĺly spaced 1-150 miles apart w/ variations. Cali-caliber…nope.
With your disposition, be a big fish in a small pond, in a humble fashion. [ie a local hero]
Make an impact where you are appreciated, not just another swinging johnson as you are in your current locale.
Every where folks own humble homes on ample ground, it’s the artificial competition for such that makes it unattainable in artificial metro scenarios. Cut loose of the herd and your life will be enriched if you can disengage the overdrive. Pause, count to 10, and ponder what an old bastard is alluding to. PS — this ain’t for my benifit, and THANK YOU for playing. Not a game…
Again, I appreciate the thought, but Kansas ain’t home, and certainly isn’t mine.
As to your other advice, I’m way out ahead of you.
I’m (hopefully) on my terminal descent to retirement in another decade or so, and my next move is out of the biz for good. I’m a big fish on a championship-level team here, and doing all I can to download three decades of experience into the kids coming up in their twenties, every single day, by decree from on high.
My plan (as God laughs) is to ride this job into the sunset (if hospital manglement doesn’t muck up everything, and my health continues to co-operate), and retire to a far less urban locale in my home state, far from the madding crowds, complete with actual moat and a fair substitute for a castle, on one of countless parcels currently selling for less than the rent on an urban upholstered toilet, and unsuitable for city folks for anything but what I plan, which is minding my own business every day until I die, come Hell or apocalypse.
I can find everything you think Kansas offers, and far more, without going nearly as far afield, and never needing to purchase a snow shovel.
Just as Kansas isn’t all K City, Califrutopia isn’t all L.A. and Frisco, and I knew all that without being told, and I’ve still only seen about 70% of it. I live east of I-5 even now, and most folks outside CA don’t realize the vast bulk of real estate in this state is, politically, redder than a sunburnt pig. The blue fraction has driven the state $50B into debt, and unlike Uncle, Gabbin’ Nuisance can’t print his way out of fiscal disaster. Demographics is destiny. So is economics.
The coastal hordes are going to get what’s coming to them, sure as gravity.
Do us a favor though?
When they come to you, hat in hand, asking for a bailout, tell them to f**k right off and lump it.
Otherwise they’ll never learn.
Worse = better.
Just ask Russia under communism circa 1990.