Month: January 2023

MegaCorp Nonsense

Layoffs – There’s Gotta Be A Better Way …

The Big Tech companies have been in the news lately, after announcing record numbers of layoffs. The Chartr graph below shows the tens of thousands of layoffs at Facebook/Meta, Google/Alphabet, and Microsoft. Only Apple has kept their employee ranks whole. Google was heavily criticized for the way they handled their layoffs. They sent out “best wishes in your future endeavors” emails to 12K employees in … Continue reading Layoffs – There’s Gotta Be A Better Way …

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Real Estate

Latitude Margaritaville, Daytona Beach

I have been eligible to live in a 55+ community for almost 2 years now. Still, our visit to Latitude Margaritaville in Daytona Beach last week, was the first time that we have ever visited one. It is quite a development. Pitched as a “55-and-better community inspired by the legendary music and lifestyle of Jimmy Buffett, built on food, fun, music and escapism.” it has … Continue reading Latitude Margaritaville, Daytona Beach

MrFireStation10 Comments
Real Estate

Wait, Sign What?

We’re back in Florida for our fourth year snowbirding from cold Minnesota. We toured models at the giant Latitudes Margaritaville/ Daytona Beach development yesterday. A weird thing happened when they asked us where we were from. Being from Minnesota, we had to sign an “Out-Of-State Non-Solicitation Affidavit” to acknowledge that we arrived “voluntarily”. What? Yes, apparently it is against Minnesota law for a Florida developer … Continue reading Wait, Sign What?

MrFireStation14 Comments
Terrific Travel

Bucket List or Garbage Can?

We’re back in Florida this winter, snowbirding from the Minnesota cold. One bucket-list item I got to do today was drive down the sands of Daytona Beach in a bright red Jeep with the roof panels taken off. That was fun! Recently, I’ve been reading about people’s disappointments with some of their bucket list experiences. It started with THIS POST on EarlyRetirement.org, where people shared … Continue reading Bucket List or Garbage Can?

MrFireStation14 Comments
FIRE Observations

ChatGPT Retirement Advice

This may be the shortest post that I have ever written. It’s one of my first experiences with artificial intelligence. If you haven’t heard of ChatGPT yet, it’s an artificial intelligence (AI) program that seems to be a real breakthrough. To test it out, I asked 5 common retirement questions and am posting the ChatGPT answers. All were copied word-for-word, from the first answers provided. … Continue reading ChatGPT Retirement Advice

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Keep Organized, Know You Number

A Bad Year, A Good Place …

I spent the evening of New Year’s Day (observed) tallying up the ugliness of our 2022 year-end financial performance. The returns weren’t great. Not at all. It looks like our retirement savings took a huge dive. Our retirement nest egg fell a whopping -16.9%. That’s much worse than I had imagined. Our losses were all centered in the plunge in our equities. The S&P 500 … Continue reading A Bad Year, A Good Place …

MrFireStation10 Comments