Even before Trump “paused” his questionable trade policy yesterday, Wall Street analysts offered updated projections for where they thought the stock market would finish up the year. The S&P 500 started the year at 5,869 and had dipped below 5,000 (-15%) after Trump’s 10% minimum tariff and demand for balancing trade deficits. Still, most investment banks were quite positive in their forecasts for where the … Continue reading Crystal Ball Predictions
Plenty of people are running scared after the bears trampled -10.5% out of Wall Street on Thursday & Friday. I’m not sure what will happen to the S&P 500 on Monday morning (futures are -2.5% as I write this on Sunday night), but I’m keeping the faith that some order will be restored over the next few weeks, months, and years. If you saved for … Continue reading Staying The Course …
Just a short, early end-of-the-week post today. I’m trying to make sense of the headlines coming out of Washington DC. I think it’s safe to say that they are more nonsense than common sense. It’s no surprise that the market is in a bit of a free-fall today. How do these make sense …. ? I don’t follow this … If we’re getting $7T in … Continue reading Stormy Fiscal Headlines
Living in Celebration FL, has been a unique experience. While some people don’t like the idea of living in an HOA-managed community, Celebration really makes it work. The town was originally designed by The Walt Disney Company, and thanks to the dedication of our HOAs, it has largely maintained that original vision of charm, order, and community spirit. One thing that sets Celebration apart is … Continue reading HOAs Working Well In Celebration
After writing ‘Two Of Everything’ a few weeks ago, I’m finding certain things I might even have THREE of between our main Minnesota home & snowbird place in Florida. Three warm jackets, three pairs of sunglasses, and three sizes of suitcases. Then, while I thought those things through, I discovered something I might even need FOUR of … a FOURTH collection of toiletry / shaving … Continue reading Four Of Everything?
We’re on the road this morning to visit my brother and his lovely wife in South Carolina. We’re leaving the Orlando area on the Florida Turnpike, one of the state’s many toll roads. Apparently Florida leads the country with about 720 miles of toll roads. The next 5 are TX, OK, NY, PA, and NJ. this is a bit of a new experience for us … Continue reading Terrific Toll Roads
Our modest experiment in being landlords has ended. Our son – who we were bribing to be our neighbor for the last 3 years – has moved to an apartment in a cool neighborhood of downtown Minneapolis. His new space is much smaller, but in a very slick building close to all of the coffee shops, bars, & restaurants all the hipsters like him like … Continue reading Moving On From Landlording
I’m home visiting Minnesota for a few days and helping my Mom get her taxes pulled together (and our own taxes). It’s funny to be working on this stuff when the headlines are filled with articles talking about cuts to IRS and SSA staff, amid accusations of widespread waste & inefficiency. Here’s our situation. My Mom gets Social Security every month. It always arrives on-time … Continue reading Tax Time Troubles
There was a recent article in the Wall Street Journal talking about how expensive it has gotten to go to Walt Disney World. Friends have been asking me about it since we live a few miles from the World Drive Main Gate and go over there quite a bit. There’s no doubt the price of a trip to Walt Disney World has gone up, but … Continue reading Disney Comparison
My buddy Russ told me that once we bought a place in Florida, we’ll be buying “two of everything”. I thought we could get by with having our Florida vacation place be a little spartan, but it’s not turning out that way. Just one year in, we’ve gotten to the point where I could pretty much go back-and-forth to our home in Minnesota without … Continue reading Two Of Everything
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