Thread: Finances - paying off home or other investments

Hello Men.

I will soon be in the position to pay off my home. I hardly need list the advantages to doing this, but for me personally one big advantage would be being able to go off travelling/doing other shit more or less when I want. As I can work from home fully I could even go and live elsewhere during the British winter, for example.

The major downside in my case is that though I'd be debt free, I'll have zero savings left - all my capital will be in my house, which is a potentially risky position. It leaves me starting again for building up rainy day money and also my 'net worth' could take a big dive if there's a crash (not an issue if I'm here long term but, you know).

The other option is I use the chunk of change for investing in other areas. A second property perhaps, though rentals are not a great bet at this time. Stocks and shares, if I choose wisely. Or just sit on the money, don't try to spend it. Maybe a little bit of it to enjoy life, for example I always wanted to semi-convert a van for trips while I enjoy the outdoors - hiking, cycling, climbing etc. A van also gives me the ability to earn money moving things for people (I currently own only bicycles and a motorcycle).

I guess these things will come down to what each man wants in life, but regardless, I would be interested to hear people's thoughts on what they would do.

Cheers All.

Originally Posted by happybachelor

I'll have zero savings left

Zero is its own risk, too. The word from financial planners (and from me) is always have an emergency fund available if you lose your job or experience other financial catastrophe. They used to say 6 months worth of income then I heard 8 months worth. I don't know how much they are now recommending.

Originally Posted by Unboxxed

Zero is its own risk, too. The word from financial planners (and from me) is always have an emergency fund available if you lose your job or experience other financial catastrophe. They used to say 6 months worth of income then I heard 8 months worth. I don't know how much they are now recommending.

With Covid uncertainty, and .gov bumbling, we're looking down the barrel of 10 years worth of income, excluding hyperinflation! Plus side, there's lots of recipes for crow and possum on the internet!

Originally Posted by mgtower

With Covid uncertainty, and .gov bumbling, we're looking down the barrel of 10 years worth of income, excluding hyperinflation! Plus side, there's lots of recipes for crow and possum on the internet!

You're so right! LOL

Originally Posted by Unboxxed

You're so right! LOL

Seriously? I'm better than crow and possum, I have a game cutlery kit, and the neighbor has goats! I found out in Amsterdam, unwittingly, that goat meat is DELICIOUS! But then again, I haven't tried crow, possum, squirrel and beaver, but I'm willing, ready, and able! The rabbits are fucked, I'll eat them before the hawks do, then use their scraps to catch the hawks and eat them too! You can bet, while other are starving, ole tower will be dining at nature's table!
In a different time and place (1800's), my bumper sticker would read; "I survived Donner Pass"....

Greetings Happy Bachelor,

Congratulations of building up your wealth enough to possibly pay off your home. I personally think you could go either way and pay it off or build your savings a bit more and then pay it off later. Each has their pros and cons.

I would caution buying a second property to rent out as that is a lot more work. I don't know how it is where you live but sometimes the laws seem to favor the tenets at the expense of the landlords.

Unboxxed
I would like at £10-£20k saved for a rainy day. Without the mortgage I could easily save £7.5k in the first year. Possibly £10k if I did more weekend work. Having no debts means I could easily get credit in an emergency, or use my credit cards and overdraft which are high limit but unused.

Bonobo
Thank you. Ironically having a rental is what has got me to this position. But with the government purposely crashing the economy, and in particular destroying local economies, private renting seems a bad move at this time. It is hard work and risky, and I'm not sure I can be bothered doing it again.

Originally Posted by happybachelor

Unboxxed
I would like at £10-£20k saved for a rainy day. Without the mortgage I could easily save £7.5k in the first year. Possibly £10k if I did more weekend work. Having no debts means I could easily get credit in an emergency, or use my credit cards and overdraft which are high limit but unused.

Bonobo
Thank you. Ironically having a rental is what has got me to this position. But with the government purposely crashing the economy, and in particular destroying local economies, private renting seems a bad move at this time. It is hard work and risky, and I'm not sure I can be bothered doing it again.

The difference between renting and owning (all things), determines which side of the economic wave you base your life on. The backside you swim around collecting all the surfboards (stuff, money, property) on the front side you're in the surf on shallow coral reefs! The golden position is on top of the wave, knowing when to rent or take on debt to gain a better financial and more stable future. Paying off your mortgage is a good start and only spend on things that have a return.

I was reading, most successful people look and drive cars no different than the average person, a good number of them drive "reliable automobiles", not flashy fast cars like one may think, Toyotas and Hondas, which I emphatically agree!
I told a MGTOW 5 years ago to dump the low retail value shitbox, endless money pit, and get a Toyota Corolla, he did, and has had no regrets, lost time, lost money, including the inconvenience of breakdown wherever it decides to "breakdown". So why not drive something more reliable than most airplanes? Plus you're not replacing it as often, taking the substantial resale losses more often and much greater, not to mention sales tax, registration, and other endless costs.

If they made houses, my home would be a Toyota or Honda! My pressure washer is 25 years old (Honda), I have a generator we used to power a worksite in the mountains, it ran for years, and only needed oil changes and spark plugs! It still runs, doesn't smoke, and yes, it's a Honda. Not all their stuff was great, but throughout their presence, and to this day, they discontinue poor designs almost immediately then take care of their "investors", the "customer".

my point is this, well built products that last, at a reasonable price, are the firm steppingstones we need to get where we're going. Rinse and repeat is not a wise avenue when purchasing personal transportation, after all, mobility on a magic carpet that goes anywhere at any time is truly priceless and shouldn't be taken for granted, choose wisely, not co$tly!

I watch the people around me change cars faster than I wear out a pair of sneakers! Sneakers: $65.00 Automobile: $35,000.00 Which one should we replace more often?

So true. Rather be the very comfortably off guy in a boring, reliable car, any day of the week. Than attracting hoes and invoices with an expensive dick extension.
Can't go wrong with Japanese anything. Except maybe gynocentrism lol.
At the end of the day it's about comfortable being perceived by most people as a ' nobody', because you're putting yourself and your own rational needs first.

Originally Posted by mgtower

I watch the people around me change cars faster than I wear out a pair of sneakers! Sneakers: $65.00 Automobile: $35,000.00 Which one should we replace more often?

I'm still driving my Camaro that I bought brand new in 1984. That's 37 years next month. Cheaper than a new car payment all the way around.

Funny thing is, old ladies are starting to notice my car and will say things to me when I am entering/exiting it, like "Cool car!".

Oh, so after all of these years, it's now a babe-magnet for the octogenarians? Where the hell was my car back when I thought I needed the attention? LOL.

Knowing what I know now, ha, my car was doing me a favor by keeping them leeches away! What a best friend my car turned out to be!

Regarding mortgages, I sold my first house in a flat market in Phoenix in the 90s, after 13 years I made no money on it, moved to Seattle (a high-cost city for those who don't know) and bought my second house. The price difference was as if I had never bought that first house. Holy crap, prices were high, even then. I was 39 when I bought my Seattle house, and a 30-year mortgage paid on schedule would mean I'd be 69 making that final payment. This assumes that I'd still have my job through my 60s which I doubted, what with my employer's wild swings of boom and bust. I had to think of a plan.

Luckily I was entering a boom period where I could have all the OT that I could eat, and I decided to create a 5-year plan where I worked 11 1/2 hour days, five days a week plus occasional weekends. I had no life, got up at 5am, got home at 8pm, ate, went to bed, did laundry on weekends, etc. No vacations, no cell phone plan, free 56k dial-up internet, clipped coupons, took the bus everywhere. I kept all expenses at a minimum to shovel all money towards retiring that mortgage. I was going to fucking succeed and no one better get in my way!

I did this OT for 4 1/2 years straight, until my dad died. Make a long story short, I retired my mortgage after 13 years, and the bust years were starting to happen. I'm very glad I did my plan. My almost 5 years of no-life is a distant memory now. I retired at age 56, no house payment and, yeah, no car payment.

So, I guess I was right after all, that I would not have a job in my 60s!

Two versions of the financial "Position of Fuck You."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eikbQPldhPY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJjKP8vYjpQ

For me, the 1990s were a decade adrift on the employment high seas.
The recession of the early 1990s, followed by the downsizing of the military made the the first third real rough.
The middle years were great. Steady work fixed my finances for a while and I paid off my student loan checks with one per diem payment.
The last couple were hell. Being underemployed triggered my ex-wife's hypergamy and ended my marriage.

But, like 1941 did for a lot of Great Depression era men, in 2001, a war came a long and fixed everything. Suddenly, my particular set of skills were in great demand.

I bought a modest house. Paid it off in less than 5 years. Got something twice as good/expensive, right after the housing bubble burst in 2008. Picked up a less-than-one-year-old house for $310k, when it sold a few months earlier for $368k.

Rented the first house. Used those payments to pay for the second house.

Drove an indestructible Japanese car (made in the UK!) for 14 years. Still have an indestructible Korean compact car made in 1993, and it is still a good little 3-season commuter that has lasted me for the last 18 years.

A paid-off house gives you peace of mind. That is part of your "fortress of solitude."

Like stocks, there are only two days that you should care about the price of your house.
The day you buy it and the day you sell it.

It is a store of value. If your government decides to inflate and debase your currency, that just raises the value of your home.

Pay it off, get that monkey off your back, and then start investing with the money you used to devote to the mortgage.

The allies took out Italy, then Germany, then Japan. In that order, but not all at the same time. Why, because that was the order of difficulty.

Now, about an emergency fund.

I believe in having one. However, does it have to be a couple of months' salary in a bank account earning next-to-nothing in interest?

No.

Could it be 2-3 credit cards that you rarely, if ever use, in an envelope marked "for emergency use only," that you keep in the back of a drawer, and have have taped up in strapping tape so if you ever did try to get into the envelope it would remind you that it really needs to be an emergency?

yes.

Could you, if you lost your job and had to go 2, 3, 4 months without a new job, get by with unemployment insurance, a pantry of canned and preserved foods, no mortgage payment, no car payment, and judicious use of cash advances on those emergency credit cards?

Wow that Chevy Camaro has aged like a MGTOW! The irony being yes, it's now a chick magnet!

Fortress of solitude.. I like that. Get your house how you want it, and pay it off, it's something that can't be taken from you. In theory. Free to reduce hours, free to travel, etc.

Some great advice here. I can't get this anywhere else. I am thankful for this site and for the men who keep it running.

Originally Posted by happybachelor

Wow that Chevy Camaro has aged like a MGTOW! The irony being yes, it's now a chick magnet!

Fortress of solitude.. I like that. Get your house how you want it, and pay it off, it's something that can't be taken from you. In theory. Free to reduce hours, free to travel, etc.

Some great advice here. I can't get this anywhere else. I am thankful for this site and for the men who keep it running.

Want some more good advice?

I started cleaning out all my avalanche piles of catch-all! I can't rid myself of all this junk quick enough! I've been at it for about 10 years! I'm sick and fucking tired of all the clutter! This morning was another "last straw" when another avalanche of shit came down when I removed something I needed. last week was a full trash bin of discarded shit! Just now I tore through my office and gathered another 2 bags of shit!

I'm detailing my classic chick magnet muscle car in preparation for sale, listing tools and shit I don't use anymore! I'm a fkn madman on a mission to liquidate to the bare fucking walls!

This packrat is bulldozing the fucking nest! It's literally a part time job! Some days FULL TIME!

So, next time that unbelievable deal pops up, ask yourself, do I really need it? Otherwise someday, like me, you'll find yourself cleaning up avalanches, only to pile the snow on another fucking slope!

I've already rid myself of machinery and shit by the metric ton! I could fill two or three 40 ft. shipping containers with all the shit I sold over the past decade! This spring I'm renting a 4o cubic yd. drive in dumpster and filling it with crushed up fiberglass (pickup caps) and all kinds of other shit I plan on removing and crushing with my grapple bucket!

House and garage this winter, outside and junkyard trail this spring!

I'm not a messy slob by any stretch of the imagination! In fact, I get complements on how organized I am. I'm doing all this in an attempt to be ready to flee this floundering and befallen nation before it's too late. The tax langoliers are coming to get anyone like me that's scampering! So why not do some langoliering myself before they do?

That would be one hell of a yard sale! I am slowly reducing my shit too. It's therapeutic. Bought way too many expensive clothes in the past. I mean how fucking pathetic is that! It's funny when you realise a lot of your old shit was purchased due to an extremely blue pilled state of mind. I wish I had a MGTOW father, lol.

Originally Posted by happybachelor

That would be one hell of a yard sale! I am slowly reducing my shit too. It's therapeutic. Bought way too many expensive clothes in the past. I mean how fucking pathetic is that! It's funny when you realize a lot of your old shit was purchased due to an extremely blue pilled state of mind. I wish I had a MGTOW father, lol.

I'm in the process of pulling my finances out of the fire and with a slide of hand getting the langoliers to eat each other because I made it out in time! Allot it's worth money, the tagsale shit I'm giving away or trashing it! The money items I'm listing at fair market value+ 10 or 15% to ride the instant purchase suckers and still leave room for cheeseballs that want a 10% discount! Everything is being converted to physical gold or silver depending on the market trend. In other words, cash, the new trash!

Even if you are far away from paying off the house, being ahead on your payments is good, too.

You can have an "emergency fund" of money sitting in the bank....and earning very, very little interest.

Meanwhile, the banks are charging you twice, three, even four and five times the interest for borrowing money from them in mortgage interest.

What if you took some of that emergency fund and paid off 2, 3, or more months of the mortgage ahead of time? And kept it paid in advance from then on in?

Would an emergency or a job lay off be as scary if you knew you were not in danger of losing your home?

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What do we call someone who can't pay their rent after 2-3 months? (Because eviction is a slow process.) Homeless.

What do we call someone who can't pay their mortgage for 4-5 months? (Because foreclosure is an even slower process.) Homeless.

What do we call someone who can't pay their car payments after 2 months? A pedestrian.

What do we call someone who can't pay more than the minimum on their credit card? An American.

Sam, just watched The Gambler.
Fortress of Solitude, Fuck You position.. sound logic.
Good movie!