Free Republic

Proverbs 22-7 “The rich rules over the poor,
And the borrower is servant to the lender.”

Very good sir!

We own our home mortgage free, 3.5 acres in a nice quiet area. We are debt free no credit cards, no personal loans and no car notes. We put 50% of our income into savings and investments. We are not high earners. We worked very hard and employed a lot of discipline to get here.

1. The Holy Bible
2. The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey
3. An introduction to the New Covenant edited by Christopher Cone

I bought a few shares DJT on Wednesday at about $22.00/share as of now it is up to almost $35.00 share.

It’s hard to over estimate the amount of work we have put into our home, the amount of scrimping and saving and to finally have it paid off. I feel no guilt keeping my house for as long as I’m alive and then it will be up to my kids what happens to it next.

I had an MBNA Bank NASCAR credit card. When BOA purchased MBNA’s credit card division my account was transferred to them. In short order my credit limit was doubled and finally it landed at $39,000.00 Me, being a dumbass, racked up a hefty balance of $18K. This wasn’t our only CC with a balance but it was the one with the biggest balance.

One month my payment was received in a day late and incurred a late charge., I called and they reversed it but the event served as one of several catalysts that got us on the path to becoming debt free. While it was our fault that we had so much CC debt, BOA made it very easy.

Anyway, once we decided to start our debt free journey, we haven’t used any credit cards or incurred and debt of any kind since. So one favor BOA did for us was that our experience so devastated our finances and the cure so changed our lives for the positive that I’m not sure that had we not had such a debt problem that we would be as frugal and investment/saving minded that we are today.

Buy low, sell high
Doing the opposite costs money

“...We’ve gotten to the point that not even Freepers understand capitalism.>>>”
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You are correct. It’s actually worse than that though.

Another example is when freepers, in imitation of the liberals, start to blame retail companies that are reporting an increase in profits based on dollar amounts and say that is the reason for retail level inflation. I say this because wholesale prices are also up and in-line with inflation and wholesalers are in competition with other wholesalers. A simple concept, if inflation causes a dollar to be worth 3% less in a year, a 3% increase in profit is really just a break even and not an increase.

I live in one of the townships surrounding Lehighton, I have a Lehighton mailing address. First allow me to say that Lehighton and Carbon County overall is conservative/republican and it’s actually in most areas a nice place. My kids went to Lehighton High School and it was considerably more “law and order” compared to the schools that they attended when we lived in NJ.

The part of Lehighton Boro where this took place consists of dense twin homes, most are a century or more old, are in need of repair and even things such as off street parking is rare. The cost of living here is low in comparison, drug usage is a problem. While I don’t know any of the parties involved in this particular incident, I’m sure I will get some information as time goes on. My guess is both parties have a certain addiction element to them and a lack of activity to keep one entertained and because the homes are so close together squabbles are not that uncommon.

One of the negatives of this area is many are disadvantaged economically and have no intention of ever improving thier situation. Lehighton has a population of less than 5000, the entire county (Carbon County) has a population of less than 70K. It is situated about 100 miles directly west of NYC but totally opposite in terms of everything. Carbon County is one of the 5 counties that make up the Pocono Mountains. The Boro of Jim Thorpe is the county seat, it is about 6 miles from Lehighton. The western portion of the county is scarred from the old coal mining industry which has seen better days. Having said that some of those old patch towns are actually well maintained.

One of the best and most effective preps is to eliminate consumer debt. Then pay off your home. Traditionally, preppers store food and supplies. Not having some (shelf stable) food and basic survival supplies is a more modern lifestyle thing. Everyone my age remembers having some what would be considered “survival” food items as a regular practice back in the day but this has gone out of style. I’m all for having some long terms storage of food, emergency lighting, a second heat source, some kind of plan to protect in case of lawlessness and some communication device, tools and maybe barter items. But acquire this stuff after you get your debt (if you have some) under control.

Have you noticed that a lot of people think that Visa and Master Card are actually the one lending the money, holding the debt, servicing the debt and charging the interest?

I added DJT to my portfolio and will continue to add to it but the only question for serious investors is: is the company a good value? If it is there will be buyers if it isn’t the stock will languish.

“....This is not convincing to me. There is little resemblance to the early 1930’s when the stock exchange was totally unregulated and the Dow cratered completely to under 100 and we had 23% unemployment. A correction is certainly due, and in an election year it most likely will be very short lived.....”

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While I agree with you that 2024 is not 1930s, there are some similarities that should be considered, the biggest being consumer debt. Our income to debt ratio (average is 10%) is considerably higher now than it was back then. Average total debt is almost $100K/family but the percentage of debt free households is less than 25%.

While the S&P 500 is ripe for a correction, there isn’t a whole lot of debt associated with the purchase of stocks but everything else in the possession of households is leveraged to the hilt. There will not be the “margin calls” like 1929 but there could be evictions, foreclosures and repossessions galore. Election year politics aside, once the train leaves the tracks, the fed will have little ability to control the crash. Wide-spread misery on the horizon.

I have two (2) single stocks in my portfolio and one of the is Visa (NYSE ticker V). Currently trading at $280/share. I buy $25 in fractional shares several times per month. I personally don’t use credit cards very much but I do use a debt card that is processed by Visa.

I am sorry that you are a physical mess. But the fact that you made a bad career choice and the fact that you didn’t manage your finances well and the fact that you didn’t save anything during your stellar employment years doesn’t change the fact that SS is not sustainable and that SS was never intended and never will be a “retirement plan” capable of supporting your golden years with a carefree lifestyle full of travel and adventure, that is the issue that I’m trying to address.

I’m reading all of these pissed off responses to social security and what age to collect and here we are in a country where 63% of households do not have the financial discipline to save/set aside $500 for an emergency, 46% have no retirement savings at all. And these people want to talk about retiring at age 62 and think in their wildest imaginations that the $1900 per month they will get will sustain then for 20 years of retirement.

The stupidest thing the government has done was to allow people age 62 to collect social security because people equate collecting SS with being retired. It doesn’t work that way. On the other hand those who save up and have the ability to exist financially can do that, those who have made no provisions, have no savings and a ton of debt should not even think about it and use that time to climb out of their debt hole. A large number of the brethren have a much bigger problem than collecting their SS at age 62.

I’m not retired yet but we paid off our home and all of our other debt. Last year we put half of our retirement savings efforts into creation of an emergency fund. By my calculations we will have 26 months’ income in savings by the time my spouse retires which is end of 2025. If we keep that money in a savings account that pays a minimum of 4%, the interest alone will cover our property taxes. My personal goal is to have 5 years expenses in savings by the time I retire. Full disclosure we are maxing out on my 401, 20% in spouses 401, 15% in a taxable brokerage account and 15% into a HYSA we are quite frugal although we were not always that way.

I gave up all forms of chemical entertainment and replaced them with investing (investments) which is a lot easier to do when you’re not spending monies on stupid recreational pursuits. Not that I care what others do with their resources.

Thank you for your response. Like you we have come to trust in the Lord Jesus and let him handle things. As far as debt is concerned we paid off our last in Dec 2022. It was a long hard slog and quite exhausting as it took 5 years of making that our priority. We thought about that day when we would finally be debt free, paid off mortgage and no other debt and were trying to devise a way to celebrate. Nothing came to mind, but I will say that when our last loan was paid off (my truck) and the balance revised itself to zero, unexpectantly these invisible chains that I wasn’t aware of fell off my shoulders. Debt free at last I had some kind of debt for 46 years now we have almost a years’ worth of income in savings and are putting almost 50% or our income into investments or savings. Life is good Proverbs 22:7

Yes but I’m not saying people should be maxing out their 401/403 accounts rather I’m commenting on the thinking behind those who urge that one invest instead of paying off the mortgage early. I think in many cases those who say this are doing neither. Just look at the stats on credit card debt and HELOCs for older workers. I have a friend that is 63 and has a combined $550,000.00 debt and just took out a new 3 year car lease.

Anyway good on you for being a saver. We (Sue and I) are working for one reason and that is to build up our nest egg. That is all. True confession: we were not good at the personal finance thing until about 10 years ago. Overnight we switched gears, paid off all of our debt and have been throwing every cent that is not nailed down into either our 401K, 403B, our taxable brokerage account or our HYSA. I know many are suffering from the economy but for us it’s not a problem and the future looks good because we took drastic steps and turned our sinking ship around and set sail to a different port, the Island of Debtfreeville.