The Core

Where do you want to move too?

If you've got a solid offer, grab the money and run.

Find a cheaper urban place to live, then start shopping for the retreat property you've been dreaming about.

A note re jewelry: Fine jewelry has many delights, and will hold its value better than many things you could spend money on, but don't think of it as an investment unless you really, really know what you're doing, gemologically speaking, and have well-established connections in the industry.

For most people, the problem with jewelry is that we buy the goodies at retail, but if we ever want to sell a piece we won't get more than wholesale value.

Keep in mind that the price of diamonds is controlled and manipulated by a cartel, and if the cartel ever loses its grip the price of diamonds has nowhere to go but down. The price of gemstones is more market-driven, but only a tiny, tiny percentage of stones could actually be considered investment grade. Unlike precious metals, whose prices are recognized internationally, the market for gemstones is established one transaction at a time. The price you get offered is totally at the discretion of the buyer.

Buy fine jewelry because you love it, but temper your expectations about how well it would serve as a store of value.

what about a boat big enough to live on?  50' sailboat.  I don't know how to sail, but don't let that stop you from thinking it might be a good idea:)  That way I could live in it any place where there is an ocean.

Granted most of the time it is not economical mainly because you never use it.  I'm talking about using the crap out of it.

A pirate's life for me...

>Where can you store wealth during times such as these?  

Farmland is doing very well these days.  You can buy a nice, decent sized house in Russell Kansas (or other small rural communities) for $60K or less.  Not sure if you want to live there though.  If it were me, I'd buy a house that I could pay for outright.  That way, if I lost everything, I'd still have a roof over my head.

You can buy a nice, decent sized house in Russell Kansas (or other small rural communities) for $60K or less. 

That is *almost* cheap enough to make me want to move to Russell Kansas

Just out of interest, what's the rental market like for small farms in Kansas? There must be more than a 10% yield on that price, surely?!

Quote from: grnidone on April 02, 2012, 03:23:22 PM

You can buy a nice, decent sized house in Russell Kansas (or other small rural communities) for $60K or less. 

That is *almost* cheap enough to make me want to move to Russell Kansas

Just out of interest, what's the rental market like for small farms in Kansas? There must be more than a 10% yield on that price, surely?!

I can't speak for Kansas, but there is a high demand to rent good crop acreage in Iowa. China and the Pacific Rim are all getting wealthier and wanting more grain which keeps pressure on crop prices.  Farmland is now more valuable for crops than building housing on it.

ok, counter offer signed and faxed... if they say yes, we close at the end of May, and from what I heard, I think we are going to shake on it, and I'm going to be lucky as hell I got an exit when I did.


>Farms
Yeah, I hear you. I like them. Wouldn't mind having some acreage. Just land even, as a longterm investment.  Not sure if I want to live on a commercial farm again.  I did once in Idaho, on a potato farm... also know to Fly Fisherman as Mecca, aka 'Silver Creek Preserve':



...I actually lived in that trailer for 6 months, moved to Alaska for a year, then into that cabin for a year.  This one had running water and 2 rooms so it was really a step up for me and dog:)

Speaking of $50k, I've seen foreclosures down here for that amount.  For 100+ you can find a 1 br extremely close to the beach, if not in a building on the beach (but not ocean view.) Granted, these places need redone, but so what. Order a new kitchen from Directbuy, and deck the place out so that it's nice as hell. When it's that small, it's worth it.

So nobody liked my boat idea? My girl want's to become a captain and said she'd like to live on a boat.  I honestly think she'd hate it.  Hard to say, because she did pretty well camping last year in CO for a week.  Last time I was on a 50' boat, SEGuru and I were coming back from Bimini in an epic storm.  We both thought we were going to die.  Lashed ourselves to the boat with life vests and storm gear, while the others stayed below. The boat was below the horizon at times, pure white out, smack dab in a shipping lane, with huge freighters that blasted right by us that we could only hear but knew if they smashed us they'd never even feel it.

This was us coming into Bimini...

....hehheeheheh never do a deep water storm passage again:)