Friday, May 16, 2014

nine years in hell


NINE YEARS IN HELL

Okay, so I’m talking to our worker who forces the evil teachings of Dave Bankers Whore “Invest All Your Surplus With My Buddies And I Pinkie Promise They Won’t Steal Any Of It” Ramsey on our poor unsuspecting Food Bank Clients ( I’m kidding.  She mostly is there not only to “teach” budgeting but to weed out the prolific spenders who use our services as a way to stay in debt for luxuries.  Our town might be getting crowded, but it still isn’t much more than two miles long.  No one “needs” a car here.  But a $600 a month car?  That is just pure stupidity ).  She was saying that the average US car payment is over $400.  The average Elko Nevada car payment is around $800!  Obviously people think nothing of buying a thirty grand car, and here nothing thought of buying a pimped out $60k pick-up truck here.  And she mentioned something I had no clue on.  They now have Nine Year Car Loans ( technically a few months over eight years )!  I was aghast years ago when they came out with a seven year loan, something I thought only the most retarded of the morons would do.  Your car loses, what?, a fifth of the value when you drive it off the lot?  More?  And then you stretch the payments out so long it is like having an underwater house for another twenty years with a mortgage.  A nine year loan seems to me to be about as bad of an idea as a Japanese two generational home loan.

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I didn’t sleep right when I had a five year mobile home payment ( when I was in Florida.  And that was $3k down and $12k carried ).  I lived like a bare assed savage to pay down my current lot in three years ( originally $6k plus eight percent interest owner financed ) because THAT caused me concern ( I still had a paid for lot way out of town but this one allows me to get to work every day on a bike, plus through the winter snows ).  To me, every day was a potential lay-off day, a potential income drop to zero.  Now, yes, granted, cars can be repossessed and so aren’t necessarily a life changer if you can’t make payments.  In theory.  In practice, most people for decades have moved as far away from their jobs as was necessary to afford a house.  And until recently cars weren’t too god-awfully expensive.  It was cheaper to mortgage in suburbia and make a car payment with extra gas than rent and a car payment with far less gasoline.  But times have changed and gas is three times as expensive as are cars.  And wages have hardly gone up at all.  So you might have kicked the can down the road by going from five years to nine on a car, but if you lose it you might as well be unemployed.  So now you are in hell the whole time hoping nothing goes wrong.  And after those nine years, you start all over again because Detroit STILL pushes out crap that doesn’t last too much past the hundred thousand mile mark.  A treadmill in Hades, if you ask me.  I don’t know why anyone would subject themselves.

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13 comments:

  1. Buy up those cheap chinese bikes from garage sales while you can still get em whole forr less than a new wheel cost.

    ReplyDelete
  2. New car? What's that? I let someone else take the depreciation. You have me beat by not needing a car. Smart man.

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    Replies
    1. With their last teaspoon of gas, one of my neighbors will run me over in a fit on envy that I figured out to bike long before they did

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  3. It's funny you mention dave ramsey and ridiculous car payments. If you notice he never gives advice on how to buy a cheap used car. I mean like the price of a down payment for some new cars. Oh, but it doesnt have A/C, *insert other lame excuses*. Just saying.

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  4. I save like a maniac, and the only debt I have is my car loan.

    Fortunately, I have enough saved up right now to where I could pay it off if I wanted to, but the interest rate is really low, so I continue to stockpile cash. If economic collapse comes, they can just repo it.

    Of course...economic collapse might just put my stockpile of cash at risk too (for it sits safely in a Credit Union, but I suppose even the noble credit union will not be immune to the big banker toilet flush).

    But if all hell breaks loose; with my cash getting frozen, and my car getting repo'd, at least I'll still have my guns, ammo, gold, and silver. What I don't have right now is paid-for land and a trailer...yet.

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    Replies
    1. Saved cash, either under mattress or in the bank, is always a risk. Course, ya need it in today's world. I guess just a exspence that must be born

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    2. Get the land.
      The trailer can follow along later, or you can throw up a 'mobile' shed (on skids or wheels). Or if things have collapsed enough, you will be able to ignore the zoning rules and just build a (sod house, log cabin, dugout house, shack, etc. depending on local material availability)...
      Only ownership of land outright will work. Any other form of property either wears out, or is prone for being stolen/seized (land can be stolen to but it is MUCH harder to do.
      Unfortunately to buy land outright can cost a bit upfront- but it is much less easy to seize than the money the credit union supposedly holds for you.
      The cheapest land will be either
      1) distant/poor location
      2) landlocked - requiring trespassing to access,
      3) have other problems
      As long as however the problems do not impact the title ownership in free and clear you can work something out to deal with the problems. if the problems is lack of affordable utilities you can laugh all the way to the bank! Utilities wont be affordable in town soon enough. If the problem is lack of water, you are going to have to plan to deal with it, but there is enough annual rain fall in almost all the USA, even in drought conditions in the desert, for a big rain collection system and cistern to provide drinking water for you. If the distance is less than 50 miles from your current work/residence you should be able to bug out to it by car, tractor, atv, or bike in a reasonable time period (a day or two at most).
      Here in the great plains my 2 40 acre parcels were to small and rolling to interest the farmers or ranchers went they went to auction. No one except myself, the state reps, and the ranchers even bothered to show up. I got them both for minimum bid. I could use either one, but one was clearly better for my building purposes (going to make that asparagus farm, don't you know Jim!). The other is a bit of a pain in the but to sell ( I could use the funds for the better one) but either it will sell eventually or I will use it as my back up location. Like gold and silver, raw land hardly ever looses real value, only the structures on it do.
      Check the announcements part of the paper weekly for land and real-estate auctions, craigslist, etc.
      I cant tell you how much peace of mind my 'junk land' gives me.
      I know that, if laid off tomorrow, I would be out on the land improving it the next day, and moving to it in a tent by the end of the month. And in a year would have a weather tight partially buried 'shack' to keep my family out of the weather.
      Also access to junk yards and industrial businesses waste streams is very useful. I just picked up 3 wooden crates (@6' x 3' x 3') and a dozen pallets. I could easily make a survivable shack with the other leftovers if I had too. I am shooting for a little better though...
      -Grey

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    3. Oh all right.
      I'll put one together.
      One day.... But I will only drag your stats down.

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    4. Seriously? You think my stats can get worse?

      Delete

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