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“The 1%” sounds like an abstraction. It’s something economists argue about on cable news. But if you’re a physician, you … Read more
This post may contain affiliate links. That means if you click and buy, I may receive a small commission (at zero cost to you). Please see my full disclosure policy for details. Do you want to adopt two girls?” I’ll never forget when Barb texted me that question. I was at work. We had looked into foreign adoption the year before, but after running into roadblocks, it wasn’t something I was actively thinking about anymore. We had […]
There seems to have been a vibe shift in the U.S. housing market over the past six months. What started in places like Austin, Texas with falling rents and home prices, seems to have spread to other parts of the country. As you can see in the table below, it’s not just Austin that has experienced double-digit rent declines since 2022: And what has happened in the rental market seems to be occurring to home prices as well. Analysis from Residential Club shows that 75% of the largest metro areas in the U.S. saw inflation-adjusted home price declines over the last year. But will this trend continue? And what might we expect from U.S. housing over the next few years? Let’s dig in. Rates Aren’t the Problem Anymore When we talk about U.S. housing, the first thing we need to address is affordability. After all, if people can’t afford houses, they don’t buy them. The big issue with affordability, as you likely already know, is that incomes haven’t risen in line with mortgage payments. In fact, you need nearly twice as much income today to afford the typical U.S. home compared to before COVID: Part of this problem is that 30-Year mortgage rates more than doubled from the early 2020s. But, 30-Year mortgage rates were an outlier (on the low side) from 2010 through the early 2020s: So seeing them revert back to their historical norm today isn’t all that surprising. But what hasn’t reverted back to its historical norm? Prices. As the chart below illustrates, the inflation-adjusted Case Shiller Home Price Index is higher today than it was during the 2000s Housing Bubble: This suggests that, all else equal, prices are the problem, not rates. Thankfully for homebuyers, prices have started to slow (and even decline in real terms) over the past few years. You can see this by looking at the annual nominal returns of U.S. housing from 2020-2025 (h/t Ben Carlson): U.S. housing saw a negative return (after inflation) in 2025. This might just be the beginning too. As Reuters recently reported, new home sales dropped by 17.6% in January 2026, the lowest level since October 2022. This is occurring as the number of homebuyers in the market reaches a record low: And as home-purchase cancellations reach a record high: People aren’t buying, or they are reconsidering buying, as prices begin to creep downward. And I believe that prices can continue to creep downward for one simple reason—home equity. There’s Room to Fall The main reason why home prices can continue to decline is that homeowners have record levels of home equity: And a good portion of this home equity was created in the last few years (as the chart above illustrates). As a result, homeowners won’t feel the sting of home price declines as badly as they normally would. We can prove this with a simple example. Imagine you bought a house for $100,000 (and all houses cost $100,000).
We are in the early innings of a fundamental shift in how we understand the human body. The current medical model is reactive and episodic — you feel sick, you see a doctor, you get a snapshot. But your body is a complex machine running 24/7, and it deserves a software layer that can actually keep up. That’s the idea behind what founder Will Ahmed from WHOOP calls the Health OS: continuous monitoring, proactive intelligence, […]
As we gear up for spring cleaning season, you may feel the need to do a little decluttering. If you do, I hope you’ll join my Tidy-Up Tuesdays challenge in April. Read on to find out how the challenge works and how you can participate. The post Join the Tidy-Up Tuesdays decluttering challenge appeared first on Boomer Eco Crusader.
For years, the FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) movement has been framed around one big, seductive idea: escaping the daily grind. “Retire from the 9-to-5.” “Retire from the soul-crushing meetings.” “Retire from the boss who doesn’t get it.” It’s easy to see why this “retire from” mindset catches fire. Work can feel exhausting, repetitive, or misaligned with our deeper values. Saving aggressively and investing wisely becomes a heroic battle against the clock—an escape plan from […]
A global tracker fund takes care of all your equity diversification needs in a single investment product. In this post, we’ll explain how to choose the best global tracker fund for you. We’ll also list our top picks from the choices on offer. What is a tracker fund? A tracker fund is an investment fund that tracks an index like the S&P 500 for the US or, in the case of a global tracker, an […]
Our heat pump project costs cut by nearly 90%, an induction stove for 66% off, and our ongoing baby project took over February. See our budget and tricks! Continue reading Circus Come to Town and Heat for Cheap (Feb. 2026) at TicTocLife.
I just logged on here for the first time and saw all the comments from my last two posts. And will wade through them and reply shortly. I appreciate your patience. (No, I don’t get notified of comments.) That being said, this month has been a doozy…so here’s just a summary of updates: The Kids Beauty and Redhead were planning to move here. She spent 7 weeks here, got a job, worked a few weeks. And then decided they didn’t want to move. So in just a few short days, she quit her new job and drove home. History Buff was planning to move here in August. His timeline got unexpectedly moved up when his roommate got transferred. So he is moving here, in with my dad and I while he job searches, in May. Princess has decided that she would like to move here. However, she is under contract with her job so the reality of that or timeline is not clear. But she has now expressed a desire to move to Texas. I was shocked. Sea Cadet also wants to move here. He’s been saying that, but is in school. So we have talked and decided that his move should wait until he completes school so he doesn’t have to deal with out of state tuition. The Finances Work continues to be slow, but I am making enough to cover my bills. No new debt. My first month of cash only has been AWESOME. Life changing. Just from a stress and mental health level, it’s been really good. I’m continuing to apply for remote work both full time and project based. Caretaking is my primary role for the foreseeable future. What’s Next In three weeks, I leave on a 3 week road trip. It was planned as a weekend with my youngest daughter, Princess. We were meeting for a weekend in Branson. But then with History’s looming move, it was extended so I will go straight from my weekend with Princess out to Vegas to help him move. When I return, I will be house/dog sitting for a week. (I signed up for Rover as a house sitter and dog walker and have two week long bookings here locally.) No other travel plans for now. But I am beginning to consider a visit to Georgia sometime in the fall and combine it with relocating my storage unit here to Texas. That’s just a thought for now, no firm. Sides Notes Before you jump on me for being gone for 3 weeks, my siblings will be covering my parents while I’m gone. I’m leaving cooked meals, etc. This has been planned, scheduled, and agreed upon as a family. I’m super excited for History Buff to be here. And when I take house/pet sitting assignments, I will continue to do my daily caretaking for my parents, just have to commute here to do it. That is actually spelled out in my profile so that
The Short Version: Oil at $120/barrel is pushing inflation back up and keeping the Fed locked at 3.50-3.75%… rate cuts are off the table for now S&P dropped 4.55% in a week while mortgage rates climbed to 6.53%… volatility is spiking across the board Family offices aren’t panicking… they’re buying distressed real estate at 18 cents on the dollar while everyone else freezes Assets that generate income regardless of headlines… like workforce housing paying 8% distributions… don’t care what’s happening in the Strait of Hormuz Oil hit $120 a barrel this month. The S&P dropped 4.5% in three weeks and mortgage rates spiked to 6.53%… the highest since September. If your entire portfolio moves with the stock market, March has been brutal. The thing nobody wants to admit is this kind of volatility isn’t going away. The Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed, which means one-fifth of the world’s oil supply is stuck. Qatar declared force majeure on its gas exports. The IEA has called it the “greatest global energy security challenge in history.” That’s not hyperbole. That’s the head of the International Energy Agency describing what’s happening right now. The Fed Is Stuck Before the war started, analysts expected rate cuts this year. Maybe two, maybe more. But the math has completely changed. Higher oil prices push inflation higher, and the Fed can’t cut rates when inflation is rising. But they also can’t raise rates aggressively without crushing an already shaky economy. Mark Zandi at Moody’s put it bluntly: the Fed is in a “no-win situation.” So they’re holding steady at 3.50-3.75%, watching and waiting while mortgage rates keep climbing. The 30-year fixed jumped to 6.53% on Friday, and home loan applications dropped 10.5% last week. The spring housing market (traditionally the busiest season) is stalling before it even starts. For anyone with a portfolio concentrated in stocks or rate-sensitive assets, this is the worst kind of environment. Volatility on one side, inflation pressure on the other, and no clear path forward. Geopolitical Risk Is the New Normal I’m not going to pretend I know how this war ends, nobody does. Trump says it’s “very complete, pretty much.” Analysts say high prices could persist for months even if a deal gets signed tomorrow, because infrastructure has been damaged and shipping routes remain dangerous. The supply chain doesn’t snap back overnight… especially when drone attacks can come from hidden launch sites for months after the main conflict ends. But here’s what I do know: this won’t be the last crisis. The last five years gave us a pandemic, a war in Ukraine, inflation spikes, the fastest rate hiking cycle in decades and now a war in the Middle East threatening global energy supplies. Each one came with predictions that things would “return to normal.” They didn’t. The new normal is volatility, and Morgan Stanley’s research team said it plainly in their latest outlook: “Geopolitical risk is becoming a persistent part of
Strategy | Start Investing The $1 Trillion 2026 Wipeout – It’s Time to Finally Clean Up Your Portfolio are you getting yourself into a minefield? In one week in February 2026, over $1 trillion in software market cap vanished. Oracle lost 60% from its peak. Figma lost 80% despite 40% revenue growth. Thanks to new AI tools, the hottest sector of the last decade may have become a graveyard – and this time, it might not recover. This is what happens when you stock-pick in a hot sector. But the data shows this isn’t exceptional – it’s the norm.I often see legacy portfolios full of single name stocks during my coaching sessions. But what often gets forgotten is how ineffective that is, and what it takes to hold onto those. Sure, employer stocks and tax reasons complicate things. But, often clean-ups can be done nevertheless.Today let’s see 6 reasons showing why – in the long run – stock picking is a loser’s game. KEY TAKEAWAYS Picking a winning stock is not a 50:50 game. 6 out of 10 stocks lose money. Another 3 barely match Treasury Bills. Just 3.7% – roughly 1 in 25 – are the magic compounders that generated all investor wealth since 1926. Apple, Nvidia, Microsoft, Google and Amazon are the magic compounders explaining why the stock market goes up. The top 3.7% of stocks created $101 trillion. The other 96% destroyed $10 trillion. Index investors capture both – and win by a factor of 10. Chasing recent winners? The last decade was an anomaly. Since 2013, the Top 10 S&P 500 stocks outperformed. But historically, they underperformed the other by 2.4% per year. Picking rising stars? Rising stars are where the 10 or 100 baggers are. But 60% of Tech stocks plummet 70% and never recover. And even the winners punish you: the average max drawdown for the Top 5 all-time compounders like Apple or Microsoft was 80%. Can you sit through 6 years underwater? Hiring a pro won’t save you. Fund managers beat the market by 1.3% before fees – but underperform by 1% after fees. Over 20 years, 9 out of 10 active equity funds lose to their benchmark. #1 A FEW WINNERS make 10x more than losers destroy 3.7% Of Stocks
Image source: Amazon While Black superheroes are now a mainstream idea in comic books, that was not always the case. Jim Crow segregation laws were in effect in 1938 when Action Comics #1 made it debut. That law would not be overturned until 1965 – Black Panther would make his debut in a comic one year later. That was not a happy accident. Key comics featuring the first appearances of major Black superheroes are underappreciated […]
If you’re already shopping for groceries and everyday items, why not get paid for it? That’s exactly what the Ibotta app helps you do. Instead of clipping coupons, you can earn real cash back on purchases you’re already making. In this Ibotta app review, we’ll break down how the app works, how much…