Excerpted from the Detroit News this morning. . . .  Michigan‘s unemployment rate in August was the worst since since September 1993.  Massive automotive buyouts and a sharp decline in residential construction were cited as factors for the state’s jobless rate. Last month 28,000 jobs were lost in Michigan, bringing the total number lost since this time last year to 96,000. Since August 2006, employment in Michigan has dropped by 2 percent while nationally it has increased by…
A Tale of Two Painters
I am perplexed. If you read the paper you can tell how bad the housing market is here. With that comes the decline in home improvement which hits the trades people hard. Very hard. I know of at least three crews that I had bid jobs over the winter that are no longer in the business. It’s gotten so bad that the high end contractor that I always use on my personal residence asked me…
My Buy-and-Hold Performance Metric – Cost per Equity Dollar
If you’re even a semi-regular reader of this blog, then you already know that I’m a huge fan of buying and holding properties as rentals, because it can yield and infinite ROI (See the post on NOOP). In a nutshell, NOOP demonstrated a repeatable process where you buy a property for cash (business credit, private investor, hard money, etc), rehab it as necessary, then pull all of your purchase, rehab, and holding costs out when…
You Never Could Tax Your Way to Prosperity
Lest you think that this is a diatribe related to politics, relax. Long, long ago I gave up letting the micro-brains in government (both elected and unelected) impact by disposition. No, this is a post about economics. And basic economics at that. I have long believed that the framers of our constitution should have included a minimum number of basic economics courses at the university level as requirement for holding any elected or unelected position…
Follow the Herd – And You Know What Happens
So – what kind of person are you? Are you one of those people that listens to the screamers and over-reacters? Or perhaps are you’re a chicken little yourself? You know the kind of person I’m talking about – they spend all of their time running up and down the street with their dress up over their head yelling “the sky is falling, the sky is fallingâ€. Or do you look at facts, even if…
Tools, Systems, and Processes
I realized the other day how much I really don’t like working on houses. Sounds odd coming from someone with a real estate business, doesn’t it? But I’m not alone. Most of the people that know in this business are the same – they really don’t like doing the work themselves. And for good reason. It’s dirty, sometimes difficult, and always takes time away from other things. Especially family. But as I was crawling around…