Thread: alevin's account talk

Not bad at all...

But don't chicken little out on the very modest 'C Fund' holdings you currently have. If the market 'crashes' 5% or 6% you will zero out for the year. It is the only thing left in your allocation that can give you alpha for the month. You have to gain more in early in the year to balance out the usually lousy summer months. If you bail out of the C you will not be able to get back in for two more weeks.

Think of it this way... If you hold your 15% allocation in C than if the S&P500 gains a point over the remainder of the month you will be at about a +1% return for the month. If the market 'crashes' a point you will be at about +0.65% for the month.

Don't go Total Amoeba on me. Never go Total Amoeba!!!

By the way, don't worry about matching the top leaders. How many of them were there last year and the year previous. Maybe 10% of them were double digits last year. Haven't looked at 2013. There are a couple targets in the group worth watching though.

Try to make the Top Quintile or two. That is, the Top 20% to 40%. The newbies that appear at the very top are taking very risky moves. They are the short term winners than they varnish...

Originally Posted by Boghie

By the way, don't worry about matching the top leaders. How many of them were there last year and the year previous. Maybe 10% of them were double digits last year. Haven't looked at 2013. There are a couple targets in the group worth watching though.

Try to make the Top Quintile or two. That is, the Top 20% to 40%. The newbies that appear at the very top are taking very risky moves. They are the short term winners than they varnish...

g'morning, Boghie my friend! The guy I'm watching is BigJohn. Walks softly and carries a big big stick, . He has done so more often than not over past number of years. Hiya, BigJohn! . I haven't followed him, been too focused on trying to find my own path. maybe now I'm finally finding it. Game I'm playing is mainly against myself. nice to see I'm doing pretty good tho, comparatively speaking in the bigger general sense. I keep my performance in perspective by looking at the leader. When I celebrate, it's pretty small gains compared to how some people do, keeps me humble.

Hi alevin (11)

Reading the stuff over on clester's thread. Good luck with the plans. What moved me to write was how blessed you are to have living parents at your (our) age. There are several stories I wish I could ask mine to tell.

PO

Hi PO. Agreed, I am thankful to still have them both. Which is why I am still working on figuring this out, looking out over the next 15 years. Both sides are known for longevity into mid90s or beyond. Dad is a 2x cancer survivor, however. so no telling. could be either one goes before the other.

My mom's side are the story tellers, Dad's side not so much. The parents were both children of the depression, born right in the midst of all that was happening. Depression-era stories both sides, one side's stories better than the other's. I know them better than the younger siblings do. Another reason I've so careful with my tsp, too careful maybe. sometimes risks are worth taking, sometimes they're not. I need the wisdom to know the difference. working on it.

Maricar's question has led me to running the math again, with some different numbers. Goal is still to retire age 61-62. trick is how to afford the part that my house wouldn't pay for, maintain cashflow for other needs including car payment in same timeframe. I'm being conservative with assumptions, ie 15yr mortgage @5%, with principal paydown to ensure paid off in 10 yrs total. Debt-free by 70, car and house. the goal. and have just enough cashflow in the interim to afford building up the mini-farm into paying a little something for itself, in terms of reducing storebought food costs and providing occupational therapy, besides providing rental income to offset the mortgage paydown.

Current owner of the target property is planning on putting new roof on soon, it needs it. One family depression story however, is of great-grandfather being overextended on farm real estate (real farms), losing them all, family having to move in with family til economy got better-not sure how long they sheltered with family, need to ask mom for that story-if she remembers. The parents both have good memories still. knock on wood.

Alevin, I understand your dilemma. Sometimes you gotta do what you think is best for you. Your parents are lucky to have a caring son like you.

Hey girl! I've always admired people who can plan and calculate for their future and you seem to have a very thorough and well thought out plan for retirement. Excellent ! I love your farming concept of sustainability and income producing. Something I've been pondering for a few years.

I wish sometimes my personality was wired for planning and sticking to the plan , but no, I'm more of a fly by the seat of my pants kinda girl - always deciding my course of action as I go along, using my own instincts and initiatives rather than a pre-determined plan. It's worked well for me so far and I've been blest, but who knows, it may come to bite me in the seat of my pants one day.

I have one suggestion for you to add to your retirement plans and that is to factor in some play and adventure .... It's good for the soul.

One of of my favorite inspirational quotes I try to live by:

Remember the past, plan for the future, but live for today. Because yesterday is gone and tomorrow may never come.

Aloha - KK 🌸

you girls should just grow weed. more people would visit your farms and buy your delacasies. it's legal right over the river in washington and nobody cares in hawaii anyways. cash cow.

Originally Posted by burrocrat

you girls should just grow weed. more people would visit your farms and buy your delacasies. it's legal right over the river in washington and nobody cares in hawaii anyways. cash cow.

Ha! Believe me, I've already thought of that. In fact, I have a good friend who owns a 5 acre coffee farm and he is seriously thinking of growing cannabis for medicinal use as soon as it becomes legal. Of all states, cannabis is still illegal in Hawaii. We have one of the toughest laws regarding cultivating. Can you believe that? Hawaii? Brah, c'mon!

Ha! Around here, I'd have teens and older coming through the backfields to raid that crop and tromp through everything else once they knew it was there-long sight distances around here-free tokes, yeah. Unless I hid it amongst the mini-orchard.

I'd rather have fun producing things to eat, not smoke, not worry about guarding the crops at night. Besides, I hear WA already has an overabundance of legal supply relative to demand=lower prices for the producers due to free market competition. think I'll pass on that idea. good for the end users that need it, tho, lower prices.

KK, you can fly on over and visit anytime you feel like it, might be some hard cider waiting in the cellar, never know. :toung:

And yes, annual vacations would be still be on the agenda-part of that cashflow that needs to be factored into calculations. not major vacas, but enough to feel like I got away for a bit. major vaca only comes once every few years-planned ahead and saved for. 2-3 of those still in my future if all goes well with tsp and outside investments. Tanzania, Iceland, maybe Germany or France or Ireland-or even Australia. fun to think about.

WorkFE

Re: clester's Account Talk

Alevin,
I applaud your ambition. My sister and I were just having a conversation about our parents this weekend. Although I have about 10 more years till they hit their 80's.

As far as farming. It takes 6-10 years for a standard apple tree to begin producing fruit. There are other variations that grow slightly faster but the yield is noticeably less. Farming, in any form is hard work but it is satisfying as well.
I do not own a significant amount of land and what I do have is timber but I lease about 500 acres a year.
It takes a special person to operate a Farmette. You have to be space frugal. Get advice from those that have succeeded at it. If you see a small farm, pull in the driveway. It has been my experience that they are extremely friendly and love to talk about there success.
Google local wineries, they are usually as mini farm as you can get.

Hi you successful mini-farm guy. Your operation including lease is far bigger than I'll ever try to take on. 10 acres will be good enough, very hard to find due to landuse laws for ag land. And all I could handle and then some, as a retiree. Frugal use of space is name of the game indeed. The apple and other fruit trees, according to the catalogs, would start producing at around 3-4 years-low production. enough to learn on, enough for home use until they get bigger production than home use could handle. I have friends and neighbors with handfuls of chickens. More egg production than their families can consume. They donate to local foodbanks and declare tax deductions. That's what I would probably do for the years when production is more than family use, less than sufficient for market selling. Or I may decide to have a multi-product little farmers market booth with lots of little odds and ends items for sale for the first several years, first come first served. mini-costco. different stuff for sale each week. :toung: I'm already reading up economics of mini-farming and getting things going, as of last weekend. Didn't think I'd ever have a chance to do this realistically. between parents and budget and my own geographic preferences.

It would require lots of planning ahead-permaculture concept primarily. That's what I have at my current residence-perennial herbs, asparagus, strawberries, blackberries and raspberries, a couple starter apple trees...planted a couple blueberry bushes last year-late. wondering if they will do well where I put them, waiting to see this spring and summer. Annuals are vegetables for home use so far, learning about soil management, spacing, crop rotation, bed layout for efficiency-all by reading and doing. been doing that for several years. I have academic training in soils, native plant ecology, ranch econ (one course touched on amortization and ranch planning), beef production and grazing land management, genetics, zoology including some on insects. been managing property for bee pollinators to the extent I have time and space-we need the native bees as much as we need the honeybees. no hives. not enough room here.

I grow heirloom and open-pollinated veg varieties-seedsaver me-learner. As a wildland biologist , I'm all about conservation of all kinds, including genetic diversity for food supply-therefore seedsaving and experimentation to find out what varieties do well for me where I am currently. would be a different environment to learn on, different soils, if I buy the 10 acre property and sell this one-which isn't near big enough for everything I'd like to do. I read a tidbit 20 years ago that we almost lost domestic corn to a virus or bacteria or something years ago. Someone re-introduced ancient southwest Pueblo mini-corn-ears about 1-3 inches long (archaeological corn) genes into the domestic current varieties-saved modern domestic corn from being decimated by disease.

As far as hardwork goes, yes. That's why I like the idea for retirement. Occupational therapy-would keep me moving.

Anyways, onward to tsp for the week. I'll be studying and learning and doing more pencil math on mini-farm economics in my spare time.