Will my friends ever buy?

The only thing that I might add here is you should NEVER advise friends or family about investments. Even when asked, you might explain how an investment works, but never tout any of them. Unfortunately, people who don't do their own research are likely to fault you if they should lose money. If someone asks me what I am doing (buying or selling) I am honest, but don't ever mention that they should do what I do. Giving the advice is a losing proposition from every aspect. You get no profit if the investment goes well for them and no allocade for being right. They will assume it was their idea, but if it goes south, that's a different matter.

Just what I've seen.

gary

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I really didn't want to turn this into a topic about my friends. I'm not going to push the issue anymore with them as I've mentioned. They have different priorities than I do. For example they go on a lot of vacations, so there you go, they have the cash to splurge, but not on PM's. They feel protected with their 401K's/IRA's.... I'm not going to try to beat the system for them.

Funny that you mentioned the shows above because they do watch those shows. I can't even put in one minutes worth of my time to watch these shows I have so many other better things to do.....they are pure junk......

 

Hi Krispy, I just read the article you posted/linked to. I don't agree with it. I mean, I don't believe personal finance is a subject that will ever be acceptable or comfortable in 'mixed' company. Unlike the other taboo topics, there is no predictability with finance. I think that as soon as it becomes common to divulge or discuss personal finance, too much judgment breaks loose in people, because basically we 'tend' towards greed. In our country (and we are VERY lucky to be here, imo) freedom of enterprise (is that the right descriptor? Might not be..) is what defines us. When I find out that my neighbor makes 4 times more than I for the same job, I'm likely to become very unhappy. Never mind that perhaps I do it better, blah, blah, blah. When my neighbor admits to making 4 times what I make for the same job, I actually might begin to see that as gloating. For I'm sure that he's not 4 times better than me, just ask me!

No, it's more of a class thing, discussing one's personal wages/salaries. The more one makes, the less he wants to tell. Want to find out? Move yourself into the poorest county you can find. Be nice to everyone, and be well appointed (car, clothes, vacations, services, etc..) Be a great neighbor. They'll love you, but every evening behind their closed doors, you will be the subject of lots of discussions. You won't be trusted. Plain and simple. And surely, don't tell them to go and invest in pm's.

I recognize this is rambling, but it's a pet peeve of mine. An employer has no way of rewarding excellence via rate increases etc, if wages are discussed amongst employees (I'm not talking union jobs..) Sitting in a room of company presidents, they may tell what each of their businesses grossed last year, but not to their employees, and not what they report on their personal taxes.

What say? That's why telling my friends/relatives investment/financial advice, well I'd much rather discuss death with them. At least with death, it equates to ALL of us.

Lucy (trying out my new MAC!)

 

Enjoy your new Mac! Did you buy that with your PM's? LOL.....

For me, I do not share or would I feel comfortable speaking about my wage with "outside" friends. Those are the ones that I consider I know, but not close enough. I can email them and it wouldn't be too odd, but they aren't part of my daily contacts. My two best buds are the onlys ones that we share our wages with. We use that to push ourselves to keep being better at our jobs and to try to be the best....

I think I'd be a little more open if they were, or if it was easier for society to discuss wages. If you don't make as much, subconciously, I think there is resentment. It also depends on personality, some people know they don't make that much and quite frankly they don't care either because it's not what they focus on. But I think the majority do care. If you are sharing wages at a holiday gathering for example, and you make $100K. And the other 3-4 young adults in your age group are making $45-55K, that's a huge gap....

Also keep in mind how much you can take home and save too.....if you are making $100K but you can barely save, then the guy making $55K who lives with mom and dad actually saves more! (if he's a saver)

There's nothing wrong with trying to make a lot of money so you can have a better quality of life when we all get older. I'm trying to work hard now because I'll rather work hard young than work hard old. Only we can stop ourselves from being successful, whether that is our job or how much attention we pay to for the future. When I'm 50-60, I'm hoping my PM's will afford me to work part time/casually. Meanwhile, unfortunately, perhaps my other friends who didn't want to touch PM's will be working hard because maybe in 30 years the value of the dollar is going to be very very useless.....???

 

It's almost already very very useless.. sheesh! My very first brand new car, 1979 Mustang, complete with financing for 3 years cost me a total of $5,400.00. My last new Mustang(05) cost me $32,000, no finance and every discount I could find. ALMOST six times the original. Our dollar today doesn't go very far, now does it? I am truly truly amazed at where we are today. And, I cannot fathom where we are headed..

Lucy

 

That is quite amazing indeed! I've read how NEW cars used to cost $5K-8K and these weren't chump cars either, like you said, Mustang! With that said, future generations are probably going to look at buying a Honda Civic for $25,000 - $30,000..... and your average higher end BMW/Mercedes probably just under $100K..... I mean, it can't really go in reverse, it seems once we took this road, it's the road paved......

New mustangs will never be $5,000 again....that's my rational for buying silver/gold. If it costs this much to purchase cars, why would something more rare like PM's go down in price?

Anyways, there's only so much we can with preserving our wealth. Unfortunately we are all paid in devaluing USD's....perhaps that is when the "velocity" will occur with our money. The speed at which the USD is moved from one hand to another....we get paid, and quickly want something else in return.....no one wants to be caught holding onto too much USD's.....

 

My first new car was a 1967 Olds 4-4-2 with all the goodies. I paid $3600. I saw one for sale recently...fully frame-off restored for $65,000.

 

Wow that is truly amazing. It's probably even more amazing that you've personally witness these kinds of prices.

It's funny when I see old signs from the 40's, 50's about 10 cent hamburgers.....it just boggles my mind how that is even possible.....

 

Late 60's..McD's burger? 18 cents.. (Say, 68, 69?) Candy bars? 5 cents and some 10 cents, penny licorice Candy cigarettes? 5 cents!

I know, I know.. off topic! Enjoy the day. Lucy

 

Just for the heck of it, a long time ago I carefully unwrapped and saved a black and silver wrapper from a 3" x 7" Hershey Bar. Price on the wrapper: 5 cents.

Let's face it. The US can't pay off its debt. Ben's only course of actions is to inflate our way out of it just as his predecessors have done. Quantitative Easing, Boosting the stock market, Ending the great recession, reducing unemployment etc are just platitudes for public consumption. He's inflating the US out of its massive debt. No ands, ifs, or buts about it.

 

And the majority of folks will just accept it as way of life. Costs go up and it's, "oh well, that's inflation for you..."

So the key is to use whatever mechanism you can to maintain wealth. Whether via PM's, foreign currencies, stocks etc....

They say don't put all your eggs in one basket but the truth is, we're already doing that. They are all in USD's....