Author Archives: Money Reasons

About Money Reasons

A offbeat personal finance blogger that comes from the tech world.

Striving for Income Diversification

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Most of my life, I’ve been an employee.  For the most part, it’s been a good living and I have no complaints about the workability of the employee model, it has put food on the table and supported my family.  Recently, an associate at work retired, and I decided to ask him his plans.  And while he has a few personal projects going on, for the most part he said he doesn’t have much in the works.  No big plans to tour Europe for a month or year…  He’s not going to talk to the mortgage brokers sydney company, and buy a house in Australia.  In fact, he has no travel plans at all!

Since he had no big plans, it piqued my interest on what he would have done it he had it all over to do again, so I asked him.  Surprisingly, he said he wouldn’t have stayed with my current employer so long.  This was a surprise to me considering he was well liked and seemed happy most days.  His statement has motivated me to create more choices for myself!

Getting Paid for recycling

Money recycling

Jumping back a few years ago, I first started exploring the entrepreneur route with selling stuff on eBay.  And while I learned skills I didn’t previously had, and it was a boost in confidence, it wasn’t for me.  Next I started blogging, and it’s been more of a hobby than a total revenue stream, but I do make more blogging that I did with selling stuff on eBay.  Plus it’s much more fulfilling and profitable.

Now I’m at the stage where I want to explore real estate.  I plan on starting out small with a duplex (or triplex) for the first year, just to get my feet wet.  Then as my investment money builds up for the next potential property, I’ll buy a larger unit (hopefully).

With the investment property, that will mean that I now have income coming from the following sources:

  1. Employment Income
  2. Entrepreneur Income
  3. Passive Income (via dividend stocks)
  4. Passive Income (via real estate)

So now I’m back in the deep learning phase of my life to learn about all elements of real estate.  I’m even thinking about getting a real estate agent license.

Cheers,

MR

Does The Lack of The Uptick Rule Make It Easier To Take Advantage Of Regular Investors?

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With the computerization of trades, and computer algorithms and code created to make trades on the market automatically, I really think that it’s easier to take advantage of regular investors.

Take Herbalife, for example…  When the famous hedge fund titan David Einhorn just questions some statements in Herbalife’s quarterly report, this served as a sell signal for all of the other shorts out there (including Bill Ackman), and they caused the stock to drop over 15%!  It continued to slide from that point much lower.

With the Uptick Rule, such a quick devaluation of the stock would not have happened so dramatically.  It’s obvious that once Mr. Einhorn expressed his concern, all of the other hedge fund manager flooded the market, with selling moves on that stock, this caused it to drop like a stone on really no news at all.  Oh sure, the hedge fund managers didn’t meet the week before and cook up this plan (or did they?), but once Mr. Einhorm expressed his views, it pretty much served as a massive sell signal to all of the other hedge fund managers out there.

To me, this is kind of a predatory approach to the stock market that many hurts us non-hedge fund individuals.  On the other hand, if the “Uptick Rule” was back in place, it would have dramatically change the outcome of that day.  You see, many of the hedge funds make great profits in volatility!  The Uptick Rule lessened that volatility big time!

There is a movement against the top 1%, but I say they should focus their attention towards the hedge fund companies and managers!  They are one of the largest creators of inequality that I’ve seen lately, especially with the complete computerization of the stock markets…  Let’s focus on the panic creators in society that make wounds deeper than the need to be.  After all,  to attack the top 1% seems harsh… after all, who really wants to protest either Warren Buffett or Bill Gates?

What is the government going to re-enact the “Uptick Rule”?  This is something that is making the rich richer, and the middle and poor classes poorer.  If not the “Uptick Rule”, then how about something to reign in the hedge funds companies, who’s practices seem a bit unethical and counterproductive to the entire purpose of the stock market…

What do you think?  Am I off base or wouldn’t it be nice to make the stock market a fair place again?  A place where you invest in a company because you want to own that company, not take advantage of the regular investors!

MR

Are You Underestimating Your Abilities and Potential?

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I once knew a cashier that was super intelligent, fast, creative and overall very amazing.

The only problem is that she never stopped working at the grocery store where she worked as a cashier.  While there is nothing wrong with my now older friend working as a cashier in a grocery store, I have to wonder what her life would have been like if she tried a little harder to get a more challenging, higher paying job or pursued some other income making venture.

The person above was actually my friend’s mom, and I knew that she was very, very smart and creative.  I was always amazed with how she seemed to know so much about so many topics, and would make some of the most fantastic creations at her home.

Now as an adult, I realize that she would have thrived in a corporate setting, or perhaps as an entrepreneur if she would have pursued such options.  It got me thinking how many other brilliant people are in job that they may have fell into while in high school and never left.  That is what happened to my friend’s mom.  In the cartoon series “Dilbert”, one of the “smartest” characters is the garbage man.  Whenever Dilbert speaks to him, the conversation always seems to blow Dilbert away.  I wonder how many other in real life are like that?  Personally, I know a few people in such positions that I consider smarter than I am, but working in a job that doesn’t utilize their intellect nor pays that well.

For a current day example, look at many of the bloggers of today.  Many come from mundane job where their full skills aren’t utilized or even recognized!  The they start blogging and almost instantly make as much as they were when they were working at their pre-blogging job.  Some have even went on be to quite successful!  What a contrast!

The key is to wake up and put as much time into finances and income creation as we (as a society) put into watching TV or other time wasting activities.  Perhaps if we made making money a personal game, it would facilitate the exploration and expansion of our innate abilities?

My friend’s mom is set in her ways and seems content enough.  Neither she or I will ever know where she could have gone with her brilliance.

Thinking of my friend’s mom makes me want to try harder!

MR

Memorial Day Smoke Fire Scare

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Today I’m going to deviate off of my normal blogging path and tell of an interesting scare my family recently had.

On this past Memorial Day Monday, I woke up at 5:30am and couldn’t get back to sleep.  I found myself continuing to watch the clock in 15 minute intervals as I waited for a respectable hour to get out of bed, and thus, in the process waking my wife.

I believe that I was close to dozing back to sleep when I heard the smoke detector out in the hall going off.  I jump out of bed and rush to the hallway, and started fanning the cacophony sound emitting from our hallway smoke detector.  You see, often in my house when toast or pop-tarts in our toaster start to burn a bit, for some reasons, this particular smoke alarm wails first.  But my frantic waving didn’t remedy the problem, so I gave the unit a twist and unplugged the unit from the ceiling.  Still it wailed, then after about 20 seconds it stopped.  That was when I realized that I also hear the alert from other units in the house!

I looked at the kids rooms but asked my wife to check them out while I sprinted downstairs to see if the potential fire was down there!  Once I was in the kitchen, I didn’t see or smell any smoke, so down I went into the basement.  Nothing there either, I quickly checked the fuse box, but it was okay and no burning smell!  I asked my wife to go outside and walk around the perimeter of the house looking for any smoke or heat distortion to the air while I grabbed a ladder from the garage and went to check in the attic.  On my way up, my wife asked if she should call 911, and I agree it sounded like a good idea!

I quickly check the attic (not really expecting a problem), but there wasn’t any smoke up there either…

So I decided to do a perimeter walk myself.  my wife was busy soothing my daughter who was now downstairs and freaking out.  Surprisingly, my son was nowhere to be seen.

While walking outside looking for smoke, I got the idea to check out the electric meter to see I could see any electricity flowing.  The display was not lite!  At that point I realized that the problem was no power was coming to the house.  I went in and flipped the main breaker, but still nothing happened.  As I heard the fire fighters stop by, I realized that the problem must have been with the power from the electric company.  Still the fire fighters walked through the house with me doing exactly what I did and came to the same conclusion that I had come to, especially when I showed them the display that was not showing any numbers.

So since everybody was up, I suggested that we all go our for breakfast and hope that the electricity was back on by the time we got home.

That was our start of memorial day morning.  Oh, and my son slept through the entire ordeal until my wife woke him to go to breakfast!

I’m still trying to figure out why most of the alarms triggered during the power outage.  Neither I nor the fire fighter had any idea what that happened.

Hope you enjoyed  the story of our Memorial Day Fire Scare!

MR