bizaro86

Having your purchasing power eroded by high transaction costs is not obviously better than having it eroded by inflation. I suppose it depends whether you are using it as a store of value or a currency.

My prediction is that one Canadian city makes the final round as a political leverage play to get Amazon more H1B visas and other things it wants. There would be appetite in Calgary (lots of unemployed engineers and empty office space here) to drop a dump truck of money on them, but we're probably too small, and in Canada.

Has anyone done one with IB? I tried with a special situation where you needed to have your shares registered in your name, and opened a ticket with them a year ago or so. They said they couldn't do it, and the opportunity passed, so I haven't asked again...

I'm mostly with IB but keep RBCDI accounts for penny stocks and convertible debentures, which are more expensive and not available on IB respectively. I've executed Norberts Gambit a number of times with simultaneous trades in my registered account. I agree that the compliance could be bad, but is that actually a short position? If I have a settled long position by the time my sale needs to settle, isn't that just a sale of something I own? Genuine question, this is way cheaper than what they charge for Fx, and I want to keep the account...

Brk won't raise, because that hurts them on every future deal. Right now, when they say that is their top price people believe them.

Regarding margin, I think it is more a signal as to what people are doing as opposed to a systemic risk in and of itself. As an example, I saw this on Seeking Alpha recently. https://seekingalpha.com/instablog/8508161-edward-frost/4899379-make-money-shorting-options-every-month Basically, he is shorting very short term, out of the money index options using contracts for difference to increase the leverage. That's like picking up nickels in front of a steamroller, where you've attached a booster rocket to the steamroller. Maybe people are always like that, but that level of greed/reach for yield and lack of risk aversion seems like a bad sign to me...

I think predicting BRK won't do 25% per year for the next 30 years is a pretty safe bet. At their current size, I'm quite confident that isn't possible.

Maybe you should look for shorts. That analysis is a very good idea, definitely something I will put on my to-do list.

I have a Heloc on my house, that is 80% LTV and prime+0.5% rate. As I paid down principal, the Heloc availability increased, so I wasn't losing cash availability. I would absolutely draw it down in a crisis to invest, so I'm keeping the option value.

Parsed, thanks for sharing! This sounds like a great service, and an interesting business as well. I will create an account and anticipate it being especially useful if one of my kids gets sick on vacation. A more business related question, is how do you feel this scales? It seems like a potentially high variable cost business, which reduces the scalability. On the other hand, maybe their revenue is just the spread between health board RATE and what they pay, and I could see the Web infrastructure being mostly fixed costs. I'd also be curious if they are capitalizing on the convenience factor for their employees by paying less. I would definitely take less pay if I could work part time hours and/or from home, and I suspect that is true for medical professionals as well.

I would take the mortgage every time. Its not callable, and depending on your jurisdiction may include an effective put option. (All my mortgages are non-recourse to me, so if the market falls enough that I have zero equity my banks will be getting the properties). Plus there's optionality. You might not be able to get a mortgage later, but cash is always cash and IB will almost certainly always offer margin. Thus, taking the mortgage loan keeps your options open the most.

That law is obviously asinine, but this popped out at me from the article. "The Legislature adjourned May 31 without taking further action. It’s not scheduled to reconvene until January 2019" emphasis added by me. Sounds like being a Texas legislator is nice work if you can get it...

Do you mind sharing the strike/expiry combinations you've been buying. I've bought a few shares on the drop here, and am curious to hear about other strategies

So this thread has been fun, and while I wish for selfish reasons the same pricing insanity would trickle down to Calgary where I own real estate, I have a question. Is there any reasonable way to make money off of knowing this is a bubble? The banks are tbtf, and I can't short the government or cmhc. Are people buying genworth puts? PS. I have a number of Chinese immigrant friends who have received money from. Both parent's house/apartment sales in china, and used the cash to buy real estate here. I have a coworker who owns 12 houses he bought from this source of funds. I'm mentioning this for two reasons. If it's true in Calgary it's probably true in Vancouver and Toronto. Secondly, my message to irrational real estate speculators is that Calgary is way undervalued!

It's worth adding that cardboard is right too. For a niche purchase, they're not a specialist retailer so you can likely get a better deal elsewhere. BUT if you want diapers, khakis, a CD repair kit and a specific children's book, it is likely to be by far the fastest and cheapest option. Knowing they'll have something, it'll be pretty cheap and will come to my house fast has real value.

But on the other hand, the diapers come right to my house with free 2 day shipping. It's like a magical box that means I never have to go to Walmart late at night ever again.

From reading it, it seems to me the child has the money on deposit earning 4% per month. Sounds like they're getting the better end of the deal... Similar to the Lego story above, I intend to do kijiji/Craigslist buy-low-sell-high of whatever my kids are interested in with them when they are old enough. My wife and I have always done that casually with our interests at the time throughout life (including rare books, musical instruments, jewelry, electronics, vending machines, and baby strollers). While we might not start the kids with shipping a 4 valve euphonium to Spain or buy 30,000 used books (both of which we've done) I think the buy a dollar for fifty cents is a useful skill whether you end up an investor or not, and the scale is appropriate for kids.

All of the Canadian banks do stuff like this. A couple of recent personal experiences. I was at a CIBC, where a little old lady was at the teller next to me. She was taking out approximately a weeks worth of grocery money. The teller said "sign here for your pre-approved unsecured line of credit and I'll get your cash" I had a mortgage at Scotia that the banker flat out said they wouldn't approve unless I signed up for their credit card. I'm sure if I had complained it would have been my misunderstanding. These are just the examples I've witnessed so far this month... Also, to whoever said Scotia has the most conservative domestic underwriting, that is not true for rental properties. Scotia has by far the most generous terms for individual rental property investors. TD is probably the strictest in that market.

I live further NW in Calgary, the condo I am thinking of selling (in Sunnyside) is a rental.

Actually 200x to 250x is the norm now if it's in reputable school zones. Sorry, I was misinterpreting the graph. I think price to rent varies by local market, Calgary is a bit under 200 I'd day. That being said, I really do have a pretty nice 2 bedroom apartment condo in a good inner city Calgary neighbourhood (across the street from a good elementry, 1 block from the Peace bridge). I would sell it at the price (say 155x my 1300/mth rent) so I think my valuation is relevant for at least part of the market. Toronto and Vancouver are different, but that's not news.

I'd like to know which Canadian markets are at ~55 price to rent ratio (the bottom end of that bar). The propertis I own now are probably 150x price to rent ratio.

I have done this in a regular condo complex, and am in the process of doing it in a timeshare complex. I've only just started, and I estimate it will take me 12-15 years to control the HOA. I've known a number of folks who have tried this at various resorts and failed. The usual issues are that to pull a condo out of the timeshare plan, you need all 52 owners to sell to you, and there are usually a few you can't find or who won't sell. The other issue is the vast majority of places you'll have a significant negative carry, and it just gets bigger the closer you get to control. I think I've licked both issues, but am proceeding cautiously. If it turns out like I expect (10 bagger+) I'll be back here raising a fund in 2032... (And of course, anyone who wants discount rooms for weekdays in San Francisco or Anaheim can PM me)

Bromance

Anybody advertising to help you get rid of your timeshare will do the following. 1) charge you a bunch of money up front. This is the important part from their perspective. 2) step 2 varies depending on how scummy they are. The usual choices are: -advertise it on a low traffic website for awhile -call the resort home owners association and developer to try and get them to take it back -list it on eBay for a low price or free -deed it over to an LLC with an unknown or imaginary membership, and stop paying the fees. -nothing These are all things you could do yourself, although the LLC one is probably illegal, and various attorney generals have shut down a few folks doing it.

I should probably add that some of the timeshares that can be purchased in Vegas do have some resale value, maybe 10-20% of retail. That would include most units at the Marriott, high season RCI points units at Grandview, some Holton units (generally higher season/point values, and there are specialized brokers for this). Also, worldmark point are worth about 10% of retail, and Wyndham points at their Vegas locations have some value as well. Polo towers/jockey club/Diamond you'd be lucky to give away (unless fixed week 52). Anyway, a retail timeshare is a terrible investment, but some have a bit of value if marketed correctly.