Gregmal

Related in a way to this subject, there are people I am very familiar with, who if they’ve done the work on something and it’s new to me, I will give that a lot of weight in terms of how quickly I can put an idea in the actionable category. For instance, GRIF was a @BG2008 special. It’s a microcap real estate name which is my bread and butter, so when my man was getting a hard on for it, I was able to do minimal work to verify on my own, and then largely jump in aggressively knowing BG is an animal on the due diligence front and if it passed his inspection, I would be good. And it turned out how I expected it to, almost to a T. So I’d say you need to have personal thresholds, but also go with instinct and find shortcuts, especially if you’re a one man/small operation type of investor. Conversely there are people who if they own something I just immediately write it off lol. I think awhile ago someone joked if @thepupil, @BG2008, @Williams406, and @Gregmal all were involved in a name, it was money. I think that criteria is still batting a thousand.

Monish Pabrai?

Most of the country was built and infrastructure established wayyyy prior to the 1990s. There is an absolute ton of housing, bridges, roads, etc that aren’t built to handle outlier weather events. The insurers have been waking up to this which is why rates should continue to be strong for years to come.

So with this recent hurricane in view, I can’t help but think this highlights the current dynamic driving homebuilders. Much of the current US housing supply is simply not built to current housing standards. Everyone thinks of Florida, but really, so many markets are unprepared and ill suited for what many consider black swan weather events. We talked awhile back about supply, but I mentioned how millennials and current home buyers and prospective don’t want their parents homes. They want modern built homes with less space and shiny kitchens and huge great rooms. This begs the question…is the new build MPC centric, resort style, big builder home the home of the future? If so it’s hugely bullish for the big guys. I bought a bunch of TOL in July on the dip and it’s already up $40 a share. Will this trend only accelerate given the recent weather related news cycle?

100%, I like it and am a long term, stubborn holder. But like pcyo(which I’ve largely moved on from), I wanna start seeing some consideration for our time and patience. If the apex of allocation is a 2% buyback during a generational market panic…I need more than that. If they sell a great asset and state that they will either find a suitable home for the money, or return it to shareholders, 6 years later I’d like to see some return of capital. No complaints really, just some grumbling. But they need to start cultivating a public market identity. A special dividend machine? A slow and steady regular buyback machine? Whatever, but it needs to be something.

Added some more FRPH last few days. Just kinda hoping they start waking up to the fact that the current state isnt going to cause a rerating on its own.

Well, elevation matters. Northern migration within the state of Florida is inevitable. As is migration to Georgia. Youve got better odds of your house getting hit by lightning than you do storm surges in most of JOE land. Not joking, theres been 2 homes at Origins hit by lightning TTM.

This could actually being a pretty big inflection when you consider the macro trends. US is and will possibly become more and more hostile to businesses, while trading at lets call it 20-25x. The FTC is an abomination, press is bigoted beyond belief, and politicians (both sides) enjoy scapegoating China, Russia, Middle East for everything. Meanwhile China is demonstrating it will support and be favorable to its capital markets, support the general prosperity of the middle class, and take necessary action to root out bad actors; while many of the China based companies trade at sub 10-15x.

Id also say LVMH and DEO benefit a good bit too.

YUMC has been turning it around. Own a small bit of that.

Yea the only way gold makes sense is as a timing trade and using futures options lol. Its worthless.

Exactly and if nothing else continued poor execution enhances the odds of favorable actions being taken

I just think it’s a waste of time even getting caught up in a lot of this. Ya know the “it’s not ROL”…duh…ROL trades at 50x this trades at 15x. “Management hasn’t executed”…duh, it shows and that’s why an activist is in here. “The business is based on roll ups”…duh, but the future doesn’t have to be. Like these are all waste of breath arguments at the current valuation with the potential catalyst backdrop. It’s like arguing about growth and asset sales and terminal valuations on eBay last year. Who cares. All else equal you’re not gonna lose your shirt and you’ve got some interesting upside optionality. Just hang around for a bit and see where it goes.

Yea the hot takes are generally and directionally wrong. It’s a case of a tremendous business, thats being poorly managed with awful integration of a large merger. With the merger integration past the halfway point, a credible activist present, and time on your side, that’s the trade. Nothing to marry or get too into the weeds over.

Per common sense, they were never going to be 5%+ long term either, its just some people couldn't get away from the conspiracy theorists on X(formerly known as Twitter) and missed a very obvious and easy to put on trade.

Think JNJ suffer from lack of sales to Diddy? Lol

Yea Kamala is married to a Jew and otherwise nothing I’ve seen from her is antisemitic. Biden is part of the pro Israel old school faction of the party. It’s more the newer and younger democrats that are really bigoted.

Yup this is where the usual clowns come in and spin the cut as "thats because they see bad things on the horizon" or some variant of the usual "everything is a big deal" nonsense.

No idea. Net debt to EV is of zero concern to me here.

Yea the valuation is rather stupid to me. The balance sheet is great. Profitability is unquestionable. Just really a matter of when with the Terminex integration. No shortage of acquirers for it as well. Just seems like a case where people are short term and impatient.

What’s wrong with that? It’s a product of float. Which is one of the more desirable aspects of the business

ABNB and RTO

Post GFC you can’t really get your name on a property unless you can really demonstrate being able to afford it. Any idiot can get approved for a car loan. That’s the difference. So many poor or imagine sensitive people and frauds driving around in cars they can’t afford. I don’t know anyone who’s in a house they can’t afford.

Yea just another chump trying to lie and mislead everyone into paying for his subscription service. Lemme guess, every week we have another datapoint or economic release that could change everything? We re always just one step away from the edge of the cliff? Consensus isn’t actually correct but rather something totally random and conspiracy based is what everyone else is missing? And of course you need his wisdom in order to take advantage of these ever present monumental events via life changing options strategies or day trades? These jokers are all the same.

I think this is a bad attitude to have as it’s clearly selling yourself short. You’re smart, you can learn just about anything. It doesn’t cost much to start or take a stab at running your own business. Which sounds risky and intimidating but that’s just a mindset thing. Tons of stupid people make decent livings running their own businesses. Why couldn’t someone smarter? And yea, go boat lol. Best part of recessions is you can buy expensive depreciating shit for not much cuz everyone else already lost their shirts.