Peggie Hall wrote:
Rosalie B. wrote:
On Wed, 13 Oct 2004 17:26:38 -0700, Peter Bennett
I'd go further, and say that if you can't afford to pay in full when you buy
it, you can't afford the boat.
I don't agree with that. You never buy anything on credit? Do you also
pay all cash for cars and houses on land? Houses may appreciate, but
cars don't.
Cars and housing (whether you're making rent or mortgage payments is
immaterial) are necessities, Rosie...boats aren't. You don't have a
A new car and a fancy house are not necessities. You can get buy
without getting a Hummer and you can live in an apartment..
boat loan AND a mortgage...you were able to mortgage your appreciating
asset (house) to buy your boat. And I'd bet that the amount of what you
borrowed against your house to buy the boat is nowhere near what your
house is worth. And if you're living on your boat, I'd also bet that
your house is rented for at least enough to pay the mortgage, taxes and
insurance on it.
No we don't rent our house out. That would be too much work. We only
live on the boat 6 months or so a year, and we've decided to stop
doing that and just sail in the summer. The loan on the boat (which
is the only one we have at this point) DOES have interest which we can
deduct from our taxes. And yes, the house is worth more than the
boat.
But too many people today are making payments on everything--rent or
mortgage, car AND and boat. They don't really own anything but the
clothes on their backs...and not really even those because they're
making payments on the credit cards they used to buy those too. If their
car loan is longer than two years--or 3 yrs with at least 1/3 down--and
they didn't put at least 1/3 down on the boat, they're also "upside
down" everywhere...none of it worth what they could get for it if they
had to sell it.
We've become an "immediate gratification" society, without any regard
for whether something we want is really affordable, or any willingness
to plan ahead and save for it, only whether it's do-able NOW on ANY terms.
Part of the reason we are able to be frugal is that we don't really
WANT a lot of the things that people say they have to have. We
haven't bought a new car since 1970, but Bob likes to work on cars and
the older ones are easier to work on.
I have no desire to have a DVD player. We don't buy a lot of clothes,
and those we do buy are not expensive. We don't drink or smoke or
engage in expensive sports or recreational activities (other than
sailing). When we eat out, which we do frequently, our bill for the
two of us is usually well under $50 including tip.
I guess my main extravagance is photography and satellite TV.
As an aside, I saw something on TV recently...the interviewer asked the
CEO of a Fortune 500 company what he saw as the main characteristic of
his company's youngest employees. His answer (he didn't even have to
think about it first): the inability to do any long-range planning...no
ability to see beyond immediate goals. They live in today, next week,
next month...to them, a year is long-range...a five, ten or twenty year
plan is a totally foreign concept.
I'm not sure whether this is the age we are in, or the upbringing of
the children -- We have/had plans and we put money away for retirement
throughout our working lives. My mom who is 95 has a plan. She and
dad made investments for their retirement. Some of my children have
plans particularly in buying housing that they can afford to pay for,
and planning for their children's education. I think to a certain
extent that is inherited or taught by example. So what were the
parents of these young people doing?
grandma Rosalie
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