Lifestyle creep destroys more wealth creation than anything. The best status symbol signaling is shopping at Target or Walmart. Having the money and not needing it signals more than spending wildly for the latest and greatest thing, but there will always be that one thing.
For my father that was cars and TVs. For myself it is food. I like good food and what I like even more than good food is to buy extra fancy food and then use it in ways that might cause someone to have a heart attack.
That was my dinner last night. I used the fancy American wagyu from Snake River Farms to make a Thai curry. Now it was the free extra thin New York strip that I used and not something like a rib eye or a filet, and I do find strip loin to be one of the best cuts for stir fry and stews.
Maybe this is just circling back to the same point I made before except I am not wealthy. We have a small little business that makes ok money and a tiny portfolio of equities that I keep messing with and messing up my own plans.
As each day passes I understand the brilliance of Buffett more and more. I also understand the idiocy of the average investor more and more. I was reading on Reddit a debate on things being priced in, and I don’t know where the term came from. Suddenly everyone is using it and it drives me nuts because the reality is nothing is priced in because everyone would value a business different.
The big debate right now is how the market was green after rates were hiked. It’s the same reason a child stops crying after getting a shot. The anticipation of the event is far worse than the event itself. This one is easy, but also irrelevant because if you’re working with a business broker to purchase a business you’re not going to ask what the rates are. That will impact your borrowing cost, but not the evaluation of the business.
I also saw someone celebrating beating the index by 1% and he did it by buying VOO which is the index with lower fees. This is almost like the time period proceeding the go-go years where there is more dumb money in the market than ever and it will only get worse as people are going to us AI and AI’s idea of a barbell is T-bills on one side and Microsoft on the other. That is like doing step aerobics with a net.
Meanwhile I am simply going to continue to refine my strategy, run away from it like a crazy person, and then slowly bring myself back to it when I get punched in the face one too many times.
David Huzzard Writes 