Plagarizing Stock Picks by the Greats

[SharperDingaan]

My strengths are strategy and risk management, my partners are common sense.

Together it means that most of the time we have a block of cash to invest when the sh1t hits the fan.

 

2008/9 we got the opportunity to buy a flat in Knightsbridge (London, UK).

It was a punch card investment, a lot of money, the $C/Sterling FX rate was unusually favourable, we were being offered an historically low price, and it was an 'invitation only' location; but it meant materially stressing the portfolio, for an unknown period - and none of us would be using this flat. Ultimately, we ponied up, and it has served us very well.

 

Points are that you 1) need cash/security, and 2) the courage/support to step up.

There are lots of ways to ensure that you have the cash when you need it; the courage you have to earn.

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, and saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

 

 

 

 

 

[james22]

I'm fully invested but have 22% x 75 % = approx. 17% cash but not in my hands! Berkshire's cash position. Really don't see a reason to hold it myself.

 

That's one way to look at it, yeah.

 

I'm holding a lot of cash and really kicking myself for not having taken greater advantage of BRK a year ago.

[Green King]

 

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, a saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

Care to explain the mechanics and reasoning behind doing that ?

[Guest longinvestor]

I'm fully invested but have 22% x 75 % = approx. 17% cash but not in my hands! Berkshire's cash position. Really don't see a reason to hold it myself.

 

That's one way to look at it, yeah.

 

I'm holding a lot of cash and really kicking myself for not having taken greater advantage of BRK a year ago.

 

What is a target price that you have in mind, now? You appeared to have bought at $125 to $130 during early 2016. I also bought for a relative at those prices then. I have some limit buy orders for 10-15% down from here, again for that account. May not fill, but wanted to give it a try anyway.

[SharperDingaan]

 

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, a saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

Care to explain the mechanics and reasoning behind doing that ?

 

This was the first oil boom and Calgary had little experience with the boom and bust cycle. Jobs were plentiful, adventure was everywhere, pay was good, and as in booms everywhere; people bought ‘toys’ and expensive houses – sure it would never end.

 

Dome Petroleum was the ‘darling’; and I was a 2nd year petroleum engineer flying up and down the McKenzie Valley pipeline, teaching Cariboo to walk under elevated pipeline, & doing engineering tests on cold weather metal fatigue and heavy drop parachutes (D9 cats yanked out of a Hercules in flight, & dropped softly onto a 50m target, when the plane is going at 200km+ an hour).

 

Then the bust struck. Petroleum Engineers with 30yrs experience couldn’t get a job, & went from king to bum in under 6 months. It lasted a long time, folks couldn’t pay their bills, and mortgage foreclosures went through the roof (often every 2nd or 3rd house on a street).

 

Alberta’s depression era laws were still on the books, & they had the effect of making recourse loans ‘non-recourse’ under certain conditions. If you had title, you could essentially ‘quit stake’, sell your property in a public auction, and just give the banker the proceeds; if it wasn’t enough to pay off the mortgage – the banker had to take the loss. Block party auctions were common, underwater homeowners would put their property on the block, and ‘enforcers’ would ensure that nobody offered more than $1 - or competed against the selected ‘winning’ family (cant bid if you’ve been rabbit punched, & are on the ground with a boot across your throat). It was community action, and it saved a great many people from poverty.

 

I went to university with many of the sons & daughters of these people, and many of their dads owed their companies to a successful win at poker – when it was common for roughnecks to ante up their partial well interests, so that the winner would have a better chance at building something. They were being wiped out, and there were more than a few suicides.

 

I found it utterly amazing, & extremely odious, that Canada’s banks didn’t know their sh1t; and that this level of misery had been allowed to happen. I changed majors to finance, researched what had made it so bad, left Calgary, & swore it would never happen to me. I learnt these things are recurring, what you can do to avoid getting burnt, and how to exploit them. It turned me into a counterculture value investor, & I have been forever grateful for it.

 

Not much different to the experiences of many of the ‘greats’.

 

SD

 

 

[DooDiligence]

 

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, a saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

Care to explain the mechanics and reasoning behind doing that ?

 

This was the first oil boom and Calgary had little experience with the boom and bust cycle. Jobs were plentiful, adventure was everywhere, pay was good, and as in booms everywhere; people bought ‘toys’ and expensive houses – sure it would never end.

 

Dome Petroleum was the ‘darling’; and I was a 2nd year petroleum engineer flying up and down the McKenzie Valley pipeline, teaching Cariboo to walk under elevated pipeline, & doing engineering tests on cold weather metal fatigue and heavy drop parachutes (D9 cats yanked out of a Hercules in flight, & dropped softly onto a 50m target, when the plane is going at 200km+ an hour).

 

Then the bust struck. Petroleum Engineers with 30yrs experience couldn’t get a job, & went from king to bum in under 6 months. It lasted a long time, folks couldn’t pay their bills, and mortgage foreclosures went through the roof (often every 2nd or 3rd house on a street).

 

Alberta’s depression era laws were still on the books, & they had the effect of making recourse loans ‘non-recourse’ under certain conditions. If you had title, you could essentially ‘quit stake’, sell your property in a public auction, and just give the banker the proceeds; if it wasn’t enough to pay off the mortgage – the banker had to take the loss. Block party auctions were common, underwater homeowners would put their property on the block, and ‘enforcers’ would ensure that nobody offered more than $1 - or competed against the selected ‘winning’ family (cant bid if you’ve been rabbit punched, & are on the ground with a boot across your throat). It was community action, and it saved a great many people from poverty.

 

I went to university with many of the sons & daughters of these people, and many of their dads owed their companies to a successful win at poker – when it was common for roughnecks to ante up their partial well interests, so that the winner would have a better chance at building something. They were being wiped out, and there were more than a few suicides.

 

I found it utterly amazing, & extremely odious, that Canada’s banks didn’t know their sh1t; and that this level of misery had been allowed to happen. I changed majors to finance, researched what had made it so bad, left Calgary, & swore it would never happen to me. I learnt these things are recurring, what you can do to avoid getting burnt, and how to exploit them. It turned me into a counterculture value investor, & I have been forever grateful for it.

 

Not much different to the experiences of many of the ‘greats’.

 

SD

 

Sounds like a great book idea!

[Green King]

 

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, a saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

Care to explain the mechanics and reasoning behind doing that ?

 

This was the first oil boom and Calgary had little experience with the boom and bust cycle. Jobs were plentiful, adventure was everywhere, pay was good, and as in booms everywhere; people bought ‘toys’ and expensive houses – sure it would never end.

 

Dome Petroleum was the ‘darling’; and I was a 2nd year petroleum engineer flying up and down the McKenzie Valley pipeline, teaching Cariboo to walk under elevated pipeline, & doing engineering tests on cold weather metal fatigue and heavy drop parachutes (D9 cats yanked out of a Hercules in flight, & dropped softly onto a 50m target, when the plane is going at 200km+ an hour).

 

Then the bust struck. Petroleum Engineers with 30yrs experience couldn’t get a job, & went from king to bum in under 6 months. It lasted a long time, folks couldn’t pay their bills, and mortgage foreclosures went through the roof (often every 2nd or 3rd house on a street).

 

Alberta’s depression era laws were still on the books, & they had the effect of making recourse loans ‘non-recourse’ under certain conditions. If you had title, you could essentially ‘quit stake’, sell your property in a public auction, and just give the banker the proceeds; if it wasn’t enough to pay off the mortgage – the banker had to take the loss. Block party auctions were common, underwater homeowners would put their property on the block, and ‘enforcers’ would ensure that nobody offered more than $1 - or competed against the selected ‘winning’ family (cant bid if you’ve been rabbit punched, & are on the ground with a boot across your throat). It was community action, and it saved a great many people from poverty.

 

I went to university with many of the sons & daughters of these people, and many of their dads owed their companies to a successful win at poker – when it was common for roughnecks to ante up their partial well interests, so that the winner would have a better chance at building something. They were being wiped out, and there were more than a few suicides.

 

I found it utterly amazing, & extremely odious, that Canada’s banks didn’t know their sh1t; and that this level of misery had been allowed to happen. I changed majors to finance, researched what had made it so bad, left Calgary, & swore it would never happen to me. I learnt these things are recurring, what you can do to avoid getting burnt, and how to exploit them. It turned me into a counterculture value investor, & I have been forever grateful for it.

 

Not much different to the experiences of many of the ‘greats’.

 

SD

 

Thanks you that made my day, you always have the nicest things to share. Those bankers were probably under a lot of  pressure from Gresham's law, being mostly empty suits with no skin in the game they did what ever the system allowed.

 

This added with Eric house buying story make me question the true strength of large national banks. Will they eventually  self implode as success make them large and their size eventually become their greatest handicap? like what happens to most fund managers when they get large.

[james22]

I'm fully invested but have 22% x 75 % = approx. 17% cash but not in my hands! Berkshire's cash position. Really don't see a reason to hold it myself.

 

That's one way to look at it, yeah.

 

I'm holding a lot of cash and really kicking myself for not having taken greater advantage of BRK a year ago.

 

What is a target price that you have in mind, now? You appeared to have bought at $125 to $130 during early 2016. I also bought for a relative at those prices then. I have some limit buy orders for 10-15% down from here, again for that account. May not fill, but wanted to give it a try anyway.

 

Depends if BRK falls because out of favor or with the (overvalued) market, of course.

 

But yeah, about 10-15% down. I've a limit order in at $140, but might consider (if the former case) once at P/B 1.3.

[Uccmal]

 

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, a saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

Awesome story.  Tx. 

 

Care to explain the mechanics and reasoning behind doing that ?

 

This was the first oil boom and Calgary had little experience with the boom and bust cycle. Jobs were plentiful, adventure was everywhere, pay was good, and as in booms everywhere; people bought ‘toys’ and expensive houses – sure it would never end.

 

Dome Petroleum was the ‘darling’; and I was a 2nd year petroleum engineer flying up and down the McKenzie Valley pipeline, teaching Cariboo to walk under elevated pipeline, & doing engineering tests on cold weather metal fatigue and heavy drop parachutes (D9 cats yanked out of a Hercules in flight, & dropped softly onto a 50m target, when the plane is going at 200km+ an hour).

 

Then the bust struck. Petroleum Engineers with 30yrs experience couldn’t get a job, & went from king to bum in under 6 months. It lasted a long time, folks couldn’t pay their bills, and mortgage foreclosures went through the roof (often every 2nd or 3rd house on a street).

 

Alberta’s depression era laws were still on the books, & they had the effect of making recourse loans ‘non-recourse’ under certain conditions. If you had title, you could essentially ‘quit stake’, sell your property in a public auction, and just give the banker the proceeds; if it wasn’t enough to pay off the mortgage – the banker had to take the loss. Block party auctions were common, underwater homeowners would put their property on the block, and ‘enforcers’ would ensure that nobody offered more than $1 - or competed against the selected ‘winning’ family (cant bid if you’ve been rabbit punched, & are on the ground with a boot across your throat). It was community action, and it saved a great many people from poverty.

 

I went to university with many of the sons & daughters of these people, and many of their dads owed their companies to a successful win at poker – when it was common for roughnecks to ante up their partial well interests, so that the winner would have a better chance at building something. They were being wiped out, and there were more than a few suicides.

 

I found it utterly amazing, & extremely odious, that Canada’s banks didn’t know their sh1t; and that this level of misery had been allowed to happen. I changed majors to finance, researched what had made it so bad, left Calgary, & swore it would never happen to me. I learnt these things are recurring, what you can do to avoid getting burnt, and how to exploit them. It turned me into a counterculture value investor, & I have been forever grateful for it.

 

Not much different to the experiences of many of the ‘greats’.

 

SD

 

It is an awesome story

[Dynamic]

I'd agree that prices in the $136-$140 range for BRK.B today would be as attractive as $124-$128 was last February when I bought big below $125 and went 100% into BRK.B in my main UK tax-free account and my wife's also, which probably came to about 90% exposure across all discretionary shareholdings.

 

Back in Feb 2016 I projected 2015Q4's BV to be 4-5% up on 2015Q3's, meaning it was effectively 1.2x BV, meaning that I'd get a pretty good floor under my investment once the Annual Report came out given the announced buy-back threshold. This proved to be the case. Given the Q4 rally in 2016, I'd imagine the reported 2016Q4 BV will again be meaningfully above 2016Q3's figure.

 

We're now positioned at 61% BRK.B and have brought a lot of taxable holdings' proceeds into our tax-free accounts and added more savings and trimmed BRK.B at $142 in May 2016 to put 25% of the portfolio in AAPL at $95, so if BRK.B were to reach $135-$140 over the next few months I would be happy to invest the whole tax-free portfolio in BRK.B taking it to 98.5% of our current discretionary holdings at that price. That's assuming nothing else is a screaming buy at the time, and I'd be especially keen to switch if our other holdings remained more fully-valued allowing me to significantly trade up the amount of intrinsic value in our portfolio.

 

[Pelagic]

 

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, a saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

Care to explain the mechanics and reasoning behind doing that ?

 

This was the first oil boom and Calgary had little experience with the boom and bust cycle. Jobs were plentiful, adventure was everywhere, pay was good, and as in booms everywhere; people bought ‘toys’ and expensive houses – sure it would never end.

 

Dome Petroleum was the ‘darling’; and I was a 2nd year petroleum engineer flying up and down the McKenzie Valley pipeline, teaching Cariboo to walk under elevated pipeline, & doing engineering tests on cold weather metal fatigue and heavy drop parachutes (D9 cats yanked out of a Hercules in flight, & dropped softly onto a 50m target, when the plane is going at 200km+ an hour).

 

Then the bust struck. Petroleum Engineers with 30yrs experience couldn’t get a job, & went from king to bum in under 6 months. It lasted a long time, folks couldn’t pay their bills, and mortgage foreclosures went through the roof (often every 2nd or 3rd house on a street).

 

Alberta’s depression era laws were still on the books, & they had the effect of making recourse loans ‘non-recourse’ under certain conditions. If you had title, you could essentially ‘quit stake’, sell your property in a public auction, and just give the banker the proceeds; if it wasn’t enough to pay off the mortgage – the banker had to take the loss. Block party auctions were common, underwater homeowners would put their property on the block, and ‘enforcers’ would ensure that nobody offered more than $1 - or competed against the selected ‘winning’ family (cant bid if you’ve been rabbit punched, & are on the ground with a boot across your throat). It was community action, and it saved a great many people from poverty.

 

I went to university with many of the sons & daughters of these people, and many of their dads owed their companies to a successful win at poker – when it was common for roughnecks to ante up their partial well interests, so that the winner would have a better chance at building something. They were being wiped out, and there were more than a few suicides.

 

I found it utterly amazing, & extremely odious, that Canada’s banks didn’t know their sh1t; and that this level of misery had been allowed to happen. I changed majors to finance, researched what had made it so bad, left Calgary, & swore it would never happen to me. I learnt these things are recurring, what you can do to avoid getting burnt, and how to exploit them. It turned me into a counterculture value investor, & I have been forever grateful for it.

 

Not much different to the experiences of many of the ‘greats’.

 

SD

 

Great story and lesson. Will need video of paradropping CATs  ;D

[Jurgis]

 

Great story and lesson. Will need video of paradropping CATs  ;D

 

Here you go:

 

 

 

8)

[Guest Schwab711]

I'd agree that prices in the $136-$140 range for BRK.B today would be as attractive as $124-$128 was last February when I bought big below $125 and went 100% into BRK.B in my main UK tax-free account and my wife's also, which probably came to about 90% exposure across all discretionary shareholdings.

 

Back in Feb 2016 I projected 2015Q4's BV to be 4-5% up on 2015Q3's, meaning it was effectively 1.2x BV, meaning that I'd get a pretty good floor under my investment once the Annual Report came out given the announced buy-back threshold. This proved to be the case. Given the Q4 rally in 2016, I'd imagine the reported 2016Q4 BV will again be meaningfully above 2016Q3's figure.

 

We're now positioned at 61% BRK.B and have brought a lot of taxable holdings' proceeds into our tax-free accounts and added more savings and trimmed BRK.B at $142 in May 2016 to put 25% of the portfolio in AAPL at $95, so if BRK.B were to reach $135-$140 over the next few months I would be happy to invest the whole tax-free portfolio in BRK.B taking it to 98.5% of our current discretionary holdings at that price. That's assuming nothing else is a screaming buy at the time, and I'd be especially keen to switch if our other holdings remained more fully-valued allowing me to significantly trade up the amount of intrinsic value in our portfolio.

 

A corp tax rate cut to 15%-20% would probably increase BRK.B BV by $8-$10/share (just eyeballing it) due to decrease in DTLs. $140 would be in buyback territory if we get clarity on when and what new tax rates will be.

[John Hjorth]

Yesterday I tried to get some kind of understanding of the conditions then described by SharperDingaan, and I found this, from less than a year ago : National Observer : How are Alberta's "entitled" millennials dealing with the oil crash?.

 

I was actually in some kind of state of shock after reading it. It made me remember to appreciate my personal living conditions up here in the Northern Europe.

[Jurgis]

Yesterday I tried to get some kind of understanding of the conditions then described by SharperDingaan, and I found this, from less than a year ago : National Observer : How are Alberta's "entitled" millennials dealing with the oil crash?.

 

I was actually in some kind of state of shock after reading it. It made me remember to appreciate my personal living conditions up here in the Northern Europe.

 

It would be interesting to compare the fallout in Alberta with fallout in places like Oulu/Salo in Finland after Nokia collapse. And maybe with Spain with their 20%+ unemployment? Maybe with more hard numbers?

 

I have to admit that I was a peak-oiler once and even suggested someone in the family to go into well-paying (pun intended) oil engineering. They did not, so at least I don't have to feel bad for that advice.

[SharperDingaan]

http://www.cbc.ca/history/EPISCONTENTSE1EP17CH3PA1LE.html

1982: The Calgary Heralds classified section bulged with homes for sale, sometimes including the contents and cars. The city had 2.3 million square metres of vacant office space, and its real estate speculators and oil investors had reverted to their former careers as teachers, dentists, and taxi drivers.

 

A little context …  this is normal.

Iceland following the banking collapse, large parts of the US following the sub-prime collapse; & these are just the better known ones of the last 10-15 years.

 

The recent oil crash is often compared to what it was like in 1982, fear. But like all crashes it passes, and there is a recovery; in 1988 Calgary hosted the Winter Olympics. Sink or swim is brutal – but it produces results; & it is what you do with that experience that counts.

 

Change is inevitable; so grab it by the throat, & squeeze the cohunes’ on the sucker.

It‘s not going to be boring!

 

SD

 

 

[John Hjorth]

Thanks for sharing, SharperDingaan,

 

I suppose all busts have some common traits, with minor invidual shades of differences among actual situations. For example, some Islandic bankers did not revert to their ordinary pre-crisis jobs, ref. this calculation of the size of Islandic football team . [i suppose the guy tweeting was far from impressed with the performance of the team ...].

[SharperDingaan]

 

A tank isn't much different to a D9 cat.

The Hercules also has be to no more than 1-2m above the ground when the chute deploys ... and you need a pilot who doubles as a magician.

 

SD

 

[Uccmal]

Thanks for sharing, SharperDingaan,

 

I suppose all busts have some common traits, with minor invidual shades of differences among actual situations. For example, some Islandic bankers did not revert to their ordinary pre-crisis jobs, ref. this calculation of the size of Islandic football team . [i suppose the guy tweeting was far from impressed with the performance of the team ...].

 

I was in Iceland in July.  It was booming.  Extremely cheap reliable power helps a great deal. 

[chrispy]

This thread took an interesting change of course.  Very sad and a good word of warning for sure.  My company is anywhere from ~25-75% reliant on oil money and these past years were pretty unnerving as it was my first downturn experienced.  Luckily the sequester was over and the Navy/Coast Guard started to build more ships...

 

I was in Iceland about 18 months ago and they are doing just fine now miraculously.  As said before, clean energy is amazing.  They have also really understood how to market themselves as a short term vacation/adventure spot for those looking to get away, or those flying between north america and europe.

[Guest longinvestor]

Beyond the coolness of 100% renewable energy, Iceland has already attracted some of the very large energy consuming applications - metal smelting industry. https://arcticecon.wordpress.com/2012/02/15/aluminium-smelting-in-iceland-alcoa-rio-tinto-alcan-century-aluminum-corp/

and data centers http://www.ibtimes.com/iceland-lures-data-center-companies-cheap-renewable-energy-2081695

 

Something similar is unfolding in Iowa with giant server farms moving there http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/12/why-are-so-many-data-centers-built-in-iowa/418005/; Berkshire Hathaway energy is committed to 100% renewable power in Iowa and is within striking distance of that goal with the latest wind investment http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/04/29/warren-buffett-just-revealed-his-vision-for-amer-2.aspx

 

Beyond politics and ideology, there is much $$ sense with clean energy. Unless you let dogma turn your brains into cabbage. 

[chrispy]

Great articles longinvestor.  Iceland is capitalizing on what it has abundance of and what it can do REALLY well with.  This is great to see and was not the case 10-15 years ago ;)

 

On another note, I just read through a majority of the ZINC discussion in Investment Ideas.  If I had read it several days ago I would never had to start this thread!  Mohnish investing in the company was all many people had to hear. 

 

Point has been taken!

[AtlCDore]

My strengths are strategy and risk management, my partners are common sense.

Together it means that most of the time we have a block of cash to invest when the sh1t hits the fan.

 

2008/9 we got the opportunity to buy a flat in Knightsbridge (London, UK).

It was a punch card investment, a lot of money, the $C/Sterling FX rate was unusually favourable, we were being offered an historically low price, and it was an 'invitation only' location; but it meant materially stressing the portfolio, for an unknown period - and none of us would be using this flat. Ultimately, we ponied up, and it has served us very well.

 

Points are that you 1) need cash/security, and 2) the courage/support to step up.

There are lots of ways to ensure that you have the cash when you need it; the courage you have to earn.

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, and saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

SD,

 

Just curious if you have a fund that allows you to buy real estate or was done outside a fund with partners? 

 

Thanks,

 

AtlCDore

[SharperDingaan]

My strengths are strategy and risk management, my partners are common sense.

Together it means that most of the time we have a block of cash to invest when the sh1t hits the fan.

 

2008/9 we got the opportunity to buy a flat in Knightsbridge (London, UK).

It was a punch card investment, a lot of money, the $C/Sterling FX rate was unusually favourable, we were being offered an historically low price, and it was an 'invitation only' location; but it meant materially stressing the portfolio, for an unknown period - and none of us would be using this flat. Ultimately, we ponied up, and it has served us very well.

 

Points are that you 1) need cash/security, and 2) the courage/support to step up.

There are lots of ways to ensure that you have the cash when you need it; the courage you have to earn.

I had the experience of living in Calgary at the time of the first oil crash, and saw first hand people selling each other their houses for $1 to avoid bankruptcy. I have never forgotten it, & have repeatedly benefitted from the experience. 

 

SD

 

SD,

 

Just curious if you have a fund that allows you to buy real estate or was done outside a fund with partners? 

 

Thanks,

 

AtlCDore

 

This was done with purely family funds; real estate was just another asset class, no different to stocks or bonds. Our IPS allows us to hold pretty much anything, but departures from core mix require a family vote & at least one independent outside review. They are blunt discussions, we need a 2/3 majority, & over time it's the number of younger members deciding outcome.

 

Real estate for us, generally means the fund buying an equity interest in a family property, instead of the family taking on mortgage. The family can buy out the fund whenever it chooses, but the intent is to get away from 'house rich & cash poor' when kids are young, going to university, or just starting out. As one of our family is a Quantity Surveyor we can do this fairly equitably.

 

Iceland:

 

I had the chance to visit Iceland when the madness was occurring, a 2nd time shortly after the crash, & a 3rd time 2 years ago. I also knew one of the bankers who had lent them money, & wasn't popular for supporting the Icelandic viewpoint. They were very smart, it was a very hard thing to do, & it probably couldn't have been anywhere done else but Iceland. It would seem that it repeatedly comes down to calling Casandra's 'bluff; today it's a very different place, & a great place to stop over to/from Europe. 

 

SD