Unpopular Opinions

[Anonymous]

Everyone in the US would be better off if we had less poor people and less very rich people and the middle class would be majority.

Yes, that would mean taxing the super rich and giving it to the poor people. The money would trickle back up to the rich and then down to the poor. Rinse and repeat. Less crime, poverty, homeless, riots.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you need to finance a boat, pool, second home, vacation cruise etc then you can't afford it. These are all cash items only.

You should be able to buy a second home in cash? Come on! You must be incredibly wealthy and out of touch to think that.

ITA with him/her that you should be in a position to pay cash for any of these items or you shouldn't buy them. I say this as someone who constantly daydreams of a yacht purchase in 10 years or so, and whose parents didn't buy their second house until they were in their 60s.

Agree. Also, no leasing cars either.

Eh, we lease a car because we can throw money away for the convenience. I don't want to pay for a maintenance on a luxury car that's a depreciating asset, when I can dump it after three years.

But my other car is a purchased Toyota, so it evens out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That the best possible investment people with money in this country could make is a robust social safety net (some form of UI, unemployment benefits, universal healthcare, subsidized childcare, housing for the homeless, and subsidized or free education and job training), paid for via higher taxes.

+1

+1000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you need to take out parent plus loans or private bank loans to afford a kid's college you can't afford the college and neither can your kid. If you can't afford it now there is no chance you can afford paying it plus interest for the next 20 years.

Completely agreed with this--PLUS and private should be avoided unless it's just for liquidity purposes. For an undergraduate education though I'd say federal student loans are a great financing option and students/families should not be scared away from them. I'd also say public all the way especially for undergrad. Private colleges and universities are not worth it.

While I get what you're saying, I disagree with Parent PLUS loans. Some parents can't pay for state schools even with the kid living at home but can pay it over time. Also, sometimes private is less costly because of merit aid. Think of LMC/MC for most Americans vice what its considered to be on DCUM. Need-based aid often comes in the form of subsidized loans vice grants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m 35, have paid off $200k in professional school debt and spent $25k on clothes, designer bags and jewelry to celebrate. (I also max out retirement and save the majority of my income.) That won’t be repeated, but it was fun updating my wardrobe to reflect my $200K+ salary. Before I was wearing the same clothes that I purchased out of college when I was making $60k. It feels good to look nice.

I regret nothing.

You are my shero.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you need to finance a boat, pool, second home, vacation cruise etc then you can't afford it. These are all cash items only.

You should be able to buy a second home in cash? Come on! You must be incredibly wealthy and out of touch to think that.

ITA with him/her that you should be in a position to pay cash for any of these items or you shouldn't buy them. I say this as someone who constantly daydreams of a yacht purchase in 10 years or so, and whose parents didn't buy their second house until they were in their 60s.

Agree. Also, no leasing cars either.

We lease cars but they’re not luxury cars by any means. We do this because we have terrible luck with cars. We used to buy and we’ve never had one last more than 2 years.

Eh, we lease a car because we can throw money away for the convenience. I don't want to pay for a maintenance on a luxury car that's a depreciating asset, when I can dump it after three years.

But my other car is a purchased Toyota, so it evens out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you need to finance a boat, pool, second home, vacation cruise etc then you can't afford it. These are all cash items only.

You should be able to buy a second home in cash? Come on! You must be incredibly wealthy and out of touch to think that.

ITA with him/her that you should be in a position to pay cash for any of these items or you shouldn't buy them. I say this as someone who constantly daydreams of a yacht purchase in 10 years or so, and whose parents didn't buy their second house until they were in their 60s.

Agree. Also, no leasing cars either.

We lease cars but they’re not luxury cars by any means. We do this because we have terrible luck with cars. We used to buy and we’ve never had one last more than 2 years.

Eh, we lease a car because we can throw money away for the convenience. I don't want to pay for a maintenance on a luxury car that's a depreciating asset, when I can dump it after three years.

But my other car is a purchased Toyota, so it evens out.

If you have never had a car "last" beyond two years, this can't be attributed to "bad luck." You're definitely doing something wrong. This is operator error.

[Anonymous]

Unpopular opinion: Bitcoin (and crypto currency in general, at least in its current form) is stupid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What's an unpopular opinion you have in regards to money or personal finance?

Mine is that, contrary to the common (?) belief that people who have fancy lifestyles must be "swimming in debt", the majority of people living like that can afford it. In general, people make more or have much more money than you think, and if you think you are behind relative to your peer group, it's because you probably are.

"Living for retirement" (which I see on here all the time...) is overrated. Prepare for retirement, but live for today.

I don’t know. I have a relative with an MA from an Ivy and many years in a well paid career who got laid off two years ago, when he was in his late 50s. He is in kind of a niche field and he is a lot older than most job hunters, so he hasn’t been able to find anything. He is really hurting for money now because he has spent most of his life enjoying expensive travel and other experiences.

If he had saved and invested more instead of spending he would be a a stronger position financially now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most people who are very rich obtained their wealth through unethical means (slimey lawyer, greedy business person who screwed people out of their money, thief, cheating people etc.) Therefore, the extreme wealth is a mark of poor character.

Behind every great fortune, there is a crime

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That the best possible investment people with money in this country could make is a robust social safety net (some form of UI, unemployment benefits, universal healthcare, subsidized childcare, housing for the homeless, and subsidized or free education and job training), paid for via higher taxes.

You can donate your own money to those causes. Or move to Europe.

Ahh. And let me guess where you fall on the socio-economic spectrum? Im betting somewhere along the lines that you could easily afford to invest in these things, find every tax loophole you can to avoid it, and think that the larger society in which you live isn't your responsibility to help maintain? Oh, and probably that you are smarter and more deserving of your wealth just be virtue of the fact that you have it?

Again, SJW, put your money where your mouth is. And BTW, all of your assumptions are wrong.

[Anonymous]

Very few opinions here are actually unpopular.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Index funds are extremely overrated.

So overrated. It’s not that hard to pick stocks. Is it really that hard to see when a company is changing the world?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Index funds are extremely overrated.

So overrated. It’s not that hard to pick stocks. Is it really that hard to see when a company is changing the world?

I don't think you understand efficient markets. An efficient market price accounts for expected future growth (ie, 'changing the world'). That is why decades of research has demonstrated that even sophisticated money managers with far better research than you do not out perform the market.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That it’s worth paying an expert .94% to manage my portfolio. (My returns are way, way higher than I was ever able to accomplish on my own and he basically pays for himself and then some).

.94% would be me a brand new luxury car every year. And there are no advisors who consistently beat index funds net of fees.

Wow, your fees are really high! Agree that its worth it to pay an expert. My fees are much lower, perhaps bc the amount under control is higher.