Augie

…..BUT, there are still a bunch of folks who would still just have to say “but we should have taken Mahomes!”

Josh seems to give you a better chance to look like a genius OC and create opportunities for a HC gig. Not personally knowing any of the players involved, this seems objectively to be his best path assuming he wants to be a HC some day. What is his relationship with Daboll like? How close are they? I have no idea. I should add, what does McD think of him? Are we sure that he would be McD’s first choice? Again, I don’t know. He could attract some fine candidates to that situation, but I suspect Josh would rather keep him, and that should carry some weight. .

First of all, I don’t claim to “know” anything, but I do have impressions. I think there is much less mortgage shenanigans than there were back in the last boom, but it’s still there to some degree, and always will be. I don’t think a gradual rise in population can account for the current spike. I think it’s more likely that second homes/vacation homes and investment rental properties and intended flips are more popular and the low interest rates have a lot to do with that. I also think Covid has changed the way people live and work. My wife works with a lot of people in NYC. Some of them have not been in the office in a couple years and have moved out of the city or moved to places with some extra space to accommodate some office space. Our son and DIL just bought their first house. Because they are both working from home, their first house has FIVE bedrooms to accommodate offices for each of them. I’m not saying that explains the surge in demand or prices, but there was extra interest in the place with all the bedrooms which drove up the price a bit. One last thought jumps out, but it’s just a gut feeling. Places like Atlanta attract people for jobs. Almost everyone I know here moved to town for a job. That leads to a more stable market, albeit still with rising values, than places like Florida or Hilton Head, SC (where we lived for 30 years before Atlanta). Those warm weather, second home, vacation rental types of places have almost NOTHING available on the market. People see cheap money and are willing to have their dream winter home, or a place they can rent for part of the year and use when they like. Some are just looking to make a quick flip and earn some easy money. The more desirable areas seem to have higher peaks, lower valleys and FAR more volatility. Back in 2004-2005 in Sarasota, FL the biggest broker in town had agents personally putting in multiple contracts on pre-construction condos looking to flip them because by the time the development was done the would certainly be worth more in all the frenzy. I had a college buddy living in Boston call me about buying pre-construction condos in sleepy Englewood, FL, and he wasn’t sure where Englewood was or what it was like! I’m glad he didn’t do it, because the bubble popped shortly thereafter. Many projects stood partially completed for years. People realized they were “under water” on the investment property or the home that was a stretch for them (“get as much as we can, it will only go up!”). Nobody wants to be under water, and they look for a way out. “Why keep paying when it’s worth less than we owe?” We lived a few doors from an attorney and a real estate developer. They lived highly leveraged and on the edge in a magnificent home worth millions. When the music stopped their home went into foreclosure and instead of developing real estate they started a new business. They had a website that was something like walkaway.com. They helped people get out of their properties and helped negotiate with the banks to cause as little damage as possible. Sorry, it seems I’ve rambled on a bit. Just re-living some nasty times. I hope and pray THIS is nothing like THAT, but some of it does feel familiar. .

Yep. It’s water under the bridge. Whining and complaining won’t help. Learn from this, and continue our upward trajectory. PERIOD. .

THANK YOU for something positive! I was afraid to click, but I’m glad I did! Stuff happens in life. We still have Josh and a bright future.

NEWSFLASH: Bass, McD, Beane nor anybody else care what you “need”. You’re a guy on the internet, just like me. They owe us nothing along those lines. They will take care of business in-house, as they should.

I agree with the bolded part. I remember the early 90’s when we would lend to a restauranteur to buy a $500K house in Hilton Head (a lot of money now, a LOT of money then) because we knew we could sell the loan without recourse. I wouldn’t lend this guy money to buy a used car, but we could lend him money for that house. He never made the first payment, but it took years to get him out. It wasn’t our problem, because the loan was sold, then resold. The lender gets paid for that deal, then moves on. Some are not looking out for your best interests. The question went from “will we get our money back” to “can we sell it before it goes bad”? It all went downhill from there. And that loan is sitting in your pension fund. I have no idea what he can or cannot afford, or what the market will do going forward. I just hope everyone does their due diligence and doesn’t swing for the fences too often. Being a contrarian rather than a follower can be helpful at times. Our son and DIL bought their first house in the last year. We warned them and they are fully aware that they are looking at a 5 year minimum window and do NOT freak out if there is a bit of a dip coming up. But they weren’t looking to make a profit, they wanted a home with a yard to start a family. We used to view our home as our largest asset and only invested in ways that would maximize that. Now? We do what we want to the place we live and if it doesn’t yield the best return, at least we got to enjoy it.

I’d rather go out vs the Champs. It makes us look better, but more importantly it will help to keep the greatest game I think I’ve ever seen alive as part of that history. THAT was a game for the ages, and despite the outcome I don’t want it forgotten.

This is part of why I was glad to buy one house (for what they paid 3-4 years ago before it was ever publicly listed) and sell TWO other properties at the same time. It’s insane right now! I looked at our last two neighborhoods in Florida a couple months ago. Out of more than a THOUSAND houses, there was only one active listing. “Sure, ask anything you want!” CRAZY! It’s up to maybe a half dozen now. Yay. This is unsustainable. It feels like 2004-2005. Then came 2006. You couldn’t GIVE real estate away. If you Google real estate cycles, you are likely to come across articles saying about 18 years. You can do the math. I’m not trying to scare you, but when a college buddy I hadn’t heard from in years called me from Boston in 2005 asking about pre-construction condos in a dumpy part of Florida he had never been to, I knew we were in trouble. My hope is for an adjustment so I can afford a place back in Sarasota in a few years when things normalize.

Is this a rule of some sort, or just an inability to get thru processing. We used to process and close them at same time. It’s the most efficient way to do it BY FAR if you have enough equity. Current appraisal, current title exam, survey, etc. On our recent purchase in December we used a guy in NJ (again) who just steamrolled everything thru. EDIT: There used to be a government program we used on a house we flipped. I think it was a 203k? You get the purchase money financed and funds for renovations are included that you can get on draws, just like a new construction loan. Might be worth a Google search and asking a mortgage broker if it’s still around. Not everybody handled them, but it was perfect for our situation. .

I try to get to the Bills home opener and one road game a year. KC is high on my list of places to attend a game. It “feels” a bit like a Bills home game, said the guy who’s never been there. I don’t know why, but I guess a no frills stadium and super passionate fans in a non-glitzy city who love to tailgate are a big part of that.

The house we just bought was with a 30 year loan, fixed for the first 15 years under 3%. A month after closing we were allowed to pay it down by about half after selling two other properties and adjust the monthly payment. The money is so cheap I hated to pay it down, but we too hate debt. It’s the only debt we have, and we will just pay it off before my wife retires. As much as we hate debt, it just feels wrong not to borrow some of this stupidly cheap money!

I know NOTHING about 401K loans but I used to do a lot of second mortgage financing. A HELOC (home equity line of credit) will be a variable rate because the line will be out there usually for 20 years and the bank doesn’t want an in-house loans with fixed rates lines of credit that long. If it’s a term loan at a fixed amount for a fixed number of years, they can adjust their balance sheet accordingly. But if you got a line of credit now at say 5%, you could wait 10-15 years until the bank is paying 8%-12% on CD’s or money markets and draw your line fully down to put it back in the bank at a higher rate. Banks don’t like that idea. We had HELOC’s for many years, just in case an opportunity comes up and you need quick access to funds without moving things around. If you have enough equity banks (or credit unions, don’t forget them!) will usually pay all your closing costs and hope you draw on it at some point. It’s nice to have out there just in case. Our last HELOC was from a credit union not far from where @Royale with Cheese lives and might be nice to have, regardless of what path you take on this deal. I believe the interest is still generally tax deductible too, so there’s that. And rates are crazy low. Good luck figuring out the best option and with the whole process.

The draft is an option, and maybe some of the guys they have taken lately will develop. But they generally have a transition to make, with Gabe Davis being the exception. Another steal like Davis would be great, but I expect another vet or two like Brown, Beasley and Sanders. Surround Josh with support! When I say a vet, I do NOT mean some but splashy name that everybody recognizes. Just a guy who can come in and make a solid contribution for a year or two. We have our main parts in Diggs, Davis and Knox, plus some young guys behind them. You’d have to be on the inside to know how much promise there is with the young guys.

There were stretches where they were both critical to winning games this year. Throw in the possible loss of Beasley, and we have a legit need. Like DE, we need to get younger and cheaper. Look what they have addressed in the last couple of drafts. Yes, they can be replaced, but what you might call an obsession, I just call awareness.

LOL! No offense to anybody, but I sure am glad we have the people we do in our front office to figure this stuff out! It’s fun for fans to throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks. Sometimes it’s even right (albeit rarely). It’s even more fun to watch a quality front office build a top flight team. The people who think they are smarter than our FO amuse me to no end. A few have good insight, but that is relatively rare. Fun game to play, I’ll wait to see what our pros decide. While some of you want them fired. 😂

It’s funny how smart we think we are. We know squat about the universe or our place in it. Hell, we don’t even know much about our own oceans! Think of where we were just 500 or a thousand years ago in knowledge, which is a blink of the eye in terms of our universe. The acceleration of our ability to learn more is exciting, but also causes some questions and concerns. My mother had an ice box as a kid. I remember party line phones and 3 channels available on the black and white TV with no remote control. Now, my 8 year old grandson can operate an iPhone or laptop to access most of the knowledge of mankind. Whoa Nelly! And it just keeps accelerating!

I am strangely fascinated by all of this and eagerly looking forward to seeing what they get. The images from Hubble were nothing short of stunning!

I’ve been to the Miami tournament several times. The one that has gone by so many names (Sony, Lipton, Erickson, etc.) but I think is now just the Miami Open. I can only do so much in a 20k person stadium, but the small side courts and practice courts are worth the the effort and the cost. Amazing!

Emotions are running high, but I’m still confused by why this is not obvious to more people. Great post!

The crazy hour and the fact that it can be hotter than the sun make the Australian Open tough. I’d still love to go one day. It reminds me of the old party game, if you could go to ANY sporting event, what would it be? Super Bowl? (Done that.) Final Four? I’d hit he tennis Majors in London, Paris and Australia! Been to NYC many times, but I’d do the US Open once. The Masters is the coolest event on the planet, but once was enough to check it off. Apparently there are attendance limitations this year, but I’m not sure exactly how restrictive it is. Maybe Djokovic could explain it to me? I’m sorry, not talking about his Covid stance, just his general smugness, but he reminds me of Aaron Rodgers.

It could be like Samson’s hair in an odd sort of way, so I have my concerns. 🤷‍♂️

Most people who picked the Bills did it because of Josh. They thought he could make up the difference in talent, because he was so special. And he ALMOST did. No question who has better weapons (NOT us), and our OL struggled most of the year.

WOW! I can’t say I’m shocked, but there was a LOT of emotional overreaction over the last 24 hours. It’s OK to vent for a bit, but the clean the house crowd is embarrassing themselves. The Bills are elite, they made mistakes and they let a great opportunity slip away. Live, learn, and move on.

Practice, practice practice! At least she’s a hard worker? 🤷‍♂️