OT - Dow plunges 1,175 - worst point decline in history

[oldpotatoe]

Originally Posted by kppolich

With WFH being widely accepted basically everywhere there is no need for those people to stay in the high rent cities like Denver, Boulder, Bay Area, NYC, etc.

Education will follow soon after with online universities surging and expensive, in person establishments plummeting.

People will just spend their money elsewhere.

Easy there big fella.
Boulder average rent is $1960
Denver-$1674
NYC-$3600+
Bay Area-$3600+

If ya want apples to apples-Aspen, maybe..

[DHallerman]

Originally Posted by echappist

I'll add that i know I should just stay the course (and I mostly have), but with such a big difference in valuation and price, it makes me feel quite uneasy...

Our uneasy feelings about the fantasy-based prices (really) have encouraged us to change the balances in our retirement accounts away from a mix of corporate stock ETFs and US government bond ETFs to just bonds.

Not cash, per se, but if US government bonds crash, well then all life is likely hell anyway.

We're going to wait with these allocations until at least February, until we see how possible turmoil plays out.

Dave, who notes that several of these bond ETFs have already been performing strongly over the past year

[verticaldoug]

Since you are in retirement accounts, capital gains taxes are probably not an issue, but for some of you if you are actively trading, you may want to double check what your capital gains will look like this year.

With the large dispersion in performance, you may want to sell some losers with capital losses to offset any gains you may owe tax on.

I also think you can be bamboozled by the index this year. The performance is really been driven by tech, and there are some decent dividend payers out in stocks. The long term issue in a ZIRP environment is to find places to generate income when everything is geared to push asset prices for capital gains.

[Matt92037]

+1. I have been watching the housing market in Bend intensely for over the last 3 years. My wife and i had a plan set a couple years ago to cash-out of CA And move to Bend no later than March 2021 but it seems we may have missed our window. I cannot believe how fast houses are moving in Bend now and at prices that are nuts compared to just 6 months ago. Primo houses by Drake Park that were over $1m would take YEARS to sell not that long ago. Now anything West of the freeway sells in 1 day of hitting the market. I am bummed but am happy for those that got in 5 years ago...

I am sitting on 9 weeks vacation and have recon trips set up over the next couple months to see what else is out there. We will see.

Originally Posted by Clean39T

We've pretty much given up on moving to Bend at this point, unless the market crashes while we're still stuck in our rental.

[joosttx]

Originally Posted by DHallerman

Our uneasy feelings about the fantasy-based prices (really) have encouraged us to change the balances in our retirement accounts away from a mix of corporate stock ETFs and US government bond ETFs to just bonds.

Not cash, per se, but if US government bonds crash, well then all life is likely hell anyway.

We're going to wait with these allocations until at least February, until we see how possible turmoil plays out.

Dave, who notes that several of these bond ETFs have already been performing strongly over the past year

This is similar to what I have done. But I have bought paper from utilities too. I bought some for very cheap during the crash and although they haven’t gone up like stocks man they yield a solid dividend from here to forever.

[merlinmurph]

Originally Posted by Matt92037

+1. I have been watching the housing market in Bend intensely for over the last 3 years. My wife and i had a plan set a couple years ago to cash-out of CA And move to Bend no later than March 2021 but it seems we may have missed our window. I cannot believe how fast houses are moving in Bend now and at prices that are nuts compared to just 6 months ago. Primo houses by Drake Park that were over $1m would take YEARS to sell not that long ago. Now anything West of the freeway sells in 1 day of hitting the market. I am bummed but am happy for those that got in 5 years ago...

I am sitting on 9 weeks vacation and have recon trips set up over the next couple months to see what else is out there. We will see.

When we went around the country in '16, we spent awhile (10ish days?) In the Bend area and we loved the area. Good climate, lots of outdoor stuff, decent skiing, nice vibe. We both liked it and talked about possibly moving there, being recently retired. The real estate market looked insane with construction everywhere - just crazy. Everywhere we went, you would hear conversations where people talked about moving to Bend from the Bay area. Google and other hi-tech companies had a major presence. Bend has had a few bust periods in the last 30 years and this looked like another one looming.

I'm not a real estate person and this is simply my amateur observation. Bend is a wonderful place to be, but the market scared me.

[reuben]

Apple lost $180 billion in market cap today. Billion. United States dollars.

That's a wild and crazy number, even with inflation, market share, covid stay-at-home sales, etc.

But shed not a tear. It's still valued at over $2 trillion.

[SPOKE]

I enrolled this semester at Durham Technical Community College to get some knowledge about CAD/CAM and CNC machine setup & operation. Also some refreshers in blueprint reading and design standards. These three classes are on-line. I can honestly say that the experience is horrible. We (students) are using video tutorials from 2 to 3 different providers for each class. I find it extremely confusing just getting thru the assignments. All these courses are normally taught in a classroom and now 2 of the classes are being taught on-line for these one semester and one is on-line for the first time. Basically the schools are t prepared for this! How could they??? I have a machine shop lab that is only allowed 10 students since we need to spread out in the shop. Just glad that this class and the blueprint reading class are really review for me. I won’t be taking on-line classes next semester unless I just take only one class. Unfortunately I don’t multi-task very well. Maybe my old age has caught up with me.
SPOKE

Originally Posted by kppolich

They might not like it, but soon they may have no choice. No college or remote college? Barring a vaccine, the 2020 school year is still up in the air.

On topic: those endowments should be back to full strength so let's see what happens.

[C40_guy]

It's days like this that I remind myself to embrace dollar cost averaging.

(while I watch AAPL, ZM, TDOC, AMZN all fall for a second day in a row...)

[kppolich]

It's OK to fall from all time highs after carrying the market for the last 6 months. Profit taking for sure as we approach the election and it will be nice to have some cash on hand to make some more focused buys as that whole event unfolds.

[merlinmurph]

Originally Posted by SPOKE

I have a machine shop lab that is only allowed 10 students since we need to spread out in the shop.

I was thinking about this the other day. How does a remote class work when a student needs to use resources not at home, like chem labs, etc.? Sure, a history class can work fairly well - others, not so much.

[Ozz]

Originally Posted by merlinmurph

I was thinking about this the other day. How does a remote class work when a student needs to use resources not at home, like chem labs, etc.? Sure, a history class can work fairly well - others, not so much.

My son is doing HS chemistry this year....with remote learning. We are going to the school next week to pick up "supplies" he will need.

Classes are conducted using MS Teams....

[echappist]

Originally Posted by Ozz

My son is doing HS chemistry this year....with remote learning. We are going to the school next week to pick up "supplies" he will need.

Classes are conducted using MS Teams....

As a chemist, I'm wary of bring chemicals home. Granted, most HS chem deals with inorganic compounds and their aqueous solutions, and none is that toxic (I don't recall using lead or mercury compounds), but still, lab stuff stays out.

Wonder how someone living in an apartment can cope with this stuff.

When it comes to organic chem though, no way I do any of that s*** home. Lots of VOCs, including hazardous solvents.

If I were to opine on this, I'd say chem labs should be held on-site. People already wear goggles and can't eat or drink (so surgical masks and such really isn't that big of an issue).

[Ozz]

Originally Posted by echappist

As a chemist, I'm wary of bring chemicals home. Granted, most HS chem deals with inorganic compounds and their aqueous solutions, and none is that toxic (I don't recall using lead or mercury compounds), but still, lab stuff stays out.

Wonder how someone living in an apartment can cope with this stuff.

When it comes to organic chem though, no way I do any of that s*** home. Lots of VOCs, including hazardous solvents.

If I were to opine on this, I'd say chem labs should be held on-site. People already wear goggles and can't eat or drink (so surgical masks and such really isn't that big of an issue).

Yes, I am curious what this will involve as well.....1st year chem, so no organic yet.

[notsew]

Originally Posted by C40_guy

It's days like this that I remind myself to embrace dollar cost averaging.

(while I watch AAPL, ZM, TDOC, AMZN all fall for a second day in a row...)

Well, when 6 months has given you somewhere in the vicinity of 50% to 500% returns, probably shouldn't get to worked up about a 10% drop off.

The stock market has been living on a dream for the last couple months, hardly a sustainable path...