TessMore Finance Blog

Howdy, friends. Sorry for the long lapse between posts. After returning from a brief summer vacation, the GRS database had imploded. Again. We patched things up this morning and can now resume publishing. Over the next couple of weeks, I plan to share excerpts from three recent money books. The following is from Buy This, Not That by Sam Dogen with permission from Portfolio, an imprint of the Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright © 2022 by Kansei Incorporated. Please note that I've edited this passage slightly to (a) be more readable on the web and (b) fit within the publisher's word-count limitations. Ready? Let's dive in! Life is rarely black-and-white, yet we need to make definitive choices all the time. Rent this house or buy that apartment? Invest in a growth stock or an index fund? Live in San Francisco or Raleigh? Join a start-up or work at an established firm? These choices all involve an expense of time and capital

Hello, friends! I have a lot to say, and I've done a lot of work on Get Rich Slowly during the past three weeks, but most of my efforts aren't yet ready for public consumption. The site de-design is 95% complete, but that final five percent is fiddly. I could be ready to launch the new layout tomorrow — or it might be two weeks. It's tough to say. If you're curious, though, you can check out my current progress here . But be warned that the site isn't fully functional. (For fun, I mocked up this very post in the new format so you can see the difference.) I have several long articles in the works — quality! the internet is dying! the sunk-cost fallacy! — but nothing that's wholly finished. And with my attention more focused on the de-design and Real Life than on writing, it'll probably be a while before anything is complete enough to publish. Still, I thought it'd be fun to stop in with a J. Money-esque stream-of-consciousness post to share a some c

A couple of weekends ago, Kim and I enjoyed a short vacation on the Oregon Coast. She's been taking foraging classes , and she had an early morning workshop on harvesting sea vegetables one Sunday. Rather than wake in the middle of the night to drive out, we rented a small place in Tillamook and took the dog for an adventure. (The dog loves the coast.) We let Tally lead us on a walk through town one rainy afternoon. Coming home, we cut through a trailer park. “We're in the poor part of town,” Kim said. “Yep,” I said. “But look at that trailer house right there. That is almost exactly like the one I grew up in.” Here's the trailer I grew up in: We stopped to look at the trailer. I pointed out the tiny windows and the sagging roof. “It's small,” Kim said, frowning. “Yes,” I said. “Yes it is.” The trailer was a beat-up 1970-era single-wide. Nothing about it looked appealing. I could imagine the inside: shag carpet, thin wood paneling on the walls, faded linoleum, col

Last month, the Federal Reserve released a new report: Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2021 [PDF]. This annual survey gauges American financial health and attitudes. The 2021 edition was conducted last November. Here are some highlights from the report: Seventy-eight percent of adults were either doing okay or living comfortably financially, the highest share with this level of financial well-being since the survey began in 2013. Fifteen percent of adults with income less than $50,000 struggled to pay their bills because of varying monthly income. Fifteen percent of workers said they were in a different job than twelve months earlier. Just over six in ten people who changed jobs said their new job was better overall, compared with one in ten who said that it was worse. Sixty-eight percent of adults said they would cover a $400 emergency expense exclusively using cash or its equivalent, up from 50 percent who would pay this way when the survey began in 2013. (Note that

Both my ex-wife (Kris) and my current girlfriend (Kim) tell me I get too worked up about things sometimes. “You over-react,” they both tell me. Maybe so. I prefer to think of myself as passionate. One of the things I'm passionate about is scammers. I hate them. Scammers are evil, evil people who prey on the most vulnerable members of society. They take advantage of social constructs in order to manipulate people into parting with their hard-earned money. No surprise then that one of my favorite sub-genres of YouTube videos is “scammers getting scammed”. Scambaiters are modern-day heroes. As much as I despise scammers, I think scambatiers deserve high praise. Today, I've collected together several YouTube videos (representing a couple of hours of viewing) that document, in an entertaining fashion, how scambaiters uncover scams, help victims, and are now actively working with law-enforcement agencies in an attempt to thwart the bad guys. Scamming the Scammers First up, here

One morning just over ten years ago, I had an interesting conversation at the Crossfit gym. I was “rolling out” — using a foam roller to break up tissue — with the usual group of guys, when one of my buddies brought up this new thing called Bitcoin. “Bitcoin is digital money,” he said. “But it's completely private and not tied to a government.” “How does that work?” I asked. From the very first moment I heard about cryptocurrency, it didn't seem to make any sense. My friend tried to explain. We all chatted about it for a few minutes, and then we lifted heavy weights and/or sweated extensively and/or both of the above. When I got home, I googled Bitcoin. Nothing I read made any sense to me. I checked the price. My memory is that Bitcoin was selling for $7 or $8 at the time. Over the past decade, I've been bombarded with info about Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. I've made an effort to self-educate, to learn why people consider crypto valuable and why they think it's

Monday, I drove north to help my cousin, Duane. We moved him out of his apartment last weekend and into a smaller place close to family. As a result, everything is in chaos. He's living out of boxes. At this late stage, his cancer affects every aspect of his life, and that includes his ability to sustain prolonged physical activity — such as setting up a new home. I spent Monday afternoon unpacking his kitchen, buying groceries, installing his internet and television, and so on. In the evening, Bob and Audrey came over (Duane's brother and his sister-in-law). The four of us sat in the kitchen and sorted the boxes of food into three piles: Duane's pantry, going home with Bob/Audrey, going home with J.D. When we were done, Duane insisted that we enjoy some birthday cake. He turned 58 on Sunday, and some friends had brought him a fancy carrot cake from a 100-year-old Portland bakery. Duane couldn't eat any cake himself (he can't eat or drink much of anything anymore)

Last Friday, I drove from Corvallis to Portland to help my cousin, Duane. Duane has been living with throat cancer for several years now , but in recent months things have grown worse. It feels like he's preparing for the end. And that means he's packing up his apartment (where he's lived for 21 years!) to move someplace smaller. We spent all of Friday afternoon sorting through his office. This was a challenge because (like most Roths) Duane is messy (and a self-proclaimed hoarder). Duane and I packed boxes and boxes of collectible card games, ancient coins, books on Greek and Roman history, and outdated computer games. While we packed, we talked. Duane is my cousin, yes, but he's also my best friend. Because we're family and friends, I feel like we share a deep connection. We can call out each other's bullshit without hurting feelings. We can sing each other's praises without becoming obsequious. Most of all, we can talk about nerdy stuff like Magic: The

Life has been lumpy lately. I've been dealing with some heavy stuff in my personal life — Mom , my cousin Duane, etc. — and that's left me feeling low. Combine that with my natural inclination toward depression, and you've got a recipe for a gloomy guy. That said, I woke up feeling great today. And that energy carried through as I had my regular Zoom call with Diania Merriam, the organizer of the EconoMe Conference . Diania and I started these calls for professional reasons, but after nearly two years they've evolved into something else. Now they're mostly a chance for us to help each other with our respective mental health struggles. During today's conversation, we had an interesting digression about personal finance. We were talking about how I need to get out of the house more. Because I work from home, I spend most of my time alone. It's not good. Humans are social creatures, and that goes double for me. No wonder I feel shitty when I never leave the

Today, I want to share a small victory. Like all humans, I have flaws. One of mine is that I hate confrontation. It's a family thing. I'm not sure why, but none of us like conflict. Sure, this trait has some upsides. My brothers and I don't get into a lot of arguments and fights with our family and friends. And when we do have conflict, we do our best to resolve things quickly. But this conflict avoidance has some enormous downsides. When trying to make peace, for instance, we're likely to give far too much in an effort to reach compromise quickly. Plus, we don't like to negotiate. Negotiation is, inherently, conflict. No thanks! In my life, this is especially problematic in circumstances where I need to stand up for myself. Let me give you an example. Recently, the roof of our home developed a small leak . After making an initial assessment, I decided it was too much for me to handle one my own. I called a local roofing contractor. “We can be out tomorrow,” sa

Today, I did the second-hardest thing I've ever had to do: I took away Mom's cat. Mom's assisted living facility called last Thursday. “We strongly encourage you to consider moving your mother to memory care,” the director told me. “I know we talked about this a year ago, and at that time you and your family decided she wasn't ready. We think she's ready now. She's refusing her meds. She's refusing to eat. She's wandering. She's more confused than ever.” I phoned my brother, Jeff, who has handled the bulk of Mom's care since she moved to Happy Acres a decade ago. “What do you think?” I asked. “I think they're right,” he said. “Mom has been to the emergency room three times since the middle of November. She seems relatively lucid after each hospital visit, but that fades fast. Within a day of returning home, she's out of it again. And her confusion does seem to be getting worse.” “Yeah,” I said. “You're right. Even when she's