My great grandpa got arrived by boat from Sweden.His family business involved helping farmers turn property into farmland.They felled trees and removed rocks.That's back breaking stuff.Someone told them, "In America, you can plow for a mile and never so much as turn up a single stone."I'm sure th
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10/15/2016
I live in the land of Wendy Peffercorn.If you don't know what I'm talking about, you haven't seen The Sandlot.I've seen it a few times. My kids have watched it many times more and my grandkids have viewed it approximately a zillion times.The Sandlot is a classic story about baseball, moving to a
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06/04/2016
Newspapers- I used to buy and read several per day.Even when I was a poor college student, I made sure to catch up on the latest news- dropping coins into the corner newsbox day in, day out.This habit began when I was a paper boy. I read the paper and then I delivered them. It felt cool being the
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05/26/2016
David vs. Goliath.We like those stories, right?Recently "The Big Short" won several awards. It's a dramatic comedy that attempted to show how a few people were able to take advantage of the impending implosion of the mortgage market.A lesser known story involves Lisa Epstein who had a hand in blo
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05/23/2016
I haven’t posted in a while. Some of you have noticed. The vast majority haven’t noticed.This is all well and good. Heck. There’s close to a few hundred thousand people who have, at some point, clicked the “sign up here” button. I’m just one of those. For those who have noticed my absence I say,
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04/23/2016
"What's a land lease?"That's the question an investor asked me after she purchased a home at auction."It depends" was my initial answer.A look at her paperwork revealed that she owned the home but not the land, which was owned by the golf community trust.There were a number of paragraphs which ex
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02/02/2016
From time to time I write about non-real estate related things. This is one of those times.---"Why are you three so dressed up?"That was the question I asked of my three younger siblings as they stood curbside, with a look of expectation of something big."If we ride the joy bus 8 weeks in a row w
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01/23/2016
Teddy Roosevelt's foreign policy was to speak softly and carry a big stick.I hadn't thought too much about that strategy but it came to mind as I looked at this before and after picture of a few of my brood.If everyone else has a snowball, you should grab one for safe measure. Just saying.Right n
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01/01/2016
The snow falls gently to the pavement.One inch.Then two.Then Three.Then four.I put on my work boots, and coat and grab the shovel.And, sleepy eyed, push and scrape and heave-ho knowing that, snow?There will be more.I think of the widows and single moms- who'll shovel their paths?I awoke too lat
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12/13/2015
There is a bridge from Memphis to Vietnam- and only I could see it.The Move: Life as a military child involved being uprooted at a moment's notice. One day you're in California; a couple weeks later it’s Memphis, Tennessee. Though I'd become used to moving, this time was different. My father was
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11/11/2015