John T. Reed’s news blog

Don’t make the mistake I made of assuming real real state investors by larger rental properties like apartment buildings and office buildings. After 54 years in the business, I figured out that “There’s no place like home” for your real estate investment money.  Most favored investment Houses get about two dozen special good deals not available to other investments. Income tax deductions and exclusions, financing terms, personal loan liability, HECMs, life estates, property tax discounts, very small political risk, bankruptcy homestead exemptions in some states, not counted for Medicaid eligibility and many college loans, you can live in it, and more. Any...

I am adding my new book An American Principal Residence is the Most Favored Investment on Earth: Maximize Yours to my on-line store. . The book is still being printed in Michigan. On 7/27/21 it is supposed to come off the press and be put on a truck to come to my house. . At my web site, it says it is sold out. That is to prevent you from ordering yet. . I am also adding this book to the formerly 20-book bundle of real estate investment books to make it a 21-book bundle.

WSJ yesterday tried to do a sober article on “How to Dip a Toe Into Cryptocurrency.” . It is a useful starting point for a basic discussion of what investments are. I have spent my life on this since Fall of my senior year in college. . One super important aspect if you talk to real understanders of investment is diversification. This is bedrock. . Basically, the are a bunch of different investments and a bunch of different risks. If you have a diverse investments, chances are some of them will do well or better in a downturn of one...

I am glad to see the WSJ and a few others now giving inflation the space it needs. But they are still tiptoeing around the basic problem. Mind-boggling amounts of deficit spending must be stopped and surpluses must be generated to lower the debt-to-GDP ratio. . This cannot be done because the scale of the excesses have been prohibitive. The current discussions of inflation danger seem to be aimed at giving the experts on such things intellectual cover when the ’flation hits the fan. . I do not worry about this at a policy level. I have opposed the responsible...

Today's Wall Street Journal says many of the most expensive grad schools produce grads with huge student debt and little or no job prospects. I will cover that in the book I am working on about avoiding traditional education. . I have also heard it about law and dental schools. The extreme example in the Journal article was Columbia Film School. Half of them make less than $30,000 a year yet average $181,000 debt. . That raises another issue—majors that sound cool. Architecture, film, theater, media, sports management. The article also lists history, speech pathology, and social work as producing too many grads. Another...