Debt is Collateral?

  In our current economic ocean of insanity, one of the worst aberrations of sound financial policy is the creation of a new kind of collateral—DEBT ! It seems that in order to borrow billions and billions more of “money”, it was necessary to first take all of the real collateral in the world and turn it all into paper (securities, etc). Then, use the paper as “collateral” to borrow more “money”.  Then, take this pile of …

Investing in Rental Houses?

Investment in rental houses has become prolific these days.  It started with large hedge funds buying tens of thousands of empty-foreclosed-homes from the banks.  They were getting these houses for around twenty cents on the dollar. After attempting to turn these properties into rental-backed securities (they just can’t control themselves) these large hedge funds decided it did not work. They were sending out their prospectus to investors with wonderful claims of seven percent annual returns …