The Off Topic Topic

[Syt]

Paging Minsky, Malthus, CC, ....

[crazy canuck]

I guess I need to rethink my costume idea. 

[Barrister]

Question: for those of you who have completed your wills - who did you choose as executors? Trust company, sibling, friends?

I ask because I'm considering a friend for the position - my brothers are both living in different countries, my wife's siblings are both worthless for this.

Trouble with a friend is friends can sometimes tend to fade away over the years, whereas family is "forever".  You may not need an executor for 20-30 years - what are the odds you will still be friends with your friend that far down the road?

But otherwise your logic seems sound.  Be sure to ask your friend before naming him.

[crazy canuck]

Question: for those of you who have completed your wills - who did you choose as executors? Trust company, sibling, friends?

I ask because I'm considering a friend for the position - my brothers are both living in different countries, my wife's siblings are both worthless for this.

Trouble with a friend is friends can sometimes tend to fade away over the years, whereas family is "forever".  You may not need an executor for 20-30 years - what are the odds you will still be friends with your friend that far down the road?

But otherwise your logic seems sound.  Be sure to ask your friend before naming him.

If your family are living in different countries and your wife's family is incapable, choosing someone who is competent and currently a friend amounts to a basic IQ test.

[dps]

Question: for those of you who have completed your wills - who did you choose as executors? Trust company, sibling, friends?

I ask because I'm considering a friend for the position - my brothers are both living in different countries, my wife's siblings are both worthless for this.

Trouble with a friend is friends can sometimes tend to fade away over the years, whereas family is "forever".  You may not need an executor for 20-30 years - what are the odds you will still be friends with your friend that far down the road?

But otherwise your logic seems sound.  Be sure to ask your friend before naming him.

If you're looking at that long a time frame, family dies off.  My mom's will names one of her brothers as executor;  he died 2 years ago (her sister and other brothers have all been dead for 20 years or more), but she hasn't updated her will and probably won't. 

Her estate is probably going to be a mess to administer to start with.  We live in Indiana now, but almost all of her property is in North Carolina (most of which is now rented out);  and she still owns some equity in real estate in West Virginia.  And while she lives with us in Indiana, she's leaving everything to my brother in South Carolina.  And the property being in WV?  It's being sold, and while my brother will inherit the equity if it's not paid off by the time she dies, the sales contract provides that if she dies before it's paid off, the buyer makes the rest of the payments to me.

[Malthus]

Question: for those of you who have completed your wills - who did you choose as executors? Trust company, sibling, friends?

I ask because I'm considering a friend for the position - my brothers are both living in different countries, my wife's siblings are both worthless for this.

Trouble with a friend is friends can sometimes tend to fade away over the years, whereas family is "forever".  You may not need an executor for 20-30 years - what are the odds you will still be friends with your friend that far down the road?

But otherwise your logic seems sound.  Be sure to ask your friend before naming him.

We've been friends for a long time, at least thirty years, so there is that! 

Hell, we already have wills naming each other, though that was mainly as a joke - a tontine in which each leaves the other his skull, for a drinking cup, to be collected by the survivor. 

[crazy canuck]

From the Globe and Mail - house in Toronto goes for 1M more than asking price.

A thin supply of listings is prompting house hunters in some neighbourhoods to jump into bidding melees with no holds barred, he says.

Six months ago, the same houses that are drawing dozens of bids today would have received one or two offers – or not found a buyer at all, he says.

Mr. Wagman is concerned about future sales in and around the house at 63 Constance St. that sold for $2.3-million, or more than $1-million above its asking price of $1.298-million.

[Valmy]

If Malthus sold his house he could buy his own island someplace.

[crazy canuck]

Nowhere near Vancouver or Toronto.

[dps]

Screw that;  he should buy us that aircraft carrier.

[Valmy]

Nowhere near Vancouver or Toronto.

Someplace warm.

[crazy canuck]

Warmth is for the weak.

[Malthus]

Heh if I sold my house and moved somewhere cheap I could make out like a bandit, I suppose. As long as it sold for enough for me to live on without needing my job. 



But that possibility aside, the current absurd run-up of real estate prices isn't good, for anyone. It's driving young people out of my city. Many can't afford to rent, let alone buy anything.

Every year, like clockwork, articles come out about how we are in a bubble, unsustainable, prices will come tumbling down ... but this run up has gone on, with only minor setbacks, since before I bought back in 2005. Houses may simply never be affordable here again. 

[crazy canuck]

I think that is what is going to happen/has already happened.  If the population projections are anywhere near accurate single family houses will be a rare luxury. Most units going up will be multi unit purpose built rental/mid to long term lease.  We will be like London.

[Barrister]

I think that is what is going to happen/has already happened.  If the population projections are anywhere near accurate single family houses will be a rare luxury. Most units going up will be multi unit purpose built rental/mid to long term lease.  We will be like London.

Yes, Toronto (and Vancouver) have the same problem - increasing populations, but restrictive zoning that prevent a lot of land being developed as high-density living spaces.  So increased demand, but a capped supply, leads inevitably to increased prices.