Joe's Rabbit Hole

After reading the Rich Dad books in the early 2000's we were confident that investing in real estate warranted further research. We found Fundrise in early 2019 and spent time researching, learning and reviewing. After a few emails and conversations, we reached the conclusion that it was something worth considering.  The ability to allocate funds to multiple goals provided an additional level of confidence that the investment would be diversified and provide a balance between income and capital growth.  We were willing to allocate a small amount to access and monitor real world performance and would have gladly allocated further funds and referred friends to the platform. Fundrise experience The platform, like many in the emerging fintech, proptech and crowdfunding space is a great concept and provides an entry into a market that was not previously accessible to the average investor. The alternatives are to directly own real estate or participate in syndication. In our opini...

Smart Home on a Budget Most smart home technology products, in isolation, look great at first glance and can definitely make our lives easier, more secure and even save time or money. It is only when we look deeper or have used the product for some time that we realize the true cost. Sometimes the product comes with a monthly subscription fee. It is critical to include the total cost over time to determine if the product really adds value. Factors to consider Trial or promotion periods - product price is discounted. On the surface this may seem like a great deal, but consider the motives of the manufacturer. How are they making money for their shareholders? Subscription fees - over the past decade, technology companies have realized that a regular monthly subscription fee, provides a more predictable cash flow and makes shareholders happy. This boosts the share prices, executive meet their targets and get their bonuses Privacy – companies sometimes sell the product at a loss, break-eve...

Mutual Funds Background Mutual funds (MF) have been around for decades and the fees have dramatically decreased over the last few decades, due to the rise in popularity of   ETF 's .  MF got a bad reputation for charging a load to purchase the fund and after the bad press and regulation changes, they were still know for hiding the fees under section 12b-1. Expense ratios (another fee), also dropped over time and there are some low cost funds that are almost equivalent to ETF's Recently, while researching investing in real estate, we learnt that the "same" investment was available through Fidelity. This gave us the added perception of confidence that the investment had pass Fidelity's compliance and scrutiny to be listed on their platform. However, after further investigation, we found the following info on their website.   Source - https://fundresearch.fidelity.com/mutual-funds/fees-and-prices/66538B719