Sean Henry

My advice on buying property is a bit different than others. This is coming from purchasing a house in the city, a tree farm, small property attached to the farm, and a foreclosed house on the small property.

First figure out what you can afford to pay monthly then aim for paying only 80% of that. That will give you some extra overhead incase something breaks or any other expenses pop up.

Don't buy the first place you find look at lots of properties, if you are looking in different regions have a different agent in each and tell them what you are looking for. Expect for them to do a shitty job and miss over half your requirements, I had a requirement for highspeed intranet and kept getting properties where the only option would be to get satellite. We looked for about 2 years off an on in the Northern Kentucky triangle (Cincinnati, Louisville, Lexington each is 100mi apart).


Get the longest term loan you can as long as the interest is not to high. Often the total out of pocket expense will be higher if you go the full-term but the monthly will be lower and easier to manage when things come up. Setting a spread sheet and/or using an online calculator is great for this.
You might find a 15yr loan will cost you 32K in interest at the end paying $736 monthly.
The 30yr will cost 51K in interest paying $422 monthly ($314 less monthly).
This is 19k more in interest you could consider this a monthly insurance penalty of $52.77 ((19000/30)/12).
Now if you pay that "penalty" every month on the 30yr it will save $9500(in interest) at the end of the loan and be paid off 5yr 1mo early still leaving you with $261 extra and the end of each month to put to the property or other debts.
Just for fun if you wanted to pay the interest "penalty" over 15yrs instead of 30yrs the extra $105.55 (still have $208 left over) the property will be paid off 8yrs and 7months early saving $16000 in interest.
Please do your own math based on your interest rates, and make sure there is no penalty for paying it off early.


Before paying extra on any loan I recommend to have a minimum of 3 months sitting in an account to cover the mortgage if you lose a job or get injured. I try to do this always have in the fund taxes and insurance covered, and realistically this amount should cover all required expenses (loans, bills, food...).

My last requirement when buying property buy in unincorporated areas or an area with little to o building codes, it will save you time and money.

I have been using the Hamilton beach one for a few years and I know some one that used the same model 4x a day for 5 years before getting a new one since the lid would not stay closed. Here is a link to that model ~$30 https://amzn.to/3jeA4yh I really like it and used it when I needed to heat baby bottles at night. I used glass bottles and a Pyrex dish.

If you want to get fancy and set/ hold a set temp check out the Miroco electric kettle for ~$45 amazon has a $5 off coupon right now. The link is https://amzn.to/3cFcwjD if you like cooler drinks or want to make small batches of beer/mead this could be handy.

I love all the tips and stories here on being a landlord. I plan on starting to look at properties next year to rent unless something on my street comes up at a good price.

So my first piece of advise on the house is get a good home inspection or two, the second one could be from a contractor or handy man so you can know what it would cost to fix up. That can help when making an offer if the seller says that it will only take 1k to fix the roof and you have two guys saying 5-7k get it in writing that it will be fixed.

Since you live with your father and have not bought in the past you should qualify as a first time home buyer. Buy it as your house and get room mates (unless you hate the idea) later you could move out and rent your room also.
If you plan on doing that I would talk to a tax/real state  lawyer and see if it would benefit you more to hold it as your house with roommates or a rental property that you rent to yourself/others since a business has other expenses they can duct from income.

I'm using a Kioti ck3510 it is a compact tractor with a front end loader and a removable back hoe. I has worked well for me so far moving dirt it might be a little big moving in wooded areas depending on how wooded they have a smaller one I believe it is the cs2010 that can also have a belly mower added to it.

If you will be using the Loader to "dig" i would recommend getting a toothed bar like the Parana bar or one of the other makes like that as it has more bite to cut through dirt and roots.

I also have a Toro Dingo its a walk behind tractor with tracks I used that a few years ago to clear an area next to my paw-paw patch to make a beer garden (a place in the woods to have a drink in the shade). They are quite expensive I would recommend renting one to try before buying one. I believe they have a digging arm attachment for it but you might be better getting a small bobcat.

There should be many options I just searched for tablet with sim card.
https://www.google.com/search?q=tablet+with+sim+card

You can try swappa to get a used one unlocked or that matches your network.
https://swappa.com/mobile/unlocked/tablets?platform=android

It does not look like they have many but check out the LG7 they have a used one for ~75. You can also use them to narrow your search and them look for one on ebay or amazon.

I got my package of books on Saturday I already started passing some out. One is going to go on the FREE shelf at the library next time my son wants to go after daycare, so I assume today since he always wants to go. (They have a train table.)

Now lets see if there are enough pictures in it to let me get by reading it as his bed time "story" (He is 3).

This podcast never made it to the RSS feed that stitcher uses. I assume other podcast apps use the same RSS feed to it probably does not show for them.

455 and 457 have both posted without issue.

paul wheaton wrote:It would still be easier if it turns out that one format is the simple "one, true format" and we just go with that.

My vote would be 35 .mp3's
Then .OGG (Dont do this. Its a FOSS format but not everything can play it).

And last .m4b.

The main reason to go with the MP3s everything can play it I could copy it to a cd as a data disk and play it on my 15yr old car radio. Using a format that anyone can play without issue will reduce the complaints and tech issues that could cause people to redownload it or try to get a different format.

I'm not sure where you live but check into being a tree farm. Usually you do not need to earn an income from it to maintain the status since it can take 10-30 years to get a crop.

Look into getting a nursery license then grow easy to split plants like bulbs, cane fruit and suckering plants.

For your first year grow hay or straw. Find someone with the equipment to bale it and sell it, you might be able to sell it to the person that cuts it. They charge you $700 to do the work you sell them everything for $1000 they just purchased 5ac of hay for $300.

paul wheaton wrote:There are just two people in for the audiobook reward at this time.  So not a really big winner so far.

I wonder if others did what I did and moved to the $100 level to get the audio book and the "book" book. The RMH plans helped too.