David Tibbitts

Okay not to get all sappy or whatever but being trusted to write @NotionHQ's release notes has been the highlight of my career?? And to finish off 2021, we posted our longest, most detailed update ever: notion.notion.site/What-s-New-157… Hope there's an exciting 🎁 in there for everyone!

@JackK Congrats! Love Bard.

Today is Bard's half birthday ♥️ All we've done in the past 6 months was go: - From waitlist to open access - From 1 language to 40+ languages - From US/UK to 200+ countries/territories - Launch coding - Give Bard vision (image upload) - Integrate with your personal life (extensions! export!) - Show confidence & mistakes in responses (Google It v2) - Steady improvement of model quality - Introduce web images in responses Can't wait to see what the next 6 months holds - thanks for experimenting with us 😍

My friend Gatsby knows more about fragrance than anyone I know. After six years at Aēsop, he left to take a bet on himself and start his own business, Nose of Gatsby. If you're looking to try something new, please consider supporting his shop! instagram.com/noseofgatsby/s…

@hapfrap go off!!

@TomFrankly @ramit This is great advice!!

Let's talk buying vs. renting a home for a minute. I see a lot of people fly into blind rage when @ramit suggests buying a home might not always be the best decision. I even see personal finance creators getting mad about this. For the record, I've purchased two homes. Sold the first, now live in the second. No plans to move anytime soon. I still think renting is the better option for some people. This is what a lot of folks don't seem to understand. Ramit says exactly what I stated above, but they somehow hear: "You must rent. If you buy a house, you're an idiot. I know what's best for literally every person on earth and also I'm secretly a landlord." *laughs evily, steeples fingers, bites into avocado toast* Idk, maybe they don't like that he's turning people away from the real estate courses they're trying to sell. Or maybe it's just dogma. Anyway, I'd like to share some of the considerations I made before buying my houses. Opportunity Cost My first big consideration for buying a home is: How long do you plan on staying? I think it only makes sense to buy if you're planning on staying long-term. Here's why. If you're around my age, you've spent the majority of your career in a largely positive economic environment. So there's this feeling that, "If I want to move, I can just sell the house! It's even more convenient than waiting for my lease to expire!" And sure, that sometimes works. But ask @MattGiovanisci what happens when it doesn't. He's been very open about the fact that when he wanted to move to Colorado from New Jersey, he couldn't sell his condo to save his life. For years, he had to rent it out and deal with tenant issues, vacancies, management issues, you name it. It's not always easy to get out of a house. Don't bank on it. (Again, this is for most people. I know some of you are savvy investors, or in a market that's conducive to quick exits and always will be, or otherwise the Protagonist of Reality with a reason why my argument above doesn't fit you) Location As Ramit often states, the rent/buy equation changes drastically when you look at High Cost-of-Living (HCoL) cities. I spend a lot of time in Manhattan. No one I know who lives there owns their home, nor do they have plans to buy anytime soon. Even the rich ones. I knew a guy who was paying over $20,000/mo to rent a (very nice) apartment. Sounds crazy, but to buy the same apartment, his mortgage alone would have been over $50,000/mo. Here's something that is stated less often: Even in non-HCoL cities, renting is often your best option if you want to live in a dense, walkable neighborhood. Zoning laws and minimum parking laws – all passed after WWII – have made it illegal to build these kinds of neighborhoods in most of the U.S. now. This means that inner-ring, pre-war neighborhoods are pretty much the only places in most cities where you can live within walking distance of restaraunts, coffee shops, bars, stores, etc. P.S. – You can thank your local city council and the NIMBYs that support it for the fact that you can't walk to Starbucks in most parts of your city without getting a full 10,000 steps in. That means buying in these dense neighborhoods is expensive. It's often cheaper to rent because the owners paid far less than current market value when they bought back in 1982 or whenever; hence they can make a profit renting to you without matching current purchase prices. My current mortgage (not even including other expenses) is significantly higher than the rent that my house's previous owner was charging his tenants. That's just the way things work. A sale locks in a valuation and can majorly increase the cost of ownership for the next owner. This is, of course, one of the major reasons for the current housing crisis in the U.S. So yeah. Dense, walkable, desirable neighborhoods are just stupidly expensive to buy in. I live in an area like this now. While I was fortunate enough to be able to afford a (much smaller) house here, I will confidently state that I'd much rather rent in a neighborhood like this than buy in suburban sprawl 20 miles away from downtown. Side note: My experience in the burbs lead to my Bow and Arrow Rule: If you can't shoot a bow and arrow on your own property without someone raising a stink, it ain't worth giving up a walkable neighborhood for that property. Many burbs have tiny yards and HOA laws that heavily restrict what you can do on your own property. Lifestyle Inflation This one happened to me, so I'll mention it. When looking for my first house, I started fanticizing about all the things I'd be able to do once I owned my own home: - "I'll be able to build a huge gym in my basement!" - "I'll have a big yard for cornhole and cookouts!" This lead us to buy a house that was way bigger than we needed. Worse, it pushed us way out to the sprawling suburbs, where we lost access to all the walkable amenities and businesses our old neighborhood had. Buying a house can easily push you to focusing on STUFF, and can take your focus off of LOCATION. I'd urge you to try to keep this in the back of your mind if you do start looking to buy a house. Think about what makes you happy now, and whether or not the location of a house you'd buy would take that away from you. Hidden Costs Ok, here's the big one. Owning a home is more expensive than you think it is. That doesn't mean it's not worth it – it might still be! Again, I own my home. I have zero interest in pushing you away from buying a home, but I do want you to understand the costs. When we look at houses on Zillow, we see that "Estimated Payment" figure and assume that it's accurate. It's not. Zillow's estimated payment includes mortgage, property taxes, HOA, and estimated home insurance. It also assumes a 20% down payment. Most people I know didn't pay the full 20%, which means: - Higher monthly mortgage payment (for multiple reasons, including bigger principal and higher LTV (loan-to-value ratio), which increases interest rate) - Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI) – a monthly payment you have to make to compensate the bank for taking extra risk on the loan Also not included in the Zillow estimate are repair and maintenance costs. Most homeowners don't think about these when buying – but you should. Regular maintenance costs are ongoing and increase your overall monthly ownership cost. Worse, big repairs can come up at any time – roof repairs, new furnace, etc. These are often large, one-time costs that people aren't able to pay off right away. So they put it on the credit card, take out a loan, get a HLOC, etc. Bottom line: repairs can become yet another monthly payment that increases your ongoing ownership cost. When I was recording a series of episodes with @andyfieb on real estate investing (on the Listen Money Matters podcast, 2017-ish), he mentioned that pro real estate investors often budget 1% of the home's value/year for repair costs. For this reason, I built myself a giant spreadsheet to estimate true housing costs, and included that figure in my calculations. The Excel formula is simple: (Cell with house's purchase price) * 0.01 / 12 On a $400,000 house, that's an extra $333 you should be saving each month. You don't have to be saving this amount, as big repairs don't happen every month. Their schedule is "lumpy" – but also unpredictable. If you're not prepared, it can hurt. The Other Hidden Cost Most people I know who have purchased homes ended up going out to the suburbs. That's where they could afford to buy. And guess what? They drive a lot more now. People often forget about this one: When you buy in car-dependent suburbia, your transportation costs go up. All the sudden, you're driving everywhere. So now you're spending well over $100 per month on gas – or $200-$300 if you're like all the people in the suburb I lived in, who felt the need to buy massive pickup trucks (of course, I never saw them hauling anything that couldn't fit in a Corolla). Tack on car payments and maintenance costs, and your car can easily add hundreds of dollars a month to your expenses. Which leads to another rule of mine. Do not think only about housing costs. Housing + Transport costs should always be considered together, becuase housing decisions affect transport decisions. Bottom Line My advice is the same as Ramit's: Run the damn numbers. It pays to become a bit of a spreadsheet nerd when you're making one of the biggest financial decisions of your life. Additionally: Consider potential lifestyle inflation, opportunity cost, and what makes you happy now. Buying a house can give you tunnel vision. It's easy to get excited and make a whole bunch of assumptions about what you want and what you're ok giving up. Be very critical about those assumptions. In short, make sure you're educated and then make the decision that makes the most sense for you.

@Johnsjawn @SFMTA_Muni I know what I’m getting London Breed for Christmas

@davidtibbies @SFMTA_Muni Need these twitter.com/ariannasan/sta…

Mid-Valencia pilot update (1/3): ▶️Traffic striping complete for pilot design on Valencia Sts. between 15th & 17th Sts. ▶️Rubber curbs installed up to Valencia & 17th, with more coming. ▶️Overhead signs for new curb management plan complete between 17th &19th Sts.

@joshm pls have AI analyze my mood via webcam so my Arc theme can change like these bad boys

my new friend Murphy

@alexhaobao I just finished goron and it was so annoying 🪨

@davidtibbies i think there’s also an argument for doing gerudo last (the desert is my favorite area) to save it for after the gorons as motivation LOL

finally reached a standstill in #TearsOfTheKingdom because i’ve finished the rito, zora, and gerudo subplots and honestly i just don’t give a shit about goron city sorry my dudes you’re gonna have to wait

wow! thank you tim cook for featuring @NotionHQ at #WWDC23

@wongmjane Welcome!!

Personal news — I’ve moved to SF Bay Area 🌁 Leaving Hong Kong to embark on a new journey in tech. Let the Silicon Valley adventure begin!

if you’re on vacation you can have cake for breakfast that’s the rule

@alexhaobao you’re in your unhinged era and I’m here for it

this is what happens when you let me actualize an intrusive thought

@weaselingaround who doesn’t love twink link

@davidcapple @NotionHQ @typeform @theallinpod @Jason your impact!!

Love when @NotionHQ and @typeform are mentioned in the same sentence regarding what the future of tech will look like (see minute 31 of this week’s @theallinpod - shoutout to @Jason).

@benln okay Easlo

Are you actively creating Notion templates? Drop a 👋

2-step verification, 2FA, MFA. Whatever you call it, it’s now available in Notion. Verify with: 🤳🏼 Phone number 📲 Authentication app 📂 Backup codes Set up in Settings & members → My account!

@alexhaobao how dare you talk about my hometown that way. but also yes.

how lisa from temecula wants her steak cooked