Stephen McBay

Soon there’s gonna be a whole generation of kids that have no idea what diesel exhaust to the face feels like.

@flyingwalruss RDR2 is a meditative experience

@Rainmaker1973 @artofmanliness

Did you know you can estimate the remaining daylight using your hands and the sun?

@simonsarris Expecting our first baby in February. Any tips on balancing the new role as parents without compromising the romance that got us here?

my office hours are OPEN what do you need feedback or advice on, what questions do you have, what secret trouble stirs they breast

🚛🚢 Today, we joined @SenBooker and @RepMenendez to visit @CityofElizabeth and see how #InflationReductionAct grants will help them monitor and reduce truck emissions near one of the world’s largest ports! 🧵

@TomFrankly @ramit That ‘tunnel vision’ is real. Appreciate this sensible take! Gonna keep saving and wait for the right property that passes the bow and arrow test.

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.

@KPBrend @brooklynpaper Congrats!

Some 💫 professional news💫: Today is my first day as Editor in Chief at @brooklynpaper! It has been a delight working alongside the team as a reporter and digital editor for nearly 2 years now, and I am so excited (and nervous!) about this next step.

@TrungTPhan Thought I was the only one to repeatedly watch this. The confidence is infectious.

Bernie Mac coined one of the most famous phrases in stand-up comedy: “I ain’t scared of you mother——-.” He dropped it during a Def Comedy Jam open mic in the mid-90s. It was Mac’s way to wrangle a hostile crowd. I watch this 6-minute clip at least once a quarter. His ability to control the audience was truly unreal. The best part is he came up with it on the spot. As he was preparing to hit the stage, Bernie was talking to comedian Bill Bellamy and the crowd was viciously boo-ing another act. “Be careful out there,” Bill said. “This audience is tough." Bernie replied: “I've been going at this too long and I've worked too hard. I ain't scared of 'em!" He brought that exact energy on stage, adding the “I ain’t scared” phrase after every joke in his set. Sadly, Mac — the Chicago Native — passed away in 2008 at the age of 50. He said of his act, “It’s not what you do, it’s how you do it. It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.”

Since 2010,  EPA and @PeaceCorps have partnered on environmental protection efforts in international communities. Today’s MOU signing strengthens our ties and creates new opportunities for us to work together with global communities to protect a shared environmental future.

@ArgerasCz @SamStrantzEsq

Never forget that they released Mummy trailer without sound effects 😭

1860's New York City, United States of America

Shoutout to planet Earth. Never seen any other planet quite like it

Abbott on Abbott on Abbott

👂We heard the #Brooklyn community's concerns and are taking action! After our info session in Jan., @EPA sampled PS110 school and will test @NYCHA Cooper Park Houses this month. Learn more about our efforts to address the Meeker Avenue Plume: epa.gov/superfund/meek…

It’s about time EPA leans into the unique and (let’s admit) awesome things that it does. It’s not all lawyers and policy analysts. I hope we do more of this. youtu.be/feFbgXkL_ZM

@MichaelAmmons First I’m seeing this. What are the benefits of red light?

Are you red light maxxing, anon?

This is the Bronx River the same year the EPA was founded, a place the city referred to as an "open sewer." This week, three dolphins were found eating fish in the river for the first time in decades. Yeah, environmental protection is actually a great thing.(Camilo Vergara, 1970)

Preach

More NYC culture stuff at the Guggenheim.