4 ms·
Could be. But there are some unlucky people in there as well - single parents who bought a house at the peak of the housing bubble because they were afraid that
by marvin 14y ago
Could be. But there are some unlucky people in there as well - single parents who bought a house at the peak of the housing bubble because they were afraid that home prices would keep rising and leave them without a place to live. And then promptly lost their job in the recession.
- yummyfajitas 14y agoReal estate speculators who made highly leveraged bets that went bad are in fact the sort of people who should, perhaps, not get the opportunity to repeat their mistakes.
- eru 14y agoWhat about renting?
- mkr-hn 14y agohttp://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4763091 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4763091
- eru 14y agoThanks. I never lived in the US. I came to Britain (from Germany) with neither car nor credit history. They let me rent a place, and I never had to buy a car. (Oh, and didn't have to worry about health insurance, either. But that's a slightly different topic.) I wonder how my move to Singapore will play out. But should I ever come to the US, I'll make sure I have plenty of money.
- mkr-hn 14y agoI've heard the US a great country to live in if you have plenty of money. It's so-so if you don't.
- tsotha 14y agoWhere isn't that true?
- mkr-hn 14y agoThis is the only place I have enough perspective on to say anything about.
- lifeguard 14y agoIf you know how to hustle in the vernacular sense you can come to the USA penniless and retire wealthy. The USA is a great place if you want/need the rule of law to protect property. Overall, the US civil legal system is not corrupt. In many places in Asia and E. Europe corruption is systemic. It is much more difficult to keep a successful business in such an environment. One example is real estate escrow services with title insurance.
- mkr-hn 14y agoAre you living in a different US? I'm not saying the path to wealth is beyond my horizon, but there's a lot in the way that only exists because previous generations managed things poorly. Someone starting a little further behind would have an exponentially harder time.
- lifeguard 14y agoI am saying the USA is the easiest and safest place on planet earth to start your own business. If you know how to: 1. buy low & sell high 2. defer personal gratification 3. save a % of everything you earn you can gradually grow wealthy. The world is in recession, and the US might be starting to recover. It is a hard market right now. But it will recover and boom (and then crash) again. I have traveled in Russia and Mexico and made friends with regular people who live there. I also studied economics at university. I am thinking about what I am writing here. edit: I was born and raised in the USA Two inspirational books to get started: The Richest Man in Babylon Andrew Carnegie and the Rise of Big Business
- lifeguard 14y agoOr have some good friends here in advance to help you :-) http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4764692 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4764692