I think it was my wife who introduced me to a uniquely useful definition of aging: accepting the formerly intolerable.
This phrase was front and center in my mind as I went through a recent roller coaster ride on a real estate deal, one where each new twist and turn revealed an additional cost, a worse than anticipated interest rate, a multitude of further recommended inspections each of which seemed equally likely to result in a new problem to remedy.
It was biblical bordering on comical: the general inspection begat the termite inspection begat the roofing inspection...
The breaking point came when the inspector uttered a dreaded four letter word: mold.
Mold investigation is a black box that makes Pandora's receptacle seem dull. The only person who has sufficient expertise in ascertaining the severity of disease is the mold inspector, who works separately from the crew that offers the bid on remedying the damage.
Mold strikes fear in the heart of both seller and buyer because it can become a neverending mystery hole into which one or both parties pour their money.
As a physician, all I could think of was the chest x-rays from med school showing large cavitary lesions typical of aspergillus fumigatus (fungus balls are gnarly).
When mold was discovered, I asked the seller to offer credits in the amount of the bid that would be required to remedy what was found.
There was understandable ambivalence on the seller's part until he saw the formal report and understood the scope of damage.
Something in the pace of our accelerated transaction changed at this moment. It was the realization that I had bent over backward so far to accommodate the seller's requests that I had become a virtual contortionist.
I had invested such time, energy and capital in the deal, I was on the verge of accepting the formerly intolerable.
It took a discussion with my wife to realize it had reached a point of excessive compromise. The writing had been on the wall all along, but I'd refused to see it.
We cut our losses and withdrew from the deal.
An expensive education, but most worthwhile lessons cost you dearly in one currency or another.
Dreams of real estate, you'll have to wait for another opportunity.
The right opportunity.
[Sigh.]
Comments 8
Sorry about the turn of events. You were wise to cut your losses as some might fall to sunk cost fallacy at that point.
You are busy enough as a physician that the hassle of managing all those repairs would push it over the top and make you take on a 2nd job. Keep searching and hopefully a diamond in the rough appears
Author
Xray,
The sunk cost fallacy was on the verge of pulling me under, so it was the sort of turn of events that I’ll eventually look back on with relief. Band-Aid took a little skin with it as I ripped it off, but that will heal in no time.
Fondly,
CD
Why would you sigh? You dodged the bullet. You didn’t die. You almost died. Never never never enter a deal without an exit strategy. An exit strategy by definition has a trigger and once the trigger is pulled the exit commences. I’ve been in the middle of buying a car and have gotten up and walked out when the $1000 dealer prep fee goes on the contract. Guess what. They call back in a week.
The take away from this is NONE of your courses and narratives and blogs tell you the truth. Volatility is the difference in price between truth and fantasy and FIRE land sells fantasy period. Fantasy virtually ALWAYS overestimates reality. Re-read the last 2 lines. Another name for vol is roller coaster. You’re a lyrical story-telly kind of guy but you’re your own worst audience. You have a delusion that you’re going to flit around the south of France with your old lady, while the kids live problem free in college and your money machine throws off proceeds on auto pilot.
Here is the truth. When you run a business you bolt yourself to the chair OR you have to be wealthy enough to pay someone to bolt themselves to the chair for you. That’s what it means to join a practice. You pay your practice manager to manage your risk and then complain about being an employee OR you manage the risk yourself. No one you proxy bolt to the chair gives enough of a shit to cover your ass in the pinch unless they own the business also and even then they may rip you off. I have a Cardiologist friend who’s office manager ripped him off for a million and this guy is as business savvy as anyone I ever met. Now his wife is the one bolted to the chair and runs the business, while he turns the crank.
The FIRE narrative rolls out like the grinder music in an ABBA song:
Take a chance on me
That’s all I ask of you, honey
Take a chance on me
Author
Your points are well taken. The sigh is simply the acknowledgement of releasing a particular envisioned version of the future from manifesting as reality. It’s equal parts disappointment and validation of process.
I used to find that if I budgeted a half hour for a used gear sale at REI, which was a source of great fun and occasionally great deals, I tended to buy items I did not use enough to warrant purchasing them. I realized it was because the value of the deal seemed too good to pass up. So I pivoted and allotted more time for shopping to allow a “mourning period.”
Now I find a great price on an item I don’t need, walk around with it in my hands for 15-20 minutes, and miraculously I find I am able to let it go with little to no struggle.
This is my mourning period for the version of me that might have owned direct real estate. More to come on why I let go of that future.
Appreciate your insights as always,
CD
Read that book by Annie Duke don’t just put it on the list. Here’s a quote:
Counterfactual:
1 A what if. 2 A possible outcome of a decision that is not the one that actually occurred. 3 An imagined hypothetical state of the world.
You HAD an imagined hypothetical state of the world. Also known as a narrative. Volatility IS defined as the distance between reality and narrative. If there is no distance, reality = narrative and the volatility is minima. If the distance is far + or far -, there is huge volatility. Volatility to a human causes disorientation and uncertainty and fear. The goal is to minimize volatility (risk) NOT to try and force reality to match a non realistic narrative. To try and force a non realistic narrative is only to assure disappointment.
Outcomes are governed by luck as well as discernment. Some risk is controllable, much risk is not. Some risk is hard to know, and some risk is unknowable. I live by a rule: you can be a victim for just as many minutes as you want, and then you can go do something constructive. The two can’t coexist. You have a monster opportunity to understand better how to decide, because of this occurrence.
Life is like a Galton board. The ball starts at the top and pings it’s way down to the normal distribution. If the right is a positive life and the left is a negative life, on a Galton the disposition of any one ball is entirely based on luck. A ball has no ability to decide. YOU have the ability to decide, and your decisions affect luck. If you bias luck with + decisions you will wind up in the right half, a winner. If you bias luck with bad decisions, you will wind up in the left half, a looser. Where you end up is marginally under your control and requires consistent rightward bias to your bounces. You can control luck to some small extent but if you quit paying attention then luck reigns supreme.
Author
Annie Duke book downloaded to my Kindle!
Here’s to biasing luck with positive decisions going forward…
Thanks,
CD
Hey CD,
I think you dodged a bullet. Some assets are much easier to buy than to sell….
Author
Thanks Dr. MB. The bullet grazed me, but no bloodshed, for which I’m grateful.