As Doctors Get a Life, Strains Show
Quest for Free Time
Reshapes Medicine;
A Team Approach

JACOB GOLDSTEIN
April 29, 2008; Page A1

U.S. medicine is in the middle of a cultural revolution, as young physicians intent on balancing work and family challenge the assumption that a doctor should be available to treat patients around the clock.

Walter Cheng, 32 years old, is in the profession’s new guard. Upon graduating from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 2004, he bristled at the notion espoused by some senior physicians that a doctor should put medicine above all else. “I thought, ‘I don’t really want to be that kind of doctor.’… My family is as important, if not more important, than my career.”

DOCTORS’ PROGNOSIS

New Generation: Young doctors are pushing to balance work and family life. Changing Medicine: Practices are adapting by creating new, more flexible schedules. For Patients: Doctors may be less exhausted, but also less familiar.

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There is a great post on Dilbert’s blog, called Time Management. Below is an excerpt for your enjoyment. It is a great illustration of all the commitments we must address or face the consequences. Enjoy, it sure hit close to home for me.

One time management strategy is to be independently wealthy, freeing up eight hours a day. But that option isn’t available to many. And apparently it isn’t fulfilling because most rich people continue to work full schedules.

Another strategy is to ignore the fact that you are slowly killing yourself by not sleeping and exercising enough. That frees up several hours a day. The only downside is that you get fat and die.

A third path is to work less than you could, live economically, enjoy each day as it comes, and try not to think about living on cat food when you retire.

Which strategy have you picked?

Readers of this blog will surely not be satisfied with $1M at retirement. They’ll likely want to have 10 times that amount, maybe more. That may be a difficult number for most people to confront but then again, most people haven’t done the math to see how much they need. If you aren’t sure about how to calculate how much you need, leave a comment and we can go through the numbers together.
Don’t be fooled by the book that says $1M is enough, it isn’t by a long shot.

So What if $1 Million Isn’t What It Used to Be?

SOMEWHERE along the line, having $1 million — like the ability to diagram sentences, do math in your head, and the dollar itself — became devalued.

Today, when magazines routinely compile lists of the world’s billionaires, and trillion-dollar federal budgets are commonplace, a mere $1 million seems quaint. Still, it is a nice round number to aim for as you plan for retirement, and is the focus of two new books.

Indeed, writing that you need at least a seven-figure nest egg (more…)

Thanks mj*laflaca for this photo

Big ups and big downs create interim situations that can favor the bulls and the bears. I always liked the Warren Buffet’s quote, “When the tide goes out we get to see who is not wearing a bathing suit!” I can just visualize Warren selling a surprised naked swimmer a pair of shorts for 10 times the value Nordstrom’s would charge. Yes, abrupt changes in the market do show us weaknesses, but they also expose opportunities.

We all know that the markets will inevitably go up and down. Yet, people often get caught up in the change and miss the opportunity that is created. I know this is true for residential real estate. I have seen many people sit and watch the market move around them. These folks tend to be purveyors of disaster. They might say, “I can’t believe the stock market dropped 200 points today. Yikes!” Others are realizing opportunity in this market and buying homes whose sales prices look more like 2005 ’s median price than 2008’s. I am also watching some listings receive multiple bids and sell for over the asking price. I even had a buyer who recently purchased a luxury home for less than it would cost to construct the home in todays market. Opportunity exists in both bull and bare markets.

I have also recently been looking at the big changes ahead in commercial and residential income real estate. I find it interesting that Shorenstein (one of the largest private real estate investment funds) has just raised its largest fund ever ($2.06 billion). It is interesting to see how the current market volatility has made for some amazing opportunities to raise real estate investment capital.

It has been interesting for me to note that powerful investors make moves when the future seems the most unclear to the masses. This is because value in real estate often occurs when the market is most inefficient. Currently the liquidity crisis has made our financial markets very inefficient. This has also translated in to inefficiency in residential real estate sales. The efficient days of placing a sign in the front yard and having 10 bidders at your doorstep have been replaced by an ebbing and flowing market. When everyone is running away from investing in the market, and the tide goes out, the professional investors begin to pick away at the deals that are left behind.

Most surprising in this market are the individual emotions and moods that tend to amplify the tides. I have often heard people say, “My friend said the real estate values are falling everywhere.” Often I have seen that the friend does not own a home. Yet, the ripple they create with their hysterical mood will affect the actions of a few. Savvy buyers and seller ground their moods with data and facts. They can then take powerful confident action in the market. They learn the characteristics of their market and then act when opportunity arises.

There are plenty of great opportunities in this market, as its ebb and flow opens and closes opportunities for selling and buying.

Throughout the history of this blog, I have posted about the tremendous shortfall that people have in their retirement funding. Around 90% of the baby boomers do not have enough saved for their retirement; most are woefully short. Can you imagine trying to live for 30 years with $25,000 in savings, no pension and a slim Social Security check that isn’t entirely safe? (Yes, the Social Security check is a promise from the government that can be lowered if the solvency of the system is in question). Oh, it’s even worse in many cases because although they may have $25,000 in savings, they are also carrying huge debt loads for their plasma TV’s, boats, cars, vacations, etc.
I like the direction BofA is taking with their research detailed in this article. More and more financial institutions will be looking to help people save more because doing so aligns with the bank’s interest of having more money to manage. The latte example is chump change; how about computing the savings of delaying buying that new car for 2 years? Or that sofa? Now you start to talk about real money.
Decisions, decisions
Just how do we spend money? How might technology alter banking? With Bank of America’s help, MIT is trying to find out
By Ross Kerber, Globe Staff | April 14, 2008

Which would you rather have: a $2 cup of coffee today, or $8.64 more in retirement savings 30 years from now?

It’s the sort of question Dan Ariely can ponder for hours. (more…)

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York has put together a great National interactive heat map that overlays the residential loan data of sub-prime mortgage holders. I am bringing this to the attention of our readers as I just witnessed a home in inner Berkeley that received 14 offers. I also just read a post on 3 Oceans Real Estate that concurred that homes on the peninsula are also receiving multiple offers and counter intuitive to what is going on Nationally, selling for over the asking price.

Since the beginning of the liquidity crisis I have been posting that many Bay Area cities were not experiencing as severe a decline as the national news media had indicated. I also stated that if we were to see a rise in interest rates coupled with a stagnation or rise in median home prices (instead of falling median home values as the media had speculated), then many home buyers would get caught waiting for the sky to fall. Having watched the Bay Area real estate markets closely over the past year I have begun to see interest rates rise due to the lack of liquidity in the banking industry. Yet, in many popular Bay Area markets the median home values have not fallen significantly as many have projected. Of course this is not true for all cities, zip codes and houses. Thus, getting the advice of a local competent real estate adviser is of the utmost importance when considering purchasing a home. Through transacting in this market I have seen for both my buyers and sellers that in volatile times there is great opportunity for both.

The interesting thing about these heat maps is that they show the strength of the Bay Area’s home owners to wait out a real estate storm. Thus, the most desirable Bay Area houses have been very resilient to the housing down turn, while in the less desirable areas I have seen sharper drops in values. In Berkeley we are seeing a lack of desirable housing inventory. This has meant the desirable housing stock is receiving lots of buyer activity and often receiving multiple offers. I believe that this is because as these heat maps illustrate the East Bay and Most of the Bay Area is not inundated by as many short sales and foreclosures as many other parts of the Nation. The maps also indicate that the East Bay has home owners who have steady jobs, strong FICO scores and lower loan to values then say California’s Central Valley.