Fliperati

I of course have to open this post with a very sincere apology for leaving everyone hanging in suspense for so long.  It’s been over three months since I’ve posted my last update and I realize it wasn’t fair to simply drop off the face of the earth like that, but there are a number of reasons why I quit writing in the blog so suddenly (although

I doubt anyone will be fully placated by my ideas of good reasons).  The holidays were the first major catalyst in my blogging hiatus, primarily because my family is in a rural part of the Midwest without any high-speed internet access and I simply can’t stomach using dial-up for any purpose beyond bare-necessity e-mail checking.  I spent quite a bit of time at home around Thanksgiving and Christmas because my prior Wall Street job limited my holiday visits to rushed three-day affairs and I wanted to actually spend some quality time with my family this year.  All that home cooking and the slower pace of day-to-day life back home really sapped my enthusiasm for blogging and distracted me from the flip that was languishing back in New Jersey.  I know die-hard real estate investors would never get so detached from their businesses, but I hadn’t been able to spend that much time with my family in nearly a decade so I was okay with tarnishing my work record over a long break.

The second factor in my blogging absence was plain old superstition.  I hate to admit it, but I have always had a strong superstitious side that is particularly pronounced when it comes to major life events that are influenced by luck, competition or forces beyond my control.  For example, I always refused to speculate on my performance on important exams in school until I had the final grade in my hand.  This behavior was driven by the completely irrational fear that discussing the test would somehow “jinx” my results.  Even though everyone else was busily comparing notes about how ridiculous the essay section was and how Question #3 on the first page was straight out of the textbook, I was like a guilty politician dodging pre-trial interview requests from the media: No Comment.  The same goes for job interviews, first dates and poker tournaments: I’ve always thought that speculation brought bad luck and generally avoided talking about anything until the final result was written in stone.

The fact that the full-price offer on my first flip fell through right around the time I began telling my friends about the sale only reinforced this long-standing policy of not discussing anything until it was a done deal.  After that it was tough to sit down and write blog posts on any new developments when I still had the fear of “jinxing” the deal.  Crazy, I know, but I’ve never been able to shake that kind of superstition.

The fact that I’m writing now indicates that I’ve closed on the sale of my very first investment property, but I’ll save the details of that story for another post because I’m short on time at the moment.  I promise it won’t take three months this time.

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I of course have to open this post with a very sincere apology for leaving everyone hanging in suspense for so long.  It’s been over

three months since I’ve posted my last update and I realize it wasn’t fair to simply drop off the face of the earth like that, but there are a number of reasons why I quit writing in the blog so suddenly (although I doubt anyone will be fully placated by my ideas of good reasons).  The holidays were the first major catalyst in my blogging hiatus, primarily because my family is in a rural part of the Midwest without any high-speed internet access and I simply can’t stomach using dial-up for any purpose beyond bare-necessity e-mail checking.  I spent quite a bit of time at home around Thanksgiving and Christmas because my prior Wall Street job limited my holiday visits to rushed three-day affairs and I wanted to actually spend some quality time with my family this year.  All that home cooking and the slower pace of day-to-day life back home really sapped my enthusiasm for blogging and distracted me from the flip that was languishing back in New Jersey.  I know die-hard real estate investors would never get so detached from their businesses, but I hadn’t been able to spend that much time with my family in nearly a decade so I was okay with tarnishing my work record over a long break.

The second factor in my blogging absence was plain old superstition.  I hate to admit it, but I have always had a strong superstitious side that is particularly pronounced when it comes to major life events that are influenced by luck, competition or forces beyond my control.  For example, I always refused to speculate on my performance on important exams in school until I had the final grade in my hand.  This behavior was driven by the completely irrational fear that discussing the test would somehow “jinx” my results.  Even though everyone else was busily comparing notes about how ridiculous the essay section was and how Question #3 on the first page was straight out of the textbook, I was like a guilty politician dodging pre-trial interview requests from the media: No Comment.  The same goes for job interviews, first dates and poker tournaments: I’ve always thought that speculation brought bad luck and generally avoided talking about anything until the final result was written in stone.

The fact that the full-price offer on my first flip fell through right around the time I began telling my friends about the sale only reinforced this long-standing policy of not discussing anything until it was a done deal.  After that it was tough to sit down and write blog posts on any new developments when I still had the fear of “jinxing” the deal.  Crazy, I know, but I’ve never been able to shake that kind of superstition.

The fact that I’m writing now indicates that I’ve closed on the sale of my very first investment property, but I’ll save the details of that story for another post because I’m short on time at the moment.  I promise it won’t take three months this time.

Comments(0)