Cryptogon Reader Has Joint Account with Siblings, Can’t Diversity Family Assetts, Losing Money by the Minute
September 24th, 2007A Cryptogon reader is desperately trying to diversity her family’s assets, but the funds are held in a joint account with this person’s siblings who have no idea how dire the global financial situation is. Unless her siblings can somehow come to see how serious this situation is, the funds cannot be moved.
The question to all of you is: How can this person convey to her siblings the seriousness of the situation so that better informed decisions can be made about future investments?
I don’t think that sites like Cryptogon are the way to go for people who are arriving this late in the game (this reader’s siblings). Even though I’ve been getting it right all along, I don’t maintain the right appearances. It’s too much, too fast and without enough context for beginners. We need mainstream sources that are concise and readable by laypeople. We need materials written by people who mainstream sources would refer to as ‘knowledgeable professionals.’
I’m sure that many of us can relate to this person’s situation. Years ago, I gave up trying to talk to my family about these matters. Eventually, my wife and I packed some books, some clothes and flew away to a better place; for good. I accepted that there was nothing I could do to help my family change their outlook. That makes me sad, but I accept it and don’t dwell on it much.
This Cryptogon reader doesn’t have that choice; she can’t cut the strings like I did. Her siblings have tied themselves to the mast of a sinking ship and she needs their help to lower the lifeboat into the water.
So, whadya reckon?
If their denial is as willful as that of a certain immediate family-member of mine (which is almost certainly the case if these family-members of which you speak are typical badly spoiled, deeply clueless Baby Boomers; yeah, I’m a bitter, cynical Gen-Xer, what about it?), forget it. The evidence could be jumping up and down right in front of them waving bright-red flags and screaming at top-volume, and it still wouldn’t alter their perspective. Me, I’m mostly fatalistically resigned to my fate. It’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine.
Am I mising something here? I have no magic bullet, but can’t you just split the difference? Send around an email detailing how and why you think the market is heading for a downturn, linking to the more bearish finance sites like dailyreckoning or whiskeyandgunpowder. Rather than making this about the NWO and the collapse of industrial civilisation, just state that you have looked at the evidence and taken a lot of financial advice and you think the best way for the family to safeguard their assets is to diversify into various other commodities and currencies and maybe a bit of gold. If all else fails, I hear greed is quite a good motivator, and there are plenty of ‘how to profit from the downturn’ pieces out there.
OK, even that might not work – I have occasionally attempted to convince my parents in this direction but most people are so scared of trying to understand finance that they don’t like to rock the boat, and hold on to shares inherited 20 years ago from great-aunts and suchlike. But waving some impressive-looking financial articles and magazines and websites in their faces might just convince them that you are the only one who knows what they are doing and they will let you begin to diversify… if you manage to convince them further later, all good, move everything into guns and gold, if not, you are at least a bit safer than before. Softly, softly.. erm.. convincee family…
However, if one insists on being the proverbial glutton for punishment, one might point others to The Prudent Bear Website. So don’t say Loveandlight never gave ya anything ‘cept a big ol’ headache, ’cause it ain’t true. 🙂
http://financialsense.com/
listen to their webcast every saturday (i burn it on to my mp3 and listen while i work).
beyond that, you are sol as loveandlight so emphatically put it…some folks can’t get beyond their favorite tv show and learned NOTHING from katrina.
take ’em shopping!
or show ’em a picture of a dog chasing its tail!!
that probably won’t work either. getting them to recognize the buying power of their money is going to the dogs is akin to dropping a frog in water and turning the heat to boil.
breaking through the denial can be a long haul even for one who has a willingness to look. the “tools” to use to show how what might appear to be a rising value (ie, the account is heavy in securities) is actually declining, as a way to get their attention, are gradually being eliminated. in the meantime they are being highly manipulated to the advantage of the few and demise of the many. this can be shown. but you will be hard up against their fear and likely they ain’t gonna like it.
that significant consumables such as energy and food are removed from the pix by those who have the power to do so… to their advantage only… should be a red flag that something’s rotten in america. that free markets aren’t free when we have a fed injecting billions should be another. that a debt driven economy is a dead end street should be another.
there are plenty of dedicated sources that explain this thouroughly. even in the mainstream. but they are known as contrarions. the prob with tying to educate your siblings is anything contrarion will be viewed as contrarion. and the emotional charge around that word is nothing compared to the emotional charge around THE “C” word which is CONSPIRACY!!
i haven’t read it yet but greenspam’s new book might hold some possibilities for you even though its like jumping in with the sharks. they would likely be open to him as legit even though some of us know he’s a dog feeder. might be able to find something there to get the lights turned on though. sometimes the only way to the light is to jump into the darkness. and sometimes the only way to beat ’em in the war is to join ’em in the battle.
having said all that, if you have no other choice but to play the game then stear them onto the global bandwagon. though i’ve chosen to not play the game, there is one source i’ve followed for some time now that is VERY successful in international finance. you can sign up for his free daily e-newsletter at… http://www.garyascott.com/ his multicurrency sandwich (connected to jyske bank… here’s a sample… http://www.garyascott.com/2007/09/11/1803.html) is highly successful and will likely remain so until the global dog catches its tail and eats itself alive! he’s almost there too so time is short.
in the meantime, kiss your inheritance goodby. ready your bugout bag and try to develope a taste for boiled frog.
if they insist in maintaining assets in USD, there is only so much reasoning yu can do with them. The lemmings are only really happy when they are engaged in fiscal schadenfreude. With that said, i was in the same position, 3 years ago. I lobbied and lobbied and finally got them to divide the assets, marked to market. If that is not feasible, then, regrettably, I submit you have 3 choices: 1) hedge with the physical commodities, either through bullion vault, with etf’s, etc.; 2) get them to diversify into the stocks of foreign companies, or 3) walk away. I know that last suggestion is very hard, but I have had to, and I know others who have had to. If you do not, after you have exhasuted every other reasonable means, then, it is your health and sanity which will suffer. You have my deepest respect for trying. – dagobaz
This is a hard one. The most important thing to do is to start ASAP, mostly what people seem to need is time. And they also need to time to themselves to mull it over. If you keep at them they’ll just want to dig their heels in. Giving them space is the hardest part especially because it’s not worth doing if they haven’t listened in the first place.
I don’t know this person but you’ve got to present yourselves in a professional manner just like the type ofinformation sources everyone is digging up.
Another thing I thought of is where have all the big boys put their money. I heard ages ago that Dick Cheney has basically detached himself from the US economy. Bill Gates moved out of US$ ages ago. Is stuff like that significant enough?
No time to dope-slap the willfully clueless. Take a look at how some of the assets are held, choose one that is about the percentage of the total assets that is your “portion,” and tell your siblings you’ll sign over the rest to them if they let you get that one asset in your name. If not, you’ll threaten to document how you tried to save the assets and file suit against them later on when it’s all dust.
Sorry, but hell really is other people, and most often the other people is family.
In general trying to convince people of something they do not want to believe is a complete waste of time. I would recommend that the person tries to get their siblings to buy them out of their position. If the siblings are so sure of their investment, they ought to be able to put something up for it. If they have trouble securing a loan to buy the lone wolf out, that might start convincing them that something is wrong. But I wouldn’t count on anything like that. I would push strongly to get the siblings to buy out my position, even at somewhat of a loss, so I could invest as I saw fit.
I really don’t want to die, someday though, it’s bound to happen. A problem implies a solution, but that doesn’t mean it’s there. And it’s true, you can’t point them here or you’ll lose em’ immediately. Kevin readjusts the focus constantly, as needed, you got to be a serious contrarian before you even get here; or want to be.
And maybe that’s the heart of the problem; it’s not that all the people you are trying to reach are unreasonable; they have an entirely different set of assumptions. You have to start there and work forward. But even then- I’ve found some pretty creative ways to express just these issues, and I can’t get though.
Very few are receptive, the percentage is really miniscule. Splitting up money with family, debating about it – it just may not be doable.
I remember reading, decades ago, when you run into a problem, you can;
Solve it-
Go around it– or,
Devise a frame of mind to allow you to live with it–
Here’s one more angle to add to everyone else’s; don’t even try to convince them you are right. But if you are right, you may be prepared to lend them a hand. Good luck, stay strong…
I’d love to send my siblings to this post. But I won’t because I’m just the weird fringe family member that goes to all those wacko websites about that are all about “doom and gloom stuff,” like having water, shelter, food, and learning how to protect your assets from the money launderers and theives in the temple. You rock Kevin, and so does this site. That is why I am so proud to send my meager support to you. Kevin, you have taught me more about the world of money and how it gets (and has gotten to)the way it is now than I’ve learned in all my years of schooling (although my classroom experience does help in understanding the things you talk about). You are an excellent teacher. I hope that if I can pass on one eighth of what you’ve taught me to my siblings that I won’t also continue to lose money by the minute.
I really don’t know how to convey the seriousness – I’m still trying to do that with people close to me on a daily basis. People have slowly come to accept that I see something they don’t, even though they’re sure it’s only in my head. Here’s my 3 dollars’ worth anyway (price increase due to hyper-inflation):
You could try showing them The End Of Suburbia, What A Way To Go or similar movies. The only thing is, many people who I know have watched them and call bullshit, get paralysed with fear, think it’s a load of doomer crap or concede that the shit might hit the fan – but only one day in distant future.
Articles quoting the heads of major banks or other ‘important’ people seem to make people believe a bit more readily, like this one, titled “Macquarie Bank Chief Economist On The Looming Depression:†http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/business/items/200706/s1962848.htm. Not that it really says much to most people, but the title gets them going. Same as the Hayman PDF (Kevin posted it on Sept 24th) – I highlighted a few dates, lines and quotes and it gets a reaction from people with half a brain. But I don’t know if it really convinces them of anything – a lot of the really insightful stuff seems to go over people’s heads (including mine, most of the time…)
You could try digging up and printing off some articles from a few years ago, maybe from independent or alternative news publications or sites (cause that’s really the only place they would have been found back then) predicting or explaining shit that back then wasn’t in the corporate media – or was, and was played down and/or “debunked†as lunatic ramblings, but has now most definitely come to pass. This might help to show them that they can’t take what the corporate media says as truth and that they won’t be getting the full story on TV or whatever, until it’s too late. I think this worked for me, but then again, I was showing them the articles a couple years ago…
I had a problem for a couple a years (up until very recently) that involved 2 members of my family whose names were on the title for a property that was supposed to be mine, refusing to sign and let me sell. I offered them their legal share each, even though that was never part of the deal. It got to the point where I was going to take my name off the f*ckin thing and lose out financially – dagobaz’s option #3, walk away. I decided that I would go WWOOFing or become a travelling vagabond/musician/scavenger or something. I was really prepared to sign my share over and walk away. Once I found out that it would cost me about $20k to transfer my share, I realized I couldn’t even afford to do that. Since then, they’ve let me do as I see fit – probably got tired of articles being left around for them to read…
So in a nutshell, I’ve written more than I intended to, and didn’t really give any valuable tips except for wearing out the workplace’s printer and being open to the option of walking away if that’s what it takes to get out – physically, emotionally and mentally. I can honestly say that I was prepared to do it. There was actually a strangely comforting feeling when I had resigned myself to letting everything go and ad-libbing it – I actually felt freer than I do now, to be honest…
Sorry, but hell really is other people, and most often the other people is family.
Aren’t personality disorders fun? 😀
Trying to do what this unnamed cryptogon reader wants to do truly can and does introduce one to an entirely new and chilling level of Orwellian frustration.
Folks have already mentioned The Prudent Bear and Financial Sense On-line, so I’ll just say that I second those recommendations. You can actually tie those two together with an excellent MP3 that consists of Jim Puplava interviewing Doug Noland of the Prudent Bear web site; it’s an outstanding introduction to the risks that confront the financial world. I especially appreciate Doug’s caution that the world is not necessary ending this week, or this year, but that as time goes by the chances of a major crisis emerging are going up. It’s a very believable and realistic take on the situation from someone who has been watching this unfold for something like a decade.
I also like the common sense and understated writings of Gail the Actuary over at The Oil Drum . Her latest pieces have focused on the ongoing financial crisis and its relationship to energy depletion. “Stoneleigh” over at the Canadian oil drum site has been also very, very astute at capturing the on-going, slow-motion financial melt-down that is occuring in credit markets; see, for instance, this round-up.
Of course, I can’t help but mention, yet again(!), the excellent radio series, The Wizards of Money. The most relevant episodes are #1 (how money is created), #11 (the derivatives casino), and #15 (homeland securitizations).
Finally, if you can just shake people’s inherent economic faith a little bit, get them thinking about wealth preservation, rather than income generation.
I agree with Pookie. Whoever this person is needs to let them buy her out. Simple. In this day and age one really needs to stop depending on others, especially those who are willfully ignorant. Tell your siblings, “I love you all, but I need to take care of my own financial risk also. Since you all think everything is fine and I don’t, then would you please do me a favor and let me opt out now before the nonsense hits the fan?” Now I don’t now this woman, anything about her, but it is my experience that if the siblings she is talking about are mostly male and mostly older, then she might as well talk til she’s blue in the face–they probably wouldn’t believe her anyway (especially if she’s the youngest sibling!)
I should know. I tried to warn my older brother, who was always considered the financial success in the family. Well, now we are doing just fine, virtually no debt, own our own house and land and vehicles outright, and savings I won’t say where. We can even pay for our son’s college! On the other hand, my brother is retiring with TWO freaking mortgages to pay! (Because he can’t sell is old 3,000 sq. ft. McMansion to pay for the retirement slightly smaller house he just bought!)
I wish her good luck. Sometimes it’s almost impossible to help family members help themselves!
Friends,
I’m hoping the that thunderstorm in the sky that is occuring on this Full Harvest Moon might knock this post out before I expose myself. Oh well, let’s have at it, Kevin is writing about me. Kevin, what a dear fellow, has been corresponding to me for several months about my situation. Oh that all financial advisors were so kind.
He checked in with me about posting my situation to the site – and I gave him the go ahead. I asked Kevin to “hide Me,” its kind of embarassing to be in this situation. But the outpouring of comments on this post require me to expose myself. I thank each and every one of you for speaking in this regard. Yuh, family; I love mine dearly, but we are from so very different schools of thought. My sisters have been so very happy having me in charge – to them, hospitals, money and where it comes from and how it works are the dark side. “Let’s just trust it all to the stock broker”” who made a mint off of my parents investments appears to be their mindset. They do not realize that Dear old Dad picked all of his stocks and gave them to the broker who made his commission. My parents went into business, had a bakery, saved every freakin dime they had, or invested it – sent 5 girls through college.
Dad said he started picking penny stocks to invest in by using a dart board when he was 17. That would be 1927! My Dad, bless his heart felt so less than others. He had to quit high school due to the Great Depression. He joined the Army, but they didn’t send him overseas, so he felt like a worthless soldier. Ha. Tell that story to someone in the military now and they’d say bravo. Then his brother passed on and left him a life insurance policy, which the rest of his family gave him hell for the remainder of his days. Anyways, wow, am I on one of my usual rants or what!!!!
I need to make clear that money we are discussing in this post is my mother’s money now, and the income from it, is being used primarily for her caregiving expenses. Our “run rate” is about $4K a month (that’s off the top of my head). I’m trolling Crytptogon for the article on “The Only Investment Advice You’ll Ever Need.”
I’m trying to get my sister’s on board with a strategy that Kevin gave me the ideas to develop.
1) diversify, diversify holdings
2) protect principal (Mom’s mantra her greatest desire was to pass on her inheritance) – the power just went out – no kidding
3) earn income – need it desparately.
I’m thinking of a large investment in foreign currency CD’s (insured) through Everbank; some with Powershares in a yet to exist insured municipal bond fund (tax free), and some U.S. CD.s. Investment goals are to generate Income, and preserve principal for a future that sure looks scary to me.
Goddess bless my sisters whose lives are very busy with lord knows what. They didn’t have my Mom harping at them for years on end – You Must preserve this capital. They still do not realize that a stock broker’s allegience to managing your dollars ends when your investments are not making them money anymore. Sigh. I’m working on a long email to them. I’m so tired of all of this. I dreamt last night that women were dying their hair in imitation of my “look.” A big long white streak of hair on the right side . In real life, the woman who cuts my hair said “you can’t imagine the money people pay for a white streak just like yours.”
Whoops – I meant no disparagement to stock brokers other than the one I am familiar with.
in that case eileen, see my 4:20, 2nd to last para. yes, scott has an agenda. to peddle his and his wife’s sundried courses. and they are indeed sundried. everything from international finance, to foreign and domestic real estate, to alternative health, to import/export. i think its called diversification. lol!! they live half time in the boonies of northwestern north carolina and other half in cotacatchi, ecuador. there is a wealth of free info on his site.
but, given your description of the situation and your thoughts expressed in the last para, you would do well to consider his on-line course on the “borrow low, deposit high, multicurrency sandwich” and/or his course on international finance which is presented with a representative from jyske.
the scotts are 2 VERY wealthy people. but they didn’t get wealthy running courses. they got wealthy taking their own advice and the advice of those they’ve connected up with along the way.
if you’re going to throw darts at the board best that be a global board now as thats where the money has gone.
how domestic money got there so fast is an appalling story told well by many but, imo, best by cathreine austin fitts… http://solariadvisors.com/about_catherine_austin_fitts.html fitts was one of “them” (in HUD under kemp in pappa bush’s administration) until she found out what was going on which is that HUD was being run as a criminal organization. which only led further down the rabbit hole of course to learn similar tactics are going on in many of our government agencies. particularly DOD. the bottom line? trillions have been stolen and moved out of this country and into the global game. the poision seeds have been there since the inception of the fed but they really didn’t sprout until reagan tickled us with trickle down and tricked us with iran/contra.
lay fitts’s story over greg palaste’s analysis of beale/freidmn style global economic thinking as written in “armed madhouse” and one is faced with a serious challenge to elementary ethics. look much further and it only gets worse.
so, as i said, personally i’ve decided NOT to play the game. that did not come easy and before i could make a conscious decision in the context of my personal ethics and world view i needed to educate myself about how the money works. in my view, fitt’s concept of the tapeworm economy is not only highly likely correct, it has now gone global.
and personally, i find a disturbing irony with economic contrarions who bitch and moan about the system being a self-depracating monster all the while pondering what calls and puts to make. maybe hypocracy is a better word. seems to me there comes a time when the only way to win is to not play the game and the only way to conceive a new paradigm for humanity.
Words fail me in my disgust of the financial system… scam, casino, rigged for the big players, bottom feeders, sharks. That being said, you may want to consider putting some small fraction of your mother’s assets in one of the Canadian royalty trusts. They’re out of the country, in a currency class that is appreciating, in a commodity class that continues to go up in lockstep with inflation, pays dividends in the neighborhood of 10%, yadda yadda yadda. Past performance is no guarantee of future success, read the prospectus, talk to a real financial person (not some internet blogger like me!). I pass this on based on what I’ve read on The Oil Drum, in comments by MicroHydro.
Full disclosure: I’m too much of a doomer to be in the stock market myself, and none of my thick-headed relatives thinks that a doomer like me has any decent financial smarts, so nobody I know personally owns either of these linked to above. Caveat Emptor! Good luck, Eileen.
I lost the bags under my eyes today after sending an email to my sisters re my investment strategy. Whew – that’s done.
This was met with a let’s wait and see YAWN. Lets wait until Mom is out of hospital.
I figure I’ve given my sister’s the best offer I can to preserving my family’s money. Unfortunately, I do believe that in the end, my sister’s will fiddle so long that Rome will burn into worthlessness.
In any case, Mom gave a parting shot across the bow against any and all takers and naysayers. I’m pretty sure that she knew things would come to this re her money.
Just before her stroke, She sold me the family home for a dollar – three acres surrounded by woodlands (sort of – big busy road in front), with an apple orchard that I’ve added to; a huge garden that I’ve expanded and has only been organic for the last 6 years; well water; as well as a 100 foot long cement pond that we used the creek at the back of the property to fill (my grandparents helped build this pool on the site of an old swamp – lots of Native American Indian artifacts on our land). There’s lots of stone – I hope someday to build a sweat lodge/shelter with it and then jump in the pool. We also have a huge collection of books as well. Someday, I hope to be able to read all of the William Shakespeare collected on the bookshelves. Last year I bought a wood stove to heat the lower level of the house. I could, and do imagine myself being self sustainable here – I think I’m mentally and physically prepared – even if and or when the whole house of cards – what will we call it this time – “the Great Regression” occurs.
I guess I didn’t realize this, but when Mom put the house in my name, she did so to avoid inheritance taxes. My sisters, goddess bless them will OWE ME that portion of the inheritance tax that would have accrued to them if the house were also in their names.
So, no matter what – I think I’m going to not owe my sister’s a freakin anero, or whatever the name of our currency will be.
I won’t have to live with the psychological stun gun to the head my sisters will have to deal with when the “Great Repression” of 2008 occurs. I for one, am not going to be bothered with thughts of “If only I had…”
Eileen– I’m coming to this discussion late, but that is because the solution has only just come to me.
Here’s what you do: Use your credit cards to go deeply into debt. Make sure it’s unsecured debt. (Too bad a person still can’t pull 150% out of the value of their house.) You want your debt to equal your share of your joint account.
Spend all the money on crack. File for bankruptcy, thus forcing the division of the assets shared with siblings.
The beauty of this scheme is, you don’t really have to spend the money on crack. You could use it to buy “something else”–as long as that “something else” has no paper trail, and you can plausibly argue that you don’t even KNOW where all that money went. Which will cause people to assume you are on crack.
This is a mean, low-down, underhanded scheme I’m suggesting–sure to cause an absolute (and possibly final) rupture with family members.