I hate to say it but 10 minutes isn't bad. I've seen 15-18 minutes within an hour of rush hour.

I used to commute from the near Virginia suburbs to 4000 Wisconsin Ave. by bus and it was 50-75 minutes each way for a trip that was about 10 miles. The best part is when I went to take the bus home, I'd wait at the stop for 30-40 minutes and then see 3 buses (which are supposed to run every 10-15 min) all pull up bumper to bumper.

I'll take a 10 minute metro wait any day.

Maybe not the answer you're looking for but if it were me, I'd rip up the existing tiles and re-tile it rather than using laminate. Part of it is that I like the look and feel of tiles and actually like installing them too.

I'd be ok with the the porch being a small step down from the main house than perfectly level. You can also get thicker tiles to close the gap a little.

I'm honestly trying to figure out what people are complaining about.

You can invest $100 in Amazon and watch it turn into $200 over time so you earned $100 by doing nothing but taking some risk. No, you don't have any influence over the company, but so what?

If there is some idea that only rich people can invest in stocks that is not true. You can invest an amount that is small by market standards but significant to your wealth and make a difference in your finances.

You can buy stocks with an extra $5. If you are in a 401k plan at work, you're buying stocks. I think you're being a little dramatic.

This is true, and, the stock market is a leading indicator, it represents people's beliefs and feelings about the near future. All last year everyone thought the near future was going to be terrible. Today, they think they near future might not be so bad. This seems to have changed almost exactly at the end of the year.

The TV show "Off the Cuff" did an episode about this and a few other weird places in the US.

Look you don't have to convince me. I think he's a liar that committed fraud and will go to jail. I'm just telling you what his defense is. Whether or not it legally holds water is up for him and his lawyers to decide.

All of these people were probably cohabitating and sleeping with one another and hanging out, so the idea that there was some kind of arm's length separation between a guy and his girlfriend who were CEO's of two related companies is kind of laughable. But we'll see.

SBF said he stepped down as CEO of Alameda two years ago and turned it over to the two people that are now his co-conspirators. I am sure this is his attempt to demonstrate distance between Alameda and FTX.

What are these "hundreds" of business entities? The press has mentioned 4 or 5.

I think the core issue is that the way that money was accounted for at FTX was a custom-written accounting system that they wrote, which didn't have nearly the necessary controls to keep track of different kinds of account or commingling of funds etc. Also it has been revealed that Alameda specifically had special treatment within the accounting system to have basically complete access to all assets in FTX which it used for all kinds of purposes.

But SBF will say that is Alameda's problem which he no longer runs. The co-conspirators will say that SBF orchestrated the whole thing. We'll see how that shakes out in court.

Well, whether or not he knew about it or used it will definitely be asked.

For a fraud conviction though they would have to show intent, like he said that he did not know about it but then used it, or something like that. And it would have to affect customers or investors.

Bernie Madoff pled guilty and was given 150 years.

I think one of the core issues is that there were two companies, Alameda Research and FTX. SBF ran the first one for a while, then supposedly stepped down, his co-conspirators started to run it, and then he ran FTX.

Alameda had what sounds like unlimited access to FTX funds and used them to make investments, fund loans and shore up losses. This is the source of many of the serious charges.

SBF is clearly trying to distance himself from Alameda and will probably try to blame malfeasance on the co-conspirators that ran it. Meanwhile they have already pled guilty and said they did things that they knew were wrong and SBF told them to do it. So I'm guessing that will be one of the main focuses of the lawsuits, if not the only one.

Well... confess? To felonies? He gave some details about what he did and didn't do, tried to distance himself from Alameda Research. He admitted that mistakes were made and that they didn't have good risk controls. But I wouldn't call anything that he said a confession.

Many of the charges he faces like fraud require intent, which means he said something that he knew was false or deliberately and intentionally misled someone. He certainly didn't say anything like that and this can be hard to prove.

There is undoubtedly more to this story that isn't being told... I really doubt an ex-con was randomly gunned down at a funeral. Being in prison for 20+ years can cause you to have a lot of enemies.

In a simple interest loan the remaining balance and interest are essentially recalculated monthly. So in the first month you will owe $10k * 7.39% / 12 = $61.58 of interest. If you pay say $200, then you'll pay $61.58 of interest and $138.42 in principal. Your new principal balance will be $9861.58, and your interest the next month will be that amount * 7.39% / 12 = $60.73 etc.

However, double check that your car loan is simple interest, because most are not. They are usually on a schedule with a fixed monthly payment, with the interest high and principal low in the first month, and the opposite in the last month.

For perspective the "Banker's Ditty" used to be: pay 3% on deposits, lend at 6%, and you're on the golf course by 3pm.

Prior to 2008 it was pretty normal for savings accounts to pay something like 2-4%, more if you locked up money in a CD or something for a few years. Mortgages were in the 6-8% range, less if you got an ARM or something. Borrowing money at 8-10% if you had poor credit or something was common.

This was relatively normal for many decades. Many lost this perspective after 2008 and the slow-motion intervention since then.

If savings account rates get to something like 7-8% then most people have little reason to invest their money and the economy stagnates. The central banks try to keep this in the sweet spot of around 2-4%.