Context is that she's asking me to help her get a mortgage and for some cash so that she can realize some stupid investment scheme she has:
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As for your proposal, I don't know what you're asking of me... 19k cash + 300/mo indefinitely (interest-only mortgage)? What makes you think someone taking on all the financial risk would be willing to accept only 10% of the profit? That's not the way the world works. I'd have thought you'd learned that by now. I also see that the concept of risk vs. reward continues to elude you because it's apparent you still haven't figured out there are no easy and surefire ways to make money and that there is always a downside. Here's a tip... You're 65ish? People at that age aren't supposed to be taking big risks with money unless they have lots of it. Any half-decent financial advisor would tell you that the older you get, the safer your investments should get. Let's put it in gambling terms, since that's essentially what you're proposing I or anyone else do. Based on what you've said in the past, you're hoping to clear 200k above and beyond the purchase price? So let's say 390k after all is said and done? 19k for the house, another 20k-ish for moving and other costs (i have no idea what they'd be but i feel i'm probably being charitable)? My investment for a year would be 44k, in the absolute best case scenario. A sale at 390k would clear 200k. In reality, i'd be risking 44k to make 113k after cap gains taxes, though it would probably be even less after school taxes, "welcome" taxes, and other bs I'm probably not thinking about, but let's be kind and say i'd be risking 44k to make 113k (we'll get to the part about you giving me only 10% of the profit later). To make that bet, I'd roughly need odds of better than 2.6:1 for it to make any sense at all. Do you provide me a better than ~38% chance of making those odds? Meh... There is a lot that could go wrong in what you're proposing and I don't even know how to go about quantifying all the risks, which entices me to be conservative. A couple lessons on odds and gambling. 1) odds are probabilities representing the likely outcome of an event. They do not represent certain outcomes. 2) an intelligent gambler (as opposed to a degen) would only be willing to make that bet - even if he had the odds - if he also had a big enough bankroll to ride out the variance in whatever game he was playing. I have neither the the time nor inclination to work out the actual variance in the kind of transaction you're proposing, but I know right now I can't really afford to lose 44k without hating myself. 3) scared money makes bad decisions. To translate that into your circumstances: you have no money, you're worried about the future, and you're hoping for a big pay-off to make everything ok. In other words, you're reaching. Lastly, you're proposal of only paying me 10% of the profit negates all the numbers above. I'd be risking 44k to make 13k, if everything worked out perfectly (it never does). If it wasn't sold at the end of year 2 that would be down to 7-8k, I'm guessing. Time to take some math classes, Michelle. I don't see in what universe I'd make that bet.
I'm the oldest. Believe it or not, I'm the only one she kinda listens to because I'm the only one that's consistently level-headed and rational, but that doesn't stop her from completely disregarding everything I say. My dad wants nothing to do with her, to the point where he's willing to let the bank foreclose on a house as long as he doesn't have to deal with her. It'll make the divorce nice and easy to finalize, which he's been trying to do since 2002 or 2003. They've been separated since the 90s. She cost him millions (his entire life's work) when the hotel went bankrupt. It was his fault as well for not being more forceful with her and not lawyering up before things came to a head with the gov't, but he was playing nice because we the kids were still in the picture and it cost him everything (he lost the other 2 kids anyway; I'm the only one that speaks to him). Ultimately she usurped control and kept information from him while he lived in a different city to supplement family income (hotel was on an aggressive mortgage repayment schedule) so his options were limited if he wanted to maintain relative peace for our sake. Someone mentioned snotty teenagers.... She is one. She's 60 or 65 (can never remember what year she was born) and she behaves exactly like a teenager. She was kicked out of her parents house last year. My siblings don't talk to her at all. She has tantrums and won't talk. I constantly have to intervene on her behalf with the rest of the family (though to be fair her sisters are kinda bitches). I'm a part-time mediator b/c of this and was for the divorce too - I had to diffuse her delusions about my father's hidden wealth. When you tell her something she doesn't want to hear, she ignores it, no matter who it comes from. That doesn't stop her from asking for money after she's contravened your advice and suffers the consequences. I don't know how many times i've had to pay bailiffs for her. The only reason i continue to do it is because if she loses the grand piano then she loses something essential to being able to earn a living. None of this is new behavior that's the resultant of the onset of old age. She thinks only about how things affect her (my father's principal complain from the marriage), and always has. She used to leave me overnight at school to find a place to sleep. It happened so often my physics prof found out and gave me free residence (it helped i was his best student so he could call it a scholarship). Yeah, great parenting there... There are myriad reasons why I'm not close to her. I'm long over them, but we will never be close, and i'm fine with that at this point. That said, I don't want to see her live in poverty either, and I try to encourage her on positive things, like starting to teach piano again, keeping her from losing it to bailiffs, getting settled in a new city, but this shit is plain dumb and i'm not going to sugarcoat it to spare her feelings. This is her 3rd time bringing this up, and I shot it down nicely the past two times.If it's not this it'll be something else b/c she keeps looking for things that amount to being get rich quick schemes to make everything OK. I'm at a loss as to how i should deal with her. She's a total disaster. I'm actually telling my grandparents to put her inheritance into an annuity or something so she can't piss it away all at once, because given the chance, she will.
