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Grimas

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Everything posted by Grimas

  1. Bumping this thread... Was talking to my financial planner last week and was looking at options if I were to get let go from my current employer or just decided to say "Fuck it, I'm done"... As I'm in my mid 50's, biggest cost in "retirement" besides mortgage would be medical insurance and the going rate is around 3000-3500/month to keep a similar coverage I currently have in the US until we are eligible for Medicare/Medicaid coverage. Apparently, "private" insurance for EU citizens like somewhere like Spain is closer to $3000/year for expats/EU citizens... This alone has me thinking F-this and EU here we come... As I have mentioned earlier in this thread, I have a EU citizenship due to a "heritage restoral" from grandparents who were disposed after WW2 and my teens have it now as well. (I was born and raised in Texas and kids are 5th generation Houstonians via wife (no pics) so this will always be home...) They have 2 years of high school left but may be applying to EU universities in Europe as well (I have the funds set aside for them but told them that whatever they don't spend from those funds go to them when they graduate so they have an incentive get done early/go somewhere cheaper). Once they go off to University, wife and I are probably going to call it quits and are looking for alternatives so sell the casa and move elsewhere. Original plan was to downscale here and still live overseas most of the year but still have a "Home base" in Texas (where I can put my gun safe, some furniture and a car). Now thinking, F-it and Italy/Spain/Portugal, here we come... Now trying to look at options like Mexico/Central America vs Europe in terms of livability and cost if we (or my current employer) pull this trigger... And still investigating if we can get an EU medical insurance that would allow us to say, live 3 months in Nice, then 3 months in Prague and 3 months in Isla Mujeres/Playa/Acumel with 3 months back in the US... (Please share if anyone has any experience with having EU medical insurance but then travelling outside the EU...)
  2. For short term outages, I have several battery up UPS connected to fiber router, a tv and another mesh router and a led lamp that will be good enough for short outages. More than 30 minutes (especially in 95+degrees), then I fire up the generator - long enough to keep fridge and freezers cold and to run a/c to cool down the house. Something longer term like a hurricane outage and I connect it to the natural gas line..
  3. I went the manual route. Power goes out, i slide the lockout bar in the breaker box, plug in cable from generator to wall and the start the generator. I could have gone the auto-start route but I didn't think it was worth the cost ($2-3k more) for the convenience... Ask me again after I have to do it at 2am with rain blowing sideways and I may have a different opinion...
  4. I can run my 4k sqft house with a 5 and 3 ton a/c pluse everything inside (but oven and dryer at the same time) on 13000w including the pool pumps (vsp motors). Already had hard start kits on my a/c. Cost me around 2500 - 1300 generator, 900 for locking switch on fuse box including 50a connector and 20' cable (installed by an electrician), 200 connector from generator to dryer gas line in case propane runs out..
  5. Don't buy more generator than you need. See my post 394 in this thread. Don't buy more generator than you can use - if you put in a 30A connection, a generator larger than 7500W is useless. The max power you can put into a 30A switch is 7200W. If you get a larger generator like 12000W, you've better off going with a 50A transfer switch... Watts / Volts = Amps A 7200W Gen is only really capable of feeding 30 Amps @ 240V (7200W/240V=30A) If you get a bigger generator like a 12000W unit, go for 50A @240V transfer switch. (12000W/240V=50A)
  6. Re- applied Feb 26th and still waiting for "conditional approval"... Argh
  7. Part 3 from Viktor https://justpaste.it/4y5en
  8. Not sure if this is part 3 as it appears to be someone else... https://justpaste.it/42cf5
  9. Part 2 of thread posted yesterday: https://justpaste.it/7l2r1 (part 1 also found at link)
  10. Note: once you drive west of Banff, cell coverage pretty much disappears until you get close to Jasper. Waze won't work... Rent car with satellite radio...
  11. Damn - try watching the (any) game with closed captioning on... Whoever is getting paid to do this must have a 2 fingered, dyslexic kangaroo doing the typing with his tail... MS Teams or Zoom auto translate does way better than this crap...
  12. Wait until you meet Auntie Menopause...
  13. I talked to a tax atty today to see if she would handle my appeal. She said that even if she got the value knocked down $100K, the value would still be higher than the amount I'm paying taxes on due to the homestead cap of 10% so it wasn't worth her time as it wouldn't actually save me any monies I would still owe. This just means I should expect another 10% raise next year... Basically, if they can't bring the value down than what you are currently paying, they don't want to take the case as they won't make any $ off of you... I actually won my appeal 2 years ago and got the value knocked down to almost what I paid for it 9 years ago so my taxes this year gets me back to what I was paying before I won the appeal. (Pro tip: when doing a refi and get the appraisal, tell the appraiser to give you the lowest number possible and not the highest and use that appraisal when doing the appeal). And while I bitch, I know could easily sell my house for >10% more that they have as market value... Bigger issue I have is the land value went up 400% this year after being flat for the last 9 when I'm in he middle of a master planned community that has no open residential lots available - what the hell did they use as a comp to justify the increase when it's been flat for years?
  14. I got tired of buying new sun loungers that fell apart every few years so I got current set from Costco where you can return them if they rust/fall apart. 4 years later - still no issues with the quality...
  15. Rent an ebike- can take the bike path north along the beach as well as get to all the sights all over town. (There is a lot of elevation in and around town...) Great way to spend day one.... I second the outdoor food market - one of the best in the world...
  16. Reminded me of when I interviewed for a senior position with Lukoil in Moscow years ago - when I asked about pension and retirement benefits, they said they didn't have any as no one lives past 60 there anyways... Needless to say, I didn't go work for them...
  17. I see United offers travel insurance via AIG but didn't know if Covid related issues are covered on it (or if Chase's policy does if I bought the flight on that card)...
  18. Just curious what people are doing as a backup plan if you are overseas and test positive on the way home? I know several people from overseas that were in town for a conference and tested positive as they tried to depart so they are sitting in a hotel room waiting for a negative test before returning. Not a big deal as their companies are covering their expenses... But what happens if you are overseas with family on your own dime? Is there insurance you can purchase before to cover costs for the time you need to spend in quarantine? Do the travel coverage offered by card like Chase Sapphire provide coverage? I've heard of some resorts offering "discounts" if you need to extend your stay but I don't see that happening if you are booking a place on VRBO... And for flights, i guess you get stuck on standby status until seats become available?
  19. When we were living in the EU a few years ago, my sister-in-law "came to visit" us and the visit lasted over a year (FML). I'm not sure anyone checks visas unless you are applying for a job and she had no issues returning home to the States. I guess the biggest risk was that she would somehow "get caught" and then deported...
  20. UT alum (Mack Ruth) won best sound Oscar for this...
  21. Nexus is Global Entry but it adds easy access into and out of Canada as well...
  22. 2 months since I submitted my renewal and it's still "pending review"...
  23. At least Card may not portal after Quinten's performance...
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