With housing prices rising and student loans at an all-time high young adults are finding it increasingly difficult to purchase their first homes. Paradoxically, many of them could afford the monthly payments on a home – in fact they are paying as much for rent as a monthly mortgage payment would cost – but they…
December 17, 1903 dawned cold and windy at Kill Devil Hills in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. The temperature was not much above freezing and the wind blowing at over 20 mph. After years of work, frustration, progress, and setbacks, all of it in almost complete obscurity, Wilbur and Orville Wright felt like they…
There is a big myth out there that knowledge is power, and…we throw that around a lot, and it’s actually a lie. Knowledge is only potential power. And it only becomes power when we…use it and apply it.…We can talk about principles all day long, and if we don’t apply them, it’s just potential. –…
“He’s been chased by Masai warriors in Tanzania. Slept in snow caves to survive. Swum through New Zealand caves to see glowing worms. Stopped a bear from dragging his friend away in a sleeping bag…” So begins an article about Stacy Taniguchi, BYU professor of experience design and management, in the Winter 2019 edition of BYU…
Investing success accrues not so much to the brilliant as to the disciplined. – William Bernstein Stupid is as stupid does. – Forest Gump In investing, behavior is more important than brilliance, and it isn’t even close. Consider the case of Sir Isaac Newton. Newton was one of the most influential scientists ever and…
John C. (Jack) Bogle died January 18, 2019 at the age of 89. Bogle created the first widely available index fund and relentlessly worked to lower investment costs, eventually forcing other mutual fund companies to follow his lead. It is not an exaggeration to say that Bogle did more for individual investors than anyone…
For me the Christmas season isn’t complete without reading or seeing a theatrical presentation of Charles Dickens’ “Ghostly little book” A Christmas Carol. Nothing conjures the Christmas spirit quite like watching the miserable old miser Ebenezer Scrooge transform into a jolly philanthropist due to a trio of ghostly visitors, the Ghosts of Christmases Past, Present,…
My father, Kent Esplin, was destined to be frugal. The first reason was that he raised during the Great Depression. My grandfather and grandmother, Frant and Annie Esplin (we called them Mom and Pop), lost their sheep ranch near Zion National Park at the start of the Depression. Dad was six or seven at the…
Nobody can do for little children what grandparents can do. Grandparents sort of sprinkle stardust over the lives of little children. – Alex Haley, author of Roots It might be true that grandparents sprinkle stardust over the lives of their grandchildren but grandparents are richly rewarded in return. I had always heard how great it…
What is Bitcoin and how does it work? The first thing you need to know is that I am the furthest thing from an expert imaginable. I am not invested in Bitcoin and have never seriously considered investing. However, I am interested in all things related to money and since I have been asked about…
