I walked into Benjamin's room the other day and saw this on his desk.  It brought such a smile to my face!  It is hard to read his handwriting, but he was running some numbers on real estate.  He has shown interest in wanting to buy a place to live and then rent out the rooms to pay for the mortgage.  I love the way he thinks!   We had a great discussion about fixed rate mortgages and ARMs.  He was asking about leveraging to buy things...unfortunately this comes from some tik tok people, so we talked about red flags of leverage and doing zero down!  We talked about how he should set a goal, something like putting money away and buying something when he is 20/21.  Sure hope he will see the value of patience and not move to quickly after graduation and end up house poor!  Fortunately the market is crazy enough that he would not be approved for a while.

Speaking of the market, average home price is now $700K!!!  Just crazy.  Over the summer there are a few streets in town that have become places for people to park campers because they have no other place to live.  There are probably about 3-4 dozen of them.  These are people that have jobs, just can't afford housing.  I was in the area the other day and drove through after dark.  Broke my heart to see a car pull up, loaded down with stuff and you could see an interior light on and they were trying to situate themselves to sleep for the night.  Not sure what will happen when the temperatures drop below freezing every day and winter sets in.  Our city commissioners have done a very poor job over the years to address our growth and now affordable housing!

Our weekly dinner group recently had a costume party.  I don't often do it, but I actually dressed up.  

(This was actually something I bought last year for a70s birthday party but was sick and couldn't go, so finally got to wear it a year later!  What you can't see are my really cool, comfortable suede boots)  This dinner group normally has an ugly Christmas sweater contest but due to schedules, we moved it to Halloween this year.  We have a traveling trophy for the winner.  I won this year!!!  Check out my trophy for the next year!

Either you get this movie reference or not!  The gal that started the contest is a huge A Christmas Story fan.  This is a small replica of a lamp in this movie.  (She actually has the life size lamp that she loves to put in her front window during the holidays.  I haven't found the best place for it to live year round, but thinking I will put in our bedroom window, that faces the street!  It is just a little wobbly, so hope it survives a year at our house!!!