Homes being built, and meandering thoughts
Lucas has a constant stream of high school peers sleeping over. Plenty of space, lack of parental helicopting, close to town and close to school make it a go-to stop for those with an invite. After homecoming, we had 16 kids sleep over. Everywhere I went the morning after there was a kid - indoors, outdoors. People with previous sleep over experience got the inside track on the most comfortable spaces, and probably more importantly, zeroed in on blankets and the like.
Just waiting on the couch to arrive - I didn't realize it when I ordered/designed it it was going to take 4 months to arrive. Love the new Japanese floor chairs with adjustable seating positions.
Prepped breakfast of eggs and pancakes and milk for pre-game meal against Abbington this afternoon.
Packed a big lunch for them since they will be gone all day. I like flexing the Dad as Mom thing - I think I do it pretty well.
Football season is off and running and Lucas Petersheim made his varsity debut against Wallenpaupack when our team - Delaware Valley Warriors - took a big lead. Popped his varsity cherry. He was pretty excited.
We have one more sale to finish this year, a Barn home on nearly 5 acres just outside Narrowsburg. In maybe a first for us in Sullivan County, this family moved their life upstate and enrolled their kids in the local rural high school. We seen that a few times in Ulster, but not as much in Sullivan. This 3500 sq ft beauty is turning out to fit the needs of a wide-range of families - the first floor primary bed/bath ensuite is a good look.
We have 4 homes we are completing that aren’t being actively marketed but will be shortly. Enough sales for one year, and with a tax bill that is hovering around $750,000 coming due shortly from 2024 earned income. Even though we aren’t the most expensive home supplier in the counties we work, and I feel we offer a ton of value, because at heart we earned our stripes during a much more difficult upstate economic environment, so learned to be uber-efficient just to survive. So, during pre-covid times, this ability helped us stick around for 17 years, and during and post covid times, it allowed us tackle more business, and expand our profits per house - which after 20 years of ekkking by, was well earned.
The thing about the sunk cost thing, and the sunk cost fallacy, is even if you don't fall into the fallacy and exacerbate a costly situation, extricating yourself - even if it's the right move, stings. It's not as if doing the right thing - properly evaluating risk vs return - eliminates the pain of the sting. But I guess just like a bee sting, it lessens and dissipates before you know it, whereas staying in the fight prolongs the resolution and possibly the result is a long felt amputation.
As we slow down, purposely, some very neat opportunities have been coming our way in which I have the time to entertain fully, which is a big switch from moving along from one to the next with no time to monetize or even consult on post-build projects. And we are just getting started on a 5 lot subdivision in Kerhonkson.
The garage door went in at my house, so that's all finished for now.
Did a ton of weeding Friday, then closed down the pool on Saturday.
This is definitely bear poop on one of our driveways. The nerve - raid our dumpsters, poop on our driveway. Hard to scale it in the picture but it's about the size of a dinner plate and 2" + thick.
All in all, it's a period of decompression after nearly 3.5 yrs of leaving it all on the field, 24/7. Quite the run.