Madison MoneySports - Personal Finance Thread

[JPolen01]

This is way different than a credit card being compromised. With that you cancel the card, get a new one, and move on. This is comparable to the OPM breach but a million times worse due to the sheer volume of identities compromised.

[CaptainHenreh]

If you haven't watched Mr. Robot, and you're interested in this at all, you should consider it. Parts of it are eerily similar. We still don't know for sure what vulnerability was exploited, and it's entirely possible it was a so-called Zero Day exploit, meaning there's not really anything Equifax could have done to stop it.

Fascinating stuff, and I've been impressed by the accuracy of the portrayal of computer crime by the show.

[Sully]

Just out of curiosity, how f'd are you if you lose the pin?

I've also been getting a ton of spam or telemarketing calls on my cell lately but I don't remember entering info into anything sketchy. Kind of annoying when you don't want to pick up cause you know it's a scam call but you have to because what if it's that job wanting to setup an interview.

Also, I don't think the article was posted here but has anyone heard of/or are using one of those password bank type apps? It like takes all your passwords and encrypts them and then enters a pseudo password in its place or something like that. Sounds like a good idea especially cause I never remember my password on sites I don't use often cause now they all require different things. (like some want just a cap letter while others want it to be 100 characters long with with 16 special characters and a meme made out of text) but putting all my passwords into an app or a website sketches me out cause what if that gets hacked, then you're really screwed (if that's how these computer things work) I really have no idea how safe they are.

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[Apoc]

If you haven't watched Mr. Robot, and you're interested in this at all, you should consider it. Parts of it are eerily similar. We still don't know for sure what vulnerability was exploited, and it's entirely possible it was a so-called Zero Day exploit, meaning there's not really anything Equifax could have done to stop it.

Fascinating stuff, and I've been impressed by the accuracy of the portrayal of computer crime by the show.

I read it was an Argentinean website for Equifax employees to log in to check credit reports or some shit. Not sure if it's true, but the report was the credentials were admin/admin.

Also, I love Mr. Robot.

[Apoc]

Looks to be unrelated, but it's enough to convince me we're all fucked and will be for the foreseeable future.

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[CaptainHenreh]

Looks to be unrelated, but it's enough to convince me we're all fucked and will be for the foreseeable future.

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Unrelated yes but Ohhhhhhh, we fucked for sure.

The world's economy is a house of cards made out of smoke and mirrors. Becoming more convinced I need to invest in Semi-Precious metals (steel and lead) and giant cases of water and preserved food.

[Apoc]

What's the consensus here on owning physical precious metals in case of economic collapse? I've done research, but haven't pulled the trigger on anything. I'm already invested in lead.

[ScottyB]

you probably want materials that can be converted to a useful product or alloy with relative ease, aka, if things go tits up you need to be able to sell it to relatively normal people with normal levels of equipment. bars of titanium are not going to put food on the table :lol:

steel and lead make sense, as well as silver for medicinal purposes. copper is workable and serves a number of purposes from cooking to electrical repair.

i think the best thing you can have is land. you can build on it, sell it, harvest it, hunt on it, and broker it. easier said than done for you guys living in the city though.

[JPolen01]

How do you guys plan on transporting your gold bricks in case of the apocalypse? The ammo I can understand.

[Apoc]

I've been looking to buy property in the mountains with a simple cabin on it. Seattle is gonna be pretty fucked if there's a major earthquake and I'd like somewhere to GTFO to. Good point on being able too grow food.

One ounce of gold is worth $1400. I can put more gold in my pocket than most of our cars are worth.

[Mike]

What's the consensus here on owning physical precious metals in case of economic collapse? I've done research, but haven't pulled the trigger on anything. I'm already invested in lead.

I have some silver. It can't hurt right now.

[ScottyB]

I've been looking to buy property in the mountains with a simple cabin on it. Seattle is gonna be pretty fucked if there's a major earthquake and I'd like somewhere to GTFO to. Good point on being able too grow food.

i think that's a wise investment.

for land, i should have expanded to say that i would pay premium to find a plot with either a spring or running water, and a decent amount of timber for firewood and building.

[Apoc]

I've always wanted to own a cabin where I can hear the river while I sleep, so got that covered. The battle I'm in right now is convincing my wife this is a good investment. She had access to similar growing up in Vermont and she perceives having one means we will never go on vacation to other places. That and she wants our daily driver to have more than 1.5 baths.

I think I'm going to convert some of my next stock award to gold, silver, our whatever else my research nets me. If you guys have a metal or dealer preferences, I'd love to hear reasons.

[WRXtranceformed]

IMO in case of true economic collapse (via either something war related or disaster), our country is screwed and precious metals aren't going to be worth shit. You can't eat gold encased in plastic. Same is true for paper money / coins

The only things that will have any value will be essentials, food, water and guns/ammo. Secondarily, survival supplies.

I just bought 8 5gal food grade water storage containers that are stackable. It's enough I think for us for about 3-4 months worth of water. I have a field-grade filter device and extra filters that would give me a couple hundred more gallons. Will be shopping in the next few weeks for long term food storage (25yr+)

[Apoc]

You can barter with gold, as it's likely to be worth far more than paper money. I agree it won't be worth much if the world truly ends, but the value of gold to the human race has endured thousands of years of hardship. There are a lot of scenarios where the dollar devalues significantly or you have zero ability to access electronic assets that are more plausible than true end of days... like when all the banks in Greece locked their doors to prevent withdrawals. Having some assets in metals in hand could help if you run low on prepped supplies.

[ScottyB]

its also worth mentioning that skills are a valuable asset for an emergency economic situation, not just material goods. you can trade something like being able to work leather, brew spirits, repair circuitry or machinery or sawyer wood. stuff you can practice on your own time.

[JPolen01]

I just bought 8 5gal food grade water storage containers that are stackable.  It's enough I think for us for about 3-4 months worth of water.  

Am I reading this correctly? 40 gallons of water for 4 months? According to the mayo clinic males need about a gallon of fluids per day and females at about 3/4 of a gallon. If that is true you are gonna need a lot more storage I would think. Especially when you consider uses of water for cooking and cleaning.

[WRXtranceformed]

I just bought 8 5gal food grade water storage containers that are stackable.  It's enough I think for us for about 3-4 months worth of water.  

Am I reading this correctly? 40 gallons of water for 4 months? According to the mayo clinic males need about a gallon of fluids per day and females at about 3/4 of a gallon. If that is true you are gonna need a lot more storage I would think. Especially when you consider uses of water for cooking and cleaning.

We do need more eventually for sure but admittedly my math was a little generous there.  The thought in an emergency is we would also fill all the tubs and sinks if we could and use that water for other needs. I really think we could stretch out 40 gallon of drinking water more than 2 gallons a day (i should drink more now but maybe drink 2 full 20oz yetis a day). Even with water used for freeze dried meals i bet we could cut that in half.

[ViPER1313]

In an emergency don't forget about your hot water heater. You always have 40 to 80 gallons of usable water stored in there.

[WRXtranceformed]

It's a good idea to read this article and apply a credit freeze with all 3 agencies since this breach. Equifax is free for the next 30 days, Experian didn't charge me, and TranUnion cost a $5 processing fee. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/one-move-make-after-equifax-breach-n800776">https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consum ... ch-n800776</a><!-- m -->

Did anyone see by the way that some of the agencies have free services that let you lock / unlock your credit at will?  I did some research but can't really tell if this is the same thing as a traditional freeze that you have to pay for:

TransUnion's version:

https://www.transunion.com/product/truei...protection