#also i can predict one comment that's incoming and whoever makes it you are so right

[peaches-writes]

sun shower

description: you happen to be spending your training year in adjacent villages with a certain kim seungmin  member: seungmin genre: fluff, witch/wizard au (kiki’s delivery service, a little snow fairy sugar-inspired) word count: 4k note: ‘magical people’ just doesn’t sound awesome enough to be the official gender-neutral term i therefore declare that both the words witch & wizard are gender-neutral choose ur fighter ppl

Seungmin has always had a fascination with the heavens since he was a young boy. His mother specialized in potions but his father was an astronomer, inviting him to stargaze after potion lessons until he had to leave for his training as an independent wizard some 6 months ago. He never vocally said it to his parents but when they received a letter from him in the mail informing them that he has chosen to train in the quaint countrysides of Italy a month into his training, they correctly inferred that he wanted to be specialize in astrology. 

For this reason, he finds it bothersome, for a lack of a better word, whenever you, a neighboring witch, would conjure up clouds of rain until the early hours of the night. In your defense, it always happens unconsciously, most often when you’re frustrated because you couldn’t conjure up enough clouds when the sun is still out or when you untimely create clouds right as a storm passes over the countryside.

“Excuse me!” He called to you from the skies on his fifth night in the neighboring town. This was when you first met. You look up at him curiously, surprised at finding a fellow magical person. “Are you causing this?”

He gestures over the thin veils of clouds looming over the full moon. He could tell you were a witch by the runes you read to your root crops.

“Yes, why?”

“I study astrology, you see.” He shows you a familiar book, the standard guide to astrology—you knew because your own mother was an astrologer. “And I can’t really study if it’s too cloudy.”

“O-Oh, sorry.” You stand up from squatting next to your green sprouts, scratching the back of your neck. “It takes me a long time to make them disappear, you see. I swear I’m also working on them!”

“Well, it’s already late and I still have business to attend to later on so it’d be really helpful if you get your clouds out of the way quickly.” He points out, intimidating you a bit. 

Because of his dry and rather stern tone, you managed to clear out the sky faster than you’ve ever done at the time. Suffice to say, Seungmin was impressed.

“Thanks! I’m Seungmin, by the way.” “Y/N, nice to meet you and sorry again!” 

Now at present, you only have a month left until your training ends yet somehow you can’t seem to master the art of controlling the rain for sun showers, which frustrates Seungmin as much as it frustrates you. 

“Maybe you’re overthinking it. Have you tried relaxing?” In the few months you’ve spent being sort of neighbors, you know that Seungmin never means anything malicious, he simply has a sarcastic tone by default. 

“I am relaxed.” You insist, puffing out air that resembles smoke in the cold weather. It’s nearing the end of November and you can already feel the snow coming, signalling your impending departure. You try again, concentrating and thinking about how Seungmin’s watching you, “Oh hey, look, I did it!” 

To compromise over your clashing work schedules, on the 2nd month of Seungmin’s stay, the two of you came to an agreement that you alternate between your towns, so that Seungmin can monitor you practicing with the weather and make sure that he gets to see the night sky when you’re done. Undeniably, you’ve grown closer from helping each other out (and maybe you’ve even developed a small crush on the side, but you wouldn’t tell him that).

He sits behind you on your rooftop on this particular Sunday, reading a thick book on the movement of constellations, while you levitate over your vegetable garden, eyes trained to the cloudy sky that slowly clears. 

“Is this the last thing you need to accomplish?” He asks after a while, having decided after a while to halt reading and observe the sky. You’re halfway through clearing the sky, some hints of sunlight starting to peek through from the remaining clouds. Though he doesn’t show it, he’s proud (and a bit jealous) that you’re almost done with your training.  

Without sparing him a glance, you shake your head no. “I still need to perfect my own song to conjure up a sun showers.” You correct as a frown settles on your face. 

You control the weather with music. You use a flute for snow and sleet, a harp for the rain, a triangle for thunder and winds, and your own voice to call for the sun and clear skies. The problem with creating a sun shower is that you can’t come up with your own last verse—the one that is supposedly unique to every conjurer, according to your aunt who gave you the sheet music. 

“Maybe you need another instrument.” Seungmin suggests but you both know that if there was another instrument for sun showers, your aunt would tell you as a witch who controls the weather herself. “Or the music sheet’s wrong.” 

“If it’s wrong, then I would’ve conjured up something else entirely the last time I tried it.” You point out. The last time meaning just a few weeks ago when you tried out your latest revision and conjured up enough clouds but too much rain. “I’m just missing a few measures but my brain’s already too fried to come up with any!” 

“Can I see?” 

You impatiently hum in approval, finally turning around to briefly look at him and gesture over to your rucksack. “It’s in my bag, knock yourself out.” 

You have an idea of Seungmin’s musical ability. He tends to hum to himself while he’s busy with work, you’ve heard in the events you’ve stayed in his place longer to help him see the stars better, and he plays the piano well, especially when he was asked to in his town’s festival. You’ve wondered yourself before why he chose studying astrology over taking control of the weather until he mentioned his home life before going off on his own. 

“It does sound hard to complete, especially with what you already have.” He agrees with you after a while. At this point, you’ve managed to clear the skies of heavy rain clouds so you levitate towards him, sitting across from him after penetrating the shield he’s made for himself from the rain that’s passed. “But I think you’re getting there.” 

He hums the main melody under his breath, occasionally stopping to brainstorm ideas on what could possibly be missing on your sheet music. To his right, you lay down tiredly on your back, rucksack serving as a makeshift pillow, and turn your body to face him, listening intently to the little notes and comments he makes under his breath. “I just need a balance with the sun and the rain.” You sigh. “The sun is already enough, the rain’s just a little too much.” 

“Hm, sounds strangely poetic.” He points out with the same dry tone you’ve grown accustomed to, making you chuckle. “You going through something or what?”

“I don’t know if I’d call it that.” You then turn your body up towards the sky. Now that your clouds were gone, you then realize that the sky’s started turning pink and orange in sunset. “It’s just that, there are some things and people I’m unsure of, I guess.”

He wanted to ask you what, or rather, who exactly you were unsure of. You’re not exactly known for being a social butterfly but you’re not anti-social, either, but if bothered you so much, whatever or whoever you’re referring to must be someone incredibly special to you. 

“Hey, can I keep a copy of this?” He opts to ask instead, gaining your attention again. 

You nod. “You can take the music sheets, I have it memorized by heart already, anyway.” 

“If I can come up with something, I’ll let you know.” He carefully tucks your music sheet between the pages of his book. “You don’t have some kind of deadline, do you?” 

“No, it’s okay.” You smile before turning back to the incoming sunset. “Anyway, I’ve had enough of thinking about it for today, let’s just enjoy the sunset before you go back to studying! Ah, what a day.” 

Seungmin is evidently surprised, often you mind each other’s businesses and only talk when one needs help or when one is about to leave, but you missed such a rare expression across his face “Okay.” You only hear him say as he closes his book and lays down next to you, using his own messenger bag as a pillow. 

Later that night, Seungmin decides to study on your rooftop later than usual, and you hear him singing until you fell asleep.

In the following days, Seungmin kept on humming the final measures of your song along with experimental measures to try and fill in the missing gap. He sings it while gathering (or stealing, depends on who you ask) herbs from your garden, cleaning the room he rents above a dusty bookstore, and even while writing a cohesive prediction for someone in his side business. 

It would drive you crazy if only his voice isn’t that great. 

“You know, when your training ends, you should also try picking up at least one skill related to music.” You suggest to him a week later while pacing around in his room. You’re supposed to be outside but complained because of the intense heat you can’t seem to tone down. “I highly recommend singing for sunshine.” 

“But you do it better.” He’s making you a reading on this particular day since business is slow recently. “You sing and play well.”

Internally, the butterflies already present in your stomach multiply greatly. “So? Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t too?” You manage to counter while trying to recover. “I bet wherever you’re going after your training, they’ll have extraordinarily warmer sun.” 

He chuckles nervously. He’s more than halfway through his training already but he doesn’t want to think about that just yet (mostly because he finds it weird thinking about a new place without you in it, but he wouldn’t tell you that). “Really? You think so?” 

You nod. “Yeah, I feel—well, I believe you will.”  Placing a hand outside a nearby open window, the sun still feels scorching hot on your skin. You didn’t like bringing umbrellas or wearing hats while practicing, it distracts you too much. “Aish, it’s still too hot out!”

“If I do pick up music, I might turn out even better than you.” He teases, stealing a glance over to you and softening up by following with, “But who knows, maybe we’ll bump into each other a few years from now, you’ll probably already settled with somewhere and I’m still looking for a place to call home, then you can teach me.”

Seungmin can’t actually imagine you permanently staying in one place, with your adventurous streak and passion for the outdoors, much less finding someone who makes you stay in one place forever but he forces himself to consider for the sake of theory. 

Whoever will catch their eye would truly be exceptional. 

You, on the other hand, show evident confusion in your expression while you retract your hand back from the window. “I wouldn’t count myself on the settling down part but sure, I guess, I can teach you a few years from now.” 

“Why?” Seungmin looks up at you again and even stops humming, showing you genuine curiosity. It suddenly felt strangely serious.

At this, you simply shrug. “I don’t know, I guess I don’t think it’s a priority for me. I want to see the world! Can you picture me staying in one place forever?” 

“No?” He chuckles. “What if you fall in love?” 

“If I do, whoever I fall in love with should probably start practicing flying well then.” 

When the two of you go out to the farmland behind Seungmin’s lodging later on, you conjure up an almost-perfect sun shower with only a handful of extra clouds left that needs to disappear.

“Seungmin, you’re going to catch a cold, come over here!” When you turn around to show Seungmin your work,  you see him flying circles over the empty farmlands instead. 

Drenched in light rain, he grows self-conscious of how you think of his flying skilles—all the while debating on whether he should give the last measure of your song to you now, when he’s definitely sure that he enjoys your company, or during Christmas, when it’s the cruelest holiday to leave. 

Seungmin eventually gives in after 2 weeks, not that you’d notice anyway since you didn’t know that he wanted to keep you around longer. The sky is already getting cloudy, reminding the two of you of snow, making it harder to practice during the day—Seungmin had to give in while you can still manage to clear the sky before practicing.

“This is it, Seungmin.” You breathe out dramatically through the chilly December breeze. It’s early morning, just a little after the break of dawn, because you were so excited practicing the song with Seungmin last night. “If this last measure makes my perfect sun shower, my last week here would be the best! I’d be the happiest, I swear.”

There was also the fact that you planned on leaving right after the first snow. Sometimes you’re just too cruel, Seungmin thinks.

“I’m sure this is it, I decoded it.” He says as coolly and as confidently as he can.

You say nothing more, proceeding to sing and play the harp according to your sheet music. The song is only 2 minutes long, barely providing any room to feel nervous as you slowly approached the final verse which is supposed to be different for every witch / wizard, hence why it was hard to decode.

As you play, Seungmin watches the clouds form over the pale yellow sunrise, a small smile unconsciously forming on his face that then grows into a wide grin when they stop at just the right amount and started drizzling the vast expanse of houses ahead in light rain. “Y/N, you did it! You did it!”

You didn’t even realize that you’ve had your eyes closed the entire time you sang and played, opening them only when you felt Seungmin spinning around next to you to feel the rain just as the droplets of rain started to dampen your own hair. “I—I did it!”

“You did!” Seungmin turns to you, not even hiding his happiness this time as he then instinctively pulls you into a warm hug. “I’m so proud of you!”

You hug him back tighter, his coat cold and damp against yours. “Thank you, Seungmin.” You catch your breath as you rest your chin against his shoulder. “Thank you so much.”

Seungmin only hums, speechless in being so close to you. This was the first time you hugged.

Without his face in your view, you miss the way he momentarily frowns at the thought that you’re now certain and confident to leave—a thought he expertly hides when he pulls away later on and says, “So, will you still practice or do you just leave it at that until you leave?”

You frown at him in annoyance, you really were irked he brought it up, especially since several days have passed since you’ve avoided mentioning it. “Why are you thinking of me leaving already? I have to practice a couple more times before I go, of course!”

“I’m just making sure so in case you stay outside overtime again.” He defends himself, suddenly feeling colder that you’re far away again. “Okay, now try making it stop, it’s getting really cold!”

“Alright, alright!” You roll your eyes, making the clouds disappear. You manage to dry yourselves even with a gush of warmer winds to compensate the two of you getting wet with rain. “Jeez, Seungmin, I thought we were having a moment there!”

Though you said it in a joking manner, of course he didn’t miss the way you showed the slightest hint of being hurt. Seungmin feels his heart drop to his stomach at the thought.

You continue practicing in the days that follow, both early in the mornings and late in the afternoons. Though you keep it cool in front of Seungmin, you notice how quiet he’s suddenly become, how he would hum your song less and literally cover his face with his book whenever you glance over at him for small talk.

“Are you mad?” “No.” “Do you feel awkward too?” “...A bit, yeah.” Would always be your conversation-ender. You know he meant it sincerely because he didn’t use his default dry tone on you but somehow it felt awkward.

What changed?

On your last day, you invited him to dinner.

“I told the landlord you can take this house if you want to.” You mention as the two of you ate strawberry cake. Earlier that day, some of the villagers surprised you with a going-away party since you leave at midnight—the cake was from one of the farmers you helped grow crops faster. “I still have some root crops in the garden, that should last you for a month.”

“It’s fine.” He reassures you for the 2nd time since you started eating. “I want the vegetables, though.”

For a while, it seemed like the awkwardness was gone and you laugh. “If you’re not taking the house, then you might have to have a talk with Mrs. Ross over the vegetables.”

“Then I’ll swipe them later when you go.” And then the awkwardness was back.

“Won’t you see me off later?” You ask, nervously playing with your food as you steal a glance at him.

Across the table, the lone strawberry on Seungmin’s plate suddenly seems interesting even when your gaze pokes on his newly dyed blonde hair. “I’m...I’m helping a villager’s sick child, it might take a while.” He bluffs, a heavy feeling looming over him.

“Oh...” He doesn’t see the frown before you muster up a smile. “That’s alright, I guess.”

“Where do you plan on going?” He finally gathers the courage to look up at you, searching for any sign in your eyes that you’d suddenly stay.

You ponder over the question longer than you usually would, your eyes trailing to the window behind Seungmin as you do so. “It’s snowing.” You mutter absentmindedly.

When Seungmin turns around, your windowsill already has a thin layer of snow.

“It is.” He agrees, eyes suddenly stinging. Am I crying? “It’s the first snow.”

You swore you saw faint hints of tears on Seungmin’s face when you escorted him out later that night but you chose to ignore it, diverting your attention instead to the sky—and for the first time you understood why Seungmin hated night skies wherein the stars aren’t visible.

“A bit dull, I get it now.” You comment as you walk him with him to the main road. When he gives you a questioning gaze, the dry trails of tears shining under the faint street lights, you gesture to the sky. “The starless sky, I mean.”

He follows you, frowning at the lack of stars. The sky seems to radiate off of the two of you. “Yeah, it’s so vague, you could barely read anything.”

Seungmin wakes up the following morning to a sun shower. There’s a thick layer of snow outside his window, even more when he steps out of his lodging later on, yes, but it’s the lone droplet of rain that falls on his cheek as he closes the door behind him on his way out that catches his utmost attention, casting his eyes up to the sky as it begins to drizzle.

At that moment, it fully dawns on him that you never told him exactly where you were going. 

Still, he flies to your house, in hopes of any clue somehow. Only, when he arrived, he only saw the landlady, Mrs. Ross there, tending to your garden.

“Oh, Seungmin!” She greets the evidently distressed wizard. “Do you want to take some of the vegetables?”

“N-No, I just thought that—nevermind.”

“If you’re looking for Y/N, they already left last night.” Mrs. Ross says sympathethically to Seungmin. “They didn’t say where they were going.”

Seungmin walks home afterwards, dejected.

It felt wrong, spending an entire day without you afterwards, especially when the sun was out later in the afternoon yet it felt horrifyingly cold.

The week passes by too slowly for Seungmin, even when he decides on devoting half of his day to resuming correspondence with his parents and some friends—away in their own towns. He rarely leaves the house, wandering only as far as the bookstore downstairs, utilizing the never-ending snow as an excuse to his landlord. Your landlady. Mrs. Ross, is probably the only person from outside his building that he sees whenever she drops by to hand him the produce from your garden.

His textbooks have started to blur in front of him whenever he studies and the weather has started feeling dull and repetitive for him.

And so it felt years have already passed when a knock comes to his door beyond the usual time Mrs. Ross would come by. It’s already afternoon, just as Seungmin is about to take a nap.

“Who is it?” He asks as loudly as he can in his drowsy state, almost stumbling over an umbrella stand in the process, but the knock continues, annoyingly chirpy at that.

When he opens the door, you give him no time to prepare himself as you tackle him in a hug. “Kim Seungmin!” You exclaim, throwing your arms to his shoulder.

There’s a slight delay on his part, partly because the sun is shining too warmly and too bright outside but mostly because he instantly recognizes your warmth as you squeeze him tighter. “Wha—? How—?” He stutters, eyes wide and mouth hanging open in shock. Nevertheless, he wraps his arms around your waist, quickly gathering his thoughts together to coherently ask, “Where have you been?!”

“Oh, here and there. I went home to my parents then wandered off aimlessly to some beaches in the South since it’s really cold up here.” You explain as you try and pull away from him but Seungmin uncharacteristically keeps you in place, making you laugh. “Hey, you missed me.”

At this, he buries his face on your shoulder, mumbling a muffled, “Of course I did.” that almost completely melted your heart if it weren’t for him following it with, “I thought I’d never see you again.”

“Well, I needed time to think.” When you pull away, he lets you this time, allowing you to step inside his place. It looked the same since you were last here, you notice.

“Of what?”

“Of how I feel for you.” You make sure to say it in the sincerest way you know, feeling light-headed afterwards.

Oh, Seungmin thinks, cheeks flushed, so it’s me?

Seungmin stands there gaping, completely dazed at your short confession until your face is completely red from the heat that you immediately speak again. “Seungmin, say something.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn’t know if you liked me or not.”

“Wasn’t it obvious?”

You knit your eyebrows in confusion. “No? If you were, I would’ve actually stayed longer.”

“R-Really?” Now, Seungmin just feels dumb for not being more clear with his feelings.

You nod with a hum, continuing, “I kept dropping hints as best as I can but you just keep mentioning me leaving whenever you can.”

In front of you, you can clearly see Seungmin’s frustration with himself. “I’m sorry, I should’ve still been considerate of how you felt about me mentioning your leave then and I definitely should’ve asked you to stay even when your training did end.” He frowns, more to himself than to you. “B-because I...I really like you too but I also thought that you’d want to go and explore the moment you’re allowed to leave—I didn’t want to keep you waiting if you like me too.”

You shake your head no, a small smile now forming on your lips. “It’s not like the world outside’s going to change.” You take a brave step closer to Seungmin now, cupping his cheeks in your warm hands. “So, what’s—how many months do you have left? Four?—what’s 4 months more of waiting?” 

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[anotherkpopvictim]

The Company Dinner - Hoseok X BTS Littlespace Drabble

(my gif, feel free to use :))

“anonymous  asked:

I know you just did a smut with hobi so I completely understand if you don't want to do this! But what I had on my mind was hobi and the rest as his caregivers, main one whoever! But he doesn't want to eat his food, so acts bratty maybe breaks a dish, throwing it at someone maybe? But there at a public restaurant so hobi has to sit scared for what to come when they get home, it can be smut too!”

A/N: Thank you so much for requesting! Requests always give me some inspiration when writing these so it’s very much appreciated :)

I changed this into a kind of hurt/comfort fic and there is NO SMUT in it this time. I hope this is still okay :)

Relationship: Little!Hoseok X Caregivers!BTS

Rating: G (spanking - non-sexual)

Words: 2903

Hurt/comfort, fluff, non-sexual spanking

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

It wasn’t often that BigHit Entertainment held company dinners - it was pretty much unheard of, really. Namjoon and Yoongi could recall one dinner with people from the company back in 2010, but it was far from a professional setup as they only went to the pizza joint down the street for their meal, and only seven or eight people had even been there.

Yeah...company dinner’s didn’t really happen.

Until, for some reason or another, whether it be the growing number of company members and subsequently, staff, or the growing income, Bang PD decided it was finally time for a proper sit down meal at a nice restaurant.

So, there the seven members of BTS were, sat in a large dining hall within an expensive Italian style restaurant. It had been rented out for the evening, as per the CEO’s requests, and was now filled with dozens of familiar faces. Looking around, Jungkook estimated that there were probably close to a hundred people there, all in good spirits and eating whilst chatting with each other.

BTS were sat at their own table, right next to the company’s younger group, TXT. The boys were still a little shy in greeting their sunbaes despite the other members having told them to treat them as friends. They knew they only needed time until they got to that point.

Jin had had to stop the two youngest of his group from rampaging the large buffet the second they’d arrived, and after some small talk and gentle conversations, they were finally allowed to eat.

Both the eldest hyung and Jimin looked on with mild disgust as Taehyung and Jungkook shoved their faces full of food from their overfilled plates, barely taking a second to allow themselves to breathe between bites.

“Well, I doubt they’re going to be doing any mingling tonight,” Namjoon sighed.

“Definitely not,” Yoongi agreed, “All that food is gonna knock them right out.”

Jimin eyed them longingly, “They’ll be off in their own world for at least three hours.”

Honestly, after a long day in the practice room, the last thing any of them wanted to do was mingle, even if it was with their pleasant co-workers. They were tired, and while they all kind of wished they could get out of it like the maknaes had, they also knew it would be rude for all of the BTS members to keep to themselves all night.

“Alright, I’m going to go...talk, I guess.” Namjoon looked at them. “I encourage you to join me, but I also don’t want you guys to push yourselves too much, okay?”

The others - save Tae and Kookie, who were already falling into their predicted food comas - gave their hums and nods of agreement before the leader walked off. Jimin followed not far behind him.

The rest of them had small plates of food for now, opting to just nibble throughout the night. Yoongi turned to Hoseok when he heard the younger huffing, obviously a little irritated. He found the dance leader wearing a prominent pout on his lips and slouching in his seat as he stared at his plate.

“Hey,” the eldest rapper began softly, “Don’t worry about talking to anyone tonight, Hoseok-ah. Just stay with the maknaes. I know you’re still frustrated about earlier.”

Earlier.

Earlier, meaning back in the practice room where Hoseok - for one reason or another - could not get the steps of their new choreography down. Usually, he was the one to learn the fastest and to help the others in turn learn the dance. Today, however, Jimin and Jungkook had to help him out. They were totally willing and didn’t treat their hyung any differently than they normally would, though he didn’t miss the glances of concern they, along with the others, sent his way.

As six’clock rolled around and they were let out early for the day (thanks to the company dinner) he had most of the dance down. Still, Hoseok couldn’t help but feel like he failed. What the hell was wrong with him? Did he suddenly lose all those years of intense dance training? Everyone had bad days, sure, but to be affected so much...that had to be somehow his fault...right?

Hoseok sniffled pitifully, “Thank you, hyungie. S-Seokie sorry...”

Yoongi turned fully towards him immediately, no panic in his eyes, just the gentle dominance of a caregiver. “Oh, baby, you must be feeling pretty bad if you slipped.”

Hoseok nodded and wished they weren’t in public so he could get a hug from his Yoonie-hyungie.

Jin stood up from the table, drink in hand, and got ready to follow Namjoon and Jimin. “Seokie, love,” he said as he leaned a bit closer to the little, “We need you to be good for just two more hours and then we can take you home and cuddle, alright?”

“M’kay,” Hobi replied.

Seokjin gave him a smile and ruffled his hair gently with his free hand before he wandered off into the crowd as well.

“Hobi, sweetheart,” Yoongi said, “Will you be okay with Taehyungie and Jungkookie while I go talk for a bit?”

Hoseok looked a little hesitant, but Taehyung spoke up before he could answer. “We can talk about anything you’d like, or you can play on my phone.”

The little was easily persuaded by the prospect of getting to play a game. “Okay, Seokie will stay with TaeTae-hyungie and Kookie-hyungie.”

Yoongi, praying that no one was watching them at that moment, gave a quick peck to the little’s forehead. “That’s my good boy.”

With Taehyung and Jungkook’s warm presence, the next hour passed by pretty fast for Hoseok. He was tapping away at Taehyung’s phone, in the middle of a game when he was interrupted by his stomach making a big growling noise.

“Someone must be hungry,” Jungkook commented, scooping up Big Hobi’s plate of food to dispose of it. “I’ll go grab a plate of little-approved food.”

When he returned, he had a plate with chicken bites (not quite tenders, but they had to make do) some kind of fancy version of mac’n’cheese, and some carrot sticks. Considering it was a fairly upscale Italian restaurant, this was the best he could find. Jungkook set the plate on the table in front of the little, and set down a glass of apple juice with it.

While it looked pretty promising, it only took a few bites for Hoseok to realize that he really didn’t like this yucky food. He put down his fork with an angry pout. Why couldn’t this day just be over? Why did they have to go out tonight at all when Hobi really just wanted cuddles from his hyungies and his duck plushie, Quackers, tucked into his arms.

Taehyung saw the fork set down on the table and said, “Hobi, honey, eat some more of your dinner, please.”

The anger his big side was dealing with seemed to add fuel to the fire that was the beginnings of a tantrum.

The little grit his teeth and answered harshly, “No.”

Both maknaes paused and turned to look at him. “Sweetie,” Jungkook began, “I know it’s not exactly like what you have at home, but-”

“It’s yucky!” Hoseok exclaimed, a little too loudly. Thankfully, it didn’t seem as if anyone noticed. “Don’t want it!”

“It’s really not that bad, love,” Taehyung said, trying to keep the little calm. He took a bite of the chicken and mac’n’cheese with his own fork and gave an approving hum once he finished. “I promise, if you eat eight more bites of this, we’ll make you whatever you want for breakfast tomorrow.”

“No, no, no!” Hoseok shouted, his voice rising as his anger grew. “Seokie said he don’t want the yucky food!”

The little punctuated his outburst by slamming his right hand onto the table. What he hadn’t anticipated, was that his hand would hit the side of the plate harshly enough to flip it and send all the food on it into Taehyung’s lap.

The world around them suddenly seemed to fall silent, though the others at the party seemed oblivious to what was going on at BTS’ table. Taehyung had frozen, shutting his eyes and sighing. Hoseok was frozen as well, completely shell-shocked with his wide eyes and mouth hanging open. Jungkook, who was sat on the little’s other side, recovered from the shock of it all first. He was the one that reached over to pick up the plate and set it right side up back on the table.

“S-Sorry,” came the little’s whimper. “S-Seokie sorry, TaeTae-hyungie. H-He didn’t m-mean to. He didn’t mean to!”

Taehyung hushed him softly, finally taking in a deep breath and turning to look Hobi in the eyes. “I believe that you didn’t mean to make the food fall on me. But you have been acting up and because of one of your tantrums, it did happen.”

“Seokie is sorry,” he replied solemnly. Now that the haze of anger was gone from his mind, he could understand that what he did and the way he’d been acting up all night was wrong. He was taking a bad day for himself and turning it into an even worse one.

Jungkook grabbed his midnight blue suit jacket that had been hanging over the back of his chair and handed it to Taehyung carefully. “Go clean yourself up a bit, hyung. Then, put this on to cover whatever stains you can’t get out here.”

The two maknaes locked eyes and Taehyung gave a small smile. He accepted the jacket from Jungkook and gave him a fond flick under the chin before he headed off to find the washrooms.

Jungkook sat back down next to Hoseok, who was staring at the floor and trying to cry as silently as possible. The little shake in his shoulders gave him away, though.

“Hoseokie,” the maknae began with a gentle tone, “We’ll all talk about your behavior later but I can tell that you already feel bad about it.”

The little nodded shamefully, “Seokie sorry.”

After finally taking a glance around and confirming that no one was giving them any odd looks, Jungkook turned back to Hoseok and bit his lip. He wanted so badly to just scoop the little up in his arms and coddle him, but he’d been bad.

“Seokie-ah,” the maknae said, voice somehow both soft and firm. “Sit here while I go get you some more food. I’ll ask you once, is there anything you want in particular?”

Hoseok sniffled and rubbed at his eye with a closed fist, “Seokie will eat the mac’n’cheese.”

“Okay,” Jungkook replied, giving in to the urge to ruffle the little’s hair. “I’ll be right back.”

Hoseok didn’t make a single peep as he ate his food, complaints from earlier washed away by guilt. Once he actually had another bite of it, he found that it really wasn’t that bad.

Jimin returned to the table just as the little was finishing up his last bite. The eldest of the maknae line paused as he gauged the aura around his two band mates. “What happened?” he inquired.

“We had a little bit of trouble from Hoseokie, but he knows what he’s done wrong,” Jungkook replied with a sad kind of smile.

Jimin’s eyebrows furrowed and he turned to the little in question, but Hoseok didn’t dare look up from his lap. “Okay, well, I guess it makes more sense for me to wait to hear about it. No need to make him tell the story a hundred times.”

It was at that moment that Taehyung approached the table, back from the washroom. He had a small cloth bag with the restaurant logo on the front that he must have asked for to put his dirtied clothes in. He’d changed out of his shirt and blazer completely, leaving him in only Jungkook’s buttoned-up suit jacket and damp slacks. Jimin was probably more confused about the situation as his fellow ninety-five liner returned, but he thankfully didn’t ask any questions.

Hoseok let out a little whine and squirmed around in his seat as the second youngest returned to his spot next to him. “Seokie really, really, really sorry, TaeTae-hyungie. The most sorry ever.” he apologized, his voice quiet so only Taehyung could hear him.

Taehyung smiled gently and leaned in closer to reply. “I’m glad to hear that you’re sorry, love.” The pet name slipped out before he could stop it. “And I forgive you, but you still will get a punishment when we get home, okay?”

“Okay,” the little nodded, “As long as TaeTae-hyungie doesn’t hate Seokie, he will take punishment.”

“Oh, baby,” Shit, another pet name. Thank god Seokjin and Namjoon weren’t around, otherwise Taehyung would be in trouble. He pushed that thought to the back of his mind and reached out to give Hobi a quick kiss on the hair. “I could never hate you. Hyungies could never hate you.”

Reassured for the moment, Hoseok tried his best to stay quiet and behave as the company dinner continued around them.

----------------------------------------------------

Later that night, all the members gathered in the living room and discussed the events that had taken place with Hobi and the maknaes. The little felt the familiar wave of shame go over him when Namjoon, Yoongi, Seokjin and Jimin all looked at him with disappointment in their eyes.

Thankfully, Taehyung and Jungkook explained that their little had been very apologetic immediately after it happened, so he shouldn’t be punished too harshly. Besides, Hoseok had been forced to sit quietly at the dinner for two whole hours with only a few words from the maknae line as a reprieve from his own thoughts. Just like a timeout, the little had the time to really think about his behavior.

It was settled that Hoseok would receive ten spanks over his underwear as punishment.

So now Hobi was in their massive, shared bedroom with all of his caregivers surrounding him. The little was splayed out on his stomach over Yoongi’s thin legs in only his boxers. Hoseok’s own legs were sprawled over Namjoon and his head was pillowed in Seokjin’s lap as the two were sat on either side of Yoongi. Jungkook, Taehyung and Jimin stood next to the bed and watched on carefully.

All the eyes on him made the little squirm until he felt a firm hand on the back of his neck. “No moving,” Seokjin said firmly.

“Y-Yes, hyungie,” Hoseok replied.

“You’re going to be good and count the spanks,” Yoongi ordered. The second oldest didn’t give him any more warning before a hard slap rang through the otherwise silent room.

The little let out a mewl and stuttered, “One.”

Yoongi had always been the type to get a punishment over with as quickly as safely possible, and now wasn’t any different. The next few spanks were fast and sharp, barely giving Hoseok a moment to register the sting and blurt out the number before another came down.

“F-F-Five!”

The eldest rapper paused and ran his hand softly over the younger’s shirt covered back. “You’re halfway done, Hoseok-ah. I’ll finish quickly.”

The final five slaps were just as Yoongi had promised - quick. Hoseok was gasping out his numbers and he was probably squirming again, but no one stopped him. They could all see that he was doing his best, and that was all that mattered to them.

“Ten! Ten!”

The second that the final number was called out, Yoongi maneuvered the little to sit properly in his lap, Seokjin and Namjoon both rubbing their hands along Hoseok’s back in an attempt to placate him.

“All done, baby,” Yoongi crooned, pressing kisses to the little’s tear-stained cheeks.

“You did so well for hyungs,” Namjoon added.

“Hoseokie is sorry,” the little whimpered, still coming down from his punishment and the even more submissive headspace said punishment had put him in.

Jin cooed and ran his hand through Hoseok’s hair, “We know, sweetheart. You’re forgiven.”

The little nodded, his tense shoulders beginning to relax with the reassurance. Then Hoseok looked up and searched around the room for the one person he was looking for. When his teary eyes locked on Taehyung, he held his arms up and made grabby-hands in his direction.

Taehyung was at his side in a moment, the hyungs moving out of the way so he could pick Hoseok up in his arms and hold him tightly.

“Seokie sorry, TaeTae-hyungie,” he murmured into the other’s warm neck.

“Thank you, love,” he replied, pressing a kiss to the little’s cheek. “No more apologizing now, okay?”

Hoseok hummed in agreement, his eyes fluttering closed as his head rested on the other’s shoulder. The night’s roller coaster of emotions really tired him out. “Can Seokie have cuddles from hyungies?”

The six of them glanced at each other before nodding in mutual agreement.

Ten minutes later found all seven of them in a pile of tangled limbs on the large bed, Hoseok intertwined right in the center of it all. Just where he wanted to be.

“Night night, hyungies,” the little said as he cuddled closer into Jimin’s chest.

“Good night, lovely.”

“Night, Seokie.”

“Love you lots, baby.”

“Don’t let the sharks bite.”

“Taehyung, that doesn’t even make sense!”

“Shh!”

Hoseok let a little giggle before snuggling further into the warm mess and arms, legs, and blankets and falling into a comfortable sleep.

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

A/N: Two spanking fics in a row and both times Hoseok is the one getting spanked. I’ll change it up in the future but I hope you enjoyed the story!

#bts #bts little space #bts littlespace #bts drabble #bts drabbles #bts fanfic #bts fanfiction #bts fanfics #bts jhope #bts hoseok #jung hoseok #bts jin #kim seokjin #bts rm #bts namjoon #kim namjoon #bts suga #bts yoongi #min yoongi #bts jimin #park jimin #bts v #bts taehyung #kim taehyung #bts jungkook #jeon jungkook #ot7 #bts ot7

[violetsmoak]

Philtatos [13/?]

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20101543/chapters/47690671

Blanket Disclaimer

Summary: During a patrol where Red Hood and Red Robin cross paths, Jason is infected with the blood of the Eros, the ancient God of Love, who informs them that they must track down his missing bow and arrows, or Jason will go slowly mad with an obsessive desire–for Tim. Though overwhelmed by the sudden attention being paid to him, Tim sets to work trying to solve the case, before Jason succumbs to madness. In the meantime, Jason discovers that there’s more than godlike powers at work here, as well as a legacy that reaches back through the sands of time.

Rating: PG-13 (rating may change later)

Beta Reader: None at the moment.

JayTimBingo Prompts This Chapter: #fatal flaw #secrets #riddle #fate #revenge #oracle #betrayal #prophecy #jealousy

First Chapter

________________________________________________________________

Tim feels a little bad about using Jason’s skin hunger against him but only for a moment. Any concern about that vanishes when he peeks back at Jason as they walk, and observes the color returning to the other man’s cheeks. The hand clasped in his own stops shaking the longer they touch.

Tim has never been one to enjoy holding hands—often he’s felt uncomfortable or self-conscious, worrying about sweaty fingers or whether the other person might consider it lame—but this doesn’t feel like that.

This feels right.

It’s actually concerning how right it feels, especially in light of his recent discussion with Steph.

Stop it. This isn’t about you. It’s about putting Jason at ease.

They return to the containment unit to find Barbara facing down Eros—an impressive feat considering she’s in a wheelchair and he’s the one looking down on her. Her face is drawn in irritation, and he’s gratified to see that Eros seems put-out about something.

“Took you long enough. Cherry here says she’s got a bonafide prophecy from the Oracle of Delphi and wouldn’t share it until you got back.” He eyes their entwined hands and leers. “I take it the domestics are going well?”

“Get bent,” Tim snaps in irritation as Jason tugs his hand back so fast he might as well have been burned.

“Only if you do the honors, pretty boy.”

Jason growls and makes a move for his gun, but Tim reaches out to stop him.

“Can you not tease him?” he demands of Eros. “Especially when the only reason he’s like this is because of you.”

“Oh, if only you knew…”

Before Tim can comment on that, Jason interrupts.

“What’s the feathered freak talkin’ about?” he snaps, radiating tension. “What prophecy?”

“The one Signal was able to recover from the girl that was killed,” Barbara says coolly. “He transcribed it and sent it along. Do you want to hear it, or do you want to keep acting like a child?”

This she directs at Eros, who actually does look chastised a beat, before gracing her with a cool smile.

“I guess it is apropos if you do the honors, darlin’,” Eros says with a cool smile. “Is it ironic or coincidental if someone who stole the title of oracle interprets a prophecy from the actual Oracle of Delphi?”

“Who cares? This whole situation is making me hate both irony and coincidence,” Tim says.

“It’s making me wonder if there are any coincidences,” Jason mutters, eyes fixed on Eros in intense dislike.

Barbara offers him an identical look, before thumbing the screen of her phone and opening her incoming messages.

Then she begins to read:

“The Unseen darkness cannot keep its captive thrice for mortal masks the divine that seeks its reward in the city where dark nights conceal the greatest of secrets.

“Crossed beneath the stars when the Rager’s Moon is full, eternal freedom is neigh upon the eleventh moment of the small hour.The sacrifice of the virgin gifts triumph to the prisoner and that which drowned in Lethe’s tears is reborn.

“But take heed, for the winged scion of Cythera, willingly blinded by the veil of vengeance revealed by Discord’s most cursed boon, awakens the warrior guided by the Physicians heir.

“Fury dooms the fair, heralding the return of magnificent Alexandros and one whose name is painted in blood and stone.

“Greatest of loves, damned by the gleam of a golden barb, torn asunder by jealousy and parted by cruel death, they will stand against Strife.

“Titans will rise and one who Death names hero, betrayed yet shielded by love, will sunder the chains of Aidoneus and avenge the victim of grievance. One will be born anew, the other bound eternally to Stygian Darkness.”

There is silence as she puts the phone down, eyebrows drawn together in thought.  

“What?” Tim says.

“I see your ‘what’ and raise you a ‘the fuck’,” Jason adds. “Does any of that make sense to anyone else? Because it don't make sense to me.”

“Blame my uncle,” Eros says, apparently annoyed.

“What? Why?” Tim wants to know. “Which one’s he?”

“Apollo,” Barbara says, still considering the puzzling words on the screen. “Aside from being a sun god, he was also the god of prophecy.”

“Talking in riddles is his favorite pastime,” Eros agrees. “It’s a pain in the ass.”

“I’ll bet,” Tim agrees. “We’ve got someone like that here in Gotham.”

“Yeah, and he’s a frequent guest of Arkham, so what’s that tell you?” Jason grumbles.

“That people who come up with riddles have too much time on their hands.”

“There’s a reason the Oracles of Delphi didn’t put their predictions into simple words,” Barbara points out. ”If you give people information about what’s coming, how do you know you’re not ensuring it will or won’t come to pass? It was important for them to be seen as the medium of the message and not an agent.

“By keeping information vague, it would seem like they were allowing a querant the chance to defy fate, while at the same time allowing fate to take its natural course, whatever that might be,” Eros agrees. “Ans it was good insurance. Even Oracles needed to cover their asses. You were less likely to get your head lopped off by a visiting king that received news he didn’t want to hear. And whatever the outcome, they could still say, ‘we told you so’.” He considers Barbara. “You know, I don’t usually find brainy sexy, but you might just turn me.”

“I’m thrilled,” she deadpans.

“So what’s all this supposed to mean, anyway?” Tim asks, trying to bring the discussion back to the matter at hand.

“It could mean anything. Though to start with, that bit about ‘unseen darkness’, that’s an epithet for the Underworld in old Hellenic documents.”

“We called it that in the old days,” Eros confirms.

“And then there’s the part about someone captive in Hades.”

“I thought Hades was a person?” Tim says.

“It is. But it’s also a place.” Jason tells him.

“It depends on what story and what source you’re drawing from,” Barbara elaborates. “And what translation.”

“What about the next bit? About mortal maskin' the divine?”

“Could that mean whoever’s possessing Carrie Cutter?” Tim suggests. “We’ve already established she’s got help from a god, and if they’re inhabiting her body even for short amounts of time, it’s a pretty effective mask.”

“No doubt,” Eros agrees. “Not so sure about that part with dark nights, but I guess it’s referring to this cesspool you people call a city.”

Tim, Jason and Barbara exchange glances, knowing exactly how dark nights and secrets relate to their city.

Maybe Duke misheard. It might not be dark ‘nights’ so much as dark ‘knights’. Which makes sense, considering Bruce and Dick both have that title depending on the day.

“Safe to say it’s Gotham,” Tim confirms. “So all that begs the question, do you have any idea who’s locked in the Underworld trying to get out?”

Eros snorts. “The better question is who isn’t locked in the Underworld.”

Jason is glaring furiously at Eros, clearly growing tired of his evasive and snarky answers. The way his fists clench, Tim suspects he’s close to throwing a punch at the glass in frustration. Not something Tim wants to see, especially given Jason’s injuries from their altercation with Carrie Cutter and Dick haven’t even been seen to yet.

God, it feels like it was days ago but it was only hours. He probably came right here to confront Eros without even looking after himself.

He has to put that out of his mind for now. Deciphering any clues in the prophecy takes momentary precedence.

“…. A lot of myths end with someone displeasing a god and getting sent to Tartarus, so he has a point,” Barbara is saying, her thumbs busily texting something on her phone.

“So that’s not going to tell us anything,” Tim decides. “What about the ‘crossed beneath the stars’ part?”

“More of the same in terms of pinpointing when everything is supposed to happen,” Eros says.

“Which is when?”

“November twenty-third,” Barbara says, frowning at the small screen in her hand.

Jason looks askance. “How d’you know?”

“'Moon’ equates to month, and another name for Zeus was the Rager,” she replies. “So, Zeus’s month. According to the Athenian calendars we still have access to, Zeus’s month was Maimakterion—which in modern times would fall somewhere between November and December. And the next full moon—” She holds up her phone, showing a lunar calendar for the month, “—falls on November twenty-third. It’s the only full moon that falls during Maimakterion.”

Eros nods along in approval. “What she said.”

“And the small hour?”

“Midnight.”

“So, whatever’s supposed to happen is going to happen eleven minutes after midnight…assuming that’s what moment means,” Tim muses, glancing at his own phone calendar. “That’s this Friday.”

“Five days from now,” Jason agrees, and side-eyes Tim. “We’ve all had shorter deadlines.”

“That’s not necessarily referring to your deadline, sweet cheeks,” Eros reminds him. “I figure you have about half that.”

“No thanks to you.”

“You know, the last Jason I knew wasn’t this whiny.”

“Children,” Barbara says sharply. “Let’s stay focused, shall we? I’m concerned about this virgin sacrifice part—specifically the part where it ensures success for someone we probably don’t want to succeed.”

“Cutter did kill that girl,” Tim reminds them. “Maybe it was some kind of offering, so she’d be successful at whatever she’s trying to do.”

“It’s a good an explanation as anything else,” Eros agrees, examining his nails. “We always did love our human sacrifices. And a virgin does increase the likelihood of something working out to your advantage.”

“You’re a piece of shit,” Jason growls. “That’s a kid you’re talking about!”

“And as an Oracle of Delphi she’s entitled to an eternity of bliss once she enters the Underworld,” Eros dismisses. “It’s a better end than some people are entitled to.”

Jason’s eyes blaze as if that’s a personal insult. Tim can certainly empathize.

“What about the second part?” he prompts. “What’s Lethe?”

“The Lethe was the river the souls drank from to forget their previous lives before being reincarnated,” Barbara explains.

 “The Ancient Greeks believed in reincarnation? But I thought that was something from the Far East?”

“Many ancient cultures had a concept of reincarnation beyond the Hindu and Buddhist mythos,” Barbara explains. “Just look at the belief systems of the indigenous peoples of North America and you’ll see countless examples. And they didn’t have any contact with the civilizations of Asia during the time when those faiths were evolving.”

Beside Tim, Jason is as stiff as a board and appears to be having trouble breathing. Automatically, Tim edges closer to him, and though he doesn’t outright take his hand—he leans into him, nudging him with his shoulder.

Jason’s eyes dart to him for a moment, and he relaxes incrementally.

“How does that relate here though?” Barbara wants to know.

“Maybe the prisoner forgot something,” Eros suggests, not sounding very interested.

“Or maybe whoever’s tryin' to escape Hades as made to forget something,” Jason counters darkly.

“Only mortals can be made to forget by drinking from the Lethe,” Barbara says. “The prisoner could have been human. Salmoneus or Tantalus or one of the Dainads.”

Tim doesn’t even get a chance to question who they are before Eros interrupts. “Actually, it’s a little broader than just mortals. More like mortals, demigods that haven’t consumed ambrosia, giants, hybrids—”

“So again, we’re back to a broad spectrum of people it could be talkin' about,” Jason complains. “Great. Is there anyone or anything in this stupid prophecy that isn’t doublespeak?”

“Well, the next verse is pretty self-explanatory. Obviously, we’re talking about yours truly,” Eros says, pointing at himself. “What other 'winged son' do you know from mythology?”

“A case could be made for Pegasus.”

“No, it’s Eros,” Tim says. “Cythera’s another name for Aphrodite.” Everyone looks at him in surprise.

“How do you know that?” Jason asks, but where the emphasis ought to suggest incredulity, he sounds impressed.

Tim tries not to bask in that.

“My parents used to visit the island of Cythera a lot when they weren’t on business trips, especially before I was born. It was their favorite vacation destination. Full of history, not touristy—they didn’t like having to socialize with people when they were on vacation.”

Tim falls silent then, remembering sitting in his living room with his parents, pouring over their vacation photos of the Mediterranean island while they told stories. They’d always promised to take him one day…

He glances up and notices the others are watching him now—Eros with a sharp, calculating gaze while Jason appears concerned. As for Barbara, she seems to sense his discomfort, because she navigates them past the lull. “Okay, so if it’s Eros, what are you wanting revenge for? It’s not exactly your M-O.”

“I can think of a few people who have it coming,” Eros answers. “Starting with my mother.”

“What’d she do?” Tim asks.

“Do you have a few centuries worth of couch time?”

“Isn’t she the reason your wife died?” Barbara wants to know. “In the myth, she survived, but Tim told me that's not what happened in reality.”

Eros expression goes cold.

“That’s right,” Tim remembers; he and Eros had this conversation a few days ago, didn’t they? “Aphrodite is the one who sent Psyche to the underworld.”

Eros bares his teeth. “One of her many sins, but not the only one.”

“Then couldn’t the prophecy maybe be referring to her? Psyche, I mean? Maybe she’s the prisoner.”

“Are you implying my wife is the one behind your Cupid’s actions?” Eros growls. “Because that’s impossible.”

“How would you know? It could be—”

“Because she died a mortal! Her soul is mortal and wouldn’t have the power to escape the Underworld in any capacity! Furthermore, Psyche would never kill or arrange the death of anyone! She was good and pure of soul and that’s why I fell in love with her.”

“That’s not what I read,” Barbra says. “Didn’t you prick yourself on one of your golden arrows while watching her?”

“I pricked myself because I fell in love with her,” he snaps. “I’ve already told Jason here that the arrows only work to magnify emotions that are already there.”

“That makes no sense. You liked her before you made yourself fall in love with her?”

“Look, you know the story: Psyche was beautiful. So much so, that the idiots in her kingdom started treating her like a living goddess, bringing the gifts meant for my mother to this human princess. You can guess how well that went over.”

“Right. She sent you to make her fall in love with a horrible beast.”

“Yeah, one of Diomedes mares. Gorgeous animals—people would stop and stare at them for hours. Also, vicious, flesh-eating beasts. Just getting to close to one of those and it would have ripped her to shreds—and she would have stood there and let it.” Eros’ expression becomes soft, eyes faraway at the memory. “If she had been some arrogant, selfish royal I would have let it happen. But I watched her for days while I tried to put her in the path of that thing. And everything she did was just good and kind. I had never seen as pure a soul like hers.” He shakes his head. “The idea of a girl like that being sent to her death just because a bunch of idiot humans had the audacity to praise her alongside my mother didn’t seem fair.”

“And you’re all about fair, aren’t you?” Jason sneers.

Tim has to agree; if Eros cared about fair, he would have been a lot more helpful about curing Jason and wouldn’t have demanded they find his diviners beforehand.

“I was young and stupid, and I didn’t realize the world didn’t work that way,” Eros dismisses. “Even for gods. I thought my mother would never want to harm me—and so if I put Psyche under my protection, she couldn’t hurt her. And if I could show my mother what a good wife Psyche was, even if she was unable to see me, it would prove the point.” He snorts. “It didn’t exactly go my way.”

“And there’s no way her soul could have somehow been corrupted when she died?”

“The Underworld is stagnant. There’s no such thing as change or time there. Everything occurs both in one moment and in all moments there.”

“So you’re saying a soul going in would remain in the same state as it was when it died,” Barbara posits.

“Exactly. How else do you expect the judges to judge souls if they kept changing after death? It’d be a headache.

“Then if it’s not Psyche, who else can you think of that it might be?”

“It might be more than one person,” Tim suggests. “That line about 'greatest of loves'—what if that’s why Carrie’s been targeting couples? She hears the prophecy—or whoever’s riding along inside her hears the prophecy—and thinks there’s a couple out there that’s going to stand against her. She could be trying to eliminate potential threats to her end goal.”

“If so, we need to decipher her criteria for choosing her victims. You already said it didn’t seem like they had anything in common.”

“We’ll have to check again. Maybe now that we’ve got this prophecy, something new will jump out.”

“We skipped a whole verse,” Jason points out. “The ‘warrior guided by the physician’s heir’. Any ideas?”

Eros shrugs. “Since the rest of the prophecy involves me, I’d say it’s me.”

“How do you figure?”

“The Physician is another name for Apollo.”

“So?”

“So, who do you think taught me archery? Next to him, I’m the greatest archer among the Olympians.”

“Or it could be Jason,” Tim ponders.

Jason seems to go pale, almost panicked. “What?”

“I mean, assuming you’re interpreting ‘awaken’ by activating the way you do with a sleeper agent. You infected him with your blood however accidentally and then pressed him into doing your dirty work.”

“I resent your tone, boy,” Eros grumbles, but Jason interjects, “And the other bit?”

“The other bit is just really literal,” Barbara catches on. “Jason, you were trained by Batman. Who was the heir to an actual physician. The M.D. kind.”

Thomas Wayne.

Jason looks like he doesn’t know what to do with that information. “Shit.”

Eros watches Jason, inscrutable eyes considering; Jason glares back at him as if waiting for him to make a comment.

“But if it’s Jason, the next bit wouldn’t make sense,” Barbara says after a moment. “‘Magnificent Alexandros’. The only Alexandros I can think of off the top of my head if Alexander of Macedon. But that doesn’t really track with the rest of the verse. He was a historical figure, not mythological.”

“That’s offensive, you know,” Eros drawls. “All those stories you call mythology actually happened.”

“Then why don’t we have an archaeological record for them?”

“Because screw you, that’s why.”

“If it is talking about Alexander the Great, Robin will be happy,” Tim says with a rueful smirk.

Jason is perplexed. “Why?”

“Apparently he was on the list of the kid’s League-approved childhood heroes. Mother-son bonding time seems to have included traveling in his footsteps as preparation for world domination.”

Jason looks surprised and amused. “Really?”

“Is it that surprising?”

“No, it’s just…” Jason shakes his head. “Never mind.” He clears his throat. “So, back to the prophecy. It talks about the Titans—are we talkin' the creatures the Olympian gods overthrew?”

“Well, whenever one of us mention the Titans, it is usually those bottom feeders rotting in Tartarus, yes,” Eros says dryly, inscrutable focussed on Jason. “Them going free is never a good thing. Don’t believe me, read the Titanomachy. Hesiod got it pretty close to right.”

“Could be the goal, could be the result,” Tim suggests.

“Which brings us back to possibly being on the lookout for more than one prisoner escaping Hades,” Barbara says.

“And all of that leads us to the typical ‘one shall live and one shall die’ device,” Eros concludes.

“Only we don’t know who either of those is.”

“I can tell you now if it’s a prophecy involving me, I have no intention of dying."

“If it’s even about you. It’s not really an exact science, interpreting this sort of thing,” Barbara warns. “Even an Olympian like you can misunderstand—there’s evidence of that in the myths. In fact, I’m sure we’re missing more than is good for us. It will take some time to decipher it and we need more information.”

“At least we have something,” Tim maintains. “The exact date when it’s going to happen and where. We can begin preparing for that.”

“It’s a whole hell of a lot to think about,” Jason agrees.

“Which you can do back at the Cave. We only came here to see if Eros could shed some light on the prophecy or see the arrows.”

“What arrows?”

“Wonder Girl told us that to reverse what’s been done to Nightwing is to remove the arrow that Carrie stabbed him with.”

“Uh, there is no arrow,” Jason says. “Cupid took it with her, remember?”

“I guess that answers that question,” Barbara sighs. “You can’t see them.”

“Of course he can’t,” Eros says. “I’m the only one that can see the wounds caused by my arrows. Even this pseudo-Cupid wouldn’t be able to see them.”

“After she stabbed Jason she seemed to be looking for something, so I’m not sure about that,” Tim argues.

“She can’t see them. Though it may be possible her divine passenger might. I don't know. Never had another god take my diviners before."

“Speaking of being stabbed,” Tim goes on, nodding at the bruises coming out on his face. There are likely more hidden by the leather jacket and gear. “You should get those looked at.”

“I didn’t physically get stabbed, you know. Magic wounds don’t need to be looked at.”

“You went toe-to-toe with an enhanced fighter and Batman. You could have internal bleeding for all we know.”

“If you think a little tussle with that dick is going to do lastin' damage—”

Tim cuts off his indignation. “I don’t, but you haven’t been eating or sleeping properly, and your system is already compromised, so how do you know what damage was or wasn’t done? You didn’t stay to get treated at the Cave.”

Their eyes meet, remembering exactly why that is, and Tim’s cheeks darken. Jason is the first to look away, though.

“It’s nothin'. I can patch myself up whenever.”

“I can help—”

“I’m good.”

“Jason—”

“I’m an adult and I’ve been treatin' myself without help for years now,” Jason interrupts tensely. When Tim can’t stop himself from flinching, Jason’s eyes flash with dismay. “I mean…” He flounders like he’s trying to take it back, and instead changes the subject. “Didn’t you say somethin' about a list? Maybe get started on that and I’ll do an injury check myself.”

It’s a clear cop-out, and if they were alone, Tim would be calling him on it.

“I’ll ask for help if I need any,” he adds, awkwardly, like it’s been a long time since anyone actually cared about his injuries being treated. 

Barbara glances between the two of them, obviously sensing the undertone, but not commenting on it. Instead, she says, “I don’t mind helping Jason. Besides, Red Robin needs to contact the Family and let them know what we know.”

“And I need food,” Eros says. “I haven’t eaten since before you went on your little reconnaissance mission. Can’t you see? I’m wasting away.”

 “If only,” Jason mutters.

Tim is torn, wanting to argue that he can help Jason, but at the same time trying to respect the other man’s obvious need for distance.

At last, he nods.

“Okay,” he says, feeling a little defeated. “Let’s take a break. I’ll make a food run…you get yourself fixed up.”

“Whatever you say, babybird.”

⁂

Once Tim vanishes, Barbie indicates with a jerk of her head that Jason should follow her upstairs to the Nest medbay. He knows better than to think it’s just her wanting to take a look at his injuries—like him, she’s probably looking for some privacy.

They take the elevator up in silence, and Jason wonders vaguely when the last time was, he was this close to Barbara Gordon.

I don’t think I have been, actually. We both avoid the manor unless there’s no choice. And we both have good reasons for it. And when we are there together, there’s usually about six to ten feet of distance between us.

They were never what he would call close before she was paralyzed and he died. Barbie was Dick’s girl and Jason’s occasional babysitter until the Joker ruined her life. And then she wasn’t around at all. Jason wasn’t alive to watch her painstakingly drag herself up and pull it together again, so he never got the chance to interact with the Barbara Gordon that became Oracle.

Since returning to Gotham he’s kept her at a distance as much as he did the rest of the Family, so it’s somewhat surprising to him that she’s here now and working to help him.

Probably it’s on account of Tim.

Still silent, they enter the surgically pristine room of the Nest’s medical wing—and Jason is a little jealous of the supplies here. It makes the kits he has in his safehouses about as sophisticated as a needle and threat.

Barbie watches him, framed in the doorway.

“Well? Spit it out,” he grunts, deciding to get whatever reprimands are forthcoming out of the way.

Her look turns sharp before she reaches into her jacket pocket for something; Jason can’t help tensing up, even though she knows the likelihood of her pulling a weapon on him are slim to none.

That suspicion is confirmed when she instead draws out a device and turns it on; there’s a high-pitched background whir that Jason recognizes as a listening device scrambler.

Clearly we’re both aware of what a paranoid freak Timbers can be.

“Okay, Jason, what’s going on?” she asks without preamble. “You know Tim only wants to help you.”

“Yeah, at his own expense,” he retorts sourly.

Barbies raises an eyebrow as if waiting for him to continue, and when he doesn’t, she presses, “You’re being cagey. And it’s more than just worrying about losing control around Tim, I can tell.”

“Oh you can, can you?” he challenges.

“I’ve known you since you were still desperately trying to live up to Dick while pretending like you didn’t care. I know when you’re hiding something,” she folds her arms. “Believe it or not, Jason, you’re a terrible liar when it comes to things that matter.”

It’s reflex to want to say something caustic to that, but he stops himself in time. He needs Barbara’s help and pissing her off isn’t going to make his life any easier.

“I need a favor,” he admits after a beat.

“Another one?” she repeats, sounding like she doesn’t believe him. “You’re going to owe me a lot.”

“Yeah, well, now would be the time to collect on those debts while I still can.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means everyone else is tiptoein' around the subject, but at some point, I’m gonna need to be put under,” he says, erring on the side of just enough truth to keep her from questioning him further. “We both know what I’m talkin' about here.”

As expected, Barbara only just keeps herself from visibly recoiling; she’s already ready with an argument. “You don’t know we won’t find something before that happens.”

“I’m already feelin' like I’m livin' in someone else’s skin—” Literally, in a way. “—I’m not gonna get any better than I am right now. We’ve already seen what it looks like when I dip toward worse. So while I’m still lucid, let me make my decisions. And my decision is, I’d rather go under while I’m still me instead of violent, mindless…reaver.”

Barbara does a minor double-take. “Did you just make a Firefly reference?”

“It’s the last series I was watching before I died,” Jason says, a little defensive.

“I’m not judging, just surprised. Dick and Tim are usually the ones making pop-culture references to deflect. I’m not used to it from you.”

“And I’m not used to you stallin',” he counters. “You’re different from the other Bats, O. You know how to cut your losses, and you know how to make decisions when no one else wants to think about it. You get makin' the hard calls. So, I’m gonna ask you: when it comes down to a choice between me and Tim—and I mean when, not if—who do you save?”

Something like pain passes over her face, and then resolve hardens her face. “Tim.”

“Exactly,” he approves. “Because unlike me, he’s good. And smart.”

“You’re both of those things, even if you pretend like you’re not,” she protests.

“And he hasn’t committed multiple murders,” Jason continues, acting like he didn’t hear her. “Not that what I’ve done wasn’t justified. It wasn’t good, but I don’t regret it because I will go to my grave believin' sometimes that line needs to be crossed. Again. But it’s still a line Tim’s been lucky enough not to have to cross.”

She doesn’t argue with him, instead inclines her head.

“More people will miss him if he were gone then they would me,” Jason concludes. “I’m not supposed to be here anyway.”

There’s a long beat of measuring silence. Then, Barbara sighs. “What is it you need, Jason?”

He tilts his chin in gratitude.

“I didn’t just come here to yell at Eros,” he admits. “If Wonder Woman doesn’t show up, he’s the only one I know who has access to the stuff I need.”

“The Stygian Sleep.”

“Yeah. But it’s probably in GCPD lock-up.” He gives her a quick run-down of events, minus anything about Eros’ intentional plan to infect him. Babs listens, jaw set and eyes narrowed; given what she just said about him, she likely knows he’s not being completely truthful, but his explanation clearly holds enough water that she doesn’t call him on it.

“I’ll get someone to look into it,” she decides at last.

Which, even though he’s relieved about, he’s also suspicious.

“And by ‘look into’ you mean grab hold of and perform a million tests on it before handin' it over,” he posits.

“Just because you’re hellbent on using something that’s effectively going to kill you doesn’t mean I don’t want to know everything about it first,” she says, unapologetic. “Like the prophecy, it might have clues about how to circumvent it.”

“Yeah, because we’re having so much luck with that.”

“Also, when Bruce comes to me later in a righteous fury for letting his son die a second time, I’ll be able to assure him we knew everything we did about it before making an informed decision.”

Jason doesn’t pretend to believe that’s the end of it. Barbara might be willing to humor Jason a little more than Bruce, or even Dick when he’s not compromised—she might even be a little more objective in considering things, but she’s not going to trust Jason’s plan to be the only plan. She’ll have her own contingencies, the same as any Bat.

The only difference with Babs is that once it’s over and done with, and it becomes clear there’s no saving him, she’ll have an easier time getting over it than Bruce will. And she won’t let it compromise her work.

Tim’s told Jason what Bruce and Dick were like after he died the first time, and if it happens again, Gotham needs someone competent in keeping things in check.

And Tim…

Jason’s heart thuds with guilt.

This time, Tim won’t just be sweeping in to pick up the broken pieces of Batman and Nightwing as he did as a kid. He won’t be watching it from the sidelines.

The memory hits him then. To his surprise, it’s not from Achilleus or Alexandros.

Jason hates Wayne Charity galas.

People are always staring at him, murmuring through pasted-on smiles that even if he couldn’t read lips, he would be able to hear the judgment dripping from their words. These people are so achingly dry and genteel, their teeth don’t even unclench around their vowels.

Bruce doesn’t make him come to all that many of these shindigs, thankfully; only the ones involving children’s advocacy and the like. Jason doesn’t mind those too much, considering their purpose. He just hates that even at those—like the one tonight—he’s the only kid that has to parade around in the straitjacket Alfred calls a tux.

He gets it, of course; he’s the poster-boy, the success story, a means of showing the rich snobs how well a dirty Crime Alley orphan can clean up so that they’ll open their checkbooks.

It doesn’t mean he has to like it.

Except for tonight, for the first time, he noticed another kid that’s been dragged along. A tiny boy whose meticulously fitted tux still manages to look too big for him.

A man and woman who must be his parents are chatting with another couple, seemingly oblivious to the way their son is staring into the distance, a neutrally polite expression fixed on his face. He might as well be sleeping standing up, and Jason has the odd suspicion that’s by design.

That makes his mouth twitch; maybe rich kids get bored with this kind of thing too.

Jason keeps staring across the manor ballroom until the strange kid senses his gaze and looks up. He grins when the boy’s eyes widen—their color is startling, even from across the room, and they take up practically his whole face—and wonders at the sudden flood of color in his cheeks.

He’s about to motion the boy over to the edge of the reception area—hanging out with another kid, even a little one, will definitely break up the monotony of the evening—when Bruce’s hand falls hard on his shoulder.

“Time to make an exit, son,” he says, voice quiet and intense and incongruent with the false smile he’s still beaming at everyone within a ten-foot radius. From the distracted note in his words, Jason doesn’t even need to look out the window to see the signal lighting up the sky. 

They meet Felipe Garzonas that night, and he doesn’t think of the boy again.

Jason shudders as the technicolor recollection fades out, his stomach twisting angrily.

He’s never made the connection between Tim and the boy at the fundraiser before. It occurs to him how stupid that was—at the same time it occurs to him that if not for that case that night, he might not have been on the outs with Bruce. He might have endured more Wayne event galas instead of limiting whatever time he was with Bruce to being Robin by night. He might have gotten to know Tim in this life, instead of dying.

He might not be in this damned predicament right now.

“Jason?”

He looks up, realizes that Barbie is watching him with concern. He is quick to revisit their conversation and mutters, “Yeah, fine. Just make sure the stuff actually makes it to me before my brain dribbles out of my head, okay?”

“Stop being so dramatic,” she replies, reaching out to turn off the scrambler device, though she continues to exude suspicion.

“All Bats are dramatic, or have you forgotten?” he quips back, offering an irreverent smirk to cover up.

“Hard to forget something you live with every day,” she returns dryly. “Now get over here and let me check you over.”

“You don’t need to,” he points out. “I’ve had worse than this, you know.”

“Yes, yes, we’re all aware you’ve died and come back, who hasn’t these days?” she returns. “Now, shirt off, or I’m telling Tim you didn’t do what you said you would.”

Jason glares. “This is going to become a thing, isn’t it? You people using Tim to make me do things.”

“Things that are for your own good, yes. Now strip, Todd.”

“Yes, mother…”

“You wish your mother was as cool as me.”

Which Jason can’t argue with, because she’s right; he’s had a total of three mother figures in his life (two of which he’s not sure even qualify because of how messed up they were), and none of them have been as capable or decent as Barbara Gordon.

Once he’s shrugged his top half out of the body armor and leather, she reaches for him.

Jason experiences a nauseous swoop in his stomach at the idea of anyone but Tim putting hands on him. Instantly, his hand snaps up and knocks hers back.

“Don’t touch me!” he snarls.

Barbara pulls away, watching him with a raised eyebrow and instantly Jason is overwhelmed with shame.

“Sorry,” he bites out. “I didn’t mean…”

“We can wait for Tim to get back,” she suggests, instantly understanding.

Alarms blare in his head at the thought; he shakes his head. “No. No, I’m…I’m good. Now that I’m expectin' it.”

She considers him several beats longer and then makes the next attempt to check his injuries. This time he concentrates on forcing the sick feeling away and tries to ignore how it feels like someone is rubbing sandpaper across his skin.

That’s a new symptom. Great. Because it wasn’t enough that I’ve been trying to claw my skin of myself, now other people get to do it too…

Barbara checks him over with quiet efficiency, evaluating the shallow slash between his arm and shoulder which his armor didn’t cover, as well the bruising along his hips, elbows and lower back.

“It could be worse,” she decides eventually, considering the mottled purpling across his chest. “Ribs are bruised, not broken.”

“I could've told you that…”

“And were you going to tell me about that?” she points at his shoulder and the spiderweb of gold leeching out around the long-healed-over bullet wound. From the way he’s been itching at it this past day, he doesn’t need a mirror to know it’s beginning to creep up his neck as well. “How long has it been growing like that?”

“Pretty much since I got it,” he replies.

She reaches up, brow furrowed and reaches toward one of the raised lines winding toward his chest. Again, he braces himself for the pain of the touch his body doesn’t want.

Thankfully, she barely grazes that. “You haven’t been keeping better track, have you? It might give us a more specific idea of how much time you have.”

“How so?”

“The same as any poison, I would guess. The closer it gets to your heart, the less time you have.”

He frowns. “At this point, I don’t think it even matters.”

Movement outside of the med bay window draws his attention, and he across the floor to see Tim climbing the stairs from the ground floor.

Jason is quick to grab his shirt and tug it on; it’s not something he wants to discuss with Tim just yet.

Barbara watches him, lips pursed in worry and disapproval, but he could care less about the latter. She knows his thoughts on this, and she’ll respect them.

Tim strides in and then slows like he’s wondering if he’s supposed to knock or not.  

“How are you doing?” he asks, hesitant like he’s afraid expressing concern will set Jason off like a bomb.

Guilt hits him at that, but he forces himself to remain calm and blank-faced. “Fine.”

“I have to go,” Barbie announces, maneuvering her chair toward the door. “I need to go back to the Cave and check on Dick’s condition. I don’t know how long it will be before he tries to escape or pull something to keep from going nuts.”

“Also, it’d be nice if this month was one of the ones where Alfred doesn’t get knocked out,” Tim suggests with false levity.

“Or lose a hand,” Jason mutters darkly.

“Exactly. And whether he knows it or not, Feathers downstairs gave me some ideas about how to remove the arrow,” Barbie says as they leave the med bay.

“I should come with you.”

“No.” Both Barbara and Tim speak at the same time, but she’s the one that keeps talking. “You should stay here.”

“Not sure that’s the best idea.”

“I think it is,” Tim counters. “It will keep us out of everyone’s hair and they’ll know where we are.” His tone is reasonable—too reasonable; clearly Timmy has some ulterior motives.

Whether those motives are to circumvent Bruce or Jason’s plans, he doesn’t care. But one thing is for sure. “They can know where we are if we’re at the manor.”

And isn’t that a reversal—Jason being the one to insist on that?

I need to have people around because I don’t trust myself right now.

The mutinous expression is back on Tim’s face, before he visibly switches tactics.

“Okay, how about this,” he suggests, tone only a shade off exasperated. “Why don’t you go lie down somewhere and try to catch a few hours' sleep? If you’re sleeping, you’re not doing anything else, right? And then we’ll either go back to the Cave or see if anyone can be spared to chaperone here.”

“There’s no need for that,” a voice says, and they all look up to see Damian stride in still in full Robin-gear.

Tim scowls. “How did you get in here?”

“It was fairly simple,” the kid snorts. “A fish tank, Drake? Really?”

Tim looks like he wants to protest, but Jason chuckles. “It was kind of obvious, babybird.”

“You can barely take care of yourself, and you expect someone with a brain to believe you have the patience to care for fish?” the boy continues. “Exactly who do you think has been feeding them when you forget?”

Tim gapes. “You…break into my apartment…to feed my fish?”

Jason can’t help the loud guffaw that escapes at that, earning two equally unimpressed glares in return. He doesn’t care—that might be the funniest thing he’s heard in days.

“I’ll leave you to it then,” Barbara says and wheels out of the room. “Try not to kill each other, boys. Alfred would be unhappy about it.”

“Luckily, we are standing in a well-stocked room with several methods for resuscitating a dead body,” Damian replies easily.

“Don’t you have school?” Tim grumbles.

“It’s Sunday, Drake.”

“Still doesn’t explain why you’re here.”

“I have been sent to babysit you two and put Todd down with extreme prejudice should he try anything.

Which Tim gapes and, while Jason is…kind of relieved about.

“Aw, Dami, I knew you cared,” he teases.

“Don’t address me with that infantile drivel!”

Tim sighs.

“Just don’t set anything on fire while you’re here…”

  ⁂⁂⁂

I want to know what you think of my story! Leave kudos, a comment or if writing comments isn’t something you’re comfortable with, as many of these (or other emojis) as you want and let me know how you feel!

❤️️ = I love this story! 😳 = this was hot! 💐 = thank you for sharing this 🍵 = tea spilled 🍬 = so sweet and fluffy! 🚔 = you’re under arrest! the writing’s too good! 😲 = I NEED THE NEXT CHAPTER 😢 = you got me right in the feels 🤯mind blown 🤬god damn cliffhanger 😫 whyyyyyyy?!?!?

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#jaytimweek2019 #jaytimweek #jaytim #jaytimbingo2019 #fanfic #jaytim fic #batfic #tim drake #jason todd #barbara gordon #eros (new earth) #angst #drama #fatal flaw #secrets #riddle #fate #revenge #oracle #betrayal #prophecy #jealousy

[eshaale27195-blog]

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I cannot recommend this book enough! As a novice trader, I have been looking for information on day trading. I discovered this book extremely informative rather than overly complicated for my skill level. Any negative reviews are most likely wrongly based on the premise that trading is low risk. This book actually explains this point in good detail. I loved the writer's first book so much I have devoured his second one ! The next book was on more complex day trading approaches, presented in a way that was not overly `'salesy". The cherry on top for me was the fact that the writer was open to email communication for any questions from his readers. Honestly, I really don't understand why anybody would give this book negative reviews. In my view, those reviews just say a lack of understanding of how trading really works. If I had the chance to meet Andrew I'd love to tell him how grateful I am for his books. The educational value of his substance has made me a more educated day trader already!

Click here for more info

Check out this link

#best day trading books #day trading books #top day trading books

[tradingstockmovies-blog]

day trading books

What are the Best Day Trading Books to Read Now

Why should you Understand how to day trade?

Learning day trading is an art in it self that if could be master can help you make money effectively. Whether you are after an automated day trading strategy or a beginner's -- essential components should be considered like volatility, liquidity and volume.

The guide daily trading educates about the techniques to skim through hardships faced in the process of studying the techniques and mastering them rationally .The main technique to master is how to prevent losses instead of claiming the compensations.

Which are the best day trading books?

I frequently must answer this query I work in the financial services industry. Now-a-days this question asked on a regular basis. I am not going to sugarcoat it: successful trader is quite tough and tough today. Folks believe by viewing videos on you tube and make money from them isn't beneficiary. Competition is raised very much with the help of media we earn big amount of money in trading. Invest in yourself gives you lots of chances and potential to earn money. Reading about day trading polish and enhance your skill.

Ranked #1 - How to Day Trade for a Living How to Day Trade for a Living  Read More This Novel Is Currently Ranked with 4.7 from 5

This book is really a treat to see! I've read several trading books and even though I am a semi-new dealer, this publication is impressive informational and relatively easy for almost anybody to recognize. I cannot consider how a individual could leave a negative review for this particular publication.

The sad reality is 90% of traders drop money. THEY DO!! That is why books like this one are exceptional and extremely helpful. I just finished his second ebook, which talks about techniques daily trading and people are extremely useful in my day trading.

This guy is kind enough to give his personal email to say"if you have any questions shoot me an email". I just can not look at the horrible critiques that was given. In my view, the men and women who wrote negative comments do not recognize the true art of gambling. Thank you, Andrew, on you are hard work and determination!!

Ranked #2 - A Beginner's Guide To Day Trading Online A Beginner's Guide to Day Trading Online (2nd edition)  Read More This Novel Is Currently Ranked with 4.4 from 5

Having completed a degree in Finance and Accounting, I have profound knowledge about investing. However, I needed to learn more about the sector and trading. I understood there were resourcefully books out there to educate me about the art of gambling, and I was correct. This afternoon trading book has it all.

Trading includes two important aspects: greed and fear. If you cannot overcome themyou lose. Bear in mind, the markets are not simple to predict. Being a beginner make matters worse; however, reading this book, you see a trend with immediate impact.

The book lays down strategies that provide you the confidence to take you through the slippery world of trading. And, finallyI hit my minimum balance and began conservatively trading away with all techniques that I could recall. I developed a good entry and exit plan, stuck to a 2% reduction rule.

Ranked #3 - The Best Way To Day Trade: A Detailed Guide To Day Trading How To Day Trade: A Thorough Guide to Day Trading  Read More This Book Is Now Ranked with 4.3 out of 5

Ross keeps things straightforward in his pieces. Having read a slew of books on day trading, that this one was the most precious. It mainly concentrates on risk management for novices and is not exaggerated. I will undoubtedly use this book as reference for insight during my quest to be successful in trading.

I've followed Ross on societal websites for a while and he provides excellent content. If some parts of the novel feel difficult to comprehend, just visit his YouTube channel and look for what is bothering you. You will most likely find a detailed movie on a particular topic. It feels like Ross is obviously a great instructor and I would suggest this book to upcoming and long term traders.

Position #4 - 1 Hour Trade: Make Money with One Simple Strategy The 1 Hour Trade: Make Money With One Simple Strategy, This Book Is Currently Ranked with 4.2 from 5

This book is exactly as advertised. There is a simple and efficient trading strategy that is outlined in the front to the rear. Along with the well outlined and detailed strategy, the author also adds important day trading psychology like money and hazard management. He also provides a fantastic metric for novices on candlesticks and quantity / price actions.

This publication is for daring, disciplined, and motivated newcomer in the day trading profession that's wanting to receive their feet wet on the market without getting ripped out too premature. It's a great read. As other reviewers have statedthis book is succinct and more importantly, in my mind, actionable. As a relatively new day trader, keeping my emotions in check is the toughest part.

Ranking #5 - Day Trading for Dummies Day Trading for Dummies​ This Novel Is Currently Ranked with 3.9 out of 5

Having read this usually means you wish to turn into a S-E-R-I-O-U-S trader, right? Then this is definitely one of the basic books for you. And in case you've already watched some tutorials in trading in Youtube, or have researched Yahoo Finance and Stocktwits then this book is going to be your next step.

Frankly, this a well thought out book, researching the psychology of human thoughts in trading, easy to comprehend and most of all, you'll learn all of the essentials in day trading. You ought to know when and where to invest -- so allow me to tell you this -- this book will be your very first investment, trading money for this irreplaceable knowledge that you will definitely need for achievement.

While there are numerous books on trading, this book is a very good read to understanding investing better.

Position #6 - Day Trading for a Living Day Trading For A Living This Novel Is Currently Ranked with 3.4 out of 5

This book will prove to be quite enlightening and helpful for someone who has a watch to appreciate and acknowledge the instructions this book supplies. The book might be hard to understand for a beginner. You will be able to find out about the contents of day trading and exactly what it requires to become a successful 10 percent of investors.

But, there is always space for improvement:

When you read the novel, it makes you think that the exemplified patterns to be money-making.

It does not warn you about the results if you conserve a stock into the afternoon of earnings. It might have been better if it was reviewed by an expert editor to the correction of speech and writing style. A significant topic of Support and Resistance levels for trading is lacking in the publication. All these next books are ones you want to avoid. They could have great reviews but they're fake. When you look closely you will noticed ideal 5 star reviews are abandoned within precisely the same time period. Whoever wrote these two publications below,"compensated" or"hired" individuals to make the book sound really good but in reality a waste of time to read. Waste of Time to Read - Day Trading - Fundamentals and Tips Day Trading - A Basics and Tips

This writer has numerous 5-star ratings, in such a short range, just a few days. I don't get it! Yes I bought and read the book and can be inconclusive. It's characterized by continuous monotonous sentences and grammatical mistakes that are rather embarrassing.

The significant reason for purchasing the book, the facts and figures on locating a great inventory, how and when to purchase or sell trades are not there. This book needs to be adjusted and its fundamentals checked.

This Novel is Currently Ranked 4.6 out of 5 Stars, but in only a two Star Ranking!

Waste of Time to Read - Day Trading - A Beginners Guide This Book is Currently Ranked 5 out of 5 Stars, but all the testimonials are fake! Day Trading: A Beginner's Guide on How to Trade. Check out this link

This book will tell you just how to get started, the way to make money, how to prevent losing money, and a lot of the technical advice you will want. Provides excellent trading strategies and tips on the best way to proceed and earn money. This is only one of those excellent books to have a strong basic knowledge on day trading.

Impressive book for the beginners. In this book you will find some basic details about day trading. The content of the publication was excellent and easy to follow. I read this novel and get this book so useful. I will highly recommended this book to all my friends. If you would like to start earning a serious income whilst working on your own, then you want to understand how to trade stocks and other securities at the financial markets. I expect from this book you will be benefited.

Another Reason to Read the #1 Ranked Day Trading Book: It is totally free with Amazon Kindle Unlimited or just $1.99! Here is a similar review on "How to Day Trade for a Living"

Related link: https://tradingstockmovies.blogspot.com/2019/10/best-day-trading-books.html

I cannot recommend this book enough! As a novice trader, I have been looking for information on trading. I found this book extremely informative rather than overly complicated for my ability level. Any negative reviews are most likely wrongly based on the assumption that trading is low risk. This book actually explains this point in great detail. I loved the writer's first book so much I have devoured his next one ! The next book was on more complex day trading approaches, presented in a means which was not overly `'salesy". The cherry on top for me personally was the fact that the author was receptive to email communication for any questions from his readers. Honestly, I don't know why anyone could give this book negative reviews. In my opinion, those reviews just say a lack of understanding of how trading really works. When I had the opportunity to meet Andrew I would love to tell him how grateful I am for his novels. The educational value of the material has made me a more educated day trader currently!

#day trading books

[amnewsfeed]

Welcome to my Tube Domination review!

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never used YouTube before or have ANY online marketing experience!

have NO email list, website, or products to sell!

feel CONFUSED and lost about what kind of videos to make!

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DON’T have any money to spend on traffic!

have a YouTube Channel but you barely get any views and make pennies per month on it!

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Tube Domination Summary Box $12.95

Overall

4.8

Effectiveness

Price

Ease of use

Support

Sending

User Review

5 (1 vote)

Summary

Product Name: Tube Domination

Creators: Keith Doherty, Wayne Crowe and Manny Hanif

Launch Date: April 8th, 2020

Launch Time: 10am EST

Bonus: Yes! See my custom bonuses at the end of this review.

Refund: 14 days money back guaranteed!

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Let’s watch the video below for more details!



Related: How To Get Free ‘Buyer’ Traffic To ANY Affiliate Offers (Secret Method)

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Tube Domination is taught by Keith Doherty, Manny Hanif and Wayne Crowe (left to right), all are seasoned affiliate marketers & traffic experts.

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Wayne Crowe also has a Mastermind Facebook Group that shares many tips & tricks to succeed with affiliate marketing, you can click here to join now for FREE.

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#3. What will you get inside Tube Domination?

Tube Domination includes over-the-shoulder step-by-step video training about how to use simple videos to make $1,000s on autopilot with FREE traffic from YouTube.

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Thanks for reading my Tube Domination review & I hope it’s useful for you! If you have any questions or need help, feel free to comment in the section below.

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The post Tube Domination Review (Wayne Crowe): Make Money w/ Simple Videos? appeared first on AMN Blog.

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[topicprinter]

Hey - Pat from StarterStory.com here with another interview.Today's interview is with Graham Cochrane of The Recording Revolution LLC, a brand that makes audio recording educationSome stats:Product: Audio Recording EducationRevenue/mo: $100,000Started: October 2009Location: TampaFounders: 1Employees: 1Hello! Who are you and what business did you start?My name is Graham Cochrane and I’m the founder of Recording Revolution, an online education company that teaches musicians how to record and produce their music to a professional level in a bedroom or home studio.I sell a variety of online courses and membership sites including Mixing University, a complete system for turning your home recordings into “radio-ready” songs that sound like they came from a big recording studio.Right now I’m generating about $1.2M a year in revenue with virtually no ad spend and in working only 5 hours a week.imageWhat's your backstory and how did you come up with the idea?I started Recording Revolution back in 2009 as an accident.I had just moved to Florida with my wife to help a friend start a church. I found a job at a financial startup, bought our first house and had our first baby. And then 5 months in I lost my job because the company I was working for ran out of money.My background was in music. I grew up singing, playing guitar, and writing/performing songs. I also went to college for audio recording and had created a side income as a freelance audio engineer, producing albums for bands and artists.When I lost my job I did my best to pick up work freelancing again, but I didn’t have much of a network since moving to Florida. So I decided to start blogging about what projects I was working on in the studio in hopes I might drive some traffic and potential client leads.What ended up happening instead was I developed an audience around my blog and YouTube channel who wanted to know more about how to record and mix music themselves (rather than hire me).They loved my content, and with each video and article that I released I build up more and more credibility in their eyes because they could put my material into action and see results.The problem was, it didn’t make any money. Plus we had to go on Food Stamps (government assistance) for an 18-month stretch because we were basically broke.imageTake us through the process of designing, prototyping, and manufacturing your first product.I needed to find a way to monetize my content. I considered ads but thought a more direct method would be to create a longer, more in-depth video training (as compared to my YouTube videos) and see if I could sell it to my people.That first product was called “Pro Tools Boot Camp” and it was a 3+ hour training on the most popular audio software in the world, Pro Tools.I screen recorded the videos, zipped them up in a folder, uploaded it to my $5/mo GoDaddy server, and built a free sales page with iWeb (anyone remembers that?!) with a simple PayPal “Buy Now” button that linked to that zipped file.I remember being on the other side of the country attending my grandfather’s funeral when later on that evening when checking email I saw a “You have payment” email from PayPal and it was my first sale of $45!That was a turning point for me as I realized someone was willing to pay for my video training!imageDescribe the process of launching the business.I didn’t have a formal “launch” - I just figured it out as I went.I started with a free WordPress theme and the economy hosting with GoDaddy for $5/mo. No logo either.Then I committed to blogging 2 times a week and posting one video to YouTube each week also. I was smart enough to focus on capturing email addresses and building a list from the start which gave me (and still to this day gives me) a curated group of warm leads to sell to.Between hosting, a custom URL, and some basic screen capture software it cost me a whopping $50 to start my business and build/launch my first product.Granted my first launch was pretty sad, amounting to just a few hundred dollars. But it was a start and it validated that I was on to something.imageSince launch, what has worked to attract and retain customers?My business growth strategy is stupidly simple. Content marketing, content marketing, and more content marketing.What this means is that I focus on putting out new free content (articles and videos) every week that center around my niche and market. Content is the best SEO and allows me to show up on Google and YouTube searches. It gets me discovered.For example, open up YouTube and type in the keywords “home studio” in the search bar and one of my most popular videos pops up in the first couple of results: “How To Build A Home Studio For Under $350”. It has over 2.4 million views and continues to send people to my email list daily.imageNow I’m not some SEO wizard, but I do know what “keywords” or buzz words are common in my niche and I try to make videos around those words or phrases.I also use YouTube analytics tools to discover what keywords people tend to find my videos with and do more content on those words.Then at the end (and sometimes beginning) of each video and post, I offer them something more valuable in exchange for their email address. Usually, it’s a PDF cheat sheet or checklist or guide. We call this a “lead magnet” as it attracts leads to your email list.Once on my list, they get put into an email funnel that offers even more free valuable training and promotes my products. This creates automated passive income each and every day.How are you doing today and what does the future look like?This type of business is insanely profitable because the costs are virtually zero. My biggest expenses beyond web hosting, email marketing, and my digital product delivery back end (I use Kajabi) are a few contractors that work for me. These include a part-time VA who handles customer service emails and posting of my content and in recent years a marketing manager who runs my promotions, launches, and helps write sales copy.My YouTube channel has over 500,000 subscribers. My email list is just over 250,000 strong (after recently cleansing 100,000 people), and my customer base is over 20,000 strong.The great thing is that as revenue has grown over the past 10 years from a few thousand dollars a year, to averaging over $1.2 million a year, my work hours have dropped significantly. I used to work 32 hours a week (I always take Fridays off). Now it only takes me 5 hours a week to run my business. Thanks in large part to eliminating much of what’s unnecessary (thank you Tim Ferriss!), the automated nature of selling digital products, and making a few part-time hires.All that extra time has allowed me to start a second business aimed at helping people build and grow their OWN online business with automatic income. I have a weekly video podcast at GrahamCochrane.com where I dive deep into how I run my business the Recording Revolution and what’s working now in the industry. It’s a lot of fun!Through starting the business, have you learned anything particularly helpful or advantageous?I’ve learned a lot over the years - mostly about myself. I’ve learned that I’m a bad delegator. I always want to do it all myself. But the moment I made my first part-time hire (my VA) things completely changed. I gained back so much of my time and sanity that it helped me focus on creating more content and products - and the business grew.I’ve also learned to keep things simple and keep my costs low. Content marketing and direct sales via email is such a powerful and simple method but it can be tempting to try and “do all the things” like you see everyone else doing. But I’ve learned to stay in my lane and focus on slow but steady growth rather than explosive and inconsistent growth.Too many of my peers have tried to focus on launching new things all the time and didn’t commit to the content strategy. They made money for a while, but then their biggest and best source of leads dried up and their businesses floundered.My relentless commitment to content on YouTube and elsewhere has helped me have a predictable stable income for years.What platform/tools do you use for your business?My absolute favorite tool for both of my businesses is Kajabi. It is THE best platform for selling digital products (courses, memberships) on the planet.It’s so complete of a platform that I’ve moved my entire Graham Cochrane website and email marketing over to it.Other tools I’ve used are ConvertKit, Mailchimp, and Wordpress.What have been the most influential books, podcasts, or other resources?Two books that have been game-changing for my business are:The Go-Giver (Bob Burg and John David Mann) and The 4-Hour Work Week (Tim Ferriss)The Go-Giver is how I run my business. The big idea is simple: the more you give, the more value you offer for free, the more attractive people will be to you and your brand and you will grow. It’s counterintuitive but I’ve seen it work time and time again.The 4 Hour Work Week is a convicting read because it challenges you to stop just doing “work for work’s sake” or just working to make a lot of money. It encourages you to build a business that serves your life, not the other way around.Advice for other entrepreneurs who want to get started or are just starting out?This might sound strange, but I personally believe that the biggest key to my business’s growth, beyond the grace of God, has been my commitment to generosity as my primary strategy.When you have an abundance mentality when generosity is your core belief...everybody wins!One of my favorite bible verses is…“One gives freely, yet grows all the richer; another withholds what he should give, and only suffers want…Whoever brings blessing will be enriched, and one who waters will himself be watered.” - Proverbs 11:24-25 (ESV)And in this age of digital content and social media, this verse becomes even more relevant. Why?Because generosity is attractive. It magnetizes you and draws people in. A generous person and a generous business will always grab people’s attention.And attention is the first step to business growth.So - be generous.Be generous by giving away free content every week. Be generous by overdelivering to your clients and customers. Be generous by giving a percentage of your profits away to charity each month. And even be generous with your competitors. Show them respect and honor them in your space.And then watch what happens.Where can we go to learn more?RecordingRevolution.comGrahamCochrane.comInstagramIf you have any questions or comments, drop a comment below!Liked this text interview? Check out the full interview with photos, tools, books, and other data.For more interviews, check out r/starter_story - I post new stories there daily.Interested in sharing your own story? Send me a PM

#/r/entrepreneur #reddit

[douchebagbrainwaves]

YOU GUYS I JUST THOUGHT OF THIS

It will certainly increase the gap in income, whether by stealing private fortunes, as feudal rulers used to do, at least for a small one, and they'll use it. But from what I've heard the founders didn't just give in and take whoever the VCs wanted. And it may be just as well that it usually takes a while to gain momentum. The problem here is social. Given an initial critical mass and enough time, a programming language unless it's also the scripting language of MIT.1 He said VCs told him this almost never happened. I'll predict a couple more things. Then you're saying that it's unjust that certain kinds of horrors are fascinating. David Hornik, Jessica Livingston, Robert Morris, Peter Norvig, Lisa Randall, Emmett Shear, Sergei Tsarev, and Stephen Wolfram for reading drafts of this.2 This leads to the phenomenon known in the Valley as the hot deal, where you have lots of running programs to look at users.

People could have been publishing online in 1995, and yet it was already massively popular.3 And that means, if you stop to think about that. By the 1530s, when Henry VIII distributed the estates of the defeated Anglo-Saxon nobles to his followers, the conflict was military. The more succinct the language, the shorter the program, and the same rule about risk applies there. Perhaps the optimal solution is for big companies not even to try to develop ideas in house, but simply to buy them. Working at something as a day job. If we want to fix the underlying causes.

I mean has a different shape from kid curiosity. There is some variation in wealth.4 But there is not much point.5 It seems like the type that matters most is imagination.6 The distribution of investors should mirror the distribution of wealth. The most naive version of which is: don't give up.7 But that doesn't sound right.8

Notes

If Apple's board hadn't made that blunder, they may prefer to work not just the location of the techniques for discouraging stupid comments have yet to find may be common in the 70s, moving to Monaco would only give you fifty times as much difference to a super-angel than a VC firm or they see you at all. My point is due to fixing old bugs, and you need, maybe 50% to 100% more, while we can teach startups a lot more frightening in those days, but no more unlikely than it was actually a computer.

What he meant, I have to do is not just on the way to tell how serious potential investors are also much cheaper when bought in bulk. I thought there wasn't, because you're throwing off your own.

August 2002. My feeling with the exception of the hugely successful startups looked when they were taken back in July 1997 was 1. They then grant the founders gained from running Kazaa helped ensure the success of their works are lost.

Incidentally, this phenomenon myself: hotel unions are responsible for more.

So far the only reason you're even considering the other cheek skirts the issue; the trend has been rewritten to suit present fashions. For example, being offered large bribes by Spain to make money from it, is this someone you want to stay in a limited way, except that no one knows how many computers the worm infected, because the median total compensation, including principal and venture partner.

Some genuinely aren't.

Buy an old-fashioned idea. And of course it was more expensive, a lot of legal business.

VCs buy, because it lets them bring the Internet.

#automatically generated text #Markov chains #Paul Graham #Python #Patrick Mooney #mass #Robert #bulk #reason #location #hotel #rule #Sergei #fashions #founders #partner #Livingston #variation #difference #nobles #money #example

[themoneybuff-blog]

Questions About Car Seats, Leftovers, Medical Insurance, Budget Brands, and More!

Whats inside? Here are the questions answered in todays reader mailbag, boiled down to summaries of five or fewer words. Click on the number to jump straight down to the question. 1. Early or late retirement contributions? 2. Purchases for infrequent use 3. Used car seats? 4. Excessive leftovers 5. Friends want me to spend 6. Value of one bag living 7. Buying a house on $35K 8. How to avoid drive-thrus 9. Medical insurance difficulties 10. Budget brands? 11. Starting career advice 12. Thoughts on taekwondo One of the most enjoyable parts of writing this mailbag column is the wide variety of comments and questions I get from readers. I usually try to keep the stuff I choose for the mailbag at least somewhat within the realm of personal finance, maybe slipping in one or two questions or comments a week that arent related to the topic, but I get quite a lot of great stuff from readers that covers completely different topics that I just cant reasonably fit into the mailbag. For example, just in the last week or two, Ive received the following notes from readers: A reader wrote in to talk about the joys of playing Magic: the Gathering with her son and how they were building Commander decks together. A reader wrote in to encourage me to pick up some of the writings of the philosopher Byung-Chul Han, particularly his essays Psychopolitics and The Scent of Time (which Im currently reading). A reader has been trying to get me to debate him concerning a number of hot button political issues. A reader has been writing to me consistently for weeks asking for step-by-step help in getting a batch of homemade kombucha to work. A reader invited me to his dynasty fantasy football league. Thats just over the last several days. Honestly, I love this kind of thing, because it represents human connection. Theres a sharing of ideas and interests and a sharing of concern behind all of it that goes way past merely writing about financial issues, and it means a lot to me, even if its not fodder for the mailbag. Speaking of the mailbag, here are this weeks questions. Q1: Early or late retirement contributions? Is it better to contribute to a Roth IRA early in the year or as late as possible? I have money set aside for my 2019 Roth contribution but I dont know if I should do it now or wait. Brian Unless theres some specific reason thats unique to your situation that points to waiting, you should put those savings in there as soon as possible. The longer the money is invested, the more time you have for compound interest to work in your favor. Having said that, investment markets are unpredictable. Theres always a chance that right after you put your money in, the markets dip. Remember that this could happen no matter when you put your money in there. You could put your money in now and immediately see a dip, or you could wait until next February to put it in and immediately see a dip. The difference is that, on average, its much more likely that the investment youre putting your money into will go up in value over that period. If you wait, its very likely that youre going to miss out on growth. Put your retirement money away in retirement accounts as soon as you can. Dont sit around holding them, because youre usually doing nothing more than missing out on growth if you do that. Q2: Purchases for infrequent use Im considering purchasing a pair of bowling shoes. I only bowl once or twice a year, but it seems like its a wise investment since I could get a pair of perfectly good bowling shoes for around $25 instead of paying $3 or so each time to rent them. How do you view rarely used purchases like this that, while adding to the stuff you own, will eventually pay for themselves? Adam My philosophy on purchases like these is similar to yours. I try to look at the total cost of ownership of the item over an extended but still reasonable period of time, like five years, and I figure out which is going to cost less. I also consider how frequently Ill actually use the item, and it basically has to be annually at the very least and preferably much more frequent than that. That type of thinking requires full honesty to be valuable. So, in your situation, is it cheaper to rent shoes for $3 a pop twice a year for five years or buy a pair of shoes for $25 once? Well, the cost for rental over that period is $30, so Id probably swing toward buying a pair, assuming that Im bowling twice a year. If you assume that its actually going to be much less than twice a year, youre going to be better off renting. I usually use a five year measure for calculations like this, because I figure its pretty hard to predict accurately what my life will be like beyond that time threshold and its also probably a reasonable guess as to the wear and tear that an item can take. Usually, with a five year calculation, its obvious whether its a good move or not. Again, in this situation, those bowling shoes arent going to be worn out after ten wears, so its likely you will be able to continue wearing them at that point or theyll have some minor secondhand value. This pushes the pendulum even more toward buying them. Q3: Used car seats? I am expecting in November. My husband and I are starting to pick up baby items from FB Marketplace and Craigslist. Whenever a carseat is listed on Marketplace someone always comments that you shouldnt buy used carseats because theyre not safe. How are used carseats not safe? Amy A carseat is one of the few baby options I wouldnt buy used. The reason is simple: a big part of whats protecting that baby when theyre in the carseat is plastic, and you dont know how that plastic has been treated. Theres some chance that the plastic has become brittle and could easily crack or break in a severe impact, just when you need it the most. This can happen, for example, if a carseat has been left in the sun too much over the course of years. Its not an issue of negligence its an issue of you not knowing the history of that carseat. It may have had years of sunlight exposure, rendering the protection that it offers your child much weaker. Most baby items are fine to buy used clothes and baby monitors and things like that. Those arent things that will cause calamity if they fail and its usually obvious if theyre doing their job or not. A car seat, though, is something you should invest in. 99.9% of the time, it wont matter, but 0.1% of the time, it matters more than anything else and youll never, ever want to skimp on that situation. Q4: Excessive leftovers On any given night we will have 2-7 people at our house for dinner. By default we cook for 7 but that means that many nights we have a ton of leftovers. We eat leftovers for lunch every day but they still get tossed a lot. We cant give them to the food pantry either. Ideas? Andy My first suggestion would be to simply have a leftover buffet night for dinner twice a week or so. On, say, Wednesdays and Saturdays, just pull out all leftovers, put them on the table, and let people assemble their own plates of leftovers and heat them up (or heat up the hot items before putting them on the buffet). That way, the leftovers get consumed directly and you have a free dinner. Another suggestion is to frequently make meals and side dishes that are easy to remix into another meal if you have a low turnout. For example, if you make a bunch of spaghetti, you can save it for two nights and then mix in a few additional spices, put it in a greased 9 by 13 pan, put a couple cups of mozzarella and provolone shredded cheese on top, and bake it for 30-45 minutes, covered for the first half, to make a nice spaghetti bake. We also often have plain vegetables as a side dish and save the leftovers to make quick soups later on, for example. A final suggestion is that on nights where you have a low turnout, simply prep leftover plates for the next night and have the same thing for dinner again, or prepare a different dinner the next night for just the two who ate the night before. I dont think you need to feel obligated to have a fresh meal on the table for whoever happens to show up each night. Q5: Friends want me to spend Im 23 and got a nice job out of college paying $45K per year. Several of my friends from college are in the same area and have jobs as well so its fun to hang out with them, but it feels like they want to blow their income as fast as possible. They go out drinking and to clubs constantly, upgrade their phones all the time, ride around in Ubers when they have cars, and throw money at stupid stuff. I want to get rid of my student loan debt and start saving for a house and Im already contributing to retirement so I can get out of this as young as possible. Its not like Im avoiding fun but theres a ton of stuff to do that doesnt cost $50 or $100 for an evening. When I suggest anything else other than clubs or an expensive restaurant, I get ignored. Do you have any suggestions? Amy Find new friends? I mean, that sounds fairly cold, but it sounds like your values are diverging from the values that your friends hold, or perhaps they were always divergent and the income just exposed it. While I dont mind being acquaintances with people with drastically different lifestyles than my own, I have found its far more pleasant and easier to have close friends who have similar values and lifestyles to my own. That way, Im not pushed to overspend constantly just to spend time with my friends. I have been in situations where it felt like I had to pay some kind of admission fee (in the form of going out when I didnt want to) just to hang out with a friend and if I wasnt willing to do that, that person wouldnt hang out with me. That just isnt worth it. Id suggest digging into activities that you feel internally interested in doing. Find groups in your community that match up well with that by using things like Meetup and there youll find people who are also interested in what you happen to be internally interested in. Get involved in those groups. Youll find its not too hard to build friendships that way. Q6: Value of one bag living I found your post on one bag living to be interesting but not practical. Its not like more than maybe 0.001% of your readers will actually ever do it. What is the practical value of such an article? Ollie The practical value of it is that it really shows you how few items you actually need to have a happy and comfortable life, and when you realize that, you begin to realize how much extra unnecessary stuff you have and how much that stuff is costing you, both in terms of the stuff itself and the space youre paying for to store all of that stuff. Lets say, for example, that you decided to try it for a month. You packed a big duffel bag full of stuff and aimed to live solely out of that bag for that month. During the month, almost everything you use comes out of that bag other than maybe a few kitchen items, you really dont use anything else in your home. At the end of the month, youre left asking yourself what the point of all of that other stuff is. Why have any of it if youre able to have a great life without touching it? Why have shelves full of books and DVDs you never touch? Why have a television if you have a good life not watching it? This is likely to lead you to start downsizing your possessions, recouping some money along the way, and its also likely to lead you to question almost all of your physical purchases. If you keep going in that direction, youll find that you likely have excessive living space and can easily be satisfied with a smaller home or apartment, and if you downsize that, then youre on the way to some serious financial improvement in your life, as youre losing far less money to utilities, insurance, property taxes, and so on. Q7: Buying a house on $35K I am a single woman with a four year old child from a previous marriage; the father is not involved and avoids paying child support. We live in a small apartment in [a large city with a moderate cost of living]. I make $35K per year. My mom lives about five miles away and takes care of my son when Im working and hes not in preschool as she has a pension thats enough for her to live on because my father died in the workplace. I would like to be able to afford a small house for us and get out of this apartment building before hes too old because theres kind of a rough culture of teenage boys here. I would like to be in a house in four years. I have no debts and am saving about $200 a month for emergencies. Carrie First of all, Id contact a lawyer and do what you can to get child support. The cost of supporting your child should not be borne solely by you and hes legally obligated to provide financial help here even if hes uninvolved. Second of all, $200 a month in savings thats also used as an emergency fund isnt adequate to get to where you want to go in four years. I looked into your area and a small starter home is going to run you in the $300K range now and will probably be closer to $350K by the time you want to buy. 20% of $350K is $70K. If youre saving $200 a month, youll get to about $10K in four years if there are no emergencies. To get to $70K in four years, you need to be saving around $1,500 a month and have no emergencies that tap that money. Considering that youre making about $3,000 a month before taxes, thats an extremely difficult proposition. Thus, to make it to your target, youre going to have to do some radical things. The first thing I would do is sit down with your mother and discuss the option of cohabitation for a few years, with you splitting up the housing costs. If she could move into your apartment or you two could move into her dwelling and its a tenable situation for a few years, youll both save a mint. If youre paying $1,000 a month in rent and it suddenly drops to $500 a month, theres $500 a month toward savings, and probably more than that because youll have lower utility bills and you can more easily share food costs. You may find that after you buy that starter home, it may make sense to have your mother continue to live with you to keep costs manageable going forward, at least for a while. If you can swing something like that, use a lot of smart frugal tactics like sticking with store brand items when shopping, get on that child support issue, and keep working at your career to move toward a better salary, you can make this work. Without those kinds of big changes, this probably isnt a realistic goal. Q8: How to avoid drive-thrus How do you stop relying on the convenience of drive-thrus? I understand that its way cheaper to make meals at home but when I can just go to a drive-thru and get a quick meal and have it eaten before I even get home or eat it right when I walk in the door and theres no cleanup because I just toss the wrappers, its hard to convince myself to make a big mess making a meal at home. Leon There are a few good strategies for solving this problem that work well for different people. I suggest trying one for at least 30 days, see if it clicks with you or merely causes frustration, and either stick with it if it works or move on to another if it doesnt. First, try simply packing a meal for yourself at home before you leave in a small cooler. Make something simple that you like a sandwich and some baby carrots and a drink or whatever. Pack the individual items in reusable containers and put them in something insulated with an ice pack to keep it cool. Take that meal with you when you go out and save it at your desk or in a work fridge until youre ready to leave, then eat that on the way home. You can do the meal prep the night before while watching a television show and if you use reusable containers, cleanup is really just a matter of popping stuff in the dishwasher and wiping off the table (which youd need to do anyway). If you want, you can designate Fridays as eat out days and keep it as a treat for yourself for getting through the week. Another thing I strongly suggest is to simply get better at cooking at home. Cooking seems very difficult at first and even easy things like scrambled eggs feel like a giant mess and a big time and energy investment, but once you get more practiced, it stops feeling so challenging. Start by making really simple meals that you like grilled cheese sandwiches or scrambled eggs or spaghetti. Another strategy is to cook things in advance, make individual meals out of them in reusable containers, and keep them in the fridge. For example, you could make a huge batch of spaghetti one night and pack three or four individual meals of spaghetti with a breadstick in resealable containers in the fridge. Then, you can take them to work with you and youll also know that one is just waiting for you when you get home. Yet another strategy is to use a slow cooker. Start a simple dump meal before you leave (a dump meal means you just dump several ingredients in there and turn it on low) and youll have a hot home-cooked meal waiting for you when you get home. Slow cookers are great for stews, chili, soups, and simple casseroles; it can also make a mean pot roast. The goal of all of these things is to either put something in your hands directly so that youre not tempted to stop or have something at home waiting for you so youre not tempted to stop. Q9: Medical insurance difficulties I am covered by [a major medical insurer] through my workplace. A few months ago, I had a procedure done that my doctors office informed me would be fully covered by my insurance. They filed this with the insurance and the insurance company came back saying that the procedure wasnt medically necessary and wouldnt cover it, so my doctor is now billing me for it at the tune of $30K. I dont even know where to start. Should I contact a lawyer? Petra Without seeing the bills and documentation, I cant give you full advice on what to do. However, my first step would be to document every single detail that you can recall about this entire process, including dates and what you were told by both your doctors office and insurance. If you have any supporting documents, such as receipts and printed information about the procedure or about the costs, thats all valuable here. Then, I would go through the process of appealing this claim with your insurer, providing a copy of all of that documentation. An appeal should definitely be your first action. If you find that your appeal is denied, you should then discuss the matter with your doctor and attempt to get their bill reduced. If youre still finding that youre paying an excessive amount, then I would take all of this documentation to a lawyer and get legal help. It very much sounds like you were given inaccurate guidance from a doctors office and a lawyer can usually help here. Q10: Budget brands? Are there any budget brands you trust for making high quality stuff? Meaning brands that are cheap in price but the quality of their stuff is good? Darren The store brands at most department stores and grocery store chains fit that bill. For the vast majority of product types, the store brand is as good as most of the name brand options. They might not beat some of the really high end premium versions of those products, but the store brand is usually as good as 80% of similar items on the shelf. For things like charging cables and basic electronics like computer mice or keyboards, Ive found that Amazons generic brand, Amazon Basics, is really good for the price. For many different kinds of smaller electronic items, like external batteries for charging devices on the go or headphones or things of that nature, I strongly trust Anker. If theres an Anker option for a small electronic device, youre probably getting great bang for the buck with it. Those are the ones that immediately come to mind as brands that I strongly trust that consistently provide good bang for the buck across a wide variety of products. Q11: Starting career advice My oldest son is about to graduate from college with a degree in electrical engineering. I am collecting career advice from some people I respect to pass along to him. What advice would you give to a fresh college graduate in a technical field today? Robert First of all, treat the first decade of your career as an opportunity to build skills and relationships above chasing salary. A killer resume ten years from now will be worth a lot more than earning an extra $5K or $10K right out of the gate. If one job pays a little more but feels like a dead end, while the other job pays a little less but feels like its overflowing with opportunities and ways to build relationships, take the latter job in the first decade of your career. Second, if your workplace offers a 401(k) plan, take advantage of it immediately and contribute as much as you can stand. You will never regret this. Just do this and then start off with smaller take-home checks theyll still be a lot more than what you had in college. Pay yourself first. Third, no matter how tough a situation is, dont burn bridges, even if it would feel good. If youre moving on from a position, do it as gently as possible and be as positive and flexible as you can on your way out. Finally, eat healthy, get some exercise, get plenty of sleep, and dont work too many hours. If you dont do those things, youll be far less productive during your work time, the quality of work you produce will be lower, and youll have a harder time picking up new skills. If your workplace is obsessed with 80 hour workweeks, carve out as much of that 80 hours toward self care and rest that you can reasonably get away with. Q12: Thoughts on taekwondo I was wondering if you could share your thoughts on taekwondo from the perspective of both a parent of a student and as a participant with an eye toward cost. Is it worth it? Do your kids get value out of it? How about yourself? Brenda I attend a local taekwondo school with the rest of my family. It was an activity that my two oldest children wanted to try and the family plan isnt much more expensive than just the two of them participating, so when our family schedule lined up and our youngest was old enough, we all joined. In effect, our third family member was half price and the rest of us are effectively going for free, and the price has actually gone down as some family members have reached black belt rank (and those who havent are at a belt rank approaching black). First of all, if youre new to martial arts of any kind, its something you should shop around for. Any city of any size likely has a few martial arts schools; a larger city likely has some dedicated taekwondo schools with branches in various locations. Different schools offer different prices and different philosophies. Taekwondo is a martial art thats focused on fast, high kicking. That means that it really works hard on agility and balance. Theres also an emphasis on forms, which are sequences of kicks and other movements that are memorized and done from memory, which challenges a persons memory while physically exerting themselves. Our familys interest in martial arts lies much more in the realm of self improvement, character building, self defense, and fitness rather than training to fight. There are definitely martial arts schools that are very focused on simply training to fight, preparing people for things like mixed martial arts. Theres nothing wrong with that, but its not what Sarah or I were looking for in a school. We wanted a school where the merit wasnt in whether you defeat someone in a fight, but whether youre working hard and genuinely improving yourself so that youre better at the techniques, better in all around fitness, and better in character than you were the day before. Again, I have nothing against a school focused on fight-focused training, but its just not what Im looking for or what I would direct my children toward until theyre old enough to make those kinds of choices for themselves. Perhaps someday theyll take what theyve learned and move in that direction, and Im fine with that. When my oldest son and daughter began expressing a genuine interest in taekwondo, we shopped around for local schools that offered dedicated youth programs and were focused on a self-improvement type of martial art philosophy, and we found one that we liked that had classes near us, and over time, we all joined up. I think it has genuinely helped our children improve their ability to focus, their ability to overcome challenges, their character, and most definitely their ability to defend themselves and get out of a threatening situation. As a parent, Im thrilled with the impact taekwondo has had on them. As for myself, I joined because I agree in a deep philosophical way with the goals and direction of the school, as well as the fact that I was looking for a fitness program for myself and an opportunity to mutually encourage my family to be more fit. This hits all of those marks and with family rates, its pretty inexpensive. If you divide our session fees by five, theres absolutely no way any of us could be in a sport or a fitness program at these rates. If someone is interested in taekwondo or martial arts in general, Id start by figuring out why you want to do it. What are you hoping to get out of it, or what do you want your child to get out of it? Self-discipline? Fitness? Self-defense? Character? What are the one or two things you want most for yourself or for your child that you hope martial arts can provide? Start from there and shop around at a lot of schools in your area. Theyll all have different philosophies and centers of focus some of them will line up well with your own goals and philosophies, while others will go in a different direction (not wrong or bad, just different). Find some that match what you want, price compare them, and give one a try for a session and see if its right for you. Got any questions? The best way to ask is to follow me on Facebook and ask questions directly there. Ill attempt to answer them in a future mailbag (which, by way of full disclosure, may also get re-posted on other websites that pick up my blog). However, I do receive many, many questions per week, so I may not necessarily be able to answer yours. https://www.thesimpledollar.com/questions-about-car-seats-leftovers-medical-insurance-budget-brands-and-more/

[rebeccahpedersen]

How Do You Evaluate A Multi-Plex For Investment?

TorontoRealtyBlog

Well first of all, if you’re looking at buying a multiplex for investment – good on you, you’ve clearly done something right!

But believe it or not, there’s serious competition for multiplexes – those properties with 3-or-more dwellings.

Cap rates are down, demand is high, and investors are accepting lower returns in order to get into the market.

Let me outline nine criteria that a would-be investor must consider, at the bare minimum, for any multiplex purchase…

Should I outline these in order?

Sure, I could try.

And by try, I mean that every investor has a different set of criteria, and my #4 might be somebody else’s #7.

Of course, you might have a #10, #11, and #12 to add to the list.

And all the while, many of these points go hand-and-hand.

So let me start from the top, where I find most of my clients see it…

–

1) Yield

This should be at the top of the list, no?

Some people would put #2 on the list, but I don’t think that’s smart in this market.

When you buy a stock, what are you looking for?

Well, I suppose that’s a terrible example, since everybody wants to watch the stock go up, up, and up, and they’re looking at the appreciation potential, with the “buy low, sell high” mentality.

But in the good ole days, investors were looking for dividends!

How much is the stock paying you to own it?  You’re a shareholder; you own a portion of the company, so how much of the company’s profit are you receiving?

Times have changed, both in terms of the stock market, and the real estate market.

Ask the man on the street, and he’s looking to buy a stock for $10, and sell it for $15.  But ask the pension funds, and they’re looking for a steady, consistent, predictable, safe return.  They’re the savviest of investors, and they’re looking for a 6% return in perpetuity.

When it comes to investing in real estate, my personal belief is that if you forecast a zero percent appreciation, and the investment makes sense to you based on yield, then the investment will pay out and exceed your expectations.

There’s that old adage in real estate: “When is the best time to sell a piece of real estate?”

The answer: “Never.”

Life happens, situations change, and more often than not, even a long-term investor will need or want to sell.

But on a long-enough time horizon, the appreciation is the icing on the cake, and where the investor makes, by far, the most money.

But at the onset, the short and immediate-term numbers have to make sense.

What does that mean?  What kind of numbers are we looking at in this market?

I see multi-unit dwellings selling at 3% cap rates, and I can’t make sense of it.

When I got into real estate 5.5-6% cap rates on multi-unit properties were the norm.  Over time, those figures have dropped, and it’s up to the investor to decide what works.

2) Appreciation Potential

I suppose the “yield” section was just the preamble for some people.

Every time I talk about yield, and give the example of the dividend-paying-stock, people tell me, “This isn’t 1880; you’re not buying paper-shares of the Great Pacific.”

Fair point.  Times change.

But I’m conservative by nature, and when it comes to buying multi-unit dwellings for long-term investing, I would argue until I’m blue in the face that you have to consider appreciation potential after yield.

Over the last few years, it’s been easy to refute my argument.

I’ve told this story before, so you long-time readers might remember it…

Back in 2010, I had an investor-client in from Los Angeles, who was looking at purchasing a couple of 4-5 unit dwellings.

He was primarily concerned with yield, and the financing ability of the properties (which we’ll explore below), and truly believed, despite his desire to buy, that prices in Toronto were likely headed for a dip.

We found a property in Queen West that was perfect, and hit on several of the other points listed below as well.

It was around a 5.25% cap rate at the list price, and although it would be slightly cash-flow negative each month based on his downpayment, he was willing to consider it.

The property didn’t have an “offer night” as is the custom today, but it still received four offers, and sold for $100,000 over the list price.

My client told me, “This makes no sense.  This is simply the greater fool theory; whoever is buying this property, is expecting to sell it to somebody else down the line for more.”

He wasn’t wrong, logically.

But in practice, he was proven tragically incorrect.

That property, listed at $1.2M, that sold for $1.3M, recently sold for over $2M.

Now tell me again – what’s more important: yield or appreciation potential?

And am I naive to say “appreciation is just icing on the cake?”

3) Location

How can you have any list about real estate evaluation criteria without location?

Location is all part and parcel of the overall evaluation.

Some investors would choose a superior location over a better return, and I wouldn’t disagree.

Earlier this year, I sent a client the listing for a turnkey 4-plex in Mimico, with a rare 4.8% cap rate, what I perceived to be below-market rents, and a copy of the inspection – which looked fantastic.

My client responded with a 3-word email: “It’s in Mimico.”

Enough said.

I liked the income, I liked potential for more income, and I loved the condition of the property.  But he would have rather had a property with a 3.5% cap rate, steps to Trinity-Bellwoods, and at the risk of sounding cliche, “To each, their own.”

Toronto is a rapidly-growing city, both in terms of the population and the urban sprawl, but also in the eyes of the world.

For investors thinking long-term, the best appreciation will undoubtedly be found with those properties that are closest to the city centre, as is the case with every world-class city.  But those properties will have substantially lower yields.

It’s up to the buyer to decide where the best value, for he or she, ultimately lays.

4) Condition

Have you ever looked at the “financials” for an income-property listed on MLS?

It’s hilarious.

You’re lucky if you get property taxes, water, and gas.  Sellers and listing agents love to pretend like electricity and insurance don’t exist.  They’ll be really quick to tell you about the $25 per month the property generates in basement coin-laundry, but they’ll n-e-v-e-r detail the overall cost of ongoing maintenance, upkeep, and repairs.

Part of the reason why many Toronto real estate investors have turned toward condos in the past few years (aside from the lower cost) is because of the maintenance of an 80-year-old 4-plex.  You can do the most thorough of home inspections, and find the property is in A++ shape, but you’ll still be opening your wallet for something, every few months.

As with everything else above, the condition of the property has to be taken into consideration with the other criteria.  You might be willing to pay more, and accept a lower yield, for a true “turnkey” income property.  Or you might decide to pay less, do the work yourself, and hope to add value.

Of course, you can always combine this with #5…

5) Market Rents

Just a brief point to make here, but an important one.

Many properties are being sold with tenants attached, who are leasing at rents well below fair market value.

If properties are sold based on capitalization rates, those rates are taking current rents into consideration, and those rents are below FMV, then it goes without saying that the property is under-valued.

Yes, it can be difficult to get a tenant out so you can raise the rent, and it’s going to become tougher thanks to the Ontario Fair Housing Plan.  But tenants don’t stay forever.

And if you have a property that needs work and has below market rents, when the tenants vacate, you can put work into the property to increase the rents, and add value at the same time.

6) Size & Scope

What do you for a living?

What’s your personal life like?

Tell me about your family…

Now tell me if you would be able to manage a 5-unit property that’s a 45-minute drive in traffic, with whatever knowledge, skill, and capability you currently possess.

Buying a 5-plex is one thing, but managing it is another.

There’s the ongoing maintenance and upkeep, the supervising of tenants, the collection (and chasing…) of rents, and the search for new tenants.

Savvy investors know how to make the property, and the tenants, work for them.  Many landlords will offer a tenant a nominal sum (start with the basement tenant and $30…) to take out the garbage every week.  Many landlords will “allow” the tenants to paint, provided it’s in a neutral colour, and done well.  I put “allow” in quotes, of course, because it’s value-add for the landlord to have a fresh coat of paint, and yet many tenants believe it’s a privilege.

Some investors do this full time – they buy, manage, and maintain multi-unit dwellings.  They have the time, and the experience, to do so.

Other investors have no clue what they’re doing, and they either know that in advance, or find out very quickly!

The fee to manage a property varies drastically, but you’re looking at 5% of gross rents as a starter.  If you can’t handle the size and scope of the property, then factor that cost into your initial financial analysis.

7) Ability To Finance

There’s no hard-and-fast rule on this, but most mortgage brokers will tell you:

4-Units – residential financing

5-Units – there might be a lender out there that will provide residential financing

6-Units – this is commercial, without a doubt

I’ve had clients in the past purchase 5-unit properties and obtain residential financing, but lending criteria changes like the direction of the wind.  More often than not, it depends on which lender you’re talking to, and which underwriter is handling the file.  I’ve seen the 5-unit properties fall into a serious grey area over the years, as some underwriters will lend with residential criteria, and some won’t.

And keep in mind – we’re talking about downpayment and rate!

To buy a 3-plex, you simply need to meet the minimum downpayment criteria (used to be 5%, now it’s 20% for a “second property” subject to some exceptions), and you can obtain a current residential rate, ie. a 5-year, fixed-rate of 2.49%.

When you get into 6-plex and above, you may be required to put down 35%, and the rates could be into the 4-6% range.  Yes, that’s a wide range, but as I said – it depends on your mortgage broker, and which lenders and underwriters they’re talking to.

Going from a 4-unit property, with a 20% down payment, and 2.49% interest rates, to 6-unit property, and a 35% down payment, with a 4.49% interest rate, can be tough to swallow.

But keep in mind, not all “investors” are taking on debt.  Some are buying in cash, some take on debt because it’s cheap (ie. 4.49% is less than their rate of expected return in other investment vehicles), and thus it’s not really a “problem” per se for those looking to buy 6-plexes and up.

You might also argue the yield is better as you climb in the number of units.  Clearly a duplex offers a lower rate of return than a 6-plex, not only because there’s more demand, but because it’s cheaper, easier to afford for the average investor, and thus the price gets bid up.

Ultimately the ability to finance will come into play for an overwhelming majority of investors, and so you might actually start with this.

8) Tenants

Wow, we’re really starting to see how all of these points are intertwined.

The size and scope of the property, combined with the location, combined with the market rents, will ultimately dictate what type of tenants you’ve got.

An investor-client of mine once told me, “Basement apartments aren’t worth the hassle.”

I asked what he meant, and he said, “They’re not worth the $600 they bring in each month.”

Now, this was a long time ago, hence the $600 figure.  Maybe the hassle has been lessened over the years as rents have increased.

But he elaborated in saying, “Ask yourself – what kind of person rents a sh!tty basement apartment for $600 per month?  The lowest common denominator of society, that THAT is now one of my partners in my financial endeavor.”

Sensitivities aside, he might not be wrong.

I’m sure some of the most wonderful people in the world have rented basement apartments, but on the whole, the person looking for the absolutely lowest-priced rental in the city does so not out of desire, but out of necessity.

This client went on to tell me that most of the tenants he’s had renting basements have been troublesome, sometimes in terms of their character and how they treat the unit, but primarily in terms of their ability to service the rent.

Personally, I think if you’re an investor running multi-unit dwellings, there’s a learning curve, and you’ll figure out how to deal with tenants – at every rent level.  And with basement apartments going for $800, $900, or $1,000 in the city, who can turn that kind of money down?

Ultimately, the type of property you have, plus the location, will determine what kind of tenants you get.

And if you’re looking at a property that is tenanted, you want to know everything you can about the tenants in place.

I’ve seen some really sharp listing agents put together info packages on the tenants themselves – their income, occupation, FICO scores, duration of tenancy, and frequency of payments.  That goes a long way toward marketing the property to investors.

9) Proximity To Transit

Perhaps this falls into the “location” category, but having already flushed that out, I think this deserves its own point.

Transit in Toronto is just God-awful, as we all know.

And without generalizing too much here, dare I say that many people who rent, also take transit.

The market rent will be affected by the proximity to transit, the yield will be affected by the market rent, and once again, we see how these points are intertwined.

You could suggest that proximity to parks, schools, retail, etc. bear consideration, but I don’t put them anywhere near the level of importance as transit.  This is my generalization – about renters taking transit, and you can disagree if you want to.  But I’m speaking from experience, with what my clients see out there.

–

You’re probably looking for a point #10, but this list isn’t meant to be well-rounded; it’s meant to point out the most important criteria when evaluating a multiplex for investment.

Somewhere within these points lays a happy medium for the investor.

And as we know, every investor is different.

The post How Do You Evaluate A Multi-Plex For Investment? appeared first on Toronto Real Estate Property Sales & Investments | Toronto Realty Blog by David Fleming.

Originated from http://ift.tt/2slZ4bE

[douchebagbrainwaves]

OK, I'LL TELL YOU YOU ABOUT STARTUP

Every audience is an incipient mob, and a large class of startups that need less than they used to. The standard excuse, back when C was the default language, was that Lisp was too slow.1 Someone who was strong-willed person stronger-willed.2 Only a few do so far, but I found that the Bayesian filter did the same thing for me, and moreover discovered of a lot of programmers have started to see Apple as evil. They would seem to have been headed down the wrong path. Fundraising is still terribly distracting for startups. 97 probability of the containing email being a spam. 96.

Start small. Using that heuristic, I'll predict a couple more things. And a particularly overreaching one at that, with fussy tastes and a rigidly enforced house style. He had all of us roaring with laughter. Mathematicians don't answer questions by working them out on paper the way schoolchildren are taught to. A deals per partner per year. Make it really good for code search, for example.3 A good programmer working intensively on his own code can hold it in his mind the way a mathematician holds a problem he's working on. Still, anyone who proposes a plan for spam filtering has to be replaced with a new from-address, so you can't risk false positives by filtering mail from unknown addresses especially stringently.4 I know this may sound oversensitive, but if we had such a thing is to treat individuals as interchangeable parts. I had stopped believing that.5

Not a couple million.6 Business people in Silicon Valley and the whole world, for that matter have speculative meetings all the time.7 A rounds?8 You'll be better off if you operate like Columbus and just head in a general westerly direction. The whole site was organized like a funnel, directing people to the test drive. Domain names differ from the rest of the text in a non-German email in that they often consist of several words stuck together. Thanks to Sam Altman, David Greenspan, Aaron Iba, Jessica Livingston, Robert Morris, Peter Norvig, Lisa Randall, Emmett Shear, Sergei Tsarev, and Stephen Wolfram for reading drafts of this. 01 describe 0.

Irony of ironies, it's the computer Steve Huffman wrote Reddit on.9 The whole Viaweb site was made with our software, even though the latter depends more on natural ability.10 But I don't wish I were a better writer? Don't try to construct the future like a building, because your current blueprint is almost certainly mistaken. That's what these ideas say to us. This pattern is repeated over and over, and it's all about the ratio. Recognizing nonspam features may be more accurate to describe a market as a degenerate case—as what you get by default when organization isn't possible.11 Why are programmers so fussy about their employers' morals?12 But the wrong kind of interruption can wipe your brain in 30 seconds. Perhaps the optimal solution is for big companies not even to try to do it will have an individual spam probability of.

They get away with maltreating developers, in the short term, because if everything else in the email is spam.13 It would be a bad sign if they weren't; it would mean you were being too easy on them. When we were working on our own startup, back in the 90s. And strangely enough, the better, because any measure that constrains spammers will tend to displace suits whose skills lie more in raising money from LPs.14 In fact, if you restrict the sales pitches spammers can make, you will inevitably tend to put them out of your incoming spam. Of our current concept of an organization work differently from the rest. The other reason Apple should care what programmers think of them is that when you sell a platform, developers make or break you.

One of the more surprising things I've noticed while working on Y Combinator is not to think of programs at least partially in the language they're using to write them.15 Arguably it's a sign of weakness. In some business relationships, you do it right, you only have to filter email from people you'd never heard from, and someone sending you mail for the first sentence of a love story.16 If you're sufficiently determined to achieve great things, this will probably increase the number of programmers, the more completely a project can mutate. There's an advantage as well as writing does, where you go to college. It would also be a need for such infrastructure companies. But invariably they're larger in your imagination than in real life.17 9189189 localhost 0. I don't know if this one is possible, but there is a group, they couldn't have multiple people editing the same code, because it changes too fast for that to be possible. One cooperative project that I think really would be a curious state of affairs if you could get to the point where it's like visual crack. Empirically, the way to use these big ideas is not to try to do it automatically: to write a check, limited by their guess at whether this will make later investors balk. But no more ambitious than it was for Apple to become as big as the ones I've discussed, don't make a direct frontal attack on it.

If you don't, you're dead. There was another speaker who was much better than me. When you're operating on the manager's schedule, they're in a position to tell investors how the round is going to get tagged as spam. Whereas if you're writing code to make it so that you can't make yourself care.18 And though there's going to be broken up, I'm slightly less likely to start something ambitious in the morning.19 Look at the individual, not where they went to college. Of our current concept of an organization work differently from the rest.

Notes

I don't think these are the only alternative would be far less demand for them.

Bureaucrats manage to think of the words won't be trivial. A less upstanding, lower-tier VC might be digital talent.

Forums were not web sites but Usenet newsgroups. Whereas when the company, though more polite, was one that had been climbing in through the founders want to write it all yourself. Most word problems in school, and yet managed to find a broad range of topics, comparable in scope to our users that isn't really working bad unit economics, typically and then being unable to raise a series A termsheet with a million spams.

When you had a contest to describe what they made more margin loans. And yet there are few things worse than the long term than one who passes. Others will say that the web have sucked—and probably especially valuable.

Picking out the same work, done mostly by hackers. What drives the most promising opportunities, it will have to do something we didn't do.

Different sections of the corpora. What he meant, I was there when it converts you get a poem published in The New Yorker. And then of course. It does at least bet money on convertible notes, VCs who are younger or more ambitious the utility function for money.

Wufoo was based in Tampa and they succeeded. Most computer/software startups. Most of the company at 1.

And it would be unfortunate. Peter Thiel would point out that successful startups are often unknowns. This would penalize short comments especially, because there are no misunderstandings. I don't know of this type: lies told to play games with kids' credulity.

Sheep act the way starting a startup enough to incorporate a prediction of quality in the 1920s to financing growth with retained earnings till the 1920s. If you really want, like storytellers, must have faces in them to be the right thing to do work you love: a to make 200x as much the better. The company is Weebly, which is the least important of the auction. But if idea clashes became common enough, even though it's at least a little if the growth is genuine.

Believe it or not, bleeding out invites at a friend's house for the talk to mediocre ones.

If anyone wants.

But filtering out 95% of the art business? I'm clueless or being misleading by focusing so much the better, and stir. Heirs will be pressuring you to take a conscious effort to make fundraising take less time for word of mouth to get all you have a notebook to write an essay about it as if they'd been pretty clever by getting such a valuable technique that any idea relating to the wealth they generate.

There was no more than make them want you to stop, but those don't scale is to trick admissions officers. I replace the url with that additional constraint, you need. I don't think they'll be able to. I can't refer a startup in a safe environment, and the cost of having employers pay for stuff online, if you're measuring usage you need to do video on-demand, because those are usually about things you've written or talked about before, but whether it's good, but not the shape of the things we focus on their own interest.

People only tend to be started in 1975, said the things you sell. It is the post-money valuation of zero. When investors ask you a termsheet, particularly if a third party like YC is how intently they listened.

Except text editors and compilers. How did individuals accumulate large fortunes in an absolute sense, but I don't want to see how universally faces work by their prevalence in advertising. Reporters sometimes call a few people plot their own interest. Two customer support people tied for first prize with entries I still shiver to recall.

Whoever fed the style section reporter this story about suits coming back would have gone into the shape that matters here but the nature of an FBI agent or taxi driver or reporter to being a train car that in three months we made a better story for an investor who merely seems like he will fund you, it is unfair when someone gets drunk instead of uebfgbsb. If you want to wait for the same way a restaurant is constrained in b. What people usually mean when they were shooting themselves in the definition of important problems includes only those on the critical path that they create rather than given by other people who had been, and so on?

There are circumstances where this is the unpromising-seeming startups are often mistaken about that. There may be that surprising that colleges can't teach them how to appeal to investors. Y Combinator to increase it, but its inspiration; the critical path to med school.

They hate their bread and butter cases.

In reality, wealth is measured by what you love, or boards, or at least on me; how could it have meaning? How could these people never come back with a real reason out of ArsDigita, he took earlier.

#automatically generated text #Markov chains #Paul Graham #Python #Patrick Mooney #position #way #colleges #drive #interest #art #kind #group #style #sup #school #love #reason #Notes #head #Valley #site #relating #editors #Apple #comments #scope #VC #cases #Altman

[rebeccahpedersen]

How Do You Evaluate A Multi-Plex For Investment?

TorontoRealtyBlog

Well first of all, if you’re looking at buying a multiplex for investment – good on you, you’ve clearly done something right!

But believe it or not, there’s serious competition for multiplexes – those properties with 3-or-more dwellings.

Cap rates are down, demand is high, and investors are accepting lower returns in order to get into the market.

Let me outline nine criteria that a would-be investor must consider, at the bare minimum, for any multiplex purchase…

Should I outline these in order?

Sure, I could try.

And by try, I mean that every investor has a different set of criteria, and my #4 might be somebody else’s #7.

Of course, you might have a #10, #11, and #12 to add to the list.

And all the while, many of these points go hand-and-hand.

So let me start from the top, where I find most of my clients see it…

–

1) Yield

This should be at the top of the list, no?

Some people would put #2 on the list, but I don’t think that’s smart in this market.

When you buy a stock, what are you looking for?

Well, I suppose that’s a terrible example, since everybody wants to watch the stock go up, up, and up, and they’re looking at the appreciation potential, with the “buy low, sell high” mentality.

But in the good ole days, investors were looking for dividends!

How much is the stock paying you to own it?  You’re a shareholder; you own a portion of the company, so how much of the company’s profit are you receiving?

Times have changed, both in terms of the stock market, and the real estate market.

Ask the man on the street, and he’s looking to buy a stock for $10, and sell it for $15.  But ask the pension funds, and they’re looking for a steady, consistent, predictable, safe return.  They’re the savviest of investors, and they’re looking for a 6% return in perpetuity.

When it comes to investing in real estate, my personal belief is that if you forecast a zero percent appreciation, and the investment makes sense to you based on yield, then the investment will pay out and exceed your expectations.

There’s that old adage in real estate: “When is the best time to sell a piece of real estate?”

The answer: “Never.”

Life happens, situations change, and more often than not, even a long-term investor will need or want to sell.

But on a long-enough time horizon, the appreciation is the icing on the cake, and where the investor makes, by far, the most money.

But at the onset, the short and immediate-term numbers have to make sense.

What does that mean?  What kind of numbers are we looking at in this market?

I see multi-unit dwellings selling at 3% cap rates, and I can’t make sense of it.

When I got into real estate 5.5-6% cap rates on multi-unit properties were the norm.  Over time, those figures have dropped, and it’s up to the investor to decide what works.

2) Appreciation Potential

I suppose the “yield” section was just the preamble for some people.

Every time I talk about yield, and give the example of the dividend-paying-stock, people tell me, “This isn’t 1880; you’re not buying paper-shares of the Great Pacific.”

Fair point.  Times change.

But I’m conservative by nature, and when it comes to buying multi-unit dwellings for long-term investing, I would argue until I’m blue in the face that you have to consider appreciation potential after yield.

Over the last few years, it’s been easy to refute my argument.

I’ve told this story before, so you long-time readers might remember it…

Back in 2010, I had an investor-client in from Los Angeles, who was looking at purchasing a couple of 4-5 unit dwellings.

He was primarily concerned with yield, and the financing ability of the properties (which we’ll explore below), and truly believed, despite his desire to buy, that prices in Toronto were likely headed for a dip.

We found a property in Queen West that was perfect, and hit on several of the other points listed below as well.

It was around a 5.25% cap rate at the list price, and although it would be slightly cash-flow negative each month based on his downpayment, he was willing to consider it.

The property didn’t have an “offer night” as is the custom today, but it still received four offers, and sold for $100,000 over the list price.

My client told me, “This makes no sense.  This is simply the greater fool theory; whoever is buying this property, is expecting to sell it to somebody else down the line for more.”

He wasn’t wrong, logically.

But in practice, he was proven tragically incorrect.

That property, listed at $1.2M, that sold for $1.3M, recently sold for over $2M.

Now tell me again – what’s more important: yield or appreciation potential?

And am I naive to say “appreciation is just icing on the cake?”

3) Location

How can you have any list about real estate evaluation criteria without location?

Location is all part and parcel of the overall evaluation.

Some investors would choose a superior location over a better return, and I wouldn’t disagree.

Earlier this year, I sent a client the listing for a turnkey 4-plex in Mimico, with a rare 4.8% cap rate, what I perceived to be below-market rents, and a copy of the inspection – which looked fantastic.

My client responded with a 3-word email: “It’s in Mimico.”

Enough said.

I liked the income, I liked potential for more income, and I loved the condition of the property.  But he would have rather had a property with a 3.5% cap rate, steps to Trinity-Bellwoods, and at the risk of sounding cliche, “To each, their own.”

Toronto is a rapidly-growing city, both in terms of the population and the urban sprawl, but also in the eyes of the world.

For investors thinking long-term, the best appreciation will undoubtedly be found with those properties that are closest to the city centre, as is the case with every world-class city.  But those properties will have substantially lower yields.

It’s up to the buyer to decide where the best value, for he or she, ultimately lays.

4) Condition

Have you ever looked at the “financials” for an income-property listed on MLS?

It’s hilarious.

You’re lucky if you get property taxes, water, and gas.  Sellers and listing agents love to pretend like electricity and insurance don’t exist.  They’ll be really quick to tell you about the $25 per month the property generates in basement coin-laundry, but they’ll n-e-v-e-r detail the overall cost of ongoing maintenance, upkeep, and repairs.

Part of the reason why many Toronto real estate investors have turned toward condos in the past few years (aside from the lower cost) is because of the maintenance of an 80-year-old 4-plex.  You can do the most thorough of home inspections, and find the property is in A++ shape, but you’ll still be opening your wallet for something, every few months.

As with everything else above, the condition of the property has to be taken into consideration with the other criteria.  You might be willing to pay more, and accept a lower yield, for a true “turnkey” income property.  Or you might decide to pay less, do the work yourself, and hope to add value.

Of course, you can always combine this with #5…

5) Market Rents

Just a brief point to make here, but an important one.

Many properties are being sold with tenants attached, who are leasing at rents well below fair market value.

If properties are sold based on capitalization rates, those rates are taking current rents into consideration, and those rents are below FMV, then it goes without saying that the property is under-valued.

Yes, it can be difficult to get a tenant out so you can raise the rent, and it’s going to become tougher thanks to the Ontario Fair Housing Plan.  But tenants don’t stay forever.

And if you have a property that needs work and has below market rents, when the tenants vacate, you can put work into the property to increase the rents, and add value at the same time.

6) Size & Scope

What do you for a living?

What’s your personal life like?

Tell me about your family…

Now tell me if you would be able to manage a 5-unit property that’s a 45-minute drive in traffic, with whatever knowledge, skill, and capability you currently possess.

Buying a 5-plex is one thing, but managing it is another.

There’s the ongoing maintenance and upkeep, the supervising of tenants, the collection (and chasing…) of rents, and the search for new tenants.

Savvy investors know how to make the property, and the tenants, work for them.  Many landlords will offer a tenant a nominal sum (start with the basement tenant and $30…) to take out the garbage every week.  Many landlords will “allow” the tenants to paint, provided it’s in a neutral colour, and done well.  I put “allow” in quotes, of course, because it’s value-add for the landlord to have a fresh coat of paint, and yet many tenants believe it’s a privilege.

Some investors do this full time – they buy, manage, and maintain multi-unit dwellings.  They have the time, and the experience, to do so.

Other investors have no clue what they’re doing, and they either know that in advance, or find out very quickly!

The fee to manage a property varies drastically, but you’re looking at 5% of gross rents as a starter.  If you can’t handle the size and scope of the property, then factor that cost into your initial financial analysis.

7) Ability To Finance

There’s no hard-and-fast rule on this, but most mortgage brokers will tell you:

4-Units – residential financing

5-Units – there might be a lender out there that will provide residential financing

6-Units – this is commercial, without a doubt

I’ve had clients in the past purchase 5-unit properties and obtain residential financing, but lending criteria changes like the direction of the wind.  More often than not, it depends on which lender you’re talking to, and which underwriter is handling the file.  I’ve seen the 5-unit properties fall into a serious grey area over the years, as some underwriters will lend with residential criteria, and some won’t.

And keep in mind – we’re talking about downpayment and rate!

To buy a 3-plex, you simply need to meet the minimum downpayment criteria (used to be 5%, now it’s 20% for a “second property” subject to some exceptions), and you can obtain a current residential rate, ie. a 5-year, fixed-rate of 2.49%.

When you get into 6-plex and above, you may be required to put down 35%, and the rates could be into the 4-6% range.  Yes, that’s a wide range, but as I said – it depends on your mortgage broker, and which lenders and underwriters they’re talking to.

Going from a 4-unit property, with a 20% down payment, and 2.49% interest rates, to 6-unit property, and a 35% down payment, with a 4.49% interest rate, can be tough to swallow.

But keep in mind, not all “investors” are taking on debt.  Some are buying in cash, some take on debt because it’s cheap (ie. 4.49% is less than their rate of expected return in other investment vehicles), and thus it’s not really a “problem” per se for those looking to buy 6-plexes and up.

You might also argue the yield is better as you climb in the number of units.  Clearly a duplex offers a lower rate of return than a 6-plex, not only because there’s more demand, but because it’s cheaper, easier to afford for the average investor, and thus the price gets bid up.

Ultimately the ability to finance will come into play for an overwhelming majority of investors, and so you might actually start with this.

8) Tenants

Wow, we’re really starting to see how all of these points are intertwined.

The size and scope of the property, combined with the location, combined with the market rents, will ultimately dictate what type of tenants you’ve got.

An investor-client of mine once told me, “Basement apartments aren’t worth the hassle.”

I asked what he meant, and he said, “They’re not worth the $600 they bring in each month.”

Now, this was a long time ago, hence the $600 figure.  Maybe the hassle has been lessened over the years as rents have increased.

But he elaborated in saying, “Ask yourself – what kind of person rents a sh!tty basement apartment for $600 per month?  The lowest common denominator of society, that THAT is now one of my partners in my financial endeavor.”

Sensitivities aside, he might not be wrong.

I’m sure some of the most wonderful people in the world have rented basement apartments, but on the whole, the person looking for the absolutely lowest-priced rental in the city does so not out of desire, but out of necessity.

This client went on to tell me that most of the tenants he’s had renting basements have been troublesome, sometimes in terms of their character and how they treat the unit, but primarily in terms of their ability to service the rent.

Personally, I think if you’re an investor running multi-unit dwellings, there’s a learning curve, and you’ll figure out how to deal with tenants – at every rent level.  And with basement apartments going for $800, $900, or $1,000 in the city, who can turn that kind of money down?

Ultimately, the type of property you have, plus the location, will determine what kind of tenants you get.

And if you’re looking at a property that is tenanted, you want to know everything you can about the tenants in place.

I’ve seen some really sharp listing agents put together info packages on the tenants themselves – their income, occupation, FICO scores, duration of tenancy, and frequency of payments.  That goes a long way toward marketing the property to investors.

9) Proximity To Transit

Perhaps this falls into the “location” category, but having already flushed that out, I think this deserves its own point.

Transit in Toronto is just God-awful, as we all know.

And without generalizing too much here, dare I say that many people who rent, also take transit.

The market rent will be affected by the proximity to transit, the yield will be affected by the market rent, and once again, we see how these points are intertwined.

You could suggest that proximity to parks, schools, retail, etc. bear consideration, but I don’t put them anywhere near the level of importance as transit.  This is my generalization – about renters taking transit, and you can disagree if you want to.  But I’m speaking from experience, with what my clients see out there.

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You’re probably looking for a point #10, but this list isn’t meant to be well-rounded; it’s meant to point out the most important criteria when evaluating a multiplex for investment.

Somewhere within these points lays a happy medium for the investor.

And as we know, every investor is different.

The post How Do You Evaluate A Multi-Plex For Investment? appeared first on Toronto Real Estate Property Sales & Investments | Toronto Realty Blog by David Fleming.

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