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#or just have both as high activity on my multi but realistically
febrainrot · 6 months
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What build would you make for Mozu or Hinoka?
Okay so keep in mind that when I build units I don't really do it in a "normal" manner, I kind play the game almost solely to make stupid builds no matter the time it takes even if I have to farm a lot. Furthermore I have a few savefiles so I often use some amount of skill transfer, not a lot but sometimes I grab a few skills on another save to not waste levels on another. I'll still give more reasonable builds after detailing my 20 steps plan to make a godkiller. Knowing that:
Mozu is very fun because of both her growths and her easy access to profiteer. She can be a good multi use units, with resource utility and offensive power. Her main weakness is that she is fairly frail, and will probably not be able to survive too many hits.
My last run had her as a Kinshi knight for a few reasons: it has the same solid luck as merchant, second highest outside of strategist (hardly viable considering that magic is the one stat she has a growth below 10). While it has an inferior strength compared to other classes, kinshi knights have both great speed and massive range (flying movement + bow range). And because they use the same weapons as the merchants, the transition after you get profiteer isn't too hard. I wanted to give her a special niche along that so I decided to be very stubborn and farm her in a class she is absolutely not good at: sorcerer.
By befriending Nyx, she get access to the dark mage, which objectively doesn't work for her, but I have too much free time. I got her to level 15 in the sorcerer class (because of how the game works you only need to spend 4 levels in that class if you swap at level 11) solely for one skill: bowbreaker. That along the speed she gets as a kinshi and her great luck makes her near impossible for bow users to hit. That made her a weird case of flying archer killer which I thought was very funny, I could throw her in the middle of a bunch of archers and they'd all have 0%. Kinshi knight provides the highest luck cap, which she'll reach pretty easily. With this she'll have at least 30% chance of producing money every turn for 7 turn. If you are lucky/willing to grind the DLCs, you can get Anna's bow which gives a massive +5 luck for a skill and strength debuff every attack (her skill should be solid by now, and she doesn't need to kill or even attack to activate her skill so you can just equip it on her if there is a turn she doesn't have anything to do). Along with that, I gave her a bamboo yumi that gets her +10 avo, further enhancing her dodgetanking despite its weakness (it's not the rarest weapon to get at the lottery or on lucky spaces, you'll always end up having at least one and you will probably get to forge it to have it stronger). Along with Air Superiority she'll get as a kinshi knight, she'll also be able to avoid flyers and especially other kinshi. From there, she has the speed to rarely get doubled, the most precise enemies will have at best 20% or so hit rates with her, and she'll be producing lots of money while also providing decent supportive damage. If you go that way aptitude isn't gonna help you much as you'll be at equal or higher level than enemies, so you can drop it. From there there isn't much to add, you can grab life and death from Master of Arms and bowfaire to increase her damage output dramatically using a bow, both are accessible with second , add a longbow to increase her range if you fear she can't dodge everything or chip an enemy she can't reach.
If you want a less time consuming and more "realistic" build (aka "for someone who isn't as obsessed as me and doesn't have too much free time), Mozu's main advantage is her high speed and luck naturally leading her to dodgetanking. The most avoidant class is swordmaster (innate +10 avo along a nice +10 crit): marrying Ryoma will let her access it along with giving aptitude to an already powerful second gen unit. Between a whooping 85% speed growth with aptitude, 60% strength, 50% HP and skill, she'll be a reliable dodgetank, especially considering her personal skill let her regain HP on forest tiles (among other tiles), which makes her a good bait. She'll have the skill to activate Astra fairly reliably, and life and death from the master of arms class would again make her damage output insane, along with swordfaire that she'll get while progressing as a swordmaster. If you're in Conquest though, the next best option is probably marrying Arthur to get her to be a berserker. She doesn't get the avo bonus of the swordmaster but nearly as much speed, insane strength, and her innate skill growths counters the poor accuracy of axes, along with a 20% crit bonus that goes well with her good skill. Her sniper line can help her in that class: certain blow alleviates the axe inaccuracy. I wouldn't say gamble is really worth it but you can try it if your Mozu has a consistent enough hit rate, and since she'll be using only that weapon axefaire is good. Now if you want to have her solely as a player turn based unit, once again, life and death will have her obliterate people. If you want to use her good speed and strong HP as bait however, getting strong riposte and sol can help with that. Sadly since Conquest doesn't allow much grinding outside of DLCs, you can't go too insane, but her only friendships options there are Effie which gives class that'll probably affect her speed negatively, or Nyx, which. Yeah, without even more grinding the skills that could work with her aren't accessible. If you count the Heirs of Fates DLC rewards, you can get speedtaker or strengthtaker, preferably the first for swordmaster and the second for berserker (those skills cannot be used at the same time so no use getting both on her), and if you make a revelation berserker, befriending Oboro
Now, for Hinoka. She's a bit trickier because she's the balanced "jack of all trades master of none" type of character. Her growth rates are all around 40 without class bonus beside her magic at 15 and her defence being a little lower than the rest at 35. That means she isn't really bad anywhere, but she doesn't really stand out either. She is the kind of characters that you might have on the map but realise soon that whatever she can do, others will do better despite having more glaring weaknesses than her. However her base skill, resistance and speed stats are good, and she always joins with a guard naginata which is a pretty rare weapon. So for her, we have solid bases
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gingermintpepper · 3 years
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After thinking it over for a bit, I've decided that I might as well do a proper underrated 3DS game rec list. I'm a bit of an ATLUS junkie and that's gonna be pretty disgustingly apparent in this list, but it's not my fault that they released hit after hit and all of them were duly ignored.
Due to tumblr's 10 image limit (and my struggle to keep motivated to do one thing for more than three hours) I'm definitely gonna have to break this up into parts and I'm fairly certain one of these lists is just gonna be MegaTen games lmao but I'd like to let people know about these excellent titles and see if I can't at least get people interested in them so they can get more traction.
So, without further ado:
Some 3DS Games that were criminally slept on (part 1)
Monster Hunter Stories
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God, where do I begin with this game. Well, the basics: It's a JRPG spinoff title of the now widely successful and popular Monster Hunter series featuring a different take on interacting with the varied and intricate monsters populating the world: Riders.
Yep, instead of hunting the beasties, you play as a young rider who's completed their intiation ritual and can now bond with 'Monsties' as they've cutely labelled the usually ferocious monsters of the wilds. The great thing is that you still fight Monsters--tons of them in fact but this isn't a paid review and in my humble opinion, the most impressive thing about this game is the visual style. The landscapes, the armour, the way they redesigned and 3DS-ified the classically hyper realistic and monstrous beasts to not only be absolutely adorable but still capable of being intimidating when the time calls for it, the stellar animation of special moves and combination attacks--it's delicious, nutritious, stupendous, I can and will consume it like it's part of my recommended caloric intake.
It's very akin to Pokemon in the way its basic gameplay premise is set up, however, instead of catching--or even indeed befriending--the Monsties in the game, you rummage through their nests and steal their eggs, later hatching them and getting yourself a brand new lightly kidnapped monster pal!
Other general things about the game:
Pros:
The armour and weapon sets for both male and female characters slap along with the general character customisation options. They're incredibly diverse (though limited in body type) and you can switch around traits and features whenever you want from your house.
The POGS--these porkers are everywhere and they serve as tiny little achievements for exploring every odd and end of the world. Also they have little outfits. They're so cute. 🥺🥺
You can actually ride the Monsties. All of em. Or, at least the ones that you have available to be your buddies. They all have exploration skills and traits that not only make exploring much more interesting but encourage you to swap out your active Monstie and play around with your options a bit.
Y'all breeding Monsties is complicated and I live for just how intense and ridiculous you can get with optimal builds for these things.
The story is really competently put together! The characters, character designs and even the internal conflict with your starting trio of characters is really compelling along with the mystery of the blight that's infecting Monsters across the world. It's not anything worth awards but it's compelling and it makes you care about the characters if that's what you're in the market for.
Amazing sound design, expansive world, everything about the presentation of this game oozes that Monster Hunter charm even if the art is cutesier than usual. You'll never get bored of its stellar visual presentation!
Available for around twenty quid on the Google Play store, so if you want, you could actually get the full game on your smartphone or tablet. Note though that it would be a battery nuker.
Cons:
If you're on a regular 3DS, frame rate drops are a given. This game kinda pushes the visual capabilities of the 3DS to its absolute limit--a lot like Okamiden did back on the DS.
One save file :( It's pretty much for the same reason as above but still.
If you're playing as the girl, you can't get male armour and vice versa. Since there's only one save file, you'll never be able to have all of the armour sets in a single playthrough and that's criminal because both of the sets for the genders are absolutely breath-taking, thank you.
I 👏can't 👏make👏my👏 own 👏Palico👏
Multi-player for this game is pretty dead seeing as it's almost five years old by now and never got much press or traction. Usually this wouldn't be an issue - this game is 99% singleplayer and you don't really need to fuss about with multi-player to have fun, but if you want to collect all the Monsties, you'll need it since the only way to get Glavenus is through pvp achievements. :/
Final thoughts: Play it if you find yourself getting tired or disappointed with 3DS Pokemon games but still want something that feels as fantastical as Pokemon. It outshines the 3DS Pokemon games at every turn and I will never be over just how thoughtfully put together and fully realised these games are. Of course, if you've ever played Monster Hunter, then you know just how intensive these games are with the lore, biology, cultures and world of their Monsters but seeing that translated into JRPG format was just very sobering and it's a game that, to this day, continues to awe me with just how much love and attention went into it.
Last note: If you're still unsure about it, there's a demo available on the e-shop of the 3DS that allows you to play through the entire initial area of the game. Your data does carry through to the full release and to give you an idea of how much I've been able to squeeze out of it - my playtime for that demo is currently sitting at 22 hours. Make sure to get a hold of that Cyan-Kut-Ku!
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7th Dragon III Code: VFD
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The title may sound intimidating but the premise is not! A mysterious disease called Dragon Sickness spread by the Dragonsbane flowers that have cropped up all around the world. You and your team are recruited by the Nodens game company after you display extraordinary prowess in their hit virtual reality game 7th Encount. As you go through the adventure, you are tasked with finding out the truth behind the Dragon Sickness and asked to stop both it and the Dragons that are destroying the world.
This game is fun. It's another turn-based JRPG however, in this game you create all of your characters yourself from the myriad of classes available to you from the jump. Different classes of course have very different specialisations - Samurai focus on high powered cutting damage with their swords, Duelists are summoners who can influence the element of the battlefield as well as summon monsters from each element, Agents can hack into your enemies and inflict a barrage of nasty ailments, just to name a few - and you are given three teams of three characters each to experiment with different team comps and find the balance that works for you. There's also a wide variety of Dragons to hunt and kill in the game, which directly affects how infected your world is with the Dragon Sickness causing Dragonsbane. Along the way you will also come into contact with many interesting characters, concepts and confrontations that will make the task of saving the world all the more imperative.
Pros
1. The character creator and differing classes give way for tons of experimenting and playing around with your own unique approach to combat and carrying out your missions. Granted, 'character creation' is generous, it's little more than palatte swaps but the classes are really where VFD shines. Eight main classes may not sound like a lot, but the expaniveness of the character skills, their synergy with their fellow classes and the uniqueness of some of the classes in and of itself allows for so much flexibility and creativity in approaches to even tougher bosses. It also encourages the switching about of your party members to really finagle with the options available to you.
2. God this game is pretty. The locations, the character art, the creature design - all of it is gorgeous and this game capitalises on every bit of the 3DS's presentation limitations as it can.
3. You can romance anything and everyone - yes, you can even be gay/lesbian/poly in this game. In fact, one of the main characters - Julietta - is gnc and he's a constant source of joy as well one of my personal favourite characters, right behind Yuma.
4. Exploration is very very forgiving as the game has healing spots and teleport nodes all over the world to allow for quick, seamless travel between quest points without feeling like anything is too much of a hassle. There are also special enemies that allow for quick grinding as well as quick farming of money. In general, the game does a really good job of making sure that the grind is never unbearable or inconsiderate of your time.
Cons:
1. This is the fourth game in a series the West has never seen any other title for, and from the looks of it, will probably never see any other titles for. Because of that, there are some elements that may seem confusing or revelations in the plot that may seem to come out of nowhere.
2. While the visuals are great, the OST of this one is pretty short making for a lot of reused soundtracks that can get really annoying if you're like me and need your audio to be interesting or consistent so it doesn't distract you too much.
3. This one isn't really a con but it is divisive: This game gets pretty difficult at times. A few of the main dragon enemies including and especially the final boss can give you a serious run for your money in the annoy-o-meter in terms of the kind of absolute JRPG fuckery they can pull out of their magic bag of bullshit movesets and while I generally enjoy that kind of thing, I know it's not for everyone. Most regular combat shouldn't be too tricky once you have a team comp that works well together but you also need to pay attention since the same team that carries you to victory one time might be worth beans against another dragon.
Final thoughts: This is... a really good game. Interesting story, really interesting characters, pretty world and a battle system that really makes you sit down and think. There's also a demo for this available in the e-shop and while your data doesn't carry over - you do receive multiple perks for carrying over your demo data including some exclusive items that, while not game breaking, do help a ton in the early stages of the game.
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This isn't a final list by any stretch of the word; I only have the energy to do these two right now, but the next games up for coverage are Ever Oasis and Stella Glow! If you're interested in my full plan of games I want to cover here then my current lineup includes: Theatrhythm: Curtain Call, Project Mirai: Deluxe, Culdecept Revolt, Alliance Alive, Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology, Etrian Odyssey V, Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker and Shin Megami Tensei IV: Apocalypse.
Finally, if anyone has played any of the games I mention, cover or plan to cover PLEASE REACH OUT TO ME, I AM SO LONELY IN MY FORTRESS OF SAND. On a serious note, I'd love to hear what other people who've played these games think!
Thanks for reading,
-Ginger
PS: @feralpeacock Because a million years ago, on my first underrated games post, you asked that I remember you. :D
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lunarr-rrose · 3 years
Video
What is the Deal with Property Insurance?
https://u109893.h.reiblackbook.com/generic11/the-storage-stud/what-is-the-deal-with-property-insurance/
Crum-Halsted is a full service insurance and risk management agency headquartered in Sycamore, IL with six offices in Illinois providing outstanding service, security, and peace of mind for businesses, families, and individuals for over 90 years.
Greg Jones is the Vice President of the Chicago Real Estate Council and Director with the Rogers Park Builders Group as well as a Deacon at Christ Community Church in Lemont. When not working, he enjoys watching the cubs with a good cigar and a great whiskey in hand, playing poker, and riding motorcycles.
https://crumhalsted.com/
Fernando O. Angelucci is the Founder and President of Titan Wealth Group. He also leads the firm’s finance and acquisitions departments. Fernando Angelucci and Steven Wear founded Titan Wealth Group in 2015, and under his leadership, the firm’s revenue has grown over 100% year over year. Today,
Find out more at
https://www.thestoragestud.com
https://titanwealthgroup.com/
Listen to our Podcast: https://thestoragestud.podbean.com/e/what-is-the-deal-with-property-insurance/
Titan Wealth Group operates nationwide sourcing off market investment properties for Titan Wealth Group’s acquisition as well as servicing a network of thousands of active real estate investors world wide. Prior to founding Titan Wealth Group, Fernando worked for Dow Chemical, a Fortune 50 company, rolling out a flagship product estimated to gross $1B in global revenues.
With an engineering background, Fernando is able to approach real estate investing with a keen analytical mindset that allows Titan Wealth Group to identify opportunities and project accurate pictures of future performance. Fernando graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a B.A. degree in Technical Systems Management.
Titan Wealth Group was founded in 2015 with the vision of gathering individual investors that have the means to invest but lack either the time to find high-yield investment opportunities or the access to these off-market deals. All too often, founders Fernando Angelucci & Steven Wear came across investors who had deployed their capital only to regret the lack of consistency or degree of returns their investments were producing. In response, Titan Wealth Group provides access to highly-vetted real estate secured investments and off-market acquisition opportunities primarily in the Greater Chicago MSA. Today, Titan Wealth Group not only assists individual investors but has grown to support the acquisition goals and capital deployment of investment groups, private equity firms, and real estate investment trusts (REITs).
As a facilitator of wealth growth, Titan Wealth Group believes that success is not limited to the sum of our efforts and is infinite with what can be accomplished through partnership.
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Fernando Angelucci (00:16): Hey everybody, welcome back. We're doing a special Thanksgiving podcast here today. So on this episode of What's The Deal, the real estate podcast that gives answers, we'll be covering What's The Deal with Property I nsurance. Real estate is one of the few investment vehicles that you can purchase in property insurance for, you now, yay for hard assets. So joining me today to provide some coverage on the topic of Property Insurance is my good friend and colleague Greg Jones. So how are we doing Greg?
Greg Jones (00:51): Good. How about you, Fernando?
Fernando Angelucci (00:53): Doing good. I'm doing good. It's 72, 73 degrees outside in California. I'm glad I'm not in Chicago at the moment.
Greg Jones (01:01): It's not quite that nice here right now.
Fernando Angelucci (01:06): Okay. So Greg, on this podcast, we have all types of listeners from super professional, you know, multi million dollar portfolio, all the way to the new investor or someone that is trying to become a new investor. So let's back up a little bit and, you know, explain who you are and what you do.
Greg Jones (01:26): Got it. So my name is Greg Jones. I am a risk advisor with Crum Halstead Agency. So I work with real estate companies and developers as well as contractors around consulting around risk and placement of insurance.
Fernando Angelucci (01:42): How'd you get into the business?
Greg Jones (01:45): I was introduced to a guy that owned an agency shoot, this is probably almost 10 years ago now. Right place, right time. I grew up in a background of construction, both my dad and my brother owned construction companies. Had friends that were in real estate, didn't want to do construction for a living. So I figured I would give insurance a try and it ended up being a really good fit.
Fernando Angelucci (02:10): Oh, okay. I didn't know that about you.
Greg Jones (02:13): Yeah.
Fernando Angelucci (02:14): Figured it would come up in one of those late night poker games.
Greg Jones (02:17): Yeah, exactly.
Fernando Angelucci (02:20): Okay. So for people that don't know what is Property Insurance and what does a risk advisor do?
Greg Jones (02:31): So property insurance is realistically, it's a like a contract. So the owner of the property has a contract in place with an insurance company, say whether that's a Travelers or a Hartford or whoever the carrier might be. And in that contract, it will lay out in the event of a claim. Here's what the insurance company is going to pay out. And that covers both damage to the property as well as if there's an injury to someone at the property. So the contract States, what the limits are, what the causes of that claim are covered versus certain kinds of causes of claim might not be covered, unless you buy that or purchase it as an add-on, a good example of that is earthquake coverage. Earthquake isn't automatically included, but you can purchase it as an additional coverage line item, but it's all built into a contract that lasts for 12 months between the owner and the insurance company.
Fernando Angelucci (03:28): Okay. And then with those types of con, let's bring it into reality with some examples. So say I'm a new investor. I'm going to be buying a four flat property in Chicago. I'm going to live in one unit myself, rent out the other three units, let's say each units, 1200 square feet and the buildings' a hundred years old, what am I looking at for coverage? Or what should I be looking at for coverage? Where are the premiums going to fall? And what are some things that I should be paying attention to or looking for in those contracts?
Greg Jones (04:04): Right. So the first question you have to answer, especially because you're living in one of those units, is how are you going to cover the property? You could cover it on a personal insurance policy, or you could cover it on a commercial policy because it's four units, that's the breaking point. You could cover it either way. After you get to five units, it's always considered a commercial policy.
Fernando Angelucci (04:27): Okay.
Greg Jones (04:27): If you go the route of commercial, which is typically what I recommend the coverage form is a little bit broader in what it will cover you for. The downside is you have to treat yourself because you're living in one of those units as a tenant, you're a tenant within your own building. So your personal property as the resident, isn't going to be covered, but your asset, the building contents within the rental properties, those are covered under the contract.
Greg Jones (04:59): When you're looking at a four unit building, based on the square footage, there's typically a dollar amount that insurance carriers will look at in terms of we're want to cover this for what it will cost to replace it. If you have a catastrophic loss, right? Every carrier has their own algorithms they'll use for this, but typically it comes down to a dollar amount per square foot. The average we're seeing at least in Chicago right now, if it's joist and masonry or better is typically anywhere from 150 to $170 a square foot is what it would cost to completely rebuild. So we would look at what does that cost look like? Then you can set up whatever deductible structure you want. Deductibles go as low as, I mean, realistically, you can go as low as you use the $500. I never seen anybody go that low. Usually the average is, you know, 25 to 10,000 for a deductible. So then if you do have a loss, everything that it's covered under that contract is paid out minus the cost of your deductible.
Fernando Angelucci (06:00): Exactly. Now, one of the things that occurs quite often in Chicago is we have these pockets, these neighborhoods, where the cost of buy the property is significantly below the replacement value. For example you know, my partner, Steven?
Greg Jones (06:16): Yeah.
Fernando Angelucci (06:16): He has a property where, you know, it's 140 year old masonry and limestone building the cost to replace that type of building would be a 1.4, 1.3, 1.4 million, but he bought it for significantly lower than that in those types of situations, what do you recommend doing with the coverage amount with the policy?
Greg Jones (06:42): So it really comes down to as the building owner, what is your goal in the event of a claim, right? So you want to make sure you have enough coverage so that if there's a partial claim or a partial loss is what they call it. So let's say hale comes through and destroys the roof. It's not a total loss. You want to have enough to repair that roof.
Fernando Angelucci (07:03): Right.
Greg Jones (07:03): The question is, if you were to have a catastrophic loss, the building is completely destroyed or it's damaged so much that the city comes in and says, you have to take this building down. It's now a safety hazard, right? In that kind of scenario, what do you want to do? Do you want to rebuild something there? Or would you rather just take the money and go buy something else and sell the land after the debris has been removed, right?
Greg Jones (07:28): So the answer to that question really drives how we advise, typically in these situations, I find the investor really would rather just take the money and go buy something else because that coverage amount that you've got for that partial loss is more than enough to buy at least another building like it in that area, or maybe even more, right? So you get this dilemma of, I bought it for, you know, say 250,000, but it will cost me 1.5 million to rebuild it. Right? Insurance companies will allow you in some cases and it depends on the carrier, but they will allow you to do what's called a stated amount, or it's a, some carriers call it a loss limit. So, you as the building owner can say, this is how much I want to cover my building for. I recognize it's not enough to rebuild it, but I want to cover it. So let's use this building and as an example, you buy it for 250,000 let's say it's 1.5 to fully rebuild it. And you say, I only want to cover it for half a million dollars, half a million will cover any partial loss that happens. If it's a total loss, I'd rather just take the money and go buy something else. The rating for that is typically a little bit higher, but it still ends up coming out much less than it would be if you were to fully insure it for $1.5 million.
Fernando Angelucci (08:51): And when you say rating, what do you mean by that?
Greg Jones (08:54): So, the premium for insurance for property is driven by a rate. So whatever value is selected for that building. So let's say a million dollars for round number purposes. So you take that million dollars, divide it by a hundred and you multiply it by a rate, and that equals your premium. So let's say it's you're getting a 20 cent rate. So for a million dollar building divide it by 10, multiply it by 0.20, that's your property premium.
Fernando Angelucci (09:24): I see.
Greg Jones (09:24): Rates vary based on the asset type. So typically you'll see multi-family tends to be the highest rated asset class out there where retail is considered a little bit less hazardous, office and industrial tend to be considered the least risky. So you could have a building of the same square footage. Let's say you're at a 18 cent rate for apartment building, same size building would be a, what? 10 to 12 cent rate for retail. You might get as low as 8 to 10 cents on office or industrial, just depending on what the asset class is and where it's located.
Fernando Angelucci (10:06): Interesting. Now with, let's say someone in what situations would somebody opt for the full replacement cost is that if you have like a super custom property that, you know, you can't find anywhere else, or?
Greg Jones (10:20): If you have a super custom property, or if the idea is I like where I'm located, the land has significant value. Even if I was going to take the money, I would rebuild something here. I might not rebuild the same thing. So another way that you can do it is some carriers offer what's called Functional Replacement Cost. Right? I seen this particularly with real estate related to older church properties and some need, especially you think about Chicago land. There is all of these churches that were built in the 18 hundreds, the architectures' crazy. You're not going to rebuild one of those just like it stands right now. Right?
Fernando Angelucci (10:58): Right.
Greg Jones (10:59): But you look at, if we were to have a total loss, we would want to rebuild something, same purpose, but we're not going to rebuild it the same way. And so you can use, what's called a Functional Replacement Cost, where you'll estimate based on, if we had a loss, what would we rebuild? What would the square footage be? Same questions, but you're not basing on what's there, you're basing it on what you would build.
Fernando Angelucci (11:24): Right.That's interesting. With the property insurance business, there's a lot of moving parts and it's one of those vendors in the real estate space that usually a lot of the investors don't actually know what goes on behind, right behind the curtains here.
Greg Jones (11:43): Right.
Fernando Angelucci (11:43): Walk us through. When I talk to you, it almost seems like every person that works within your organization, It's almost running like it's their own little business with inside of the organization. Almost like you're not entrepreneur or entrepreneur, some people would say, what is the day in the life of a risk advisor look like, what are you doing on a day-to-day basis?
Greg Jones (12:04): So on a day-to-day basis my time is usually split in a few different categories, right? So there's the time that goes into just the day to day servicing of your existing clients, right? That's helping guide through the process of whether it's an acquisition, that's coming up a disposition, a refinance, there's always moving parts, particularly within real estate. Right? And so there's a lot of day to day servicing. I mean, the interactions with a real estate client versus let's say a manufacturer is completely different.
Fernando Angelucci (12:38): Right.
Greg Jones (12:38): Right. Just because of all those moving parts. So part of the time is spent with that servicing with myself and my team. There's another element of it, of I'm trying to connect with new people. So before we hit a, you know, pandemic that involved going to lots of events and networking and, you know, all that came to a screeching halt in March. So now it's been a lot more time on the phone working through marketing, trying to figure out different creative ways to connect with people, to bring in new clients. Right?
Fernando Angelucci (13:09): Right.
Greg Jones (13:10): And then once you open that opportunity and you're starting to work on a new client there's a lot of time that goes into underwriting. So if an investor says, Hey, we want you to look at our portfolio. There's a lot of detail that you work through with them to gather the right information. And then you're compiling that information and really painting a picture for your underwriters. So, I mean, people have asked me before, what's the difference between a good broker in a bad broker or a good adviser, bad advisors is it's really making sure that you're painting a picture for an underwriter to make that client look really good versus here's 12 locations, here's all the basic raw data, what's my rate? You know, if you actually go into more detail and explain, like here's what the company does, here's what their practices look like, here's what they require of tenants of vendors coming in and out of the space to do work. You can actually derive a much better result than just providing a spreadsheet asking for someone to get you a quote.
Fernando Angelucci (14:12): Interesting. So almost painting a picture of the whole business, not just that one property, you're looking for.
Greg Jones (14:18): Exactly.
Fernando Angelucci (14:18):
To quote on.
Greg Jones (14:19): Exactly.
Fernando Angelucci (14:20): Interesting. How about on the other side? So that's, you know, that's your prospect side, if you will, but how about the actual carriers that you match up with? How do you find these guys? How do you know if a deal is gonna be right for a certain carrier? Cause I know there's hundreds of insurance companies around.
Fernando Angelucci (14:38): Hundreds.
Fernando Angelucci (14:38): In Iowa and I saw every one of the buildings.
Greg Jones (14:42): We're all headquartered there.
Fernando Angelucci (14:42): Yeah.
Greg Jones (14:42): Well, maybe not all of them, but a lot. So yeah. Every, so every insurance company has a different appetite, right? So there is some time spent with those and what those underwriters figuring out what that appetite looks like. So some carriers will, every carrier will say they like real estate in some capacity. Right? But the question is what kind of real estate that you like. So back in the day is when carriers would stop by the office and, you know, have a catch-up meeting with us, you know, they would talk about their appetite, what they've been hitting on recently where they've seen success. And so the first question is always, what kind of real estate are you writing? So in some cases, it's, they really like office and industrial, some carriers really like apartments, few carriers, like every asset class, there are a few. And then I would say in today's market, it's even changing beyond what it has been historically, just because of the unknowns of, you know, what will come of the pandemic and particularly around office and retail and what that's gonna look like. So we've even seen carriers backing away from those asset classes where they historically have been of the most appetite.
Fernando Angelucci (15:55): Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. So for example, how many carriers do you work with if you had to guess?
Greg Jones (16:03): So in the real estate space, I would say we probably have 15 or 20 that really focus in on real estate that specialize in that. So the team that I came over with that help launch our Chicago office has really put a lot of emphasis into partnering with the right companies that work with real estate because real estate is our focus. And so, if there's a market we've come across, that we find is really competitive in the real estate space, we do what we can to get a contract with them. So there's very few markets that specialize in real estate that we don't work with.
Fernando Angelucci (16:36): Yeah. And it's funny, we've worked with each other in the past and you really know which carriers have an appetite for what type of assets. You know, we do some niche style assets, not only the single family, multifamily, but also the self storage buildings.
Greg Jones (16:51): Uh-huh.
Fernando Angelucci (16:51): And you've gotten quotes to me not only quickly, but usually beating out almost all the competition on the premium. And I think one of the things that really helped us, is the fact that you do have a really good ability to paint kind of that picture. Here's what the company's like. Now I have, I'm somebody that always believes that you should get insurance and, you know, plan for the worst, but hope for the best I have come across a lot of investors that do the opposite.
Fernando Angelucci (17:20): I survived.
Fernando Angelucci (17:20): And swear by real estate insurance is a scam and the carriers never pay out. So for you, what would you say? Why should a real estate investor have property insurance? And on top of that, why should they use a risk advisor or a broker as opposed to just contacting a company directly?
Greg Jones (17:43): Good question. So I would say, why should they have property insurance? The short and simple answer is in most cases, if there's a bank involved, it's going to be required.
Fernando Angelucci (17:54): Right.
Greg Jones (17:54): Where it's an option is where you actually own the asset a hundred percent. There's no lending requirements. You can choose whether you're going to insure the building or not. I've seen this particularly be the case when you've got developers who are buying, let's say a vacant property that they're going to repurpose, right? So usually they'll in a lot of cases, they'll buy it for cash or there won't be a bank involved if you will. So they have a choice whether they want to cover that building or not. The, I would say the reason you want to is because you want to have something that protects your investment, right? And it's not just the asset itself, especially when you're looking at development projects, you might purchase a building for, let's say a million dollars.
Greg Jones (18:43): You're going to put a couple of million into it, repurpose it. It's not just covering that initial million dollar investment. It's also looking at what is the potential income that you stand to lose if you lose that asset. Right?
Fernando Angelucci (18:58): Right.
Greg Jones (18:58): So insurance is, I mean, if you think about it, there's not a product out there where you can spend, let's say, I mean, I'm thinking back to one that I did for a client a while back bought a vacant building for it was like half a million dollars. Once he was done with the repurposing of it, he would have been into it for probably about 2.5. And the monetary return on this was going to be over half a million dollars a year. Once it was all done, the coverage of insurance was like $8,000, but we were covering the building for $2 million. Right? So you're spending eight in the event of a total loss. You're getting all of your investment back minus your deductible for 8K to protect an investment of significantly more. So, I mean, being someone that's fairly risk averse I would strongly recommend it.
Fernando Angelucci (19:59): Yeah. And so you're talking about the significant income that, that property would bring in. Is there some type of a rider that you can get for say, instead of it being a total loss, but say something happens where all of a sudden you lose your income generating potential from that building. Is there some type of like loss of rents protection or income protection that you can put on as a rider?
Greg Jones (20:20): So typically you'll have a loss of income or what's called business interruption coverage that's built in. So once you have a stabilized asset, it's generating rental income, you can cover that two ways. You can do it on a stated amount. So you're stating for every location that you have, this is what our annual income is. And if there's a claim, so let's say there was a fire at the building, right? The tenants have to relocate because you're doing all these repairs, it's going to take six months to do the repairs.
Fernando Angelucci (20:51): Yeah.
Greg Jones (20:51):The policy will pay out that loss rental income for those six months until you're back up and operational again. That's based on a stated amount, it functions the same way. A lot of companies prefer to do what's called actual losses sustained, which means you report what the rental income is, but you're not capped at that number. This is particularly important on portfolios where tenants change, right? You don't want to have to go back and report every single time. Well, this tenant moved out, this tenant, moved in. The rents went up a little bit, you know, and change that number all the time. So having actual losses sustained what they will do if there's a claim, they'll look at at the time of the claim, what was the rental income? And that's what they start paying until the repairs are done.
Fernando Angelucci (21:42): And I know we're skipping ahead here, but what are your recommendations on the two methods stated income versus actual? What do you prefer? What do you advise people to go with?
Greg Jones (21:54): Oh, I always prefer actual losses sustained. If you can get it just because it makes it very clean. So, I mean, a lot of times when you'll have an investor that's buying a new asset, they're typically inheriting tenants, right? They might be doing things to the building, providing more value, updates, all kinds of things. Right? And with that comes typically at lease renewal time adjustments in the lease. And if you have actual losses sustained, it doesn't matter what those adjustments are. You can have a unit that's going forward $2,000 a month. You put a lot of value into it, updates, improvements. You're going to increase that from, you know, $2,000 a month to 2,500 a month or whatever the case might be. You don't have to go back and report it every single time. So you don't want to have a cap on what could be paid out for lost income. Actual losses sustained is a much cleaner way to do it.
Fernando Angelucci (22:49): Gotcha. So what are some of the decisions that an investor or someone would be faced with when choosing insurance, what should they be looking out for? What are the things that you're recommending they look for, or pushing them or nudging them towards getting, if it's additional riders, if it's certain types of policies, kind of walk us through that.
Greg Jones (23:13): So there's a few things that I always look for. First time I see a policy. So one of those things is co-insurance which is a very confusing thing for most investors, co-insurance has to do with how much you're going to cover your building for. So the average investor will always cover their building for replacement costs. Typically that's the most standard way to do it. So let's say you have a building that's valued at a million dollars at replacement cost. Co-insurance allows you to insure it for a little less than that. So typically you'll see either 80% or 90%, but if you go below that, there's, what's called a co-insurance penalty, which means, let's say the buildings' a million dollars in value. You have an 80% co-insurance clause in your policy. That means that you can be fully insured up to 80% of the value.
Greg Jones (24:08): So in this case it would be 800,000, right? If you are insured for less than that, and there's a claim, even if it's a partial claim, they will subtract a percentage off of what would have been your claim paid amount based on how far under that 80% you are. So let's say you're insured only to 60% value. Well, you're 20% below where you should have been any claim that gets paid out is going to be docked 20%.
Fernando Angelucci (24:38): I see.
Greg Jones (24:38):
So what we do is, we look at trying to put everything on what's called Agreed Amount, which waives co-insurance, which basically is stating, I mean, we've gone through the process to make sure we're insured adequately, right? But we don't want any risk of co-insurance or penalties. If there's, you know, evaluation difference between the time we wrote the policy and the time of claim happens. So we are going to the carrier is a green in their contract. They will pay out up to X, no questions asked if that is on agreed amount. So that's one of the big ones we look at. One of the overlooked coverages I think is sewer and drain backup. And it's oftentimes put at a very low limit, but if you've gone through claims before, water damage, and you're a lower level, that can cause a significant damage to repair.
Fernando Angelucci (25:31): 60 to $80,000 worth of damage. Greg Jones (25:34):
Exactly. So that's something that I always want to make sure is at a very good limit. That's included in the Chicago market the other one is ordinance and law coverage.
Fernando Angelucci (25:46): Yeah.
Greg Jones (25:46): So it's not automatically included, but it provides coverage for, let's say you have a catastrophic loss and you're dealing with a building that was built in 1912.
Fernando Angelucci (25:56): Right?
Greg Jones (25:56): It's been updated, but there's a lot of things that are grandfathered in, just because of the age of the building. When you reconstruct, you have to reconstruct according to 2020 building code.
Fernando Angelucci (26:09):
Right.
Greg Jones (26:10): And that's an additional expense that is not automatically covered. So making sure that you have those kinds of things. So we, I really focus on trying to get into the weeds on this kind of thing, to make sure you know exactly what it is you're purchasing, and that it's actually protecting your asset, right? Because there's nothing worse than you go out and you purchase a policy from your broker, you have a claim. And then in that process, something's not covered. And you're like, well, I paid for this policy. Why is this not covered? It's like, well, this wasn't included, or this was sub limited. So only a certain amount of it gets paid and you're left spending money out of pocket. The last thing you want is to spend money out of pocket after you've had a claim, and you're already dealing with that headache.
Fernando Angelucci (27:00): Right. How would you advise someone choose the right coverage for their building in a word? It seems like property insurance is kind of like this pull lever here lose a little bit on the other side, pull lever on the other side, loses a little bit here. Usually it's with premium or with, which coverage amount, you're talking about things that are, let's call them named coverages versus unnamed.
Greg Jones (27:26): Right.
Fernando Angelucci (27:26): You know, issues. So what would you advise for someone and how they should approach choosing the right coverage?
Greg Jones (27:35): So typically the way I've always approached it is, I want to lay every option out there. That's on the table, right? These are the coverages that are available. Here's the tiers at which you can get these coverages. Right? So think about sewer and drain backup. For example, I can show you if you want 25,000 of coverage, it's going to cost of this. If you want 50, it's going to cause this, if you want 250, it's gonna cost that. Right? And then based on the size of the building what's your lower level construction type, right? Is it all block and stone? Okay. You probably don't need as much as then you're looking at, you know, fixtures and things like that versus yeah. We have a frame drywall, carpeted, you know, lower level, right?
Fernando Angelucci (28:19): Yeah.
Greg Jones (28:19): That's gonna sustain a lot more damage. So there's a lot of consulting around, based on what you have. This is what's recommended, but here are all the options. And so you lay that out on the table, make a recommendation but at the end of the day, it's up to that investor to choose what they want to proceed with.
Fernando Angelucci (28:37): Okay. What is the most common mistake or mistakes you see real estate investors make when it comes to property insurance?
Greg Jones (28:46): I would say the most common mistake I see is that the first thing they do is they look at what the premium is and they make the decision based on the premium without actually diving into all of those little ancillary coverages. Right? So they'll look at what the premium is and how much is the building covered for, they won't look at things like co-insurance, they won't look at is there any limitation on what my business interruption coverages, is equipment breakdown included all of those little things that if there's a claim will have a big impact. They're just looking at my billings cover for a million dollars and it costs this much. That's the least expensive one. Let's go with that. Or also looking at, what carrier are you partnering with? How does that carrier respond? If there's a claim. Or they carry that really will push back and try to find any possible way, not pay a claim or do they have a good track record of really working with their insurance, right?
Fernando Angelucci (29:47): How do you find that information?
Greg Jones (29:50): So that's where I think working with a adviser comes into play, especially one that's ingrained in the industry by the industry. I mean the real estate industry. So someone who's worked with multiple carriers has been able to see claims walked out from multiple carriers, and be able to say, I've seen experience with this carrier, They're all willing to offer you terms. Here's the pros and cons of each one and what I think their strong suits are.
Fernando Angelucci (30:19): Gotcha. How about on the flip side, what are some of the common mistakes you've seen risk advisors make?
Greg Jones (30:29): I would say the two that I see the most would be not going into full detail and doing the full underwriting themselves on the front end. So, like I said before, there's a lot of brokers out there. I mean, there's thousands of insurance brokers, right? I mean, you can go to anybody, you want to get insurance pretty much.
Fernando Angelucci (30:48): Right.
Greg Jones (30:50): But if they are not going into that full detail and figuring out all of the things on the front end before they start quoting something with a carrier. There's a lot of things that can get missed. Right? Not actually doing the legwork to make sure are we covering the building adequately, are we running the right reports to make sure that this asset will be fully protected up to the investment level that the investor has, right? Are we including the right coverages?
Greg Jones (31:20): Are we asking for the right endorsements or add-ons right. I would say that's probably the biggest mistake because that's where you find they rush through the process, they get a quote, something happens and then there's an item that wasn't covered, and then it's up to that broker to make that right. So I would say that's probably the biggest mistake I've seen. The other is just not actually, like I was talking about before painting that picture with an underwriter, the difference that you can get for a client through that is huge. It's really, that's a way to create value for an investor when you do it that way versus just spit balling out there to any carrier you can to get a quote. And it's also a way to potentially lose the client in the long run, because you're going to get the best pricing when you paint that picture, versus you're just marketing it out to everybody and taking a shotgun approach. It's very easy for somebody that really knows what they're doing to come in and create that value drive down that cost, and then you lose the client. So.
Fernando Angelucci (32:37): One of the things that I have seen is trying to do everything yourself, as opposed to building out a team to help you with that. And you've alluded to it multiple times that you have a team around you that helps you fill these duties. What does that look like? What does your team look like? And what are they responsible for each?
Greg Jones (33:00): So on the team is built out of there's multiple advisers in my firm multiple ones of us that focus in real estate. I think one of the real advantages is the way we've built out this office is we have professionals that are focused not only within real estate, but within various aspects of real estate. So you have guys that are really focused in the multifamily space. You have guys that are focused in commercial, meaning like office retail, industrial. You have others that are focused in condominium associations, right? So it creates a wealth of knowledge that you can pull from. So let's say you're working on something that's a little bit outside of your wheelhouse. You have that resource that you can bring in to make sure that nothing's getting missed through that process, right? There's expertise there. There's also a service team that handles a lot of the transactional pieces that happen within a real estate account. So when you're going through a refinance there's documentation that the lender needs to see based on what you have on your insurance policy, you know, evidence of coverage, et cetera. We have a team that one processes, those changes provides those certificates when they're needed, helps process the day-to-day things of those transactions that you're doing on the front end behind the scenes with the carrier, so that people like myself, the advisers can really interact more with their clients and do the consulting piece.
Fernando Angelucci (34:31): Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So let's move back to say new investor, new real estate investors looking to get involved, just saw this podcast. What advice would you give them when they're looking to buy their first investment property or start their first project? Let's say maybe it's inside of a rental, It's a fix and flip property.
Greg Jones (34:57): Right. I would say as someone new that's getting into it, the, I think the most important thing you have to think about when it comes to insurance is partnering with the right broker, because a lot of people are generalists that'll say, sure, I write real estate. I also write restaurants and I write manufacturing and I'll write a trucking company and they're not ingrained into the industry. And there are, there are brokers that really specialize within an industry like myself, that's real estate. Right?
Fernando Angelucci (35:29): Right.
Greg Jones (35:30): As a new investor, there's a lot of education that comes with that first investment, that first project, even the first few. Right? And so being able to partner with someone that is part of the team with you, that can say, okay, based on what you're investing in, or the project that you're doing, these are all the things you want to consider. Right? You don't have to go with all of them, but at least you have the information and you can make an educated decision.
Fernando Angelucci (35:58): And then how about on the flip side, what advice would you give to somebody considering becoming a risk advisor or an insurance broker?
Greg Jones (36:07): I would say if you're going to become an insurance broker or an advisor. The most important thing I think you need to be able to do is specialize in an industry.
Fernando Angelucci (36:15): Okay.
Greg Jones (36:15): For the same purpose. Right? There's obviously a lot of change happening within the insurance industry, right? I mean, online rating systems are on the rise. I mean, think about your home and auto insurance. Right?
Fernando Angelucci (36:31): Right.
Greg Jones (36:32): You don't have to go through a broker to get home and auto insurance. You can go online, plug in your information, the quote will get spit right back out at you. It's turning it into very much of a commodity. Right? I think in the commercial space, there's still a lot of room to bring value to clients. Right? But the only way you bring value is if you can bring consulting and advice and you can't bring consulting and advice on 12 different industries, you have to really be able to understand how your client's business works and speak to that versus taking orders or reacting to what they're asking for when maybe what they're asking for isn't actually going to protect them the right way. And you want to be able to bring value. And that's the only way you can do it.
Fernando Angelucci (37:24): I always tell people, especially new investors for real estate investors, it's good to be a Jack of all trades and master of none. But then you surround yourself with investor or with advisors that are the opposite.
Fernando Angelucci (37:38): Exactly.
Fernando Angelucci (37:38): The advisors is a master of one thing, not a Jack of all trades.
Greg Jones (37:41): Right.
Fernando Angelucci (37:41): So, you know, I worked with you in the past. I know you, I know a lot of people that worked with you in the past, what can a real estate investor do to make themselves a good partner, a good client to you? So that is the interaction between the two is seamless. And you don't want to scream every time you see Fernando calling you on the phone.
Greg Jones (38:07):
Yeah. I would say communication is probably the biggest thing. Right? I was talking with a colleague about this a couple of years ago, and I was like, you can tell a difference between a client that views you as a vendor and a commodity. Versus a client that views you as an advisor and part of their team. Right? And the difference there is, they're bringing you into conversations about what the future looks like in advance. So I've got some clients that are really good at this, where we have quarterly meetings and we'll talk about this is what's in the pipeline. What do we need to be thinking about? Let's prepare for this in advance. They'll ask a lot of questions, and you particularly see this where if you've got an investor who's maybe changing their direction of their focus, right? So let's say I've talked to some groups recently where historically they've done a lot of work in the office and retail space.
Greg Jones (39:05): They want to launch a multifamily division. And so they'll say, okay, we're changing direction here. What do we need to be thinking about as we start looking at a different kind of investment versus what we've done in the past? With those kinds of conversations, the process is much smoother versus the I have a portfolio of office and retail and, Oh, by the way, I forgot to tell you, I'm closing at noon tomorrow on a 80 unit apartment building. I need you to get this added for me, which if there was no conversation on the front end, who knows if the carrier that you're with, you could even add that location to, or you have to go and get something from scratch and you're on a you're on a deadline to do it. So I would say the communication and just having open dialogue about what's going on within the company and asking questions and keeping that line of communication open is the best thing a client can do.
Fernando Angelucci (40:03): Yeah. I mean, that makes a lot of sense with almost any advise you work with. You've got to really make sure you're, you're communicating not only often, but well in advance of when you need things to be done by a certain deadline.
Greg Jones (40:20): Right.
Fernando Angelucci (40:20): So with that being said, how can, you know, how can people reach you and what should they know, or what should they prepare before trying to contact you or reaching out to you?
Greg Jones (40:34): So I can be reached my contact info I believe is on our website www.CrumHalstad.com. I also can be reached by phone, email. I don't know if you'll have that information up later, but that's typically the easiest way to get ahold of me phone and email. As far as what to have prepared, I mean, typically I like to start just by having a conversation with, what is it you're looking for? What do you have? What's the plan? One of the things that I've tried to do that's a little bit different with clients is not just looking at what your particular need is right now, but also like what's the next 12 months look like? Right. So I was a good example of this. I was talking with an investment group that so far all of their investments have been in Chicago. Right? But over the next 12 months, they're trying to start investing in multiple States. And so, having an overview conversation around what the plan is, is really helpful because you want to set a platform that a client can grow from. Right? So as far as what they have prepared, just have a conversation and then we can kind of direct from there, what information we need.
Fernando Angelucci (41:55): Yeah. That makes sense. Come prepared, that I know you like to get involved a little bit earlier in the process and what most investors will involve you in the process. Right?
Greg Jones (42:06): Correct.
Fernando Angelucci (42:06): How many let's say I got a closing on December 30th, when should I call you?
Greg Jones (42:13): I mean, I would say as far in advance as possible but.
Fernando Angelucci (42:18): Right as you to go into contract then?
Fernando Angelucci (42:19): Yeah right as you go into contract. So it really has to do with, it's not so much what our timeline is, really. It comes down to what the carrier's timeline is, right? Because when we get that phone call that says, you know, hey, I'm closing in four or five days, there are some carriers that could be really competitive in that space, but they can't turn it around that quickly. They, because they already have so many files on their desks that they're trying to work through. They're not going to jump on the last minute one that just came in and push everything else they've been working on to the side typically. So as much in advance as you can is great. That being said, there's always options. I mean, I've done it before where I get notification two days before we put something together, it doesn't allow us time to go out to all of the options. Right? But it still allows you to provide some, right?
Fernando Angelucci (43:14): Yeah.
Greg Jones (43:14): And then you talk at that point of, okay, so what's the strategy after we move forward with this, you know, do we try to remarket it down the road at next renewal? Start the process earlier, et cetera.
Fernando Angelucci (43:27): That makes sense. Alright Greg, I really appreciate you coming on. Thank you for giving us the scoop in on Property Insurance and Risk Advisers. Everyone that is watching, they'll have a link to your contact information below as well as the website there, if with whatever you'd like to provide.
Greg Jones (43:50): Awesome
Fernando Angelucci (43:51): And thanks again, everybody for tuning in to What's The Deal, the real estate podcast that gives you answers. If you have any questions or if you have certain topics you'd like us to cover, feel free to comment below, and we'll get back to you as soon as possible. And that is our Thanksgiving edition of What's The Deal. Hope everybody has a safe and happy holiday.
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openheart12 · 4 years
Note
Hi, yes, hello beautiful! Can you write a fic where MC accidentally sends Ethan her entire fanfic folder by mistake 😂🤣
How To Get Away With Fanfiction
I’m reliving my embarrassment 😭 but it is done and idk wtf happened with this lmao. This is also to make up for earlier kmjhygfd
Only tagging @ao719 @oofchoices @loveellamae @burnsoslow because no one else should have to read this unless they click on the read more and if they do... god bless. And thank you to Maroe for helping me come up with some of these ideas!
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It had been a long day at work when Dr. Gertrude-Sue Claws made her way home to do the one thing that relaxed her; writing fanfiction.
She had thought of the perfect idea for Spirit and Rainbow Dash and her fingers flew across the keyboard.
There was something about the multi colors in his mane and tail that drew him to her. He lived by the phrase, “hump ‘em and dump ‘em,” which he planned on doing with Rainbow Dash, but not without consent because horse jail wasn’t fun. He had heard the horror stories from his human friends, Kurns and Bryce.
“Rainbow Dash,” he neighed.
“Spirit…” She neighed back in response, she knew all about his...extracurricular activities. He was the biggest fuck horse out of the herd. Ever since Rain had died from drowning, god bless, he hadn’t been the same. It was also why he paid more attention to Rainbow Dash because she had Rain in the first part of her name.
“Let’s do this,” he smirked with his horse mouth.
“Fine…” She turned her back to him as he reared on his hind legs and mounted her, letting out a series of neighs.
She laughed silently to herself before moving on her Owen Hunt fic and she knew how much she was going to enjoy this one especially.
Owen was walking through the halls when he saw five women stalking towards him like cats, one even had whiskers drawn on her face. “Anitah with the h, get him!” He heard one of them command and watched as she came up to him, kicking him in no man's land. He felt them drag him into an empty exam room.
“MAROE! You got the chainsaw?”
“Nah bruh, Bears and Rams were in charge of that,” she explained.
Anything but Krista, cocked her half shaved eyebrow at Burns and Ella. “Y’all got the chainsaw?”
“No, but I have the cream for the burn I’m about to inflict,” Burns snickered to herself at her own joke, the others joining in before getting back to business.
“Burns, Ella, go scope out the cafeteria for some good food because I can’t kill in good faith on an empty stomach and as me and Ella say, we always get food first,” Anything but Krista said, turning her attention to the two people left, throwing them both a knife. Then proceeded to stab Owen numerous times, but making sure not to hit any major organs yet.
“We need a blender,” Anitah with the h announced.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Anything but Krista and MAROE said at the same time, looking at each other and bursting into laughter at the jinx.
“If that was making a human smoothie, then yes. We’ll show him that no one messes with Derek Christopher Shepherd,” Anitah with the h said smugly, pulling a blender out from behind her back and plugging it into the wall.
“You...you pulled that out of your jacket?” MAROE asked in a surprising tone.
“Y’all don’t keep blenders in yours?” Anitah with the h asked as if that wasn’t common, but it was good to know that she was always prepared.
Suddenly, the walkie talkie came to life, “Team Bears/Rams to Team CA, what y’all want from here? Over and out.”
“Team CA to Team Bears/Rams, we want CookOut. Over and out.” Anything but Krista responded. “It’s about time y’all tried a little piece of heaven,” she looked at Anitah with the h and MAROE.
“That’s a negative ghost rider, the closest CookOut is on the other side of the country. Over and out.”
“Well you better get on your way because you two also need to try a little piece of heaven, we’ll save the good stuff for when you get back. Over and out.” The trio resumed their slice and dice game, taking a short break to play Choices because the latest chapter of The Nanny Affair had just been released and even Owen wasn’t going to keep them away from Sam Dalton.
A couple hours later, Burns and Ella arrived with the food, handing out their respective trays to their respective orderers, they were able to keep the milkshakes from melting by their cold hearts.
“Ahhh gimme my milkshake,” Anything but Krista snatched it from Burns’ hand, earning a slap on her hand from her adoptive mother and a threat of taking away her pony...again.
“Yooo this shake hits different,” Ella exclaimed.
“You could even say that it slaps,” MAROE added making her squeak.
“It’s the one good thing North Carolina has to offer for me,” Anything but Krista chimed in, fist bumping Anitah with the h because the struggle was real. The cows really did outnumber the people, they just hoped that there wouldn’t be a cow revolution because that would be awful except the yeehaw folk would probably survive since they did have a song called “A Country Boy Can Survive.” 
“Burns, we left you the honor of picking the perfect weather for us to dispose of the body which is more like liquid at this point. We need rain, thunder, and lightning to erase all of the evidence. Watching “Forensic Files” has finally come in handy. And Ella, we need you to pretend to be a nurse or something to help us get out of here. I’ll be honest, I haven’t thought that far ahead…” Anything but Krista admitted, but they expected that from her so they already had a plan in place.
“If anyone happens to see Derek Shepherd, I ask that you tell me,” MAROE added.
“Not if I find him first,” Anything but Krista said.
“He’s like fifty four years old…” Burns said being ever the good adoptive mother.
“Then I call Spencer Reid!” Anything but Krista exclaimed.
“I have Lucifer then,” MAROE challenged knowing that would get under her skin. 
“Children, calm yourselves.” Burns shook her head.
“Hey, I’ll be eighteen in like a number amount of months,” Anything but Krista said.
“I’ll be eighteen before you,” MAROE said, sticking out her tongue.
“I’Ll Be EiGhTeEn BeFoRe YoU,” she repeated, placing her hands on her hips and doing that Spongebob meme. After thinking of a better comeback, she grabbed her knife she used on Owen earlier and plunged it into MAROE’s back.
“Et tu, Brute?” MAROE said with shock in her voice before her body crumpled on the ground.
“Yes, bye bitch.”
The other three just stared as the blood drained from her body before turning their attention to Anything but Krista. They were the epitome of 👁👄👁.
“What? She wanted to “due” anyway. And at her funeral we can play “To Be So Lonely” because well she will be lol.”
“Anywaysss, we gonna get food or what?” Ella asked as she covered Owen’s body with a sheet.
“Wings?” Burns suggested and they all agreed. After arriving at the restaurant, they were very shocked to see MAROE sitting at a table waiting for them.
“It’s the trying to kill me for me,” she said upon taking their seats, glaring at Anything But Krista specifically.
“It’s the stealing my fictional husbands for me,” she retaliated.
“It’s the acting like children for me,” Burns' authoritative voice came.
“Sorry,” they both murmured as they looked over the menus to order their food. The rest of their lunch going smoothly, their victims already forgotten about. Don’t mess with hangry chicks who hate Owent Cunt.
“So who’s next?” Anitah with the h asked.
“Ahh you’ve gotten the first taste of blood and now you’re addicted,” Burns observed. She would make for a good profiler for the FBI at Quantico. She would have a cool nickname; Cunt Punter.
“Why not just kill everyone we hate?” Ella questioned.
“That’s a great idea! I say we kill Guy and Vanessa,” Anything but Krista suggested.
“And Landrat!” MAROE added, the whole group agreeing, finishing their lunch before getting to their killing spree.
Gertrude-Sue was laughing at her made up characters and story when she received an email from Ethonk Remy to send him a folder that she had. Goggle Drive was acting stupid so she didn’t realize that she had shared her fanfiction folder with her boss before it was too late. She saw a little giraffe pop up in the right hand corner telling her that he was already viewing what was inside the folder.
“Holy donkey claws,” she cried out loud, smacking her hands against her face.
Meanwhile, Ethonk was going through her folder when he came across a document and his eyes went wide. “What are they doing with the dog?” He said to himself.
Wonder pets, wonder pets
We're on our way
To help a friend and save the day
We're not too big
And we're not too tough
But when we work together, we've got the right stuff
Gooo wonder pets yaaaaay!
The phone
The phone is ringing
The phone
We'll be right there
The phone
The phone is ringing
There's an animal in trouble
There's an animal in trouble
There's an animal in trouble somewhere
“What the hell are Wonder Pets?” He continued inspecting the different documents ranging from murder of one Owen Cunt, horses having sexual intercourse, Wonder Pets stuff, four kids and a dog where they did questionable things with each other, a sponge and a starfish were high on marijuana, a game where Gertrude-Sue had made him and her a family that looked way too realistic for his liking, two bunnies who kept hopping around with one of their little brothers, and multiple documents about Matthew Gray Gubler, Tom Holland, Tom Ellis, Patrick Dempsey, and Harry Styles which were all quite disturbing.
He took out his phone to call her. “Hey uh, Gert, what is this?”
“Oh well you see, the funny thing is that I accidentally sent you the wrong folder so if you could just pretend like this never happened, that would be fantastic. Okay thanks bye. I’m sending you the right one this time.” And she hung up, ready to throw herself off a cliff at her stupidity.
One thing was for sure, she would never make this mistake again.
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csykora · 4 years
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https://slate.com/transcripts/c2JZaHhQeC9QMGlhdUFpUGEycnl0UnRnNUdJRmo5R0tCdG02ck5pTTRhTT0=
On this week’s Hang Up and Listen podcast, we talked to two members of the group, both from UCLA: Elisha Guidry, a rising sophomore defensive back from Long Beach, California, and Otito Ogbonnia, a rising junior defensive tackle from Houston. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity. The link to the full audio interview is at the bottom of this piece. —Joel Anderson
Joel Anderson: I guess the first question is: How did this group and the list of demands come together?
Otito Ogbonnia: It was something that we always knew, individually and teamwise, that this is a sentiment that most people felt. We were just waiting for an opportunity to get this whole thing going. And this started with some of the guys from Cal who used this as an opportunity to demand change and try to really get something done here. It was really Zoom that allowed us to do this whole thing, and being in a pandemic. It’d be very hard to coordinate a movement this big in normal times.
Elisha Guidry: Also, the social movement, or the civil rights movement really that’s going on in our country also inspired us. There’s a lot of inequalities that people are noticing. People are being awakened to seeing some of the things that go on in this world, and I feel like college football has many of them as well.
Josh Levin: Elisha, there are 17 demands on the list. What are the top line ones, as far as you’re concerned?
Guidry: For me personally, I feel like they’re all important. Definitely the players’ safety with the COVID, and ensuring that if a player decides to opt out, that his eligibility is honored, as well as getting insurance for players when they finish playing, because football takes a toll on the body and the mind. And I feel like once the player is done, they’re kind of just kicked out. They’re kind of just thrown in the world without a lot of guidance.
The image and likeness is very important because players deserve to be able to create wealth for themselves with this sport. I feel like a lot of players come from lower-income homes, a lot of players have struggles and football is kind of their way out. So just having an opportunity to be able to affect their families and affect their communities and people around them with their sport, even if they don’t make it to the NFL, is very important.
Stefan Fatsis: The demand that’s gotten a lot of attention is asking for 50 percent of revenue from the conference to be directed toward players. I mean, realistically, there’s no way that the Pac-12 leaders are going to agree to that immediately. So it does feel like by asking for it, you’re bringing this out into the open, the idea that athletes are aware of the inequities here and that we’ve got to move toward some system that helps compensate them in some way. Is that how you view it or are the ambitions higher among the group?
Ogbonnia: That’s exactly how we view it. I think when you exploit a group of people for this amount of time, it’s just kind of what you get. They had their opportunity to fix this, multiple opportunities. And one thing we, as a group, aren’t willing to accept is the idea that it’s not possible. This is a country which was brought up upon working hard and doing the impossible. And there are ways to get it done. Fifty percent of revenue is ambitious and it’s high and it’s asking a lot. But we live in this country, just like everybody else. And in regards to name, image, and likeness, why should we be the only citizens in this country who are denied making money off of who we are and our brand? And why is it that a kid at UCLA being a musician can go perform and make a couple hundred bucks off of their name, image, and likeness, but when it comes down to athletes, it’s a whole different story?
And I think that’s where that social justice kind of comes in, right? When you deny a group of people certain rights, you start to wonder why you’re doing it.
Anderson: A little more than a month ago, before even the We Are United movement, UCLA football players published their own list of demands related to coronavirus protections. So there was obviously an activist streak within the team already. And I just was curious to know, where is the team with that?
Ogbonnia: I forgot to mention about when you asked about the start of this movement, one thing those Cal guys told us is that they saw our letter to our university. They saw what we published and they kind of took that lead from us. So that was cool to see that.
And in regards to where we’re at now, for the most part, we’re doing well in terms of guaranteeing COVID protections. And we’re taking a very conservative approach to getting back to play in competition, if that’s even feasible.
[But] this is above UCLA. It’s above any one conference or any one school. It’s above any one person or any one culture or athletic department. It’s a conference thing. And the conference has the power to get some of these things done. As you’ve seen, the NCAA and the conference aren’t necessarily as conjoined as one may think. And a lot of times, they work separately in a lot of these matters.
Guidry: The Cal guys saw the things that we were asking for and they had to stop themselves—like, OK, we don’t have the same type of protection, and that’s something we want, because we feel like we’re taking this risk coming back to school and trying to participate in this game.
We all love football. We all spend so much time playing, since we were kids, and we want to do that as safely as possible, especially during this pandemic. Just asking around is what got everybody started and kind of got us all connected. And then we realized that there were more issues than just with the COVID-19 precautions.
Levin: I think it’s important for folks listening to this to understand how amazing and unusual it is what you guys are doing—even doing this interview. There was a story recently about the University of Iowa. They didn’t even let their players be on social media. The amount of control at these programs, about what they allow you guys to say, what they allow you guys to do in public, it’s so restrictive. And so the fact that you guys are talking to us about this, the fact that you put this message out, it’s an enormous deal. And we’ve already seen, there are varying reports about what’s going on at Washington State, in your conference, about potential repercussions for players there for joining this movement and for speaking out. [Editor’s note: According to a transcript published by the Dallas Morning News, Washington State coach Nick Rolovich told player Kassidy Woods that if Woods was a part of the Pac-12 unity movement, “that’s gonna be an issue.” Rolovich later said in a statement, “WSU football student-athletes who have expressed support for the #WeAreUnited group will continue to be welcome to all team-related activities.”] Are you guys at all concerned about potential repercussions from UCLA? And are you aware of the power imbalance? Your coach, Chip Kelly, was an NFL coach. He’s a multi-multimillionaire and you guys—you could have your scholarships taken away, potentially.
Ogbonnia: I think that’s something that a lot of people consider when they’re joining this movement. When you join something with this magnitude, you get the idea of what you’re getting yourself into and kind of make [peace] with that, with the consequences of what you’re doing. Of course, I would love to keep my scholarship and stay on the team. And our coach or our administration has never threatened us in that manner. And I don’t think they will. It’s been relatively positive and we haven’t seen any type of repercussion, retaliation from anybody from our school.
And it hurts to see that type of stuff being exemplified at Washington State, because you tell people to stand up for what they believe in in this world. When you want to support something, I think you should have the freedom to do it. And in regards to holding your tongue in a lot of these things, I think that’s where the conferences and the universities and college football as a whole gains their control over individuals. Because you start to feel a certain way after you’re done with football, when you’re in the system and you feel silenced, you feel like you can’t say anything, and that takes a toll on you. And it’s taken a toll on me until I kind of had a realization of who I am and who I want to be in this world. And that’s not somebody who’s silenced or who feels like they can’t be who they are because of what I’m doing.
I don’t think that’s what we sign up for. [It] doesn’t say that in our letter of intent. You shouldn’t bar anybody from freedom of speech. They should be able to say what they want without feeling like they may get cut or that they may get blackballed by their team or their coach. And that’s why that Washington State situation is very significant in our eyes in this movement. We’re well aware of what’s going on and we’re trying to do the best we can to help those guys out there.
Guidry: I feel like for real change to come, you’ve kind of got to put yourself out there. If I have to be sacrificed to have a greater movement come, then that’s something I’m OK with. If I got to sit out to help bring a change for my children or my friends’ children that are to come or the next generation, that’s something that, at the end of the day, it’s going to make things better. And if I have to be the one that has to be at expense for that, that’s something that I’m OK with.
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