In the last 5 years, I've probably closed at least 75 commercial or multifamily acquisition/construction loans of $30-$100mm at a nominal interest rate, generally all structured as ~5-year interest only loans with a balloon at maturity. The standard financing in the industry is a short-term balloon loan to commence construction and build equity (through adding improvements and land appreciation); at maturity, refinance with increased equity and return some cash to investors. It will be a shit show when these developers have to start refinancing at current rates, and an outright disaster for those who haven't built enough equity to refinance as budgeted.
My wife is on maternity leave and her SAAS company laid off about a third of their workforce including most of her customer success department that was offshored. She isn’t expecting to have a job when she is off protected status. I’m in the moving industry and the housing market halt is really fucking us and we have been cutting costs like crazy. Fun times right now.
I've worked on a ton of commercial and multifamily with same/similar terms as well. Currently in the process of drafting a PPM for a new REPE fund. Same clients, so they must be somewhat optimistic and/or appropriately budgeted.
We've invested in a few hotel constructions and they have already come back and asked for more money due to rising interest rates.
Was impressed with how they did it...never a good message to deliver but honoring RSU's, bonuses, and generous severance is pretty great
Eh, don't think I'd say that exactly. Hiring freezes are here with more surely coming. Apple, Amazon, etc. have already announced them.
On other news. Traeger reports earnings today. Really interested to see what they say on forward guidance. Even if you don't care about outdoor cooking as a category at all, they are a good gauge of consumer durables and leisure categories.
Whew, Traeger got crushed. Not at all unexpected, we are seeing similar numbers. New buying opportunity tomorrow. They're still setup very nicely for the future if they can make it through this (assumed) short term industry downtrend
whats got you so positive about them? I realize they were the industry standard but there are a number of other companies now with similar products with as good quality for half the price.
They essentially built pellets into what they are today and marketed at such an incredible level that they're just on their own island. Their brand awareness is basically on the level of Weber, which is unheard of. Searches for "Traeger" outpace searches for "pellet grills" in many years for example. Companies have had better pellet grills at lower prices for years (including mine) and buyers and consumers just don't care. They are convinced Traeger = top quality. I'm highly confident they could drastically cut marketing spend and they've done enough to maintain brand awareness and loyalty for quite a while. Costs from China and logistics are coming down, we're hoping to the tune of like 10% for next year for our stuff and theirs should be similar. There's also the Meater business, which is $100M annually by itself and very high margin. to be clear, I don't see this as being early tech or anything like that. There's no 20x opportunity here as the overall grill industry is only so big, but a $400M market cap just makes no sense for them. By 2024 volume will be back, margins will be up, spending should be down and I think they're back to $1B cap
It's just hard to accurately state their brand affinity for buyers/consumers without being in some of those meetings and hearing it directly. Hell one example is they literally can't keep Christmas ornaments in stock at some stores. No other brand, even Weber, has customers giving a shit about merch like that.
Put that on while working. Being at a tech co, specifically one that hasn't yet done any RIF, that first half was pretty terrifying. So it was nice that they followed that up with some complete shit-quality political takes and projections (Pennsylvania almost certainly going Red along with probably Arizona for the Senate) in the second half.
For about six months my neighbor would pop over every time he smelled my Rec-Tec. He said he was going to get one, asked a million questions, etc. I told him repeatedly not to get a Traeger, he could get better quality for less. Sent him the link to buy my exact model, which I said I highly recommended. He bought a Traeger.
Just caught up on this thread. I guess the only positivity I can add is that my savings account is up to 3.00%!!!
Walmart had a flash sale on the Traeger 575 model a few weeks back and my neighbor bought one for $499. Zero lot line yards so my porch is like 20 feet from his and it smells so damn good. Smoking meats all the time and tells me how easy it is to use. I’ve wanted a smoker for a while now and convinced myself Traeger is the brand I want if I see one on sale this holiday. But you say don’t get one?
I’m not the one to ask honestly. I just repeated what I was told when I was shopping. I don’t know anyone who is unhappy with Traeger.
I definitely wouldn't say don't get one. Think of Traeger the same way as Yeti. They are fine products, but you're paying up a bit for brand. If you're looking for the best "bang for your buck" it's never going to be Traeger. My opinion is you can get a similar spec for cheaper from other brands, or a better spec for the same price from a brand like Rec-Tec or GMG, but a ton of people just want that Traeger logo and that's understandable since they have such a massive presence in the industry, at comps and really just in outdoor lifestyle as a category. hell you can go buy Traeger co-branded Whistlepig Whiskey right now, or Leinenkuegel infused Traeger pellets,
I don’t think they make Sunset Wheat anymore. I drank a ton of it in college since many State College bars had it for $3 a pint.
Just to add As far as buying a grill. Traeger was an industry standard and built great products, then as they had the patent they kinda let quality lag since they were the only game in town. Then when the patent ran out others jumped in at a lower price with basically the same quality. And now I think Traeger has learned their lesson and is building great stuff again. They are quite a bit more expensive still unless you can find them on sale. I have a Camp Chef which I love, was about $300 less than the Traeger of comparable size. And I know multiple people who have Pit Bosses and they have no issues. To me the brand name isn’t worth the extra money. It def not a bad product. HTH.
HSA Question- If my wife has our two kids on her health insurance policy which is high deductible and i have my own health insurance policy which is not high deductible, can she contribute the $3,650 for self-only or the $7,300 for families.
Market loves that CPI data. I’ve been lumping on Salesforce and Hubspot for a while, hope there’s a reward there soon.
How do I speak in code so as not to attract the usual suspects. What’s happening with FTX and SBF is wild wild wild. And Michael Lewis has been following him around for a book …so that should be fascinating.
If a minuscule drop in YoY inflation caused an insane rally, I wonder what will happen when the fed pivots
It's pretty infuriating how average regular people get punished by fed price hikes because corporations are greedy as fuck....
Pretty wild that covid is going to outlast NFTs, crypto, Kanye and twitter. Could have gotten hella good betting odds on that back in 2020