Try this one for size

Ok, awhile back the boss and I received an invitation to tour a “New Lakeside Community Project on Beautiful Lake Livingston!”

Cool.  Thanks.  Whatever.  We’ll go, but we won’t buy, gimme my free gift.

I don’t remember what the gift was.  I think it was an overnight at some hotel which we probably used.

That isn’t the important part.

 

This is the important part.

 

The guy was pitching us on the property and explaining that there were only so many lots and only so many lakes and in a few years my parents’ generation would be retiring in huge numbers and snatching up the best of these properties and driving up all of the prices. 

I nodded politely and followed his logic.

He continued to explain that I could purchase the property now—today!—and hold on to it for 5 or 10 years and then sell it at 10 times the value I bought it at.  “10 times?”, I asked.  “Well, at a significant increase in value” he replies.  “If you say so” I say.  He continues to make his pitch and goes on to explain that in addition to the property blah blah blah…  I ceased to pay attention and he apparently noticed because he stopped short and swapped out with his boss—the closer—who then upped the pressure on my lovely wife and me.

Since I’m an accountant I was crunching the numbers as he was providing them and was able to explain that a 10% interest rate was stupid and he stammered because nobody he had encountered seemed able to calculate payments and interest.

 

But even that isn’t the really good part.

 

When the closer was at the end of my patience I asked him in the most inquisitive tone I could muster “Any idea what’s going to happen in 30 years?”  Of course he told me he had no idea because truthfully none of us really know what’s going to happen.  I continued “Neither do I, really, but I know my parents aren’t getting any younger and for the most part there are more baby boomers than there are of the rest of us.  How many of them do you think are going to own their fancy retirement beach and lake homes in 30 or 40 years when they’re 85 and 95 years old?”

 

Silence.

 

“I’ll see you in 30 years when I’m retiring.  You better have some sweet deals.  Now where’s my free hotel stay.”