Former Jaguar Mark Brunell filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy
Brunell fell victim to real estate downturn.
“The timing of the group’s real estate acquisitions at the height of the real estate market, in hindsight, clearly was not good,” Brunell said in a statement e-mailed to the Times-Union.
If you made $52 million over the course of 10 years, spent $17 million on taxes, spent a whopping $200,000 per year just to scrape by, invested the rest entirely on speculative real estate, that real estate then lost 75% of its value then...
You'd think you'd still have $4 million leftover to enjoy a very comfortable post-NFL retirement and would have no need to file bankruptcy.
You'd think.
You might not have factored in what Fitch Ratings analyst Bob Curran had to say about debt and leverage in April 2005 though.
It may simply reflect our overleveraged society and the fact that people are carrying more debt on everything and it doesn't take a lot to affect a small percentage of them in terms of moving them from homeownership to not.
That's probably my favorite quote from the housing bubble. You'd think he'd be the biggest bear of them all. It's something I could have easily said back then. No such luck though. Check out what he said next.
"It's hard to make a case, based on what I see here, that all of a sudden it's become an enormous trend." He said the economy is improving and employment is growing, which bodes well for a homeowner's ability to make mortgage payments.
Guess what? It eventually became an enormous trend, the economy fell apart, unemployment skyrocketed, and it did not bode well for a homeowner's ability to make mortgage payments. Go figure.
I read an article in SI last year that stated 80% of NFL players are bankrupt two years after they retire. ?! These guys get paid millions, and go broke within a matter of months. Go figure.
ReplyDeleteAlso, there's an article in the latest issue of BusinessWeek, which is a magazine I've become increasingly less impressed with lately, about this con man of the stars, one Ken Star. It appears that the "wealthy" are not all that sophisticated of investors after all.
Anyway, as far as real estate goes, it's very simple really. Any investment, sufficiently leveraged, will lead to ruin.
If you don't know what you're doing, you don't know what you're doing, and you have no business handling money.
From a millionaire to a hundredaire, that is the way of the world.
Boxers are famous for blowing all their money as well, so sad.
ReplyDeleteI had no idea Brunnel was into this stuff.
GawainsGhost & GYSC,
ReplyDeleteI would think it would be especially easy for professional athletes to lose money. They already know they are better than most people at one thing.
Unfortunately, some skills just don't carry over. Managing money is clearly one that doesn't.
"Its a Liger, bred for its skills in magic"
ReplyDeleteIf it were only that easy.
GYSC,
ReplyDeleteYou know, there's like a boat-load of gangs at this school. This one gang kept wanting me to join because I'm pretty good with a bow staff.
We're definitely in inside joke mode now, lol. ;)
Schools train us to in specific industries... we graduate, earn and spend. The system is not designed to teach us what to do with the money that we earn. If school boards had your interest at heart they would spend more time teaching us the history of economics among other financial courses.
ReplyDeleteOf course, our society depends on reckless spending which conflicts with an educated population.
Remy,
ReplyDeleteAt the very least, you'd think someone would teach how to balance a checkbook at some point somewhere. Go figure.