25. Note Investing and Economic Outlook with Bob Fraser

Bob Fraser is the Co-Founder & Principal at Aspen Funds, a residential mortgage fund. He worked in tech and in the stock market before starting his notes investing fund eight years ago.  In this episode, he talks about investing in notes, his outlook for the economy, why he is not concerned about inflation and ends with a discussion on Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

Bob explains that buying notes is just buying mortgages on real estate. He talks about Aspen funds and how they focus on notes on single family homes. Bob discusses the difference between performing notes and non-performing notes. He explains that when they buy non-performing notes, they rehab the loans and once It’s performing again, they sell the paper.

Bob talks about the note underwriting process and why they prefer second position mortgages when they are available.  He also discusses the market for re-performing loans and how they find the loans to buy. He then talks about the pandemic and how it did not have a large effect other than causing many people to pay off loans early.

Our discussion turned to the economy and Bob explains that he sees a “screaming” economy for the rest of 2021 and 2022 depending on the reactions of the Federal Reserve.  He is not concerned about inflation because the economy is coming up to full capacity and discusses the factors that have prevented inflation in the past even through the massive money printing and how it expects those trends to continue. Bob explains why wages, oil and food have deflationary forces that are helping prevent inflation.

Bob discusses how he changed his views on money and is now a believer in Modern Monetary Theory (MMT).  He mentioned that he is not concerned about government deficits because those have historically been reduced and eliminated by inflation.

Bob ends the conversation talking about cryptocurrencies and why he prefers Ethereum to Bitcoin and other altcoins. He also discusses proof or work versus proof of stake.

Podcast he recommends:

Invest Like a Billionaire

To get access Bob’s comprehensive 2021 Economic Forecast go to www.aspenfunds.us/resources.

 
Bob mentions the following book:
This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly

To connect with Bob go to www.aspenfunds.us.

If you would like to contact Jim Pfeifer, you can email him at jim@leftfieldinvestors.com or if you would like to find out more about Left Field Investors go to www.leftfieldinvestors.com. 

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