DIY Cheaper Foam Mattress (Cheapurpedic)

$194.99 FREE SHIPPING - King Memory Foam Mattress LUCID by LinenSpa 8" Memory Foam Firm Viscoelastic Mattress 20-Year Warrantyhttp://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0050JL32U/ref=ox_ya_os_product

I don't know if this is a pricing mistake. This is REALLY cheap and you can cut it in half to create two twin size mattresses.

75% savings and cheaper than a Full and queen size mattress?

And if you want to make it even thicker, you can just add mattress toppers to the top.

NOTE:
This is a really good price in comparison to similar spec'd mattresses with 3.0 lb memory foam, 8" thick. Remember, this is for a KING size for $200! There are other models with higher density foam, (ie. 4.0lb or 5.0lb) but they cost more than 50% more!

My recommendation is that you try out this 8", and if you want to try out a denser foam, you can switch out the topper with whatever density you want from a place like: http://www.mattressbymail.com/memorytopper.html

Even if you buy a 4lb Memory Foam topper at 2" to top your existing mattress, it's only $106.99 more, which is still cheaper than the next alternative.

If you would like more information the "theory" of memory foam beds, check out: http://www.gmilburn.ca/2008/04/27/make-your-own-memory-foam-bed/ Once you understand the theory a little more, you can customize your bed for a truly DIY feel!


MAKING TWO TWIN BEDS:
The dimensions of the King Size is about 75" x 80".

So when I got it, I cut it in half to create two 40" x 75" twin size mattresses. I bought a twin size zipper cover off Amazon. Any will do depending on your needs. I needed pee-proof because my two kids were going to use them. Mark it down the middle, and then I had a cheap hacksaw with some very fine teeth, and it cut through fairly easily.

The mattresses even come with a King size zipper cover that I can use for whatever thing I see fit in the future.  I actually already have a different mattress I had made back in about 2007 that I'll be able to use it on.

Personal Blog on Hiatus

You've probably noticed I haven't "blogged" for a while.

That's because I'm focusing more on my professional blog:

http://jKimGroup.com

And also prepping for the blogs to my hotels.

Most of the worthwhile action happens at work anyway. 

In terms of personal life, my "life" updates are typically easily summarized in a twitter post, placed on Facebook, my YouTube channel, or some other publishing medium that's not so profound.

Seriously, my personal life is not that interesting.

Made it to Top 10 in Diamond for StarCraft 2

It's strange how these arbitrary rankings make me want to play more.

Canon Vixia HF M30 Review

After tons of research, I ended up getting the Canon VIXIA HF M30.  Here were some major criteria I had:

1) 1080P Capable
2) Microphone Input
3) Not crazy expensive
4) Reputable brand
5) Expandable memory

This pretty much narrowed my choice down to the Canon VIXIA HF family.  Each of the other variations of this model pretty much only offered more internal, built in memory.  I opted for one of the lesser internal RAM and figured I could get SD cards that would do the job just as well.

So far, I haven't had any issues at all after I ordered it on April 15, 2010.  Compared to my old Canon ZR60 which used DVR tapes, this new system is absolutely awesome.

In fact, the native format of these videos are in a format that PS3s and YouTube.com read without any conversion necessary or editing.  That's why you see a lot of my videos uploaded to YouTube.com without any edits since I just simply downloaded the videos straight from my camera and straight to YouTube.com

For some sample videos, check out any of my 1080P videos on http://youtube.com/jeffersonkim.  I also did some room tours for my hotel which you can find at http://www.anaheimparkhotel.com.  The room tours were completely unedited and are playing on a loop on a PS3 hooked up to a 46" LCD at the front desk in the full 1080P goodness.

I'm interested to see some of the other production videos I'll be able to make for the hotel.

Here are some other accessories I purchased as well:

Raynox HD-5050PRO, 37mm, 0.5x, Super Wide Angle Conversion Lens

Fits right onto the camcorder without any accessories needed!  In fact, you don't want to put any extra adapters since the extra length will affect the corners when viewing out the lens with black out.

Adorama Heavy Duty L-bracket with 2 Standard Flash Shoe Mounts

You'll need this adapter to be able to use the directional microphone since the Canon shoe is a proprietary mini-shoe.

Chloe Throw Up

My LendingClub.com Experience

UPDATE (3/4/2010): I managed to sell all my notes and profited a total of $344.00 from both Propser.com and LendingClub.com holding the notes for less than 3 months.


I ended up investing over $20,000 in order to get this promotion they would give me 1% cash back.

After looking at the potential returns, I was super excited and invested aggressively.

Unfortunately, once I reviewed their stats and AFTER I invested my money, I realized that the stats weighed returns on notes that hadn't even had time to default, so they were heavily skewed.

In addition, the biggest risk is the fact that should Lending Club go bankrupt, then you could potentially lose your entire investment.

They don't really tell you that you could lose your money in case of bankruptcy, unless you read the fine print in the prospectus.

After reading this, I realized I didn't want to put all my eggs in one basket and started selling my 250+ notes on their trading platform.

I have 3 notes left, some of them defaulted, but I managed to sell most of them and still make hopefully a little over $200 should this entire thing pan out.

If it weren't for the fact that I could lose all my money if LendingClub goes out of business, I would've kept my investment. Perhaps one day, assets will be protected from bankruptcy similar to how Vanguard protects the index funds should Vanguard go bankrupt.

But even then, I'd be careful. Check out the 45.3% delinquency on Prosper.com loans:
http://fred93blog.blogspot.com/2010/03/prospercom-022010-late-loan-stats.html

WARNING: LendingClub.com Statistic Innacuracies & Potential Downfall

I was hoping to get returns on my investments with LendingClub.com at a range of 10% based off their website which states the average return is 9.67%

Upon further review, most of the money coming in is toward new loans which haven't had enough time (120 days) to go into default or to be charged off. This naturally skews the data.

So what I did was that I took the data off their website for loans originating in 2007 and 2008 and the results and returns I see are actually much worse and quite scary.

The reason for this is because most loans end up going into default after about one 6 months to a year. Everyone pays fine for the first couple of months, and then they TANK.

For example, try going to https://www.lendingclub.com/info/statistics-performance.action and set the custom dates from June 1, 2007 to December 31, 2008. What you'll see are some pretty sobering statistics.

None of the average returns are above 6% APR. The F class notes are even negative.

Here's a breakdown of each credit grade and the percent that end up getting Charged Off or enter into Default:

Credit	Total Loans	Charged Off	Default	% Fail
A	397	5	1	1.51%
B	692	44	15	8.53%
C	722	60	22	11.36%
D	519	64	14	15.03%
E	386	52	8	15.54%
F	163	43	5	29.45%
G	122	24	3	22.13%

According to http://www.peerlendingwealth.com:8080/LowRisk/MinimizeRisk.html the default rate you're seeing above is GINORMOUSLY more than what they're supposed to be.

The defaults are CRAZY. I can expect as high as 10%, but I can't believe I'm seeing almost 30% default rates for some credit grades. And these loans are supposed to be only for those with FICO scores above 650. We shouldn't be seeing anything higher than 6.3% default rates.

Perhaps the main saving grace is if you only invest in Grade A loans.


SAD REALITY
Based off the fact that index funds average 8% and have crazy volatility, I was hoping that LendingClub.com was going to offer me a much sweeter alternative. The true data suggests otherwise and I'm hitting my head for not delving into the data while I was initially investing.

Now I'll just be happy to get 6% returns over three years with LendingClub.com, but unless my loans end up turning out good, I'll still be relying on the good old index funds to bring in the average 8% over the long run.

And based off the data, I may just invest in Grade A loans for now on.