Quotes about Effort

All the so-called "secrets of success" will not work unless you do. ~Author Unknown


You cannot plough a field by turning it over in your mind. ~Author Unknown


Much good work is lost for the lack of a little more. ~Edward H. Harriman


God gives every bird its food, but He does not throw it into its nest. ~J.G. Holland


The one thing that matters is the effort. It continues, whereas the end to be attained is but an illusion of the climber, as he fares on and on from crest to crest; and once the goal is reached it has no meaning. ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Wisdom of the Sands, translated from French by Stuart Gilbert


I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it. ~Thomas Jefferson


Character is what emerges from all the little things you were too busy to do yesterday, but did anyway. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966


I've got a theory that if you give 100 percent all of the time, somehow things will work out in the end. ~Larry Bird


The difference between try and triumph is a little umph. ~Author Unknown


Many an opportunity is lost because a man is out looking for four-leaf clovers. ~Author Unknown


No one understands that you have given everything. You must give more. ~Antonio Porchia, Voces, 1943, translated from Spanish by W.S. Merwin


Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. ~Thomas Edison


Men are made stronger on realization that the helping hand they need is at the end of their own arm. ~Sidney J. Phillips


The person who is waiting for something to turn up might start with their shirt sleeves. ~Garth Henrichs


He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying. ~Friedrich Nietzsche


The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary. ~Attributed to both Vidal Sassoon and Donald Kendall


Nobody ever drowned in his own sweat. ~Ann Landers


When I was young, I observed that nine out of ten things I did were failures. So I did ten times more work. ~George Bernard Shaw


Put your heart, mind, intellect and soul even to your smallest acts. This is the secret of success. ~Swami Sivananda


Now I know, a refuge never grows
from a chin in the hand and a thoughtful pose
Gotta tend the earth if you want a rose.
~Indigo Girls


There's nothing like biting off more than you can chew, and then chewing anyway. ~Mark Burnett


Hard work spotlights the character of people: some turn up their sleeves, some turn up their noses, and some don't turn up at all. ~Sam Ewing


Though the barriers of life seem formidable, we find when we challenge them that they have no will. ~Robert Brault, www.robertbrault.com


One saves oneself much pain, by taking pains; much trouble, by taking trouble. ~Augustus William Hare and Julius Charles Hare, Guesses at Truth, by Two Brothers, 1827


Some people dream of success... while others wake up and work hard at it. ~Author Unknown


The winds and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators. ~Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire


Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle. ~Abraham Lincoln


The footprint of the owner is the best manure. ~English Proverb


Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. ~Will Rogers


Most of us can easily do two things at once; what's all but impossible is to do one thing at once. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966


The only thing that ever sat its way to success was a hen. ~Sarah Brown


Sweat is the cologne of accomplishment. ~Heywood Hale Broun


If a man is called a streetsweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and Earth will pause to say, Here lived a great streetsweeper who did his job well. ~Martin Luther King, Jr.


Gift, like genius, I often think only means an infinite capacity for taking pains. ~Jane Ellice Hopkins


If you feel you are down on your luck, check the level of your effort. ~Robert Brault, www.robertbrault.com


The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work. ~Emile Zola


We work for praise, and dawdle once we have it. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960


Effort is only effort when it begins to hurt. ~José Ortega y Gassett


People know you for what you've done, not for what you plan to do. ~Author Unknown


Plough deep while sluggards sleep. ~Benjamin Franklin


Man stands for long time with mouth open before roast duck flies in. ~Chinese Saying


For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business. ~T.S. Eliot


There are no easy methods of learning difficult things; the method is to close your door, give out that you are not at home, and work. ~Joseph de Maistre


Yes, to be a good parent, you have to sacrifice, but this is not a requirement of parenting, it is a requirement of being good at something. ~Robert Brault, www.robertbrault.com


Labor disgraces no man; unfortunately, you occasionally find men who disgrace labor. ~Ulysses S. Grant


He was a self-made man who owed his lack of success to nobody. ~Joseph Heller, Catch-22, 1961


Success is a ladder you cannot climb with your hands in your pockets. ~American Proverb


God gave us two ends - one to sit on and one to think with. Success depends on which one you use. Head you win, tail you lose. ~Author Unknown


Doors don't slam open. ~John M. Shanahan, The Most Brilliant Thoughts of All Time (In Two Lines or Less)


About the only thing that comes to us without effort is old age. ~Gloria Pitzer


Many people think they want things, but they don't really have the strength, the discipline. They are weak. I believe that you get what you want if you want it badly enough. ~Sophia Loren


Be not afraid of going slowly; be afraid only of standing still. ~Chinese Proverb


If you can do a half-assed job of anything, you're a one-eyed man in a kingdom of the blind. ~Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.


No man ever wetted clay and then left it, as if there would be bricks by chance and fortune. ~Plutarch


He who is outside his door has the hardest part of his journey behind him. ~Dutch Proverb


To go beyond is as wrong as to fall short. ~Confucius, Analects

7 top homebuying myths debunked

7 top homebuying myths debunked

Think that you get more for your money in the suburbs, that homeownership is the path to wealth and that a big down payment is always better? Think again.

By Marilyn Lewis of MSN Real Estate

Myth No. 1: Buying beats renting
Yes, that's what you've been hearing all your life. But then, the chances are that housing values have been climbing for much of your life.

Now, the mortgage meltdown is changing attitudes about buying and renting. In a recent survey, government finance agency Fannie Mae found that 23% of renters are postponing their plans to buy a home.

One big reason to think twice about buying is that home-maintenance chores are endless. Caulk the windows. Regrout the bathroom tiles. Change the furnace filter. Will it ever end? No. Sure, you can hire someone to do all this for you — if you have the money. Otherwise, there goes your weekend: mowing, weeding and checking off items on the honey-do list. That list of stuff hangs over your head like homework.

The only thing worse? Repairs. The roof springs a leak; there goes $20,000. You wanted a new car? Too bad. See that carefree gal at the Saturday matinee? When her toilet broke, she called the landlord — and then she headed out the door.

These days, when people do buy, it's to make a home, not a fortune. People gave the Fannie Mae pollsters mostly nonfinancial reasons such as safety (43%) and school quality (33%) for buying.

Myth No. 2: A home is a great investment
"Real estate is the path to wealth." This belief is so ingrained in our thinking that it's nearly a religion. And maybe once it was so. But today, the return on real-estate investments – and that includes your home – is abysmal. The hard truth: Your money is better off in stocks.

Blogger J.D. Roth did the math. His calculations show that money invested since 1926 in owning a home earned roughly 1% above inflation. Stocks, on the other hand, averaged about 7% over inflation. Not the 15% returns that many investors had been hoping for, but a whole lot better than your average real-estate investment. Nationally, home prices have fallen about 33% since mid-2006, according to the S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index (.PDF file).

Jack Hough, a financial writer, reached the same conclusion. Stocks have rewarded investors with 7% inflation-adjusted return over long periods, while homes netted their owners about 0%, he says.

"If you have $300,000 and a choice between spending it on a house or shares, you'll pay $6,000 a year in incidentals if you buy the house or about $15,000 a year ($1,250 a month) in rent if you buy the shares. But the shares will return $21,000 a year after inflation, while the house will return zero. My numbers work out even better than these. I pay a smidgen less than $1,250 a month for rent," Hough writes, in "Why rent? To get richer."

But New York Times writer David Leonhardt, a proponent of renting, is rethinking: He now finds buying may be better — in some places. The economics on housing costs vary by market, Leonhardt says in this recent article.

To decide, he calculates a "rent ratio." Divide a home's purchase price by the cost of renting a similar home for a year. At a ratio of around 20 or above, renting looks better. Below 20, buying gets more cost-effective. (Comparing a $300,000 home with a $1,500-a-month rental — $18,000 annually — yields a ratio of 16.6; a strong case for buying.) Many big metros now are down to 16 or lower, but markets with ratios of 25 could be in a bubble. The ratio is only one part of the decision. Other factors matter, too, such as homeowners association fees and commute times and costs.

* Video: The hidden costs of homeownership

The new caution on homebuying does seem to be sinking in: 70% of people surveyed recently by Fannie Mae believed that buying a home was "one of the safest investments available." Seven years ago, the same survey found 83% believing that a home purchase was safe. (Just 17% thought stocks were safe.)

* MSN Money: 40 ways to save money on almost anything

Myth No. 3: My home is my piggy bank
When homes were gold mines, borrowing against the equity was common. Prices were rising, interest rates were low and lenders were pushing refinancing; you could imagine that you were borrowing against selling your house in the future for a huge pile to pay it all back.

People used equity lines of credit or mortgage refinances to buy cars and vacations and to put the kids through college. It wasn't unheard of to finance your ongoing monthly expenses with home equity.

In retrospect, it was an awful idea. Today, banks are more conservative about lending, even to those with equity.

* On our blog, 'Listed': Sen. Al Franken proposes Homeowner Advocate office

But cash-out refis will be back. When home prices rise again and lenders rediscover their courage, remembering the $2,000 and $3,000 fees they earned from each new loan, you could find yourself thinking, "We need a new roof and, look, there's all that equity just sitting there."

When you do, remember that home values can fall, leaving you stuck with a debt bigger than the home is worth. Leaving a cushion of equity gives you protection; you can sell if you need to and still make a little money or at least break even. (Read personal-finance guru Liz Pulliam Weston's "4 reasons not to refinance.")

* What’s your home worth? Find out

Myth No. 4: A bigger down payment is always better
Buyers usually are urged to put lots of cash into a home purchase. The reasoning: You'll borrow less, saving tens of thousands of dollars in interest on the loan and lowering your monthly mortgage payments. You won't need to buy mortgage insurance, which is required if you put less than 20% down. Also, if your home value falls and you want to sell, you have a cushion of equity and less chance you'll have to contribute extra cash to pay off your mortgage.

But you don't have to put 20% down. Federal Housing Administration loans, with down payments as low as 3.5%, have grown in popularity.

There are a couple of powerful reasons why a small down payment, coupled with the required mortgage insurance, might be a good idea:

* Borrowers with mortgage insurance may be able to get a lower interest rate than those who put down 20% or even 25%, according to this New York Times article. Lenders apparently feel safer when loans are insured; the insurance covers the lender if you default.
* A low down payment may help you buy now, while prices are at record lows, if you haven't yet saved 20%. If you wait to save a bigger chunk, prices could rise beyond your reach.

There are some other benefits to a smaller down payment:

* Flexibility. Your money is not all tied up in your house, leaving you with little or no cash for home repairs and improvements, an emergency or job loss.
* Diversification. You can diversify your investments, distributing your money more safely among a variety of investment types — stocks, bonds or mutual funds, for example. That way, a real-estate downturn won't wipe you out.
* Choice. You can always make additional payments, adding to your equity and paying off the loan sooner; you can stop paying mortgage insurance once you have 20% equity in the home.

Myth No. 5: You get more for your money in the suburbs
Builders of newer, lower-cost homes like to concentrate on the suburbs, where land is cheaper. First-time buyers can be forgiven if they think these homes look like bargains. You do get more home for the money, it's true. And they're often brand new, to boot.

But the hidden costs of suburban life can break you. The farther you move from jobs, stores, schools, friends, family and entertainment, the more you'll spend on transportation. Savings from lower-cost housing often are wiped out by unexpectedly high transportation costs.

Depending on the region, it costs $1,500 to $3,800 more a year to live where homes are built far from services, says a study by The Center for Neighborhood Technology, a nonprofit think tank that promotes "sustainable urban communities." The center created a housing and transportation index showing the true cost of sprawl on a family's life.

Here are average monthly commuting costs from Arlington County, Va., Real Cost of Commuting, (.PDF file):

* $110 for 10 miles.
* $229 for 30 miles.
* $349 for 50 miles.
* $648 for 100 miles.

And those numbers don't include parking.

They also don't consider the toll on your sanity. The Census Bureau finds that Americans spend an average of 100 hours a year commuting to work. What would your life be like if you got back just half of those hours — more than an entire workweek each year?

Myth No. 6: Remodeling is a great investment
Go ahead and remodel if you want to. Just don't tell yourself it's an investment. You'll be lucky to recoup your costs, much less make money. "The home-improvement-as-investment myth, combined with easy credit, fueled an awful lot of irresponsible spending in the past few years," Weston writes in "Remodeling? It's a waste of money."

That's not to say that you can't get back some of the money you spend on remodeling when you sell your home — if you choose your projects wisely. The return on your investment dollar will depend a lot on what you remodel, how much you spend on the job and where you live.

These days, with money tight and homes cheap, homeowners are getting a smaller return on their money, according to Remodeling Magazine's 2010 Cost vs. Value report, which is based on surveys of real-estate agents.

Many maintenance projects must be done to keep up the value of a home, but a great return on your money is not guaranteed. Some projects recoup only about two-thirds of their cost when you sell the house, while others pay a better return:

* a roof (pays back roughly 67% of the cost at resale).
* vinyl siding (80%).
* an entry door (steel 129%, fiberglass 65%).
* windows (vinyl or wood 77%).

Remodeling projects with the best payback include:

* adding living space by converting an attic (83%).
* converting a basement (75%).
* midrange deck additions (80%).
* minor kitchen remodel (79%).

Less lucrative:

* major kitchen remodel (72%).
* master-suite addition (61%).
* sunroom addition (57%).

Of course these are averages of agents' estimates. Costs and resale values vary by city and region. An office addition that pays back big in one city may recoup little value in another.

Also, taste is such an individual matter. "While working in real estate, I watched sellers gut their kitchens to update them and get more money for their house and at the same time the buyers would walk into those just remade new kitchens and talk about gutting them because the fridge should be over there instead of over here – 'over there' being where the fridge was prior to the sellers doing the renovation," writes reader DodgyHingst, in comments on "Remodeling in 2010? Additions are out, replacements are in" on MSN Real Estate.

Bottom line: The payback you can count on is the pleasure of living in your remodeled home. Remodeling is not really an investment; it’s consumption.

Myth No. 7: Homeownership brings security and peace of mind.
Younger people are urged — by parents, real-estate agents and even government (remember President George W. Bush's "ownership society"?) to buy homes. Homeownership is touted as the path to personal security.

Some benefits are compelling:

* Your life and stability aren't hostage to the whims of landlords who may raise your rent, sell the house or kick you out to give the house to their children.
* You won't have to jerk your kids out of a school — or school district — because you have to move again.
* You're spared the upheaval (and big expense) of packing up and moving yet again.
* There's a feeling of confidence in knowing that you — not the landlord – can choose what color to paint the walls and whether to tear out the kitchen light fixture. If the roof leaks or the oven dies, there's no need to pray the landlord will spring for repairs.

And yet, there's no feeling of security right now for the 10.7 million households — about one in four — whose mortgages are underwater.

Many Americans' dreams of moving on or moving up are on hold because they can't afford to sell their homes for enough money to pay off the loan, let alone make a profit. Unhappy couples wanting to divorce can't split up their assets and start over because they can't get their money out of the family home.

Peace of mind? Not at the moment.