Agree 100%

6b: I understand your friend had good intentions but getting you drunk then taking you to a difficult game was pretty irresponsible of both him and you. You know you dont have the discipline to turn down something like that, and he probably did too. You need to avoid those situations before they spiral out of control.

Paying off the loan at that time would have only been responsible if coupled with getting a full time job.

ReGen,


But if you’re gonna be lazy, it sure does help to be a lot smarter than OP.

OP needs go full George Castanza. Every time you’re faced with a decision do the exact opposite of what your gut is telling you. Watch your life change drastically.

Paying back is only responsible if you also have a means of income. OP claims poker is his means of income and that doesn't work if you don't have any money. If he had kept $5k on top of what he has now he could have played 1/3, play a high volume for several months and have his own bankroll for less than $500 in interest.

Compare that to being cash broke not having income and being cash broke. He's wasting a lot of time not making money and playing Runescape which is a ton more money than the interest payments.

If you look at the purpose of the loan, paying it back entirely is idiotic.

Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard.

However, OP is the worst of both worlds - he is neither hard working nor talented. In his head, he believes he's some sick talented poker prodigy who would only be playing higher were it not for "variance". But in reality, 3betting marginal hands and never folding postflop does not equal talented, it only equals whale territory.

I agree, he does need to give this up, get on some sort of recovery program, find a job, get some proper worth ethic and turn his life around.

6bm could have also attempted to negotiate a better interest rate for himself by paying off some of the loan. no reason why he couldn't talk to DL about paying back all but 5k and lower the interest rate to 20% APR. still not great, but better than 48% APR

additionally, were credit card cash advances ever a thought ? not that it's a good idea, but the interest would be lower.

In literally no world is keeping a loan at Australia's maximum legal interest rate responsible. It's not like he's going to starve. He can and will get a job if it comes to that. Keeping even 5k at 40% is literally insane. That is not sustainable and a life crippling interest rate. There's a reason most countries have maximum interest rates far below that. Hint: It's because they WILL lead to bankruptcy.

If he starts starving and refuses to get a job, I'll agree that he's being irresponsible. But mocking someone for paying off a 40% loan is absurd. I believe Dluo said he might consider a staking arrangement again.

If paying $200/month allows you to make $3k a month versus making $0 a month it is a slam dunk decision. It's the immediate $20k which was stupid as you do want to limit your interest payments but if you ignore all the things OP didn't do that he should have, a competent person could make a profitable and responsible decision to hold on to the money for a little while.

That's simply not true. If I was broke and wanted to play poker for a living then getting a loan at 50% would be far superior to playing without a roll. And it's not like it would be that expensive either. Given the loan amount, I would most likely pay it off within 2 months and still have a decent roll to play 2/5.

And I would call you irresponsible for that, not 6B.

You live in Texas with a maximum legal interest rate of 18%.

A quick google search confirms what I'm assuming: Australia's (non-business) bankruptcy rates dwarf those of Texas, which has ~4 million more people.

If you're even just reasonably risk averse, this was the right move. He can get a job and build a bank roll without staring down a bankruptcy court at the same time if that's what he wants to do.

Oh come on. You've had zero faith in 6b and that he could maintain that kind of profit. You're only getting onto him for this because for once he made a reasonable decision and you can't cheer on his inevitable demise anymore.

I'm not sure why you are going on these off-topic tangents which aren't relevant to the discussion. In my scenario I either take a loan with a 50% interest rate or I play under-rolled. The loan is the far less risky choice and it's not even close.

I have mentioned in this thread I think my estimate for his $1/$3 hourly is about $13/hour I believe. If he plays consistent 50 hour weeks he gets up to $3k. I have also said that OP probably can't do this because of all other reasons. I personally don't think OP is going to succeed, with or without loan, but that has nothing to do with the validity of the loan. I am going to disconnect OP from the loan from now on.

I think taking the $20k was too much, for the specific purpose. Even a stable and winning person would pay a far higher burden than necessary and the compounded interest on $20k versus $5k is insane. But what you're saying is that it is irresponsible to take a 50% loan in any case. You're basically saying "taking loan == dumb and irresponsible" regardless of context.

I don't think that claim is true. If you can reduce your risk of ruin by playing high volume low variance small stakes games and being prepared to pay $200 for a few months it far outweighs not playing and not making money.

I mean obviously paying back the loan, getting a job ASAP is the best thing to do for OP and most people. That said, it is far from irresponsible on it's own to take this loan in certain cases.

6,

how much cash do you have, not counting what people owe you?

what are your upcoming expenses?

Right, for you. Because you're a winning player who is capable of working more than 15 hours a week (even staring off against a brutal 10 minute commute) and who can control their life expenses.

Conversely OP is going busto either way so he's much better off getting a job without a 20K debt to loansharks hanging over his head.

J,



That minus $230 plus whatever he’s spent on drinks and KFC in the last couple of days is what he has.

IIRC his monthly rent is $700.

6bet, I troll this thread a lot but I'll be real for a second.

You need to get a job today. Even if you can finish applying and interviewing in one day, get the job, and get your paperwork through payroll it will still take around 2 weeks for you to get your first pay check (sometimes longer ime). Is your rent due on the 1st? If so you have until Feb 1st at the latest, so you have ~3 weeks to get a job to make sure you can pay rent.

C'mon dude, you can't wait until every penny is gone. You can always quit if you go on a heater

Just sell GFs phone.

My response was to the above that keeping a 50% loan is never responsible.

By giving up the loan, even if he were to do everything correctly (ie play well, cut costs, put in hours, study, etc) his chance of success would be dependent on the luck of the cards. Conversely, if he had kept the loan his chances of success would have largely been predicated on making good decisions (ie playing well, cutting costs, putting in hours, studying, etc).

The only logical reason to get rid of the loan at that moment when he would be left close to broke is if he planned to get a job, which he didn't.

so after rent is due, he has a net worth of under 2k

that seems like the nut low of results for taking a huge risk and "not failing".

I guess it depends what OPs move is when he 'has to' get a job.

Since it's probably going back and getting another predatory loan, yeah paying off the loan is a bad idea because it's just ping-ponging around.

I guess in my mind I was figuring going busto would result in OP facing up to reality and working for a living but given he tends to choose the suboptimal fork in any given decision tree, maybe not.

Let's watch and see what he does!

A few days ago he mentioned still giving poker a shot when he gets money from a job. Clearly he's going to continue his dream of being a poker pro. Maybe some day it'll stick but everyone itt except 6b knows that it's going to take a massive change in attitude to happen.

fyp

Johnny,

I have multiple friends who have run it up to over a million at poker starting with less than that!

They are probably good at poker though.