Hacker News Reader

jacvon How the Tour de France became a $100M business

If you haven't already, take a look at the official Tour's highlights (only 8-10min though) - I find the broadcast and editing better than NBC's. They're usually decently quick to come out too post-stage.

Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSpycUnuU0IVF7gGIhGojhg

Yesterday's (Stage 7; 8 will probably drop in an hour or so): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMpFcgyXl8s&list=PLg3WzTG3Lf...

jacvon U.S. mortgage interest rates jump to 7.16%, highest since 2001

I don’t think I agree with you. I don’t know of a lender offering 0% down loans for people in those markets (the only thing I could find was VA loans or USDA), but could be wrong.

For a large portion of people, monthly cost is not the big problem. A 20% down payment on an median home price of $850k (Seattle), $1M (LA), $1.3M (SF) (all these taken from google’s results) is because it’s very hard to save that much money when you’re paying median rent of $2.7k (Seattle), $3.3k (LA), or $4k (SF) (Zumper, 2bd apartment).

All else equal, I think a lot of people when trying to buy for the first time would prefer lower house purchase price with higher interest rate because of saving for a down payment vs the same house at a higher price and lower interest rate.

jacvon U.S. mortgage interest rates jump to 7.16%, highest since 2001

I would think this could help with people trying to buy their first place.

I think a fair amount of people - particularly those in HCOL cities - could afford monthly payments that are on the high side, but saving for a 20% deposit has been more difficult because of how high prices have been (ie, stuck in a rent cycle of only saving a bit because of how high rent is and so on).

jacvon My next Mac might be the last

I would disagree with this.

Mac Mail is probably the worst application I've used on Mac (+ the one on the iOS is not far behind). Search is atrocious - like unusably so, it constantly has syncing issues (even with iCloud) when trying to get new mail, it's incredibly slow, and I don't care for the design.

jacvon Toyota RAV4 Prime hybrid SUV now selling for 48% over MSRP

Probably a combo of things:

1) Prices in the US don’t include tax.

2) Ireland is also an expensive place to purchase a car because of VRT. RAV4 PHEV is €47k in Germany for example.

3) Lastly, could be some spec differences between the cars that account for a difference, as in my experience, cars in Ireland aren’t always the same specs/trim as other areas (but I could be wrong about Toyota, I don’t know).