On Tuesday, I mentioned the manner in which our club handled our payments .

I'm not a maven like Ira S. & Gene Brooks. Although that are several ways to
handle this matter I thought our way would be of interest

My posting was criticized by Ira S. and Gene Rooks

Ira made the comment the" Any club that tries to enforce equal membership
shares is doomed to failure."

Well, our club does this and has been in existence for over 45 years with
the same policies. We keep our membership at 15 or so members. I have been
in the club for 14 years and treasurer for 11, We only had one member leave
who was dissatisfied. All other members have resigned only for health
reasons.

Gene stated that a club would have difficulty to attract new members as
the portfolio value increased. This is true .This happened to us in 2002. We
solved that by taking a large distribution to make the price attractive
again.

At that time we changed to Bivio Acct Sync and must say that it made record
keeping a real pleasure, to say nothing of the savings in time and money in
accounting fees.

Since we took the distribution in 2002, our club has beaten both the Dow and
S&P 500.

The club name, Senior Investment Club, is just what we are. A group of old
goats who invest.

Arthur Klages
Treas.



-----Original Message-----
From: club_cafe@bivio.com [mailto:club_cafe@bivio.com] On Behalf Of
IraS1@aol.com
Sent: Tuesday, February 12, 2008 1:29 PM
To: club_cafe@bivio.com
Subject: Re: club_cafe: yearly deposit

Any club that tries to enforce equal membership shares is doomed to failure.
It isn't fair and it isn't necessary. The club has use of that member's
money now and he can't use it for anything else. Therefore, he should get
his units now . There also are many circumstances which could lead to
members having to change their contribution level, temporarily or
permanently. There is the problem of bring in new members. A new member
would have to contribute the current value of the present members' account
in order to own an equal share. Finally, the whole idea behind the unit
system and investment club accounting software is that the software handles
all the calculations for you.
 
Ira Smilovitz
 
In a message dated 02/12/08 1:20:29 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
aklages@triad.rr.com writes:

        I might be wrong, but if you deposit his entire deposit to Bivio &
treat
        the entire amount as a member payment, then the member will own more
units
        than other members. If that is permitted bythe club, then it is OK.
        
        However, our club , and I believe many others, have the same
periodic
        payments for all members so they each own an equal equity in the
club. If
        you want to have all members equal, then deposit the check to the
suspense
        account, and transfer the amount of member payment each time it is
due.
        




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Hi, Arthur, as one old she goat to another he goat, I wasn't meaning to be
critical, just pointing out that there are difficulties in keeping members
equal, and mostly that it is not necessary. You can keep people equal on
number of units owned, but they will have put varying amounts of money in to
do that.
Best wishes, Gene Rooks

Gene.

That's how we do it.

We had keep the equal payment policy for a few reasons. We have monthly
luncheon meetings + a Xmas party paid for by the club (50% deductable) and
we also we all vote on stock buys and sells. The members feel that if we
are all on the same basis, there won't be any complaints about members who
pay less enjoying the same benefits and voting privileges. . Perhaps were
old fashioned, but it works for us. All members are 60+, I'm 86.

We had considered having a reduced fee membership because the portfolio was
getting too high , but we decided that when the portfolio becomes
excessive, we take a distribution to lower the entrance fee.

With younger members, I can see why you might allow members to pay different
amounts to attract members but we feel that one cannot be all things to all
people. We don't turnover members often, and our members usually stick with
us until they have to leave because of health problems. I think that being
a little particular with our membership helped our club to survive .

Whatever it is, it has worked for us for over 45 years.

Arthur


-----Original Message-----
From: club_cafe@bivio.com [mailto:club_cafe@bivio.com] On Behalf Of Gene
Rooks
Sent: Wednesday, February 13, 2008 5:12 PM
To: The Club Cafe
Subject: Re: club_cafe: yearly deposit

Hi, Arthur, as one old she goat to another he goat, I wasn't meaning to be
critical, just pointing out that there are difficulties in keeping members
equal, and mostly that it is not necessary. You can keep people equal on
number of units owned, but they will have put varying amounts of money in to
do that.
Best wishes, Gene Rooks