Most (all?) of these companies have not been through a complete credit cycle since they were founded after 2008. I would be cautious about putting money into them that you cannot afford to lose.
Only after they go through a full credit cycle from boom to bust will you know how well they have managed risk and leverage. If they are transparent enough for you to be able to do the due diligence on their assets and leverage (and you have the expertise) you should probably wait and see how they do during the next recession.
I would also suggest you ask the question why would you would invest in them as opposed to using more traditional REIT or investing in real estate yourself if you are so inclined. Is it because you are expecting a greater long term return and you think they might be able to provide it? Again, I would wait and see how they do in the next recession (or credit crisis) to get more realistic view of their long term return profile.
From my experience (as a programmer) I have seen what I would consider both mediocre and talented developers who fit your description of frothing to themselves thinking they could do better on their own. Neither performed up to their abilities mainly because of the distraction that the frothing caused.
I the case of one talented developer, I was tempted to ask them the following question but held back: What makes you think you could do this kind of work at a high level as an entrepreneur when you are struggling doing it for someone else?
I also think Racket is a good introduction to Lisp. The documentation is great. Take a look at the vector documentation as an example http://docs.racket-lang.org/reference/vectors.html?q=vector&.... If you are not familiar with the language, there are plenty of examples to help you get going.
I recently started working through The Practice Of Programming and I wanted to compliment it with a functional language. I thought it would make the on ramp to functional languages a little smoother by first coding something in a language I'm familiar with and then port it over (producing more idiomatic scheme is the next iteration). I chose scheme as the compliment and PLT/Racket as the environment. So far, it has been working well.
My suspicion is that their struggle is more about the perceived cost and time. My wife and I are able to eat most of our meals at $2-3 per person. We have found that to get the cost low, you need to seek out cheaper produce (usually not safeway) and cut way back on meat consumption. Making your own cereal also helps as well as only buying things on sale. You also need a little more time to prepare the raw ingredients.
Ask your self: what would you rather have a) a fulfilling relationship and perhaps sexual intimacy or b) the possibility of wealth and riches?
You can't buy a and there is no guarantee of b.
Edit: After thinking about it a little more, the chances are if you are reading this, you are already filthy rich-- meaning you are probably in the top 1%. We often evaluate our "richness" by evaluating our selves with those who have more than us. Stated differently, we evaluate ourselves "up" instead of "down". The reality is that 99% of the rest of the world has less access to opportunity, education, resources, even food.
Great article! Recognize though that time is not fungible. For example just because you stop watching tv from 9pm to 10pm doesn't mean your going to be productive <insert task> in that same block of time after working a full day at your day job.
Based on a lot of our responses, I think a lot of us are just substituting web surfing for watching tv (self included). So how do we keep from just substituting another time sink for tv? How much time do we waste "web surfing" in the evening when we could be doing something else more generative?
Some of the disciplines she takes you through are tough but rewarding. One of my favorites is writing three pages in a journal per day. At the time it was tough, but it really helped to connect my head with my heart.
I'm beginning to agree with this more and more. Consider something you have done in the past that is similar to the the task at hand and use how long it took as a guide.
It also helps if your development cycles are fairly short (i.e. 1-2 weeks and no longer). I have found that it is much easier to estimate how long it will take if the amount of work you are estimating is smaller.
Keeping your development cycles short also has the beneficial side effect of reducing the shock factor when you have to double it.
As odd as it may seem we often prototype something we need to test using web.py even though our primary development language is php (using Zend). I recently did this to test a REST API. This has also been part of our process of 'flirting' with using a python web framework for some of our applications (looking at pylons).
For those of us who like the gmail interface this seems like a reasonable option. But, you still have to "push" the problem to another provider. Who do you rely on for your 'some other email domain'?
Pay off any debts you have and set aside some for taxes. Consider some diversification, but keep as much of it as you can (or stomach) as liquid as possible (high interest savings accounts, CDs, or treasuries). There may be some great opportunities in another year or so for those who are still solvent and have a lot of cash-- housing will probably be a lot lower, and so will stocks. Wait until then and you may pickup some of the deals of the century.
Only after they go through a full credit cycle from boom to bust will you know how well they have managed risk and leverage. If they are transparent enough for you to be able to do the due diligence on their assets and leverage (and you have the expertise) you should probably wait and see how they do during the next recession.
I would also suggest you ask the question why would you would invest in them as opposed to using more traditional REIT or investing in real estate yourself if you are so inclined. Is it because you are expecting a greater long term return and you think they might be able to provide it? Again, I would wait and see how they do in the next recession (or credit crisis) to get more realistic view of their long term return profile.