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A couple of alternatives to consider:

1. Investing in private companies in your area. 1-3 year loans with equity kickers for early to mid stage companies. Should have a local angel investor group of university incubator that is a great source for these types of deals. Downside is you have to look at a lot to find a few but the upside is potentially nice if you don't mind the risk.

2. Go to local title company and offer to bridge short sales or situations where concurrent closings end up being delayed by a couple of days. Have the security of real estate backing it and make a few points on each deal inclusive of interest and fees. Focus on smaller deals. Wouldn't do if you are not familiar with real estate but sounds like you are.

3. Find a remodel entrepreneur type and back them for flipping. Would definitely stick to lower priced homes to start.

Not offering any advice (call Stive or one of the others on here), just offering suggestions to explore.

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I am looking closely at this. I am pretty handy myself. Even if things crash people will need a place to live. The key is getting them cheap in a tight market, Austin area.

But China isn't buying all our debt. We are buying our debt. During QE Goldman Sacks et al pretends to be the winning bidder at auction but the debt goes directly onto the Fed's balance sheet. It's bought with electronically printed money. That's why interest rates are so low. China isn't stupid enough to buy a material quantity of 30 year treasuries at 2% interest. So just not paying the debt really isn't a viable option. Particularly for the USA which is going further into debt every second. We are loaning money to ourselves. It's insane and the poster who predicted a wildly devalued dollar as a result is correct!

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But China isn't buying all our debt. We are buying our debt. During QE Goldman Sacks et al pretends to be the winning bidder at auction but the debt goes directly onto the Fed's balance sheet. It's bought with electronically printed money. That's why interest rates are so low. China isn't stupid enough to buy a material quantity of 30 year treasuries at 2% interest. So just not paying the debt really isn't a viable option. Particularly for the USA which is going further into debt every second. We are loaning money to ourselves. It's insane and the poster who predicted a wildly devalued dollar as a result is correct!

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I always wondered who would be dumb enough to buy a t-bill at 2.3% for 10 years. Thanks for the insights.

Here's the rub, at least for the time being, the US Tbill is still considered to be relatively high quality, low risk. When bad things economic happen elsewhere the money flows to US Tbills and it's considered a "flight to quality".

I'm not saying that this is how it should be, I'm just stating the way it is.

As bad as our federal government's fiscal practices are, and I completely agree they are bad, the perception is it's still among the safest place in the world to park money and expect to get paid back without losing your shirt via devalued currency or unpaid debt.