Aren't you glad you didn't go along with the crowd (real estate only goes up! it's a slam dunk!), run out and buy a house, second home, condo or 'condotel' in 2005 during the height of stupidity and mass hysteria?
Whew. Dodged a bullet there.
Everyone else - "baaaaaa"
October 23, 2006
HousingPanic Stupid Question of the Day
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
23 comments:
Yes, very glad!
-Dragasoni-
condotel - now that's funny!
Yes, very very glad! But, I'm really starting to feel bad for all those sheeple, when I'm out looking at open houses.
Looking at the housing market, it feels like the end of the meal. You know, when you grab that piece of bread and wipe it all over the plate to get the last bit of food.
The housing industry is picking up the last GFS before the game finally ends.
Clad we did not build that 400 room condotel.
panicearly - same here. selling was the most important (and correct) financial decision I ever made
not investing in a new property, either as speculation or as a new principal residence, when everyone else was, was the second most important (and correct) financial decision i ever made
Both were tough to do given the context of Phoenix, Arizona, where selling and not buying in 2005 made people point and laugh at you
Who's laughing now?
It was obvious that it was time to sell. The best decision that we made was to rent instead of buying another home.
Panicearly, I agree totally!!
This was probably my biggest decision I've ever made.
Kept me from going out and buying that second house!
God he looks hot. All I can think of is a B.Bernanke & D.Lereah Manwich.
I want to be glad, but I am starting to have some doubt as to how far the home values will fall. Can anyone explain what is going on with the stock market soaring and what this means for housing?
I see no end - it always is wait another 6 months. I want to buy, but am seriously doubting I will be able to.
Thanks.
It seems a bit smug that you are congratulating yourself for selling in 2004/2005 (or at least not buying.) Although prices were getting higher and higher for homes across the country, many people thought it was inevitable, like death and taxes that home appreciation rose. Granted the double digit rise seemed a bit over the top, but with jobs, families and other things to take care of, it just didn't hit most people's mindframes, that this was an unsustainable growth. We sold our home June 2005. Three months later the house sold again (b/c the new owners were transferred) for $30k more. I guess he made back all the commission costs, but wow. There were many reasons that we chose to sell at that time, but one of the many was that a PYSCHIC came up to me at a party and said she saw a crash of the housing market coming and urged me to sell. After a year of travel etc, we have settled back down and are renting, with the hope to buy. Prices still seem high here in Portland but no sense of urgency by us buyers to get out there now b/c the house will be gone tomorrow. One home we looked at sold in Nov 2005 for $350. Its now listed at $489. Way more than a 10-20% growth. Unless you're Robert Schiller, I dont know if most of the posters tap dancing on the popped debris of the housing market deserve so much hubris. Yes, some greedy flippers are getting burned and that doesn't make me cry, but lots of people who didn't take out HELOC's or ARMS are not reading blogs like this and are unaware of what exists unless the MSM tells them, and they may be intellectually dumber or simpler, but I'm not sure if they deserve your ridicule.
This post is very funny.
Am I allowed to post another blogger comment form Papermoney? It is a good read.
http://paper-money-tales.blogspot.com/2006/10/
nutcase-neighbor-stealing-open-house.html#links
I agree that we need to congratulate ourselves for our good-judgement on this site because, lord knows, no one else is going to do it. When you go against the conventional, received wisdom then people laugh and think you're crazy. When you're proven to be right, people say you were lucky. Even a blind squirrel finds a nut every once in a while, I'm told. It's great to have a forum like this where I can read information and opinions that support my own analysis. It helps to vent.
Yes, I'm very glad I didn't buy a condo last spring when I was thinking about it. But it still frustrates me to think about all the people with no investment education, experience, or acumen who, in effect, told me I was stupid.
Man, I am so depressed. Talked to my sister and brother-in-law yesterday and they are poster children for the Sheeple of the Year award. They're totally in denial about how much of haircut the Portland area will be receiving in about 6 months to a year. They want to bring Mom out to Portland and buy a condo for her. Why? "Because real estate prices always go up" and "Everyone should have a mortgage because renting is for fools." Etc. They think I'm an idiot, but they don't say that to my face. They tell Mom and she tells me later. (Sigh!) So there goes my inheritance. My sister and brother-in-law are gonna throw it away on real estate "flipping."
Man, I am so depressed. Talked to my sister and brother-in-law yesterday and they are poster children for the Sheeple of the Year award. They're totally in denial about how much of haircut the Portland area will be receiving in about 6 months to a year. They want to bring Mom out to Portland and buy a condo for her. Why? "Because real estate prices always go up" and "Everyone should have a mortgage because renting is for fools." Etc. They think I'm an idiot, but they don't say that to my face. They tell Mom and she tells me later. (Sigh!) So there goes my inheritance. My sister and brother-in-law are gonna throw it away on real estate "flipping."
------------
I don't suppose a mathematical/economic analysis of the costs of renting vs. "owning" would get them to change their minds? Or would that be like trying to teach calculus to a cat?
I own some nice land and had a set of plans drawn last year, but it took 9 months to get them out cause the guy was so busy. in the meanwhile I started looking into RE blogs. Then I had an appraiser out who told me the house would only add $75% of the house cost cause I have so much value in the 20 acres. I stopped all ideas of building and am glad.
My brother is wanting a lot on the waterfront in Wilmington, NC and is talking my mother into buying it for him. No way to talk sense into him. His wife is posturing for a divorce i think and insurance costs along the coast will kill values out there. Oh well, ditto the inheritance.
I don't suppose a mathematical/economic analysis of the costs of renting vs. "owning" would get them to change their minds? Or would that be like trying to teach calculus to a cat?
++++++++++++
Good idea but not for my relatives. They are way too arrogantly inept in most areas, but particularly in economics about which they little....
"They are way too arrogantly inept in most areas, but particularly in economics about which they little...."
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"....about which they KNOW little," I meant. Sheesh! So much frustration, I can't even write any more....
As tempted as I was to escape the rental racket, me and my family (who were thankfully the Voices of Reason), I'm happy I did not give in to temptation.
I looked for a house in 2005 when I moved back to SF after a few years away but ended up renting.
Unlike many HPers, my decision to wait wasn't really driven by a belief that housing was going to crash. I just realized that I couldn't compete with all the people who were using I/O Option Arms to buy houses. I decided that if I were to buy, it would have to be with a fixed rate loan. As a result, I "lost" all the bidding wars that were going on back then (I put "lost" in quotations, because in many cases the house sold so quickly, and for so high a price, that I never even made a move).
SF has hardly collapsed, but buyers are in a much better position now than they were last year (a RE agent actually said that I was lucky I didn't buy last year, and that inventory has doubled... of course, he went on to say that now is the time to buy, blah blah blah).
Now I've made a concious decision not to buy. But I guess my financial common sense about ARMS saved my ass before I saw what was happening out there.
Well let's see what you guys think of this.... I started buying real estate in 2003...and I am VERY glad I did. It is totally possible to make large amounts of money in this market or any other market if you do it smart. What is smart? For starters fixed rate loans, properties that cash flow, doing work that adds real value (real value meaning it increases the rental income). Hate to say it but boy am I glad I did NOT listen to the naysayers. I would be a helluva lot poorer.
I was so very close to buying in the 2nd quarter of 06. Pressure from parents, wife, and everyone everywhere saying you needed a house to be successful.
Luckily a house we liked a lot was under contract, and we didn't see anything else we liked. Then I saw the housing blogs just tearing this shit apart. (Not even this one, it was a better one that showed overpriced shit holes) Thankfully now it saved me from paying way to much for a house.
Post a Comment