Reminds me a lot of the early 80’s. My aunt was a jeweler and you would think she would of loved the great run up of price in silver and gold then. She told me she hated it, and would stop making jewelry for a while, fearing she would pay more for materials than her work would later be worth.
A bit of hat eating here. I love posting predictions. When the economy tanked I said to sell gold when it was 800 $. I figured it would tank like other commodities, but I was wrong.
I did advise buying Intel when it was at the bottom, and also called BP when it was 3 days from bottom. So I only have to eat a 1/3 of a hat.
Now I want to cough up the last third of hat, and say that what drives a gold bull market is an expectation of high inflation. Hasn’t happened. What seems to be happening is the house market is at bottom, gold has been flat for 2 years. The fear of economic collapse and hyper inflation has been shown false in the minds of investors. Even if there is inflation soon, that just makes having land a better investment, if you bought at the bottom, which I am calling now for house prices. Past bottom actually, but only slightly.
So, my call… ( I am sure many millionaire uni riders are holding their breath now)
Buy a house now. Nick, that means you. Many houses are now priced much lower than the cost of construction. Dump gold. It lost 3/4 of it’s value in '83 and appears poised to do so again.
That’s not the case here in CA. We’re having another RE bubble. A condo that was priced at $180k last year is now listing for $300k and selling for $330k+.
Unless you have 100% cash in hand, you cannot buy a house within 50 miles of the SF Bay Area right now. No way, no how.
Wow. CA is a big state, of course, and it’s good to know (?) things are bouncing back in some areas, probably the Bay area in general), but I think other areas, like Stockton, are still very much in the “buyer’s market” phase.
A friend started his own rare auto parts biz, Proper Parts. He makes and sells parts you can’t buy someplace else. He works from home and sells online, so he can live anywhere. Lack of jobs is the #1 killer of RE value.
He looked all around, and was hot on the Ft Myers area of FL. I used google street view to look at stuff he was thinking of buying. Nice looking places for less than 30 K that had cost 300K only a few years ago. Hard to believe, but google it and see it yourself.
Alex showed me the place he closed on, near Pittsburgh. An old house that looked nice in pictures. 1/4 acre of land with house for 24 K. No way something comparable could be made at that price today. Shop, look, look, and make lot’s of low ball offers. No one will be offended, and if they are, don’t call them back, keep looking and sitting on your wallet. All offers are good, just maybe not accepted.
I believe M8’s experience in the SF area is real, but not typical of most of the country. RE values are near or passing bottom now in most of the country, particularly in areas with poor job opportunities. Use google street view and be amazed at what is out there.
Gold goes up, up, and up, for 12 years (one of the best, if not the best, investments of the last decade), and then there is a downturn, or “correction” for a short term. With gold, the mainstream go all out and criticize gold, but with any other investment or asset they would not do this. Quite odd. Every asset, investment, equity, currency, has its up and downs.
In any case, I’m happy about the downturn… Good time to buy more gold. I just put an order in for my wedding band, made of gold.
I will have to give you this one. We have been having this debate for a few years now, and I have been pissing on gold since it was about 800/oz. To the point where I have seen white gold turn yellow
Still, I place my bet that RE , in most places, is a better bet than gold NOW.
However, with my forum record on this, and your gold bugness, ha, ha, I am not surprised we disagree on this.
You are right that all assets have up’s and down’s, so of course the idea is to buy at the bottom and sell at the top. Not a news flash. Yet many people fall in love with the asset that rewarded them in the past. This is perhaps the way most people get caught holding the wrong end of the stick in a crash. You want to change up your game sometimes. Now gold is near top, the great crash I mentioned was a blip, for now at least. But popular is rarely the way to go in predictions. The money is in doing the unpopular thing, at the right time. RE is near the bottom. I may have been wrong for years Gilby, ha, ha. But things change.
Buying a wedding band is a poor investment, she will never let you sell it. That is if I am correct in assuming you are getting married. If so, good for you. But now I have won this debate, at least partially, as you will admit you have found something in the world more valuable than gold.
Now let me guess, she is a blond with big assets, is she…is she? If so, congratulations.
I can’t resist writing a joke if it made me laugh. Yeah, then I did wonder, what if she’s not blond? Maybe still funny, I hit send. I’m sure she’s hot anyway (my luck with blonds has been mixed). So , definitely good for you Gilby ! And with all the $ you have made on gold lately (I hope, you know, that you placed your money where your mouth was the last few years), you can easily afford a life time supply of hair coloring !
No, really, just kidding, everyone here loves you and congratulations !
But no, seriously now, I have found something Gilby sees as shining brighter than gold. Finally !, a victory for me! Got to tell you , I have had a tough few years on this gold debate thing.
Still and all, after the ring and cake and all that, buy her a house. I don’t care if you throw in a diamond with it (highly advised by the way, girls are sorta like that). She’s gonna want a house. If you doubt my genius ( and who that reads my posts doesn’t ?) . Just ask her. Blonds, red heads, light brown, dark brown, or straight dark black, they all want a house. This RE vs gold debate has gone to a new level. Good for you ! I hope you want a 4 bedroom someday.
That can be good or bad kinda. Smart girls can be so helpful at times it can sorta piss you off, you know, making you feel stupid and all. If you don’t understand that, just ask her, she will explain it to you. Most of my girl friends make me feel stupid at times. I suspect that we both have excellent taste in woman. Smart girls don’t wanna buy stupid shit. A serious plus, plus. Until you want to buy a cool motorcycle that she thinks is stupid shit. I mean, there are ups and downs to this, but at least with a smart girl, you will have enough money left to argue about it.
Anyway, good for you. I want you to need that 4 bedroom because kids are so much fun when you are paying for them and not me. Ha, ha. Kind of like little puppies , only so stupid they aren’t house broken for 2 years, and then they will really start to take your place apart. I am an expert on kids, I used to be one. If I couldn’t take something apart that wasn’t broken, no body could. Yeah, me and dad had some good times…at least for me. Glad he was paying for it. I mean…I had an excuse, I was a kid and I was broke. I had no job. I can’t pay to fix stuff. I was broke, and eventually so was half of the stuff in my dads house, you know, because I was there.
But anyway, I wish you guys the best . If you have kids, I hope they turn out nothing like me. I mean, what are the odds ? I was exceptional . Sorta like winning the lottery, only in reverse. You are gonna have a great time.
You can still congratulate me though.