{"items": [{"author": "Julia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/922187885962?comment_id=922337246642", "anchor": "fb-922337246642", "service": "fb", "text": "I definitely underestimated how much time home improvement would take on an ongoing basis. Some has been optional (Jeff builds shelves we'd like to have) and some less so (hmm, this thing is rotting, need to deal with it.) There's been a lot less of this:", "timestamp": "1516585689"}, {"author": "Julia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/922187885962?comment_id=922337351432", "anchor": "fb-922337351432", "service": "fb", "text": "And a lot more of this:", "timestamp": "1516585721"}, {"author": "Pinkie", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/922187885962?comment_id=922841351412", "anchor": "fb-922841351412", "service": "fb", "text": "Kudos for this post...the real question for me though is: how do you know when it is the \"right\" time to buy a house?  Do we just stomach the fact that prices have gone up so much in the last 10 years cause its not like you can go back in time. And it seems unreasonable to wait for some impending trump economy doom and gloom situation which would plummet home prices but still maintain my savings account.  The idea of more space for less money sounds great!", "timestamp": "1516828451"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/922187885962?comment_id=922841351412&reply_comment_id=922849515052", "anchor": "fb-922841351412_922849515052", "service": "fb", "text": "→ I don't think timing the market is something individuals should generally be able to expect to do in markets that are competitive. If everyone can tell that houses will be much more / less valuable in the future prices mostly already reflect that information. What we paid in 2015 felt really high, and was much more than what the house was worth in say 2009, but it was worth it to us at that price and we intended to stay there for a long time. Three years later the price has happened to go up, but it could easily have gone down and still could go down.", "timestamp": "1516831436"}, {"author": "Pinkie", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/922187885962?comment_id=922841351412&reply_comment_id=922850034012", "anchor": "fb-922841351412_922850034012", "service": "fb", "text": "→ So true. I find I constantly wish I had the ability to see into the future, in many aspects of my life. But if I had such superhero skills my life would be so boring. Trade off...", "timestamp": "1516831746"}, {"author": "Paul", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/922187885962?comment_id=922841351412&reply_comment_id=923887959002", "anchor": "fb-922841351412_923887959002", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Jeff Kaufman Eliezer asserts in \"Inadequate Equilibria\" what I'd always understood, that this is asymmetric: that if the smart money knows that house prices are going to rise, that'll push prices up until there's no money to be made by investing there, but if the smart money knows they're going to fall, that won't cause them to fall because there's no obvious way to make money out of anticipating the fall.", "timestamp": "1517122919"}, {"author": "Alexander", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/jefftk/posts/922187885962?comment_id=922841351412&reply_comment_id=938652889962", "anchor": "fb-922841351412_938652889962", "service": "fb", "text": "→ Paul For major US metro area markets there are house price index futures that make shorting possible, though in practice they are pretty thinly traded http://www.cmegroup.com/.../SandP-case-shiller-home-price...", "timestamp": "1524510242"}]}