Anyone care to speculate on the prices of houses in the next few years? I'm not sure if it is better to buy now or wait for prices to drop.

Nobody can time the market 5 years out in real estate. Unless you take the global view that real estate over a long enough horizon always increases.

Its always a good time no matter what though to buy good cash flowing real estate assets.

Not sure how this applies, but sellers are caught in a game that benefits the realtors and the buyers, driving prices down and sales volume up. Each viewing carries a certain equity for nailing the sale -- compiling amateur realtors with zero knowledge of the property/neighborhood/city, who also lack good salesmanship leads to the home owner losing.

I'm far from a real estate expert, but in my home market (DFW) I've never seen home prices drop, outside of the 2008 housing bubble bursting. They tend to rise for a while, then go flat for a while. I would be very surprised if you can buy a given house cheaper in a few years then you can but it now, in absolute dollars. Plus, I'm not sure you will be able to finance cheaper in a few years than you can now.

Where? It makes all the difference.


Also, while prices will surely drop at some point in the future, it may be from much higher than the current price and the "drop" will still be higher than now.

Houses flat line like that because people who buy are reluctant to sell for a loss and end up holding to properties for several years longer than they actually want to until inflation gets them to a dollar value where they get to pretend like it wasn't a loss. Instead of reduced prices you see reduced volume of sale.

If you can buy a house for the same price now as you'll be able to 5 years from now though it would be a pretty bad idea to buy it now. Not many properties (outside of labor intensive multi unit rental properties) generate enough cash flow to make it a good investment with zero appreciation.

.... general advice to the op


If finding good deals / undervalued properties was easy they wouldn't be undervalued. Your best bet is just to buy what serves your purposes and try to figure out what fair market value is based on recent sales to figure out how much you're willing to offer.

Yeah, there was a lot of interest in the flipping business thinking they could buy some rundown slab and call their neighborhood roofer to get it up to code and hit the sell button. The problem was that if there was money to be made there, they needed to be the roofer.

Low unemployment and low interest rates make high real estate sale prices. I'm not sure those will both continue for 5 years.

They're not making any more land.

Making land isn't the issue. Freeing up land with permission to build on is (at least it is in the UK).

Don't want to be that guy but I think you could make an argument that real estate prices have dropped in the long term.

You could make the argument that prices have dropped in the western world since the liberalization of governments and the fall of feudal rule. Most people could not afford/ owned any real estate 400 or more years ago. Therefore, because it was unaffordable unownable you could argue that it is actually cheaper and more affordable than ever. Just an argument, but I think it is always dangerous to assume any asset, on its face, will always appreciate.

Yes, that is the relevant time period.

Imagine one day being able to make indeed land available for anything you can imagine 100-500 meters below the surface. An entire new world can exist down there with even plants and lakes below all our agricultural and arid land away from cities.

This is what fusion will do for this planet and naturally endless real estate across the solar system in rotating colonies built out of asteroids by an exponential army of machines of the first country or company or group of visionaries that will decide to go for it.


Welcome to scientific society.

They are not making any more people either.


(referring to pop. growth rate decline in the USA)

If your wanting to go into debt to buy a house now you might not have that house to live inside in 5 years.

I love real estate, I will have 9 rentals units in feb 2019.

But a house isnt a great investment, unless you do something with it (airbnb, student room rental, etc).

Probably stays pretty flat for a while. Depends on the market though. Dallas, San Francisco and Vegas are much more likely to rise/fall then North Dakota or Mississippi. Trying to time bubbles is kinda like trying to win the lottery though. It’s better just to find a good investment and prepare for the risk then try to get lucky or think that you can solve something that’s incredibly complex.

Why would San Francisco/Bay Area fall more than other areas? I’d think it’s the exact opposite.


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Demands really high there at the moment and supply’s really low so prices have run up a lot. I think it’s gone up more then twice as much as other areas since 2010. It’s definitely a higher risk investment though... a lot of businesses are moving back into the Bay Area which caused a larger increase in demand but it’s starting to reach a point where affordability of housing is not manageable even for developers and other skilled labor. This will probably cause businesses to start to move out again to San Jose/other locations and if they do demand will lessen and so will real estate prices. Also the whole tech sector has grown at an unsustainable rate which has caused that area to flourish so if it contracts they will be the hardest hit.

I’m not saying that Bay Area investments aren’t good investments and it’s incredibly likely they rip higher during this period but they are definitely higher risk then other less exposed markets.

what type of units do u target typically?

I guess I’m just looking at the Bay Area during down times. For instance during the last crash it didn’t fall nearly as hard as other markets. There’s a floor here because there’s so much money and it’s such a ridiculously desirable place to live by people from all over the world (especially the Chinese ). I’m not coming at it from an investment angle, just as a homeowner resident here. I thought you were saying if a crash comes it will go down more than other markets? Did I misinterpret? Because I feel like it never drops here much compared to other markets.


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Which crash are you referring to? I thought median home values in Bay Area went down like 50% in 2008 compared to like 20% average drop throughout the country? Wasn’t only Miami and vegas hit harder or am I mistaken?

I wasn’t referring to crashes though because I don’t see a housing crash in the next 5 years just a little volatility up and down which will cause prices to remain relatively flat.

housing will fare better in a recession than many other types of investments, and has upside if economy stays strongish. its a good choice..Id stay away from high priced high tax regions...as a broader trend people are migrating to lower tax locales

Mostly 4+ units unless a massive deal comes around. I have 1 house that I rent, I only bought it because I had a good deal because the owner was sick and didn't live there anymore. I wanted to flip it but I am a pussy so decide to rent it... will be either selling it in 2019 or kicking the tenant out (she still hasnt paid decenber rent, so this should be easy) and trying airbnb with it. I know a lot of investors who have very few airbnb units (around 5) and they do this full time, this is the nature of my market thought, touristic city (quebec city). Surely wouldnt be the case for every market.

If I was in the situation OP is, I'd househack a duplex or bigger, dont you guys in the land of the free have ridiculous first time buyer perks like 3.5% money down? Dont waste that stuff on a house that removes money from your pocket every month man. Read rich dad poor dad and take a good hard look at life, you can be anything, but theres no free lunch, you will have to work if you want to grow your networth.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...nding-declines

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...all-since-1996