[c7b]

You seem to be looking at buying a house as an investment. I'd argue otherwise: your first piece of real estate is a necessity, not an investment - you always need a place to live. So, in financial terms, you're closing a short position, not opening a long position.

Of course there is non-negligible friction if you need to move, so you do want to be mindful of not buying right at the peak, but in general I think you're overstating how much you need to worry about prices: you don't profit when prices go up, since you'd also have to pay more for a new place, and as long as you can afford the payments, your home moves in line with the market and don't need to sell, you also don't need to let falling prices affect your sleep. Your position is market neutral, you are mostly giving up flexibility.

[spiffytech]

While I think you're right in ordinary times, this doesn't work during a bubble. You could be totally blocked from moving if your home is worth a fraction what you owe on it, no matter how necessary the move is (job, school district, family).

[c7b]

Even then there are some mitigants: you could try to rent out your first home and rent or even buy a new one. Tax-wise that would work against you (usually, in most places), but it probably wouldn't bankrupt you.

I agree, of course you don't want to have bought right before a dip. But if you sketch out a few scenarios and look at the overall and your individual situation (eg, Would rental income cover credit payments, even in an adverse scenario? Do you have expenses you could claim in years when you're renting out? Do you have other uses for the property, eg within a family?), you might find that you can manage the risk (or not). It's definitely not risk-free, but there's also significant upside potential if you can make a long-term commitment.

[andsoitis]

> this doesn't work during a bubble. You could be totally blocked from moving if your home is worth a fraction what you owe on it

Do you actually mean after the bubble has burst? Because during the bubble, why would your house price be a fraction of what you owe on it?

[tzs]

He might be thinking of people in the US who are not in Alaska, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Idaho, Minnesota, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oregon, Texas, Utah or Washington.

In those states first mortgages are "non-recourse" loans. What that means is that if the borrower does not pay off the loan the lender's remedy is limited to whatever they can get foreclosing and then selling the house.

With a non-recourse loan if I find myself owing a lot more on my mortgage than my house is worth I've got the option of just walking away and letting the lender foreclose. I will no longer have a house after that, but my possessions and savings and investments and income will be safe.

In the other states first mortgages might be "recourse" loans. With those if selling the house isn't enough to pay off the loan they can come after you personally for the difference.

With a recourse loan the lender can come after me for the shortfall if the foreclosure sale isn't enough to pay off the loan. They might go after my possessions, saving, investments, and income.

[Siddarth1977]

Most people are putting down 20%. Even if you have a non-recourse loan that's a huge loss. Plus the hit to credit record means you probably won't be able to take out a new mortgage for years.

It'd only be a tiny percent of people who found themselves underwater, but with so little equity they didn't care to lose it, and who also didn't care about tanking their credit score for the next decade.

[dragonwriter]

> You seem to be looking at buying a house as an investment. I'd argue otherwise: your first piece of real estate is a necessity, not an investment - you always need a place to live.

You need housing, but you can get that without home ownership.

[dexterdog]

And then it's even more expensive