[Volundr]

> We've conflated having a home with a financial asset.

And it's a really, really shitty one. My house has roughly doubled in value since I bought it, but in practice that's useless to me. I can't claim that value without rendering myself homeless. If anything it reduces my mobility by making it harder to move, since I really need to coordinate the sale of my current home with buying the new one to help absorb that $500k or whatever price tag.

My if house prices dropped by 50% or more drops my net worth on paper, but it doesn't actually change anything. I still have a place to live + my savings, investments, etc.

[Infinitesimus]

> I can't claim that value without rendering myself homeless.

HELOCs ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_equity_line_of_credit ) exist to solve the problem of cash being locked up in your house. You can take a line of credit using the property as collateral or other purchases.

[Volundr]

Sure, it increases one's borrowing power and that can be useful. But "I can use it to go deeper into debt" is pretty limited utility compared to other kinds of wealth.

[Eddy_Viscosity2]

How does that help? If don't have enough cash now, then how will getting a loan that needs to be paid back with interest help with that. I will have cash for a little while, then I will have way way less as I have to make payments. Then I miss a few and they take my house and I'm homeless.

[beAbU]

Assuming the mortgage is paid off!

[rsynnott]

Yeah, I think people miss this. Generally, the only way to benefit from growth in value of your home is to either downsize or to _die_.

(Also, of course, depending on timescale, doubling may not be that impressive. If you'd put your money in a broad index fund about five years ago, it would also have doubled.)

[JKCalhoun]

"Downsize" can simply mean move to a region where the price of homes is less. Our home in Omaha is certainly not smaller in size than the one we left in San Jose.

[gogobio]

You conveniently exclude the third option which is to keep working your ass off, build a family with high total income and grow upwards. Your argument only accounts for personal and professional stagnation. Also - you could try dropping this insane San Fran pride linked to your identity and move to another area that is cheaper. The world is full of workarounds if you're not unreasonably vain, vapid, or lazy.

[rsynnott]

> which is to keep working your ass off, build a family with high total income and grow upwards.

Eh? If you're moving to a _larger_ house (I assume that's what you're talking about here) the last thing you want is house price growth; that would increase the cost delta between the smaller and larger house.

[JKCalhoun]

"I can't claim that value without rendering myself homeless."

Well, you can move.

I went from the Bay Area to Omaha, Nebraska without going homeless. I retired though, so there's that. (But my wife was able to work from home with the move.)

(Next stop: perhaps a double-wide trailer in Eloy, Arizona.)

[pandaman]

> I can't claim that value without rendering myself homeless.

Are you using some peculiar definition of "homeless" as someone who does not own real estate, like in Elon Musk had been homeless when he sold his California houses?

[Volundr]

I'm using it to mean someone who doesn't have a place to live. Like say someone who just sold their house and didn't go and use that money to buy a different house. Yes, that's very different than the person asking for change on the street corner, but I thought it was pretty clear from context which I'd be.

[pandaman]

Many people rent without ever owning a house, we don't call them "homeless" normally. Even if you owned a house they still allow you to rent. You can even rent while owning a house or several.

[Volundr]

I'm sorry my pun bothered you so.