Bottom line – it’s not how much you make that counts, it’s what you can keep. And timing counts.

Too true. Attempting to time is usually a fools game. Although sometimes, rough direction is obvious.

That said, as AN pointed out, long term (really long term) 20+ years, you’ll likely come out ahead, depending on what you buy and provided you only look at the house. Would you be better served buying a little further down? Maybe to probably. How much better is open to speculation.

There’s several other posters on other blogs that are very bullish on real estate long term, they also are current long term owners. They’re trapped.

They’re not financially trapped, mentally trapped. The thought of losing their $300K based property tax to move up to something in the low million range stops them cold. The net/net, slightly better house, slightly bigger payment, but a whopping extra $10,000+ in property taxes. Which makes it a lot bigger payment, even if they roll their equity forward. They’re likewise mentally trapped from even making a lateral move as it results in a likely $6000 additional property tax.