Pery, whether I am a wealthy investor or not, does not effect the point that I made. Emotional knee jerk reaction decisions are rarely good financial moves. To just up and sell and take that loss just because of a fear of what might happen, is simply foolish. The decision has been made, so live with it. It probably is a mistake if you measure it in terms of return in the next few years, but you just cannot go in and out of houses like that due to the transaction costs.
I agree with your point about recognizing the mistake so as not to repeat it, but it is yet to be seen if buying right at this point is in fact a mistake. We do not know that yet. Most of us in here, myself included, do believe values will drop, we just have varying degrees of opinions about how much. Perry ( I think ) is one of the more pessimistic in this area, and I am one of the more optimistic ( -20%). Who knows who is right.
The point about working is just that, go to work and enjoy your life, stop worrying about the hourly value of your home. Working harder if it is what you enjoy, is not work in my opinion. If you hate your job, get a new one, or work less.
From a pure sentiment standpoint, it is getting negative enough out there where it does bear watching as a contra play, in other words buy spot. We are not there yet, but could be within a year.