one of the things, assumptions in this thread has been the ability to sock away that much money. those like yourself who can do that probably are doing the right thing, at least in terms of available options (and like i said, i have no idea what other "conservative" and "safe" options there are). investing in real estate just came off the top of my head as an alternative, i have no idea why (housing blog? what? where am i…)… but with regards to re investing, i was thinking of the income potential and not the bubble potential. with 150k socked away, i would think that you could have qualified to buy investment props back in the day if you had kept liquidity…
you mention your company offerings; that colors my view significantly as my company offerings are slim and none; no co match (anymore) and limited fund option
I guess again, here I'm old fashion. I'm a believer that very few people can ever time the market.
Case in point. Back when I first started working. My salary was like $40k. Two-bedroom townhomes in La Jolla were selling for $400k. I had no savings, so $400k was pretty much out of my league. At the same time, by apartment rent was like $660/month. So the entire rent versus buy decision was again rent was so much more favorable than buying. I could have probably asked my parents for a downpayment, but I didn't want to. It was far easier to sock away stuff in a 401k than to put it in a savings waiting to buy. My after tax paycheck already looked pretty pathetic so socking what little I had away after tax was basically like socking away lunch money. Anyway, my 401k funds weren't that grate. As you can see, it only did like 7%, not the 10% or 15% often think they can do. Sometimes having a great 401k plan does not equate to the number of fund options. I had one employer that had only about 6 funds, but they were primarily indexes.That one employer was good. Everyone else does the standard fidelity crap.
Anyway, I could be wrong, but I really haven't seen a time when buy really equated to renting in CA. Buying was always more expensive than renting. Just it seems like lately, that difference has gotten significantly out of hands. I'm not convinced I'll ever see when in a specific location property will go with a conventional 30year mortgage at the same cost as rent. It seems like the perception is that all else being the same, buying would be more desirable that renting. So to me, it seems like there is some inherent "value" associated with buying which would put a slight premium on owning.Then again, I'm too young and only lived through 1 recession, 1 stock market crash, and never lived through a depression, so I wouldn't know.
There's the other extreme side of me. Which is saying, perhaps real estate is not going to be a good investment for the next 15-20 years. Perhaps this time it is different. The world has changed. U.S. isn't growing anymore, and with that, why would RE in U.S. ever appreciate in the next 15-20 years, until we get back on track? Well, if that's the case. If I have to wait 15-20 years to recoup some decent returns on an investment, it's not much of an investment to me.
Let's say that real estate doesn't appreciate in the next 15-20 years? I'll be over 50 years old by then. 50 YEARS OLD. I'm not going to hold by breath on that one asset class for financial stability. So again, while I'd love to by investment property if it makes sense, I'm not holding my breathe.
Sorry, I'm a believer that some people who are just born at a certain time just aren't born at the right time. And there's nothing you can do about it. I feel sorry for folks like me from Gen X. I think we got accustomed to all the life luxuries without really having to work hard for it. But if you take a step back, you'll see that we had pretty bad timing at everything. We graduated at a time near the end of a recession when finding a job wasn't easy. We get caught up in the end of a tech boom at at a time when we are actually useful labor in the workforce. And then when we turn into are late twenties and can just afford RE, the market goes up insane, making affordability an issue. And some of us make even worse decisions by participating in the RE madness. Oh well.
