Nobody wants to catch a falling knife. It is as simple as that. If potential buyers see continued home price erosion, they will stay parked on the sidelines. But as with everything else in this unique and historic housing market, perhaps the usual logic doesn’t apply.
“Housing is one of the great investments right now. I tell people all the time when they come up to me, they say, "What should I do, Mr. Trump?" I say go buy a house,” said Donald Trumpearlier today on CNBC.
“It wouldn’t be an obvious mistake to buy a house now,” hedged Robert Shiller, barely a few hours later.
Perhaps they were just jumping off Warren Buffett’s declaration yesterdaythat if he had a way to manage them, he would buy a couple of hundred thousand single family homes and rent them out.