If you bought a stock at $5, watched it rise to $100, then dip to $80 right when you decided to sell, did you lose $20 or did you make a $75 killing? Of course you made a 1500% gain on your initial $5 investment! Many sellers are now focused on the loss of potential gains and not on the actual gains they could reap from the booming market that ended last year.
It’s no secret that the Real Estate prices are down anywhere from 10-15% from the highs of 2021 and into 2022. You can’t watch TV or open your iPad without being bombarded by endless news stories about the slide of home prices in the US. It’s like all of the media outlets met at Starbucks and had a caffeine fueled chat about how they could depress homeowners in the U.S.
Wouldn’t it be refreshing for a news outlet to point out that if you bought your home more than a few years ago you have been on the receiving end of a huge financial bonus in the form of added equity in your property? Yes, it might be less than the all time high, but you are fooling yourself if you think you are losing money because you missed the very peak of the market.
One recent seller whose home is now worth $800,000, when it was worth $925,000 at the peak, was heard to say “I can’t afford to take that loss”. He bought the property for $200,000. There is no investment adviser alive that will tell you that is a loss.
It’s human nature to get caught up in irrelevant details when making important lifestyle changing decisions. We get caught up in the cost of the $600 survey, or the pink paint color in the bedroom when we are buying a $1M home. We control the small details to avoid tackling the hard decisions.
You don’t need to be a Real Estate guru to know that your home is still worth more now than it has ever been with the exception of the small Covid blip of 2021 and 2022. Yes, you could have made more selling at the top of the market, but timing the market is impossible. Ignore the doom pedaling media and look at your actual increase in wealth. You will see that now is still a great time to get your home sold!
Steve Mallett is the Host of the Mallett and Michelle on Dripping Springs Podcast and the owner of the Mallett Integrity Team Real Estate company. He’s been an award winning Broker since 2004. Call him anytime at 512-829-2062 for great real estate advice and counsel.