Quote from maxpi:
Mine has quadrupled in 20 years which points to 7% inflation. Houses themselves don't change much over the years, the function, quality, etc. is very stable. I am going to use those as the basis for economic comparisons from now on.
What really happens when house prices go up is not that a house is worth more, it still serves the same purpose, has the same costs of operation relative to it's price, etc. What happens is that the currency used to buy it is worth less. People complain that Americans savings rates are very bad, actually it points to Americans being smart. They don't put money in a pass book account that pays 1%/annually when the dollars are deflating much faster than that. Americans are putting their money in houses and leveraging like crazy to do it As long as we don't have deflation they are making out like bandits. If we have deflation they will still have a house to live in if they pay it off, If they don't pay it off the banks will take any kind of token payments a person can make during deflationary times because they don't want to repo worthless properties. They will be a huge liability to a bank rather than an asset. One rule of real estate is that abandoned properties will be destroyed, banks know this.