The price of Gold has been at an all time high...why?...you can't easily spend gold...you can't eat it...you can't use it for fuel to run your car or heat your home...you can't easily get rid of it when the time comes...and it will come...so what makes gold so valuable?
Well, gold is a 'commodity' just like corn, wheat, lumber, oil, gas, money, etc., and the scarcer a commodity is, the more valuable it becomes assuming there is a demand or market for the commodity!!!
There is only so much land on planet earth also, so the more houses that are built, and the more land that is developed, the scarcer real estate becomes...desirable real estate I'm talking about!
Now, many will argue that a home is not really an investment...it is a liability...inasmuch as we have to pay our mortgage on it, keep it in good repair, heat it, etc., but a nice home in a good location that has been updated periodically and well maintained is worth its weight in gold...well, not literally...but think about it!
No one can predict the future or determine how inflation, market fluctuations, job stability, etc. will affect a home's value! All we have to go on is the past. So let's take a look at the past.
In the late 1940s post world war II era homes were being built for returning GIs...these homes were selling for around $10,000...for a single 3 bedroom all brick home on a nice lot!!! Today, that same home if maintained and upgraded will sell for between $200,000 and $300,000.
Later in the 1960s homes were selling for $18,000...which were a little larger, still a single, and on a little larger lot, and with a couple of bathrooms...these homes today sell for between $250,000 and $350,000 or even more!
I just read a post from my friend Scott Daniels in Florida that indicates that people from other countries are beginning to see the great values in US realty...Scott writes, "I don`t know about you, but we`ve seen a tremendous increase of buyer`s from England, Germany, France, Japan, Spain, Dubai, and Canada."
You see in the beautiful towns and villages of our country, the good old USA, there may be gold in them there hills!
Don't let others beat you to it!!!
Fran - When we started thinking about retiring we bought a tract of land in the late 90's in eastern NC, on the water for what I thought was a fortune... then. Today it's more than quadrupled in value because as they say, they aren't making any more land. The old saying of there's money to be made when there's blood in the streets is quite true today... the smart folks are buying and will make out very, very well.
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