Home Buyers: Do you think of real estate as a long-term investment?
As I was pondering the state of the real estate market, my thoughts turned toward my family’s Friday game night.
We often choose to play Monopoly on game night. This simple game got me thinking about home buyers and sellers and the reaction to the housing market. Could it be that many real estate players in the last few years–home buyers, sellers and even some real estate agents and lenders–were living for the moment? The money could be borrowed, the properties were there for the taking and the future seemed far away. 
The first time I played Monopoly with my son Zach, who is 6, and my daughter Zoe, who is 10, I was quite impressed by my children’s ability to save their payday money toward future purchases.
Zach passed GO and collected his paychecks at least five times before he considered purchasing property. He carefully studied which properties his sister and I were buying. When he did spend his money, he successfully split up my railroad properties. I wanted four and only ended up with two. Zoe’s red properties that she had intended on building hotels and houses on were split up when he bought the last one out from under her.
Zach was ruling the board and even garnered a sweet dice role that landed him the coveted Boardwalk property. Then, Zach’s investment prowess changed. He started hungering for every property he landed on. He spent all his payday money and started taking what was left of his small change, down to his $1 bills, to buy the less expensive properties like Baltic and Mediterranean avenues. At $60 apiece, these properties should have been affordable to him, but he had already busted his piggy bank.
Meanwhile, Zoe had been purchasing from the beginning, but took breaks in between to save up her money to purchase again. Her real estate purchases were steady but sensible. She was choosy about what she wanted to buy based on rent value, property location and her income and savings.
Zoe won the game that night and Zach ended up with many properties, but very little money.
Should more home buyers and sellers be setting themselves up for a long-term investment, thinking about house value, property location, income and their savings?
Please share your thoughts by commenting below.
Posted by Rebecca D. Levinson