To Buy or Not To Buy, That Is The Question!
This poem was published in the Farm and Land Magazine in 1917 almost 90 years ago but it could have been written yesterday.
I hesitate to make a list
of all the countless deals I’ve missed.
Bonanzas that were in my grip-
I watched through my fingers slip.
The windfalls which I should have bought
were lost because I over thought.
I thought of this, I thought of that,
I could have sworn I smelled a rat.
And while I thought things over twice
another grabbed them at the price.
It seems I always hesitate,
then make up my mind much too late.
A very cautious man am I
and that is why I never buy.
How Nassau and how Suffolk grew!
North Jersey! Staten Island too!
When they culled those sprawling farms
and welcomed deals with open arms.
A corner here, ten acres there,
compounding values year by year,
I chose to think and as I thought,
they bought the deals I should have bought.
The golden chances I had then
are lost and will not come again.
Today I cannot be enticed
for everything’s so over priced.
The deals of yesteryear are dead,
The market’s soft and so’s my head.
Last night I had a fearful dream
I know I wakened with a scream.
Some natives had approached my bed,
For trinkets on the barrelhead
(In dollar bills worth twenty four,
and nothing less and nothing more)
They’d sell Manhattan Isle to me,
the most I’d go was twenty three.
Then they scowled: “Not on a bet!”
And sold to Peter Minuet.
At times a tear drops down my eye
for deals I had but did not buy.
And now life’s saddest words I pen,
“If only I’d invested then!”
Farm and Land Realtor Magazine October 1917
Almost every investor has had the experience of adding up all the fictitious losses suffered by not acting on a potential investment when the opportunity presented itself.
How Many times have you heard “If only I had bought that property last year” or “It was only $36,000 in 1976, I can’t justify paying $195,000 in 1985?” Now let’s look ahead to 2006 and you can bet people will be scratching their heads with the same hindsight, $400,000…! “Why didn’t you buy in 1985 for $195,000?”
What you have to remember is that real estate prices are relative to the economy at that time. True, the sooner you invest, the more profit you realize, but remember, the profit ladder continues to rise and it’s never too late. You can start on the first step, the third step or the ninth step and there will always be an infinite number of steps in that ladder above you. What hurts you is not getting on the ladder at all.
Don’t do the “woulda, coulda, shoulda” routine. Get on the ladder, The McFarland Group can help. Call us today at 800-826-1995 to learn how!
Posted by: Dave McFarland | March 11, 2008 at 10:00 AM