Thanks for the comment, and please, don’t be a stranger.

Regardless of interest rates’ ‘over inflation’ in my opinion is merely a temporary rest stop. A fixed rate of under 7% for investment properties could be lookin’ Heaven sent before long, given the FDR/LBJ mindset in DC.

Rents are declining or not, depending upon the location, as usual. There’s been no building of residential income property in San Diego for instance, the last 20 years and counting. The product we like in a couple parts of Texas have seen rents rise in the last 18 months. Go figure.

Still, it’s the long term that brings the most consistent results. You and I have agreed on the folly of timing markets, as we have on why it’s called risk capital.

Pick a 10 year period and real estate, as you’ve so often said, produces winners. This is especially true when compared to the recent corrections in both real estate and Wall Street. If an investor spent $100K in stocks, and the same amount in income property back in February of 1999, who would you rather be about now? Just sayin’…

Our genial host thusly intones: “Unlike all of the previous buyer’s markets I’ve experienced, this one sports some pretty attractive interest rates, as if the prices aren’t enough to put a smile on your face.”

I have some nits. Rates over inflation and rates over what OOs would experience are not that good. Second, prices aren’t very favorable in a declining rent environment.

Absolutes? Not even close. Then again, neither are current conditions absolutes either.

We are “arguing” about the details. Investment class income real estate is the best investment it has been for many years. The caution here is whether any of the good deals now will remain good deals. They don’t call it risk capital for nothing.