Am I too late to the party?

Question corner: Am I too late to the party?

I could have bought a home a few years ago but didn't. Now, with prices so high, am I too late?

The history of local real estate tells us it's never too late. Of course, 20/20 hindsight also tells us that some times are better buying opportunities than others, but don't let that fool you into thinking the good times are over.

The answer to your question is "better late than never". Many people were never invited to the party. If you've still got your invitation, by all means use it.

I'll tell you a story. Almost forty years ago a couple about your age bought a home for $35,000. Today, of course, it's worth more, way way more: about $1,300,000. "Sure", you're thinking, "if I'd been perspicacious enough to buy in 1968, when I was five years old, I too would be sitting on a gold mine today. But this is 2006 and all the good deals are gone".

But the young couple who bought in 1968 could have said the same thing. Why? Because just twelve years before, in 1956, that couple could have got the same house, brand new, not for $35,000 but for $15,000. And the couple that did pay $15,000 for it new in 1956 paid Joe Eichler twice as much for it as they would have for one of his new homes just seven years before, in 1949. That's two couples who easily could have looked at recent price appreciation and said, "This will never last. If I buy now, I'll pay too much".

Fast forward to 2006, with home prices seemingly as high as they could ever go, and with frantic competition making it tough for even motivated and well-qualified buyers to get a house. No great deals here, right? Yet local buyers who bought in 2004, when real estate was supposedly "fully priced" and poised for collapse, have already seen the value of their homes rise about 20 percent.

The dramatic price appreciation of the past few years won't go on forever, but it doesn't have to. It's never too late to get into a market that's appreciated 3500 percent since 1968 while giving shelter to you and yours.

Yesterday's home prices always make today's prices look high. But instead of thinking that all the good deals are gone, just think how great that 2006 price will look in 2016 or 2026. That's the attitude and timeframe you need to buy real estate.

Because real estate isn't that garage sale where you snapped up a genuine Tiffany lamp for $10. The couple who bought their home in 1968 for $35,000 could have decided to wait for home prices to return to their "correct" 1956 level but, if they had, they'd still be waiting. Fortunately, their goal wasn't a screaming deal. Their goal was to own their own home. Waiting never accomplishes that.

In 1968 that couple did what all motivated homebuyers do, sooner or later: they bought what they could afford, when they could afford it.

They didn't make it any more complicated than that. Neither should you.