I owned a condo in Buckhead for 7 years. It was on the market for 5 of the last 7 years. This is when our beloved Buckhead became the reviled Buckhood.
Condo owners are first time home buyers who live where they play. High income single professionals pay for a pristine playground. When your playground succumbs to gang-style gunfire, it is a ghetto instead.
I was married for 2 eternal years. We lived in my husband's house in the suburbs. When I divorced, I gave him his house back and moved immediately back intown.
On the advice of my best friend Joe and my parents, I decided to rent an apartment rather than buy a house. I rent for two very good reasons.
1) I started my third business and needed to reserve capital for its incessant demands instead of a house with all its expenses.
2) The real estate market would only plunge deeper, so waiting to "buy when there is blood in the streets and sell at the sound of trumpets" became my strategy.
Now I have an inkling to buy again. The question used to be where do I want to live? Buckhead, Midtown, Brookhaven - all neighborhoods in Atlanta to my liking.
Now my existential angst extends beyond which intown enclave to reside in to living in the city itself. Not just a matter of lifestyle, but about life itself. I ask myself not just where I want to live, but how I want to live.
In reading Warrren Buffett's brilliant biography The Snowball, I look at every purchase as a business issuing shares of stocks for a part of its ownership. For example, I own my own business. Because I alone own all 1000 of its shares, it is privately held. If I owned 500 shares, but the other 500 shares are owned by other people, the business would still be privately owned but not just by me.
However, if any of the shares were available for the public to buy, it would be a publicly traded company. Its share price would first be determined against its IPO - Initial Public Offering. The valuation sets the price per share, but so does public sentiment about the company.
Earnings determines the value of each share. If there were more debts than profits, its value low; its earnings more than its expenses, its value high. The volume of people buying or selling the stock also impacts the share price, raising it with belief in success or lowering it with fear of failure.
I see buying a home as the same thing as buying ownership of the resident's city "stock" price. Buying and holding stocks seems so passe these days of rampant hysteria and leadership betrayal. However, a 30-year fixed mortgage is the ultimate in buying and holding stock. Only this time, its stock ownership is the city itself.
I ask myself, would I "buy and hold" stock in the City of Atlanta if it were a business? Would I buy shares of its business by my belief in its management team, the City Council? Is my long-term view of the State of Georgia bullish in its growth or bearish in its ineptitude?
Could I sell my stock at a profit as others increase their faith in the city and state governance? Or would my stock shares tumble in tandem with my home price? Long term, do I believe Atlanta will earn me a profit or a loss?
I believe in the State of Georgia much more than I do City of Atlanta. The difference between city and state is its cultural values. A "Red State" that espouses conservative values is investment grade to me specifically, and to business in general. Meanwhile, Atlanta promotes a looping rap video, promoting style over substance in all matters of business.
I'll keep putting money into my own business. I believe in myself, owning two other successful businesses. I am not a risk. I am an investment.
As for City of Atlanta, that's risky. So I rent. Yes, I'm renewing my lease. And enjoy my skyline view.
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