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Title: How to Profit From the Coming Real Estate Bust by John Rubino ISBN: 1-57954-870-9 Publisher: Rodale Press Pub. Date: 20 September, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.27 (11 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Worth a read
Comment: If the names Stephen Roach, Marc Faber, Bill Bonner, Bob Prechter, or Jim Puplava are familiar to the reader, then John Rubino's well written, easily digestible, and quite convincing summary of the bear case (not just in real estate, but also in the US equity market) should be old news. However, if these names are unfamiliar, the reader would do well to plunk down the money to buy this book, consider his argument, and give some thought to preparing for possible bad times should they occur.
Rubino spends the first part of the book laying out a case for why a bubble exists in the real estate markets, and then uses the second part of the book to explain possible strategies to protect assets and even profit. The hedging strategies are well organized, but I doubt most people would consider shorting housing/fannie/freddie stock or buying gold/silver bullion. It would also be unrealistic to expect people to abruptly move from their overpriced houses in California/Boston, leaving friends, families and schools behind. The asset protection strategies could have been more detailed (in the same vein as the books by Martin Weiss). Rubino could have made his real estate bubble case stronger by using more local market information, statistics, and graphs (a la John Talbott in his highly recommended book The Coming Crash in the Housing Market).
Overall, this book would prove valuable for people unfamiliar with the risks in the economy and the possible outcomes if this risk ever manifests itself in the economy and the markets.
This reviewer cannot help but add as an aside that given the current conditions (early 2004) in the United States of unhealthy financial asset and real estate valuations, burgeoning debt and its financing by foreign nations with their own unpredictable agendas, high budget and trade deficits, and wage pressure brought on by globalization, it might not be a bad idea for the reader to recognize that the potential downside risk may be much greater than any potential upside, and act accordingly when planning for their financial future.
Rating: 5
Summary: Outstanding!
Comment: I never thought I'd say this about a finance book, but I couldn't put this one down. It is fascinating, logical, concise, well-written, and occasionally quite funny. Despite the catchy title, it is about more than just the regional housing bubbles we are experiencing right now: it is a primer on the entire lending industry and how badly it's gotten out of hand.
Just to be clear about it, this is not a "doom and gloom" or "the sky is falling"-type book. There are no histrionics to be found here, only well-researched facts and common sense presented in a very reasoned manner. Whether you own real estate or are thinking of eventually buying, and whether or not you are convinced that some housing markets are overpriced, this book will give you the background and advice you need to protect your assets and possibly even to profit enormously.
I have to comment on one of the other reviews here, by "A reader from San Diego, Ca," which implies that Rubino ignores the laws of supply and demand. This is an unfair accusation because it cites bad data: as a matter of fact, San Diego's home supply has increased at exactly the same rate as its population growth. They have both increased by 7% in the past 5 years. In the same time period, San Diego home prices have increased by 110%. The person who posted that review is clearly more interested in rhetoric than in facts but I wanted to set the record straight.
Rating: 5
Summary: Right Again
Comment: Back in 1999, when investment bankers were ordering $400 bottles of wine at lunch and Dow 36,000 was a credible forecast, not a joke, John Rubino was offering bear market strategies to readers of his column in TheStreet.com. Here's what he wrote on Oct. 21 of that year:
"Put simply, stocks are as expensive as they've ever been and the economy is running out of slack. Labor is so tight that companies are having to pay up to keep good people. Health care and energy costs are rising again, and interest rates are up across the yield curve. The inevitable result: higher costs of borrowing and doing business, lower corporate profits and sinking stock prices."
Rubino was clear-headed enough at the height of the stock market bubble to see the tunnel at the end of the light. Now he is sounding the alarm about the housing bubble. It's well worth listening to.
You don't need to be an economist or a financial expert to grasp the warning signals he points to: credit policies that have become shockingly easy, to the point where a down payment on a home has become optional; high levels of consumer debt, and soaring home prices. Meanwhile, job creation and income growth are stuck in neutral and profligate government spending has undermined the value of the dollar and left the U.S. up to its neck in debt to the rest of the world. Rock-bottom interest rates have been pumping air into the bubble, of course, but so has the relatively new process of securitization, a feat of financial engineering that allows government-sponsored agencies like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to create a virtual bottomless pit of new credit that is beyond the reach of anyone to regulate. Rubino does an admirable job of walking the reader, step by step, through this financial maze, explaining how it has held together so far, and how it could fall apart. He posits a number of scenarios for how things could play out, from the merely worrisome to the terrifying.
There are so many moving parts to the global financial engine, it's best not to get too hung up on exactly how or when the bubble will pop. Inevitably it will, and you'll understand why after you've finished the first half of the book. The second half of the book is your roadmap. It outlines a variety of strategies for sheltering your investment portfolio as well as your real estate assets from the post-bubble fallout. These include investing in commodities, particularly gold; selling stocks short, buying stocks in recession-resistant sectors, and buying bear-market mutual funds. Even if you don't think there is a housing bubble, the second half of the book offers a good investing overview that will serve you well no matter where you think we are in the business cycle. Rubino also offers a variety of defensive moves for home owners ranging from the drastic - selling, trading down to a smaller house, or moving to a less-overpriced housing market - to the less drastic but more complicated strategy of shorting housing stocks to hedge the value of your home.
Full disclosure: I used to edit Rubino's columns for TheStreet.com. So I have long known what new readers will soon discover: He's a talented financial writer with a deep understanding of the markets and a knack for explaining complex things in a simple and lively way. His advice was worth listening to in '99 and it is even more so today.
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Title: The Coming Crash in the Housing Market : 10 Things You Can Do Now to Protect Your Most Valuable Investment by John R. Talbott ISBN: 007142220X Publisher: McGraw-Hill Trade Pub. Date: 28 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Great Bust Ahead: The Greatest Depression in American and UK History is Just Several Short Years Away by Daniel A. Arnold ISBN: 159196153X Publisher: Vorago US Pub. Date: 25 November, 2002 List Price(USD): $8.95 |
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Title: Financial Reckoning Day: Surviving the Soft Depression of the 21st Century by William Bonner, Addison Wiggin ISBN: 0471449733 Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Pub. Date: 12 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $27.95 |
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Title: The Dollar Crisis: Causes, Consequences, Cures by Richard Duncan ISBN: 0470821027 Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Pub. Date: 25 July, 2003 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Conquer the Crash: You Can Survive and Prosper in a Deflationary Depression by Robert R. Prechter Jr. ISBN: 0470849827 Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Pub. Date: 21 June, 2002 List Price(USD): $27.95 |
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