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Strategies & Market Trends : Bob Brinker: Market Savant & Radio Host -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: octavian who wrote (42234)	1/17/2009 8:27:52 PM
From: Skeeter Bug	Respond to of 42834

octavian, i did miss out on lots of gains. i'm not jealous, though. i don't understand the irrational bubbles and so i didn't play them much. i was in and out of the market playing both long and short - but not with anywhere near 100% of my portfolio. for a few years i had a broker who beat the S&P returns for a few years with me being only 30-40% invested. i did decent, but the best decision was not to dollar cost average into a bubble. i'd make it again and again and again. yes, for a time lots of folks made lots of money. most promptly spent it and mortgaged their homes for more. it isn't so much that i've been vindicated - i knew it was going to blow with 100% certainty. i did not know when. note this one single fact - no bubble in history has avoided a bust about as big as the bubble itself. this time wasn't different - at least that's the way i bet. i have serious concerns about where the world goes from here and it looks to me like it could eventually be a world war. being right is not worth that - not even close. having said all that, i wouldn't be the least bit surprised if my investment returns beat someone who dollar cost averaged since 1994... and i missed the emotional roller coaster and current emotional distress of those folks. if they leveraged at bubble levels, some of those folks have nothing left. many folks got lucky on some level and doing quite fantastic, too. even now. good on them. PS - while 60% of california home mortgages are underwater and some cities face 1 out of 9 homes in foreclosure, i'm worried about paying off my mortgage in full. the market could fall another 50% and i still have solid equity in my home. i'm a true fiscal conservative - and we are a rare breed. over the long haul, though, it pays off.