Today, the unionized work force is a fraction of the size it was a few decades ago, the job market is much less stable, and we’re still signing on to 30 year mortgages. Low and no down payments make the risk even deeper.

It might not be a bad idea to consider the long term stability of your career field, to the degree that anyone can, in determining if buying is really the best option. In much of the country right now, people are having to move to other states to find work in their fields. That’s probably adding to the foreclosure problem.

These are complicated times, and hopefully we’re all learning a few things from them.

It wasn’t just the high interest rates – companies were re-organizing and shrinking operations like crazy because of the recession and people were having to move for jobs.

I actually wonder, with people changing jobs so much, and families so scattered, if homeownership really is a good idea for most of us – my partner has pretty specialized skills and if something happened to his company he would have to choose between finding another job in his little niche, or starting over in a slightly different part of his field so we could stay here. And if, God forbid, his parents needed us nearby because they became disabled or ill, one or the other family would have to move to a new state.

I’m bullish on housing here, and plan to buy another rental.

A lot of homeowners are too young to have participated in the housing market of the early 1980s. That was a bad one too, but of course double digit interest rates were the obvious culprit then. We don’t have that to blame this time around, so this market is harder to figure.

Unfortunately, they got greedy and built a house they couldn’t afford to live in — right around the time the market tanked. They finished it, put it on the market, and it didn’t sell. They eventually had to put their own home on the market, too, and that one ultimately sold. Since the new house is much more expensive than they can actually afford, it’s still on the market (and *still* hasn’t sold). If/when it eventually sells, they’ll have to move again. I can’t even begin to imagine the financial havoc this has created for them.

Often they rely on an experience they had a few years ago, or what their parents and friends tell them. But the market changes, sometimes dramatically, and people’s knowledge tends to lag behind the trend. Selling a house into a weak market is radically different from selling into a strong one.

I was purposely in the position where I paid two mortages for a month – I wanted to renovate my newly purchased home before I moved in, so we stayed in our old house for a month, then moved in when everything was ready. Yes it cost us an extra mortgage payment, but it was well worth it to avoid living in a dusty, dirty, paint-fume-filled construction zone.

To us, the risk of carrying the old house for a few extra months (which would’ve been the absolute worst possible scenario — a much more likely scenario at the time would’ve been an extra month or so to re-list and sell the house) was well worth not having to suffer through multiple moves with four young kids (mainly due to the stress it would’ve placed on the kids).

In the end, it worked out, but I certainly wouldn’t roll the dice like that in the current market.

When you’re juggling two enormous transactions at once, you really need to consider the potential for a worst case outcome. Not that you should go in expecting it, but rather being prepared to deal with it.

This is one of those areas where some planning can really make a huge difference.

That’s the honest truth! I would add — neither is real estate listing agent optimism.