MARKET PSYCHOLOGY

So much of what happens in the market is about psychology, both at the micro level, when you're buying or selling real estate, and at the macro level, when you look at the big factors that influence the market. As we're hearing on the news these days, we can't afford to ignore the psychology of the market. Economics is a social science. Markets are, in the end, about people - about how they react, and why.

Which is why I'm taking a day away from my plan to say more about closing docs, covenants, zoning, and private agreements to talk about something I heard on the radio last night that I found not just irritating and irresponsible but also - to use an adjective I try to avoid - unpatriotic.

"You think the mortgage market is bad now? Just wait," the right-wing rabblerouser admonished. "If you've got a mortgage, you better stay right where you are, because under Obama's plan, you won't be able to get another one."

Wrong. False. And while I understand that even right-wing rabblerousers have a right to speak and line their pockets by distorting truth over the airwaves, it's important for all of us to understand that this is a guy trying to make a living by stirring things up.

Somewhere in the last decade, people began to equate fear with patriotism. Let's be frank. Fear is bad for our country. It's bad for our economy. It's bad for you as a home owner. So, please file this encouragement to sit on your mortgage in fear you'll never get another in the same basket where you tossed other predictions that have come from the far right - that riots would follow Obama's election, that the President is the Antichrist or the reincarnation of Hitler.

Free speech. I understand. But don't buy into it.

Off my soapbox. Tomorrow I'll get back to the nuts and bolts of your closing docs. Unless I hear something equally stupid that potentially affects your real estate values, and mine.