"I'm standing in front of a burning house, and I'm offering you fire insurance on it." Ryan Gosling, The Big Short.
It's true what they say. You view the world differently when you have children. I've spent months running the numbers on where my family should own a home for the next twenty years. Climate, safety, affordability, the economy. I don't have the answer yet, but the data is painting an interesting picture.
In Spain 53% of the country meets the conditions for desertification, the worst in Europe, ahead of Cyprus and Greece. And 90% of Spaniards live on under 3% of the land. If everyone's in the cities and the rest is turning to desert, who grows the food? Last year storms knocked out Ibiza town's desalination plant. This July, one night in Ibiza never dropped below 28°C. Where does the water come from when that fails again?
US stocks are priced at a level they've only reached once before, in 1999. The Nasdaq then fell 78% and took about fifteen years to get back. If there's a crash, are people prepared?
In Australia, where owning a house is THE play they sell you, nearly 1 in 3 mortgage holders are at risk of mortgage stress, the most since 2008. The average one hands over 38% of their take-home pay in repayments. And the stress is rising fastest in the expensive coastal and leafy suburbs, the ones that thought they were safe.
So do you bet where everyone's looking, or where nobody is?
🎵 Talking Heads — Once in a Lifetime 1980. A man wakes up in a beautiful house and can't work out how he got there. Full playlist and archive at niccjohnson.com/drop.