Profiting through all Markets

[Alex Franks]

With the housing market as a whole cooling off a bit and civil unrest around the country/world how do you plan on making money in all aspects? (Bull,Bear and sideways) I’ve been trading stocks for over three years now and have found a way to make money whether the market is up, down or sideways. So I’m great on the stock side of things but would love some insight on the Real Estate side. My question to you is, how are you going to make money in the future if the housing market cools, crashes or even raises higher? Currently I’m under the notion of gaining capital and paying off debt while putting more equity into our current residence. The plan with that is to sale in two years when I PCS with no capital gains tax. But we easily qualify for $300k plus worth of real estate or around $2,800 extra a month mortgage if the worst happened and we couldn’t find renters and had to pay out of pocket. Any thoughts? Thanks! Alex Franks

[Ed Emmons]

I was never leaveraged more than 65% across my entire portfolio. Therefore, I could handle nearly 50% vacancy. It is good to have diversity just as it is in the market. Lower income areas are more resistant to market change. Whereas the high income areas often take the biggest hit. Although not as glamorous, a portion of lower income but good condition property will serve as a reliable hedge against market influctuations in my opinion.