In the last couple of years, many people here bought properties in Myrtle Beach, which has had a volatile market for resort properties.The tourism has done pretty well even during the crisis as many foreigners especially Canadians have taken the currency exchange advantages, and as a result, the Myrtle Beach airport is expanding.

The bulk of the smell you're experiencing are volatile organic compounds (VOC's) within the paint.

Check out the below, falling bonuses have troubling knock effects and other industries will have trouble taking up the slack:http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20130122/BLOGS01/301229992#The average Goldman employee made $400k, and while I know the median is much lower, it's easy to see why the volatility is troubling.

Doesn't hurt to illustrate the low returns available in CDs, bonds, and annuities, and the volatility and low 15 year average return in equities (< 5%).

However, the lower the number of times that you do it the greater the volatility.

The downsides I've found are lack of transparency in what they own, volatility (due to leverage and the forward-looking nature of a stock market, prices can swing 20-40% in a year), and for those like me that are gradually entering into real estate investing, not a lot of learning to be had about property owning/renting.Best wishes, S

@Zach Holmes yes, buy & hold would be the easiest to manage while moving around.Maybe pick one or two strong lateral markets, like the mid-west [not volatile markets like Vegas, Phx, etc] and just sticking to those areas the entire time you are moving around?

Las Vegas has been so over heated the last 18 months that you'll be buying at the top of the market which is not good in a volatile market like LV.

Condos have HOA fees, additional volatility, restrictions on renting, .....

I remember one Embedded systems engineer interrupting a conference to repeat some non-sense he heard at a get rich quick seminar which correlated stock volatility to buy and sell signals.