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I had coffee with a friend today who has just put her townhouse on the market. She did the "normal" thing that people seem to do these days, and added the listing on her Facebook page, hoping to get some more interest (I haven't heard of this working) and was annoyed when the only interest that she got was from people she hadn't spoken to in ages, enquiring as to where she is going to move and her love life. What she did find interesting though is that one person asked her what she originally paid for the apartment, as if she was entitled to know and my friend obligated to tell.   

![IMG_20210810_133634.jpg](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/tarazkp/23wfqyWd6SbfkMBn2M4kH34WC43oa4ss3SuEbMTR8rVnFFwefJHNWGhXXB1j9YjvkY2VH.jpg)

Housing prices have been steadily increasing here too, especially in newish and ready-to-move-in places, for as we found out last year, it is very difficult to get renovation loans. Mostly, if you want to renovate, you have to have the cash on hand, which *very few* do in the amounts needed. This means that a lot of the older houses are left on the market and people are driven into higher loans on newer places, with no possibility to put sweat equity into raising the value. 

This has meant that apartment prices have increased substantially, where for example, my friend's apartment has risen almost 50% in the last five years. That is a large amount in Finland (it has been worse in other countries) and my friend is pretty happy with the return, but if she were to look for another place to buy, those profits will be absorbed, as all housing in her wanted type range has increased proportionally. 

![IMG_20210810_133557.jpg](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/tarazkp/23wqY3mWmMjae5vM8tjMAP9kM7ntwQxUjr1nnoBCDkt3aU9BLQrUChenrqpa8ASZnKCeL.jpg)

What is interesting though is how many people evaluate a property. If for example she listed at 300,000 and someone who was interested in it then discovered that five years ago she had bought it for 200,000, they would likely mentally devalue the current price and no longer see it as a viable option. I have seen this happen, even though they know that the entire area has increased similarly in the same time frame, not just the single property. 

But, I think this mentality affects all things that change in value, not just something large like a house. For example, if someone had bought Bitcoin at 100 dollars, did they still see it as a bargain at 1000 dollars? What about at 9,000 dollars? 

My phone is running out of space and I was looking at what apps I don't use and came across the Wallet of Satoshi, which I haven't used, other than signing up to get one transaction of 300,000 sats in early May last year. As you can see, the value was at $42 and now it is at 188 dollars - a 450% increase in 15 months.   

![Screenshot_20210811_014902.jpg](https://files.peakd.com/file/peakd-hive/tarazkp/48GgFbdQYhD4ESCq5CTL2KNTXspCvPEZzdKq3wDD4AmHiidv4nPmas8EinQQFfkwCv.jpg)

What does someone who bought Bitcoin at 100 dollars think about buying Bitcoin at 45,000 dollars? Now, perhaps they made so much gains that they don't need it, but the holder is rare and most people who bought, likely sold soon after, perhaps after a 450% gain when it was at $450. 

The returns are far slower to be realized in the housing market, with something like a 450% gain taking decades to be seen, yet people see investing into crypto a risk, even though a small amount into the right areas will outperform most investments anywhere. 

A couple months before the above transaction when BTC was at 9000, it was at 5000 and many people still didn't buy, because they had watched it drop over the last few years through the bear market from 20,000 and were scared it would fall further. However, if they really did believe in the future of it realizing potentials in the hundreds of thousands, why didn't they buy?

It is hard for us to break our perceptions of value when we have already cemented into our psyche what is considered low and high. Right at this moment, there are people looking at Bitcoin and seeing it as overpriced and others seeing it as a bargain for the future price. Some will wait until it drops, some will buy in the hope it will rise, some will never buy because it always looks too expensive.* Some will be right, some will be wrong, some will adjust their perceptions, some will stick to their guns. 

Value is an interesting concept and while we talk about it a lot in regards to various tokens, it doesn't really mean much, as it is a proxy of what people actually value. A million dollars has no intrinsic value, but the goods, services or peace of mind it buys, does. People don't want to be wealthy because of the money in the bank, they want it because of the opportunity it gives them access to. Tokens are the same, and just like at an arcade, they only have value because you need to put them in the slot to play the game. 

When it comes to investing, it can be useful to see the historic prices to get a sense of trends, but it should be remembered that those prices are history, they are no longer valid to buy. What is important is the future value in relation to the current purchase price. Someone buying my friend's house may believe it will go up and is a decent investment or, they might just value living in the area for some reason and not mind paying for the access. The market price however is the market price and regardless of whether it is a bubble or not, no one is going to sell below market evaluation, unless they are forced for some reason, so what they originally paid for it doesn't matter to a new buyer at all. 

I believe that the value of the crypto projects that last are going to be like this where in hindsight, people are going to wish that they bought, even though at the time they believed it to be overvalued, so they didn't. That that did buy, will wish they bought more, but might not buy more at higher prices, because they have the sense of the low. this means that new people who believe the future value will be higher again can opt-in and see gains, spreading the distribution wider, even though each new entrant will likely have a fair amount less than those who came much earlier.

Each of us might have a different understanding of what is valuable, what is cheap, expensive, useful or not - so we each make decisions on what we invest into. It doesn't matter if it is our money, energy or time, every day and every moment, we are weighing up the options and tryin to do what will bring the most gains in whatever we are considering at the time. When we watch a movie, we want to watch something good. When we exercise, we want to see results. When we buy a token, we want gains. 

Essentially, we are all looking for the future to be worth more than the past, to be better, and we make our decisions accordingly. It doesn't always happen as we had hoped.


Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]


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