If The Dust Gets Any Deeper

I’ve often heard people saying that you should invest in real estate, they aren’t making any more. The premise behind this is that since there is a finite amount of land, then its scarcity will keep the value up no matter what happens to the economy.

I have to admit, that with the land that I have purchased (my home); the value just keeps on going up. Our house isn’t in one of the desirable areas of the city either, so I guess the saying is true. My parents bought the house I grew up in for $14,000 and when they sold it about 16 years later, they were paid $165,000. Now, the same house would probably be pushing a half million dollars. That isn’t a bad return on your dollar. Of course, there are people who have lost money on real estate, but land is one of those long term investments and if you just stick it out, you should do alright.

I was dusting today and that saying about them not making any more land came to mind. Neither Louise nor I am fanatical house cleaners, so we have a chance to see real estate being made every week. In a month or so, about 1/32^nd of an inch will accumulate on any level surface. That means that in 32 months or 2 and 2/3^rd years, a full inch of “land” is created on my dining room table. If I left that table alone for 100 years, there would be 37 and a half inches of dirt. That is just over a yard. In 1000 years, that same table would be buried under 30 feet or so of dirt.

Not making any more…bullshit! We have been in this house for close to thirty years so I’m assuming that the outside of the house gained at least ten inches of dust, the same amount of grass clippings and leaves and possibly five inches of dead bugs. Why in five hundred years there will be another house built on top of this one.

They found Pompei under about 20 feet of ash and more than likely dust. They just keep building city on top of city in Jerusalem and that area is mostly desert and as we all know, desert is mostly dust, well sand dust. I have no idea where I am going with this, but it is kind of interesting. I imagine that at some point, the people living in these cities just gave up trying to dust and at some point figured it would be easier to just move somewhere else and start again.

Well, not the people in Pompei, they died a horrible death from poisonous fumes and superheated air burning their lungs. What did they expect living at the base of a volcano? Most people move when the dust gets too deep, I would imagine that lava would have the same kind of effect.

I guess the point is that yes, you should buy real estate and if the dust gets any deeper, Louise and I are going to move.