Fortune aks: Is it too late to get in?
The answer to that question, when posed by a major magazine cover, tends to be an emphatic yes.
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The articles are actually more circumspect than the cover:
Is the Housing Boom Over?
How Real People Get Rich
The New King of the Real Estate Boom
Riding the Boom
Get thee reading!
You missed the double down with the most recent cover of Money!
This week’s Fortune cover could certainly pound another nail in the coffin of the housing mania.
But I would remind you that Fortune had another cover story last Sept entitled “Is the Housing Boom Over? Million-dollar condos. Speculators everywhere. Here’s why the bubble is going to pop.”
When I saw that piece, I thought, “Uh-oh.” So maybe this week’s cover cancels out that one.
Fortune doesn’t have a particularly good track record of calling the end of trends.
I recall a cover from early Sept 1998, during the LTCM hedge fund meltdown and concurrent 20% stock market tumble, that read: “How to Prepare for the Coming Recession.” That cover pretty much bottom-ticked the market. The Nasdaq was trading at 1,500 when the issue hit the stands on its way to 5000+ just 18 months later.
They were right about the recession. It was indeed coming. But not for two years+.