Juggling Dynamite

My heart is heavy today because of Daniel Kahneman’s death. Dr. Kahneman was a wisdom mentor for me and many others, and his teachings on money management and investing will always illuminate.

Michael Lewis’s 2017 book The Undoing Project discusses Kahneman’s work on human behaviour, the prevalence of mental errors in overconfidence, and the critical importance of Emotional Intelligence in effective decision-making. The book is about Kahneman’s life work and partnership with Amos Tversky. Kahneman’s excellent 2011 book Thinking Fast and Slow remains timeless.

His 2021 appearance on The Armchair Expert Podcast was far-reaching and one of his last public discussions. Here is a direct audio link.

Daniel Kahneman is a psychologist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Daniel joins the Armchair Expert to discuss the complexity of human nature, studying judgment and decision-making, and his experiments involving loss aversion. Daniel explains that memories can play tricks on our minds when remembering experiences and how to avoid noise and bias in the corporate hiring process. Daniel recounts his childhood growing up in Nazi-occupied France and his encounter with an SS soldier, he breaks down decision hygiene, and how it relates to vaccines.

Economist, David Rosenberg reveals the potential for significant economic downturn and wealth erosion in 2024. With an uncanny blend of humor and insight, he exposes the misleading job reports, the phantom strength of the housing market, and the precarious position of the consumer credit bubble. This discussion stretches beyond the US, offering a grim look at Canada’s economic pitfalls and the global implications of these trends. If you’re looking for a wake-up call on the economic realities of 2024 and want to know how to safeguard your financial future in these turbulent times, this episode is a must-watch.

Here is a direct video link.

Nationally, the average Canadian home sale price in February 2024 was $719,400, -11.9% from the cycle peak of $816,720 in February 2022.
Year-to-date, sixty percent of homes in the Greater Toronto Area sold below their asking price, 71% in Vancouver, and 48% in Calgary (the trend over the past three years is shown below). The average number of days a property spends on the market in the GTA rose 13.6% over the past year (TREB).
Bidding wars are less common than when interest rates were lower, and conditions like property inspections and financing approvals are once again typical. Still, most markets are considered balanced in terms of sellers and buyers so far, with properties priced to sell seeing offers.  See: Home sellers forced to confront new market realities this spring.

With sales edging down and new listings up 1.6% month over month in February, the national sales-to-new listings ratio was 55.6%. A sales-to-new listings ratio between 45% and 65% is generally considered a market where supply and demand are balanced, with readings above 65% favouring sellers and below 45% favouring buyers.

“If you price your property at what you want and it makes sense in the marketplace, you’re selling within seven days,” he said. “And the main reason for that is there’s such a low inventory out there that buyers don’t want to waste their time with sellers who are playing games. Buyers appreciate sellers who are pricing homes at what makes sense on paper, and are going through with the sale if everything checks out.”