Cash is king in a furious real estate market. Even well-qualified buyers who have solid mortgage guarantees will get beat by all cash bids time after time.
If only they had a bucket of cash sitting around so they could pay cash, too! Well, maybe they do, and just don't know it yet. That's because necessity is the mother of invention, and a new crop of investment companies are springing in to help.
Prices are surging in both cases, which makes it complicated
Even with rising home prices, low interest rates have made it marginally more profitable to own than rent. (Since all real estate is hyper-local, that will be more or less true in your exact location.)
However, as interest rates begin to rise, the gap will shrink even further, and it may be a financial toss-up whether you buy or rent.
If you don't know exactly what the Metaverse, ETFs, cryptocurrency, and digital investment in artwork and real estate is all about, you're not alone.
In a nutshell, the Metaverse is a collection of invented worlds, like multiplayer online role playing games. Real people interact as cartoon-like characters called avatars. Think of it like an immersive internet, where you can climb a mountain, attend a concert, or visit a cocktail party and chat with folks you don't know virtually (instead of suffering the same fate in person). People access these worlds through a normal computer screen now, but Metaverse builders envision a future of 3D virtual reality.