Book Review > The Secret Life of Real Estate, How it moves and why

Phillip Anderson is Managing Director of the subscriber service, Economic Indicator Services (EIS). This is his first book and in Part II, the longest section of the book, he recounts the history of land speculation and the reasons for it from the early days of American settlement through to the present era. From his research of these historical times he draws conclusions about the relationships between the rise and fall of - the financial system and banks; government policies; building and construction activity; population movements and most importantly the greed of speculators to – the rise and fall in real estate values.

Part III has the most interesting content where he summaries the lessons of Part II and develops his hypothesis of the real estate clock. The hypothesis is supported by the earlier research and includes an extensive area of graphs and charts. The conclusions drawn are that throughout European settlement in America (and some passing references to Europe, Asia and Australia) there is a reliably repetitive real estate cycle.

The author discovers that the real estate cycle repeats itself approximately every 18 years. In addition, he tells the reader the warning signs and trends that precede the various “hours” on his real estate clock. One warning about the book is that the conclusions are drawn from American data over a considerable period of time and they might not be reliable for interpreting real estate trends in other countries.

In summary, if the author’s research is reliable then we can utilise the “clock” to know when to buy and sell real estate in the future.

Brian Cordiner is a member of the AIA.