How to time the Market.

When I don't know what to do, I listen to experts--like these:

"The stock market will fluctuate, but you can't pinpoint when it will tumble or shoot up." (AAII Guide to Mutual Funds)

"It must be apparent to intelligent investors--if anyone possessed the ability to do so (market time) he would become a billionaire--quickly--." (David Babson, author, adviser)

"What it really takes to improve your returns and diminish your risks is a willingness to stop focusing exclusively on the movement of the markets." (Baer & Ginsler, The Great Mutual Fund Trap)

"If we haven't said it enough, we'll say it again: Market timing is dangerous." (Barron's Guide to Making Investment Decisions.)

"Only liars manage to always be "out" during bad times and "in' during good times. (Bernard Baruch, famed investor)

"You have to keep reminding yourself. We don't know what's going to happen with anything, ever." (Peter Bernstein)

"I never have the faintest idea what the stock market is going to do in the next six months, or the next year, or the next two." (Warren Buffet)

"Any investment method that relies on predicting the future is doomed to fail." (Chandan & Sengupta, financial authors)

"A successful investor has a good knowledge base, a well-defined investment plan, and nerves of steel to stick with it." (Andrew Clarke, financial author)

"Forget market timing in any form." (Paul Farrell, (CBS Marketwatch.com)

"Benjamin Graham spent much of his career trying to devise a good formula for when to get into--and out of--the stock market. All formulas, he concluded, failed." (Forbes, 12-27-99)

"Don't sell out of fear or buy out of greed. Just keep making investments, and let the market take its course over the long-term." (Norman Fosback, author, researcher)

"The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectful." (John Kenneth Galbraith, Economist)

"If I have noticed anything over these 60 years on Wall Street, it is that people do not succeed in forecasting that's going to happen to the stock market." (Benjamin Graham)

"From June 1980 through December 1992, 94.5% of 237 market timing investment newsletters had gone of business." (Graham/Campbell Study)

"After receiving the Nobel Prize, Daniel Kahneman, was asked by a CNBC anchorman what investment tips he had for viewers. His answer: "Buy and hold."

"No one is smart enough to time the market's ups and downs." (Arthur Levitt, former SEC chairman)

"Nobody can predict interest rates, the future direction of the economy or the stock market." (Peter Lynch)

"At the peak of the bull market in March of 2000 only 0.7% of all recommendations on stocks issued by Wall Street brokerages and investment banks were to "Sell." (Miami Herald, 1-26-03)

"We're not keen on market-timing. It just doesn't work." (Morningstar Course 106)

"We've yet to find anyone who can accurately and consistently predict the market's short-term moves." (Motley Fools)

"Forget trying to time the market and do something productive instead." (Gerald Perritt, financial author)

"The market timer's Hall of Fame is an empty room." (Jane Bryant Quinn)

"In the long run it doesn't matter much whether your timing is great or lousy. What matters is that you stay invested." (Louis Rukeyser, TV host)

"It's my belief that it's a waste of time to try to time any market decline, or try to pinpoint a market bottom." (James Stewart, Smart Money columnist)

"People should stop chasing performance and just put together a sensible portfolio regardless of the ups and downs of the market." (David Swensen, Yale Investments)

"Trust in time and forget market timing. Allow time to work its compounding magic for you. Let market timing inflict its miseries on someone else." (Tweddell & Pierce, financial authors)


Courtesy of Taylor Larimore (It’s actually for stock market but can just as well be applied to purchasing a home)