“I’m going for a walk,” she said just as I came in and sat down. “You’re welcome to go, too, of course.”

Of course I am. Because it’s a free country and all of the outdoors is pretty big and because she likes my company.

Only I’d just gotten in, set my things down, emptied my books and took off my shoes and I was in that first 20 seconds of re-enjoying a comfortable chair experience.

“There’s a house a few neighborhoods over that went on the market, and I want to see it. They listed it at $700,000.”

Which was intriguing enough.

So we walked a few neighborhoods over. It’s similar to ours, but thankfully not ours. It’s a five bedroom house. There’s a small pool. Two-car garage. Brick and siding exterior. Quiet neighborhood. Trees and sidewalks and a driveway and all of that. Newly updated most everything, according to the listing.

It is not a $700,000 house, at least in any rational world.

Let’s look at the pricing history of the house.

In the early spring of 2012 it went on the market for $359,500. In June of that same year it came off the market. It went back up again in April of 2015, now at $399,900. The price was lowered several times, until it finally sold in July or August of 2015 at $379,900.

In March of 2017, it went back up again, listed this time at $409,900. Less than three weeks later, they lowered the price. Three more weeks, another reduction. And they removed the listing, now at $389,900, in July of that same year.

Now, a word about this market. It’s wacky, even in the best of times. Purchases are often seasonal, based on academic schedules, and you apparently have to act fast, even when there isn’t a crunch. When we came up to shop for houses the majority of what we picked out in the days and a week or two before were off the market by the time we got here. Ultimately, we got perhaps our top realistic choice — everyone has that one they’d try to rationalize over-extending for, right? — and only then because the timing was just, just so precisely right. Another day, either side, it might not have worked out.

Also, and this is important, we don’t have a $700,000 house.

And if I was somehow interested in buying a house for $700,000, I would want a little more space in the yard and privacy as opposed to what this little quaint neighborhood domicile will provide. Also, this is a college town. There are two substantial industries here, and not that many folks, I would imagine, are looking in that range. Good luck to them, but given that locale’s history, and the comps around them, it just doesn’t seem plausible. That price is substantially above the tax assessment, as well. So I’m sure their neighbors are all pleased at this development.

Nice house. No way in the world, in a rational world anyway, it is a $700,000 house. But what even is rational in the housing game at this point?

Low interest rates and market exuberance will keep prices up for a year, maybe two or three. And then there will be some pain. That’s my economic prediction.

My other prediction is that the price on that particular house is going to be lowered.

Last Thursday I mentioned a little project I was working on. Here are the fancy fruits of my minimal labor.

These are homemade cufflinks, in a chain style. There’s a little chain and a non-distinct button on the back to hold a French cuff sleeve together.

So my wrists will look dapper.

And I have quite a few more to make with more cool fabric I have. When you’re making your own, I learned right away, they are terribly inexpensive to make in big batches. So, after I finish another long-running project or two, I’ll have to make a fancy drawer for storage for all of them, eventually.

That ought to raise the property values around here by four or five bucks, right?