Long ago, Ben Graham taught me that "Price is what you pay; value is what you get." Whether we're talking about socks or stocks, I like buying quality merchandise when it is marked down.
I have got this letter which actually goes out the day after I die. It has already been written. And it says that: "Yesterday I died". And then it says: "That's bad news for me, but it's not bad news for you, the shareholders of Berkshire". And then I go on and explain what is going to happen. I know that is one time when they will be really interested in hearing from me.
With housing it's something even more dramatic than that, because most people aspire to own their own home.If you really think that houses prices are going to go up next year and the year after, you feel if I don't buy it this year, I'm going to have to buy it next year.That's not true of an Internet stock. But it's true of a home.
Mark Zuckerberg will be a hero to many young entrepreneurs 20 years from now. Bill Gates will be a hero to others, and they will look to those [people] like I read books when I was in my teens about Rockefeller or Carnegie.
Confidence in markets and in institutions, it's a lot like oxygen. When you have it, you don't even think about it. It's indispensable. You can go years without thinking about it. When it's gone for five minutes, it's the only thing to think about.