Time to buy stocks?

There's an adage on Wall Street that says, more or less, "when your mother in law is selling stocks, it's time to buy". This article in the Times today suggests that that time may have come. I witnessed the inverse of this adage when, at the height of the tech boom, my girl friend and I stopped in a deli for coffee after a day of X-Country skiing at Pound Ridge. There in rural Pound Ridge we noticed the counterman, a fellow who barely spoke English, glued to the CNN Business channel, monitoring his investments. "If you own any tech stocks," I warned my friend,"it's time to sell." When coffee dispensers know that the stock market is going to make them rich, you don't want to share that dream.

Which is all a long way of pointing out that when everyone in the market is convinced of one thing, a smart investor might consider the contrarian view (I'd say something about Global Warming here, but I think I'll give that a rest). When this Kramer guy is screaming "sell!" on national television, when the Time's reporter finds people whose mothers in law are fleeing stocks, when "everyone" is convinced that worse is coming, the "irrational exuberance" may have been wrung out of the market and prices may finally be getting real. I haven't noticed that phenomenon among Greenwich real estate sellers, yet, but perhaps it's on the horizon. In which case, be ready.