Ralph Merkle Quotes

Buy land. They ain't making any more of the stuff.

The fundamental problem of society is that demands are infinite and resources are always limited

Things that are unique and rare will cost a lot of money. Houses in East Hampton and Malibu will cost a lot of money because there just aren't that many of them. The value of sports has appreciated because it's the only thing that people have to watch live.

Property is a nuisance.

Every time you look at a house in Los Angeles, the real-estate agent will tell you that someone famous once lived there. It always seemed irrelevant to me: Does a property gain value just because Alfred Hitchcock used to eat breakfast there?

To my real estate agent, Chernobyl is a fixer-upper.

The first lesson of economics is scarcity: there is never enough of anything to fully satisfy all those who want it. The first lesson of politics is to disregard the first lesson of economics.

In economics, one of the most important concepts is 'opportunity cost' - the idea that once you spend your money on something, you can't spend it again on something else.

Buy land, they're not making it anymore.

The most critical factor subduing the demand for housing is that home ownership is no longer seen as the great, long-term buildup in equity value it once was.

Places like Hilton Head, with water adjacency and nice climates, are in high demand, and land values are insane. In the case of Hilton Head, which was developed in 1970 on what had been a mosquito- and alligator-infested swampy barrier island, land value has leaped from nearly zero to now unaffordable.

Since scarcity is the basic economic problem, if it does not exist then there is no reason for my economics course. Devoting time to the study of how people use limited resources to fulfill unlimited wants and needs should help us to discover how to best utilize the resources we have at our disposal.

Money is a way of creating scarcity.

In Sydney, we always have a deficiency of housing. So that's one good thing, which will cause real estate to keep going up. Not fast, but it'll go up.

Time is a resource whose supply is inversely proportional to its demand.

As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed, and demand a rent even for its natural produce.

Most economic fallacies derive … from the tendency to assume that there is a fixed pie, that one party can gain only at the expense of another.

Too many pigs; two few teats.

Land will continue to rise in value, being yet capable of Improvement; And as the Demand increases, for the Quantity will be the same

Men did not make the earth... It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property... Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds.

One day thousands will desire this land.

There's a harsh reality to situations where demand outstrips supply.

Wealth is not a pizza, where if I have too many slices you have to eat the Domino's box.

Scarcity is a good sales tactic if you are selling something people want.

Our bounty, like a drop of water, disappears, when diffus'd too widely