There is an ancient Chinese curse that says “may you live in interesting times” and the World economy is certainly doing that right now!

Many people are worried about the banking system and whilst I personally believe that, overall, only panic can bring it down, I can understand why anyone with money on deposit is sweating right now. With this in mind, traditionally, there has been a flight to assets. Not bits of paper and promises like stocks, shares and bonds, but real things like property and land. No matter how the price of these fluctuates in the short term the reality is that when you come down to it you own something solid, tangible, that people need. Something that you don’t lose, no matter how stupid bankers and Governments can be.

There are a lot of questions about timing because the money value of property is falling in Europe and North America but the reality is that whilst paper money has no value unless we believe it does and whilst stocks can fall to zero, a house will always be a house!

This reminds me of something a neighbour said when I first moved to Spain “with land you will never starve”. He had grown up in Franco’s times when starvation and poverty were a reality for many Spaniards. He can remember walking through the night (to avoid the heat of the day) with panniers of oranges on his mule to the tourist market in Fuengirola (20 kilometers of tracks) and then walking home the following night, hopefully without the oranges but with some money.

I hope that things will not get that bad and that we don’t enter a depression, but if you are worried about the future my neighbours words are worth remembering.

There are also places in the World that are still booming. Countries like Argentina, and Brazil who export food and commodities are doing well. And because their economies have often been a mess they are still largely cash based societies. So the credit crunch doesn’t affect the average person who doesn’t have mountains of debt. Property prices in these countries continue to rise quickly, albeit from a very low base, so they can be sound places to invest your money. This week I have a few suggestions for land and property investments, offered as an alternative to bank deposits!