If you’re thinking about moving, you’ve probably heard this advice: It doesn’t really matter what the market is doing, as long as you buy and sell in the same market.

Generally speaking, it’s good advice.

When your sale and purchase happen within roughly the same market, you reduce the risk of a significant change in values between the two transactions. If you sell and then wait a year or two to buy again, you’re also making a bet on what the market will do while you wait.

If prices rise, the home you eventually buy may become more expensive. If prices fall, waiting could work in your favour. The difficulty, of course, is knowing which way the market will go.

Buying and selling within the same market helps reduce that uncertainty.

But there’s another side to this advice that often gets overlooked: buying and selling in the same market doesn’t necessarily mean everything evens out.

In a softer market, one of the biggest hurdles for homeowners is accepting that their home may be worth less today than it was a year or two ago. That difference can feel like a very real loss, and understandably, it can make selling difficult to consider.

But if you’re selling in order to buy another home, your sale price is only one half of the equation.

The home you want to buy has been affected by the market too. And depending on what you’re selling and what you’re buying, the change on the purchase side can sometimes be greater than the change in the value of your current home.

This can be particularly important if you’re moving up. A softer market may mean accepting less for your current home, but it could also mean paying considerably less for the more expensive home you want to buy.

The reverse can be true when downsizing. And different property types, neighbourhoods and price ranges don’t necessarily move in step with one another.

So rather than assuming it will all balance out, a better question is:

What has happened to the value of the home you’re selling compared with the value of the home you want to buy?

If you’ve been waiting for your home to regain its previous value before making a move, it’s worth considering what could happen on the other side of the transaction as well. If your home increases in value, the home you want to buy could become more expensive too.

Sometimes waiting makes sense. Sometimes today’s market may actually make the move more achievable.

The important thing is not to make the decision based solely on what your home used to be worth. Look at the entire move: what you can realistically sell for today, what you may need to spend on your next home, and how the two sides of the market are behaving.

Thinking about making a move this fall or next year? Even if you’re not ready to do anything yet, I’d be happy to help you look at both sides of the equation and talk through what it could mean for your particular move.