There is a great quote in Shakespeare's Hamlet: "There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so."

The point of this quote is to argue that the universe is fundamentally neutral. When an event happens, it is neither good nor bad; the label is determined by the judgment we ultimately bring to it.

Take snow, for instance.

Here in Toronto, I find that when it snows, people tend to look at it as a bad event. They think of the traffic that will ensue and the work that will be required to clear out walkways and driveways. But I love snow (maybe because I don't have a driveway). Snow is good. As an avid snowboarder, it gets me excited for the winter season.

And right now I can tell you that I'm praying to the snow gods for a dumping or two in Northern Utah. The entire Mountain West region is off to a slow start this season and has had to delay resort openings. My judgment tells me this is "bad."

Now, let's consider the real estate development market.

The prevailing narrative right now is that it's bad. But Hamlet would say that only thinking makes it so. An alternative way to think about the market is that it's presenting a generational buying opportunity.

Like snow, I would call that a good thing.

The Stahl House — also known as Case Study House #22 — is up for sale in Los Angeles.

Even if you don't know this house by name, I'm sure you've seen Julius Shulman's iconic photograph from 1960 showing two women sitting in a corner of the house. It is widely credited with turning the house into one of the city's most recognizable landmarks.

Buck and Carlotta Stahl are the original owners. They purchased the steep lot for US$13,000 in 1954 (equal to about $157,000 today). This was a large sum of money at the time, especially for a lot that was thought to be unbuildable by many architects.

Designed by architect Pierre Koenig, the house was built as part of Arts & Architecture magazine's Case Study program, hence the name. The intent of the program was to come up with templated responses for an expected housing shortage following the Great Depression and World War II.

When the program launched, it stated that "each house must be capable of duplication and in no sense be an individual performance," and that "the overall program will be general enough to be of practical assistance to the average American in search of a home in which he can afford to live."

Sound familiar?

The program also secured material donations from the building industry in an effort to make the prototypes as low-cost and repeatable as possible. Ironically, the house became the exact opposite: It became a singular icon of Los Angeles, used in movies, for fashion shoots, and as a general backdrop for a modernist city.

And today, after 65 years of stewardship under the original owners, the house is on the market for US$25,000,000. This works out to nearly US$11,400 per square foot of interior space.

When I first saw the list price I immediately thought to myself, "Interesting, I wonder how much of this price is being attributed to the real estate and how much of it is being attributed to its status as an icon and piece of art."