The second home is the asset wealthy families buy fastest and sell slowest. It is bought on a good week, in good weather, at the top of a season. It is usually sold on a worse week, because selling tends to follow a change in circumstances rather than a change in price.

Thin markets cut both ways

A resort market has few buyers, and the few it has want the same months of the year. In a rising market that scarcity produces the headline prices that make the asset look like an investment. In a falling one it produces listings that sit, because the buyer who would have paid last year price is simply not in the market this year. Time on market in prime leisure locations is measured in quarters, not weeks.

What it means for an allocator

Price the illiquidity rather than ignoring it. If the realistic sale window is twelve to eighteen months, then any number that depends on exiting faster is not a plan. The families who do well with second homes buy them as consumption, fund the carry from income, and treat appreciation as a result rather than a thesis. The ones who do badly bought a holiday and underwrote an investment.