A New Housing ETF from Robert Shiller

Up until now, Robert Shiller has been spectacularly unsuccessful in (a) finding ways for investors to short the housing market, and (b) designing ETFs. So, naturally, he's now trying to do both at once!

Matthew Hougan explains the idea - as is usual for Shiller, it all makes sense in theory. But before you try to use these new contracts to "trade the housing market like stocks", I'd give them a good year to see whether they really behave as they're meant to behave. And I certainly wouldn't try to use them to hedge a possible decline in the value of your house.