2. CAPE ≤ 15: $1,125,046 — Only invested 5 months out of 384. Statistically meaningless.

3. CAPE ≤ 25: $1,042,926 — Endured an 85-month dry spell. Brutal.

4. Faber 10-Month SMA: $992,120 — The only practical strategy that beat DCA. More on this in a second.

5. Monthly DCA: $984,594 — The boring baseline that beat most "smart" strategies.

6-12. Everything else, including crash buyers, value averaging, and hybrid approaches, all underperformed plain vanilla DCA.

The one exception worth noting is the Faber 10-Month Simple Moving Average strategy. It beat DCA by about $8,000 while keeping dry spells manageable (max 18 months) and was actually behaviorally followable. That's the mechanical approach of buying when the S&P is above its 10-month average, sitting in cash when it's below.

But even that requires discipline most people don't have. How many investors do you know who can sit in cash for 18 months while watching the market rip higher, trusting their system?

Here's what bugs me about market timing strategies: they're almost always back-tested to perfection but fall apart in real-time. You know why? Because back-tests don't account for the psychological torture of watching your strategy underperform for years while your friends get rich in index funds.

The CAPE ≤ 20 strategy didn't just lose to DCA. It lost by 16%. And that's assuming you had the discipline to stay the course through 16 years of waiting. In reality, most people would've given up and bought at the top anyway.

So what does this mean for investors today, with CAPE at 37?

First, acknowledge that forward returns from here are likely to be lower than historical averages. If you're expecting 10% annual returns, you're probably setting yourself up for disappointment. Plan for something closer to 5-7% real returns.

Second, that doesn't mean stop investing. It means adjust your expectations and keep contributing. The alternative—sitting in cash waiting for a crash—has a proven track record of underperforming by six figures.

Third, if you want to get tactical, the Faber 10-Month SMA approach has some merit. But be honest with yourself about whether you'll actually stick with it when it's underperforming.

The hard truth is that market timing is seductive because it feels smart. "Buy low, sell high" is common sense, right? But "low" and "high" are only obvious in hindsight. In real-time, you're just guessing.

The data is clear: over 32 years, through two bubbles and two crashes, the best strategy for most people was the simplest one. Show up every month, invest the same amount, don't try to be clever.

If they can't beat that with complex timing models, what makes you think you can?