There’s a difference between timing the market and looking at fundamentals.

I think the advice of “don't time the market” is actually pretty damn good. Life is unpredictable, and the market is often irrational. The notion that you can enter and exit perfectly, IMO, is pretty naive.

That said, I think we've thrown the baby out with the bathwater with this one. Timing the market would be “Oh shit, Ukraine crisis, time to get out”. “Ok, crisis solved, time to get back in!” What could possibly go wrong? /s

But then you could actually do the smart thing and look at fundamentals, whether of individual companies or of the indices. You could say, hey, VOO is only yielding 1.4% in dividends, I'm not sure that's really worth it. But then you take interest rates into consideration, and then maybe you say, well, that's actually fair, then. Great! But what's happening now is that interest rates are going to be going up. You have to adjust your notion of what's fair. That's not “timing the market”. That's sound fundamental analysis.

The same people who use the phrase “don't time the market” to throw valuation out the window (whether of companies or indices) are the same people who would say “don't time the market” in real estate from 2000-2006. Funny that nobody recommends timing the market, but if that baby's going up, suddenly the trend line is more important than fundamentals.

For some indicators, see here: https://www.currentmarketvaluation.com/. Note that the S&P 500 is fairly valued when looking at interest rates, but those are going to be changing.