It could be the case that some people think about their investment as something that they build up and then when they reach their target they exit, but that does not seem like a good way of thinking about bitcoin, especially if you might be able to wrap your mind around the reaching of your target just means that you change your strategy and maybe you are not so much focused on accumulating bitcoin any more, but the mere fact that you are not focusing on accumulating, does not necessarily mean that you should want to or need to sell (at least not to sell in large proportions).
Just because a person does not have a plan to sell his BTC does not necessarily mean that he does not have a target, even though some folks might have somewhat vague ballpark ideas of their target in the beginning, so they might not be sure about when they might be getting close to their target, yet, if every year (or whatever basis) they are reassessing the value of their BTC in light of their goals and wants in life, they might start to consider ways to hone or to specify their target in such a way that they would be able to define what they want more clearly based on the quantity of BTC they had accumulated up to that point, which might cause them to transition into some other stage, such as maintenance stage or even some kind of a sustainable withdrawal stage, which I would also not characterize sustainable withdrawal as a way to get out of bitcoin, but instead a way to just withdraw from it on a regular basis, whether making price-based withdrawals and/or making time based withdrawals.
I think you couldn't be more accurate here. I would add though that it might a question of needs and opportunities. If you reached the accumulation target for BTC and the price is amazing (whatever that means) and in the neighborhood out of a sudden there is this once in a lifetime opportunity to buy that house that you ever dreamt of, then maybe it is also a question of satisfaction that can become decisive. Now if that means I am forced to sell off everything in BTC and then top of that take a mortgage to get it financed, I should probably think twice (unless I have some deadly disease and want to live in a dream place for a short time...).
It's true that people can have a target without actually intending to sell by then. Regarding the price, the truth is that we are still so early days that I think nobody can reasonably estimate where BTC will end up or peak for a long time. I will be honest and say it could be anything. If governments start racing for accumulation because they once and for all understood that bitcoin has geopolitical relevance, well, how much does there even remain for us normal human beings? And this is not an unrealistic scenario. It's probably already happening for sure apart from El Salvador.
I just remember people saying that BTC will never reach 1,000 USD, then they said it will never reach 10,000 USD, then they doubled that number, then institutions started to announce that bitcoin could change the world, then governments were involved in various ways like selling seized BTC, which actually legitimates it because governments can't prohibit something that they sell themselves.
So many details to consider here. I am curious to see where this is heading in the next 5 - 10 years. It doesn't mean we won't see crashes. For sure there will be crashes as with any asset that is subject to herd behavior, but bitcoin is very often fought back in the recent past when some experts announced that there will be a black swan event.
It may be true that if you are in that situation you will make two decisions, the first is to get luxury goods/houses or everything that you have dreamed of for years, and the second decision is that you will think wisely about the bitcoin investment that has been built from a long time ago. Yes, my answer is maybe if we have achieved the desire to have a luxury home and at that time all your wealth that you have in BTC. If it happened to me, maybe I would only sell some BTC and the others I would keep for years to come.
The reality is someone who has fallen in love with Bitcoin of course will not leave BTC in the investment that he will make. So at this point we can rebuild our BTC portfolio by accumulating every week because we only sell some BTC just to satisfy ourselves with our dream of having a luxury home.
This often happens to the wider community where they change their lifestyle when they have reached the level of wealth that they have built from the investments they have made. I remember one word, fulfill your dream when you are able to achieve it. Yes, that is a common thing and we remain in our position to have BTC and also have a luxury home. Just sell some of it and buy it back through DCA, of course, slowly you will have the BTC back like before you sold it.