Thing is I'm not trying to exit my positions. I just have a bunch of spare cash I acquired this year (some of which I'll have to pay to IRS come tax season). And not sure if I should just hold it, or dump into index funds/ real estate.
You really have two questions. 1) whether or not now's the time to invest in equities, and 2) what should you do with the fixed income portion of your portfolio. The answer to the first question that no one knows whether or not now's the time to invest in equities. You should decide upon a equity/fixed-income allocation and stick with it. Then make your decision based upon bringing your actual allocation back to your target.
For the answer to the second question, I rely upon advice from one of the people I respect most in the investing world, William Berstein.
If the pupose of the fixed-income portion of your portfolio is to counterbalance equities, then go with short-term treasuries or a treasury money-market fund. Corporate bonds do go down in a market drop. In a severe market event they could go down a lot. So, even though they pay higher rates in steady markets, their effectivness is a counterweight, just when you need them most, is less than ideal. William Bernstein says he doesn't know why anyone would own corporate bonds.
If the purpose of the fixed-income portion of your portfolio is to generate income, that's a very differnent purpose than acting as a counterweight to equities. In that case, a combination of a ladder of individual TIPS and dividend stock index funds should be up for consideration. The reason for a bond ladder of individual bonds vs. a bond fund is that you can match the term of the bonds to your liabilities and (if they're treasuries) you always get your money back when the bonds mature. In a bond fund, you can lose capital. As an individual, you'll probably never have a large enough portfolio to properly diversify the risk of individual long-term corporate bonds to make up for the slighty higher returns than from TIPS. Again, William Bernstein says he doesn't know why anyone would own corporate bonds.
Personally, I don't want to own any mid-term or long-term bond funds for any reason. If I have a need for mid-term or long-term guaranteed income, I'd want a TIPS ladder matched to my income needs. If I have a need to counter-balance equities, I'd want short-term or money market treasuries.