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There are a range of ETFs that aim to have inverse daily returns to different things. I bought some SPXU, which aims to offer 3x the inverse daily return of the S&P 500. It works for this use case, betting that the S&P will fall. There are risks to using leverage, and inverse ETFs are meant for short term bets (a few days at most).

Curious what instrument you were going to buy the VIX through? $VXX? $VXX was only up (coughing) 33% while the CBOE VIX was/is up nearly 100+ %.

I hadn't looked into all the options to be honest, VXX was on my radar. So was TVIX[1], but figuring out how to optimize decaying short-term bets like these felt like too much for a non-expert. I'm certain there are smarter and less risky ways to hedge a market that seems overbought.

[1] https://sixfigureinvesting.com/2015/10/how-does-tvix-work/

Sell calls against long stock positions. If you're really scared, use the credits on the calls to buy further out puts.

You can also just buy puts. Puts on SPY increase in value as SP500 declines.