re: The Medium income Amercan Family now earns 1/2 the income needed to buy the avg home.

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See here’s the thing, the “cheap” apartments and “starter” housing in convenient areas for college students, college grads and young married couples has been allowed to deteriorate into such a state that they simply aren’t livable.

These “starter” apartments and homes are now permanently lived in by a underclass and turned into unsafe ghettos. And apartment complexes and housing companies aren’t allowed to build “economical” type structures both in size and in prime locations anymore either, so there’s really no new inventory with your mentality.

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This is the single biggest problem with the housing market today. It's fixable, but no politician and most American people don't have the stomach for it.

Imagine how much the housing market for starter homes would open up if places like the South Side of Chicago were legitimate options for young white families looking to buy their first home.

A young couple just out of college shouldn't have to dodge gunfire walking to the mailbox in their first house.

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Naw to the commie shite. Its a manufactured crisis, over 80% of America lives in urban areas and urban areas typically have dems as the local government. Their insane zoning restrictions make it impossible to build

A lot of major cities also require a chunk of new housing be dedicated toward people who cannot afford to live there, which drives up the cost for those who can

Get rid of the stupid rules, let developers build, prices will fall

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That's odd. In my rural area with minimal restrictions homes have at least doubled over the past 5-6 years.

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No offense

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But your attitude says you have Champaign tastes and schlitz beer finances. Quit complaining, step up and improve yourself.

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Yea, that is where the problem is. It isn't that they can't afford a house, it is that they can't afford what is being asked for a hosue. I think Dave's numbers are way too conservative, so you could bump that number up some, but it really isn't making that much difference.

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His advice is definitely wildly out of date, but it wasnt that long ago it didnt seem that far fetched either. The problem is housing has popped up way too much way too fast while interest rates rose dramatically along with it. That should never really happen but it did somehow and people are for whatever reason (i guess not enarly as mcuh recently) getting into these very expensive homes at much higher than just a few years ago interest rates.

We could sell our house for $430k in todays market and for us to move to a $600k-$700k single family home our mortgage would almost double (Depending on exact price) and thats moving from a 15 year to a 30 year

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But your attitude says you have Champaign tastes and schlitz beer finances.

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We make plenty of money to live where we do, but just pointing out obvious things like the reason why Calera AL has brand new 1500sq-ft $225k homes is because, drum roll, its not a highly desirable area for most people to live in. The same exact house in most of metro ATL would go for about double that easily.

You have to understand where MOST people live is always going to be more expensive than a town of 12k people in the middle of nowhere Alabama that doesnt exactly have the same economic opportunity being 40 minutes away from the nearest city which isnt even a major city by any shape of the imagination. Thats fine if thats the life you want to live, but its not necessarily fit for everyone.

Sounds like you guys are letting the HOA's bend you over.

Gen X here and I've never paid a dime to an HOA. I've owned 3 houses though

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The absolute fact is that the typical home being bought today is nicer and the rate of ownership has remained the same. And that friend didn't start with the low interest rates of the last 5 to 10 years. That's the fact you can't ignore it. And you can't explain it.

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Related: Consumer credit card debt is at an all time high

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Sounds like you guys are letting the HOA's bend you over.

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I would always choose to live in a well run HOA over a house off the side of the street. We value neighborhoods with pool/tennis and other amentities. These are not free. Our landscaping is impeccable because it's 1 company that does the whole neighborhood, there are no run down houses and if there's any major issues they can get fixed.

There's defintiely poorly run HOAs out there, but we've been here almsot 8 years, wife has been on the board, I've done their finances a few times and it's extremely well run a very desirable neighborhood as aresult for people to move to. $210/mo is on the low end for condo/townhouse HOAs with the amentities and things it pays for i nthe metro ATL area.

There are people who live in condos in ATL who pay $300, $400, $500/mo for their HOA fee

Singlke family home HOAs are less in this area but its because they dont include landscaping and we dont have a personal water bill and single family homes will. etc...

Baw, if your argument is that everything is fine, everyone just needs to spend 3+ hours a day commuting, thats a horrible argument. Not to mention wear and tear on car + gas from that shite