This wasn’t in a rural area or impoverish inner ring suburb. This was in an older but perfectly nice suburb of a large midwestern US city. I had two friends at the time who were just out of college and teaching in public schools. And they both bought houses. One had a spouse who was working (normal job, not high pay or anything) but the other was single. I know for a fact they didn’t have any help from parents. I do know they both had most of their school paid through scholarships so little to no college debt, fwiw. Went on google street view to check out the houses - not large but definitely comfy. Around 1,600-1,700 sq ft single family homes with a yard and everything. Something a small family would be comfortable in.
And I mean, I was looking at buying a home around that time, too (and for years afterward). My salary was above the national median but not that much above it. There were lots of options - the only reason I didn’t buy was because my life situation was not stable. I don’t live in that city anymore but looking at my salary now and what’s available on the market, buying a home is pretty much out of reach for me. Certainly what I could get now, in terms of square footage, is drastically reduced. I’m not even taking into account current interest rates, I was just plugging in numbers at the old 4%.
That’s how fast material conditions have eroded for a lot of Americans. This is what journalists who write this articles about “aww why are young people so down these days, they should just cheer up all that bad stuff is all in their head” completely miss. Probably because in all likelihood, they bought a house a couple decades ago and are secure themselves. It’s why the dems’ bullshit about how the economy is so great is so offensive to us. It’s a denial of reality.
Generational politics is bunk, but I also think inequality should be thought of along multiple axes. One is whether or not you bought a house 15-20 years ago or not. If you did, then you’re sitting on a mortgage that is relatively low which makes your material conditions comfortable. You’re not feeling the effects of the bad economy as much. If you’re under 30, then it’s not possible to be in that situation.
Admittedly, in the years just prior to 08 a lot of people who absolutely would not otherwise have been able to get a mortgage at all got approved for surprisingly large mortgages. If not for the sketchy subprime mortgages, the affordability crisis we have now would have happened about 15 years ago even with the lower prices.
In the lead up to 2008, I was hanging out in a bar with a happy hour crowd that was easily 90% mortgage people. The amount of stories I heard about people who wouldn't have otherwise qualified for a subprime, but they fudged paperwork or whatever to get them the loan, was obscene. And they had anybody doing it; They were basically running the equivalent of telemarketing boilerrooms for subprime mortgages. And the feigned ignorance when it all came tumbling down? Fucking disgusting.
it does sound like they in particular got mortgages that they were able to sustain. i'm not sure if that changes anything about your point, the subprime mortgage crisis was obviously brought about in this way by the many many people who got houses that weren't actually affordable to them overall, so perhaps that was a boon for those who didn't shoot so big. my parents bought a similar size home in a similar sort of area for $50k in the mid-90's, and now their neighbors sell for $200k+. but they also were offered much larger, stupider mortgages than what they actually understood to be affordable.
The wisdom used to be to buy as much house as you could get approved for because house prices COULD NOT go down
So banks approved every single application bc fuck it free interest and if anyone defaults the home is worth more than when they bought it. Repo it and resell it, can't lose
A bunch of people signed up for 5 year adjustable rate mortgages where you get a low intro rate and thus a low monthly payment but the whole thing comes due in 5 years in a so called balloon payment. Then you have to pay the balance or lose the house
No biggie of course before 5 years you sell out and collect the equity on your massive house, put it into the next down payment and rinse and repeat
Unless of course house prices go down 😉
There's no doubt a lot of middle class people built wealth this way that would have otherwise been locked out. But eventually many of them had the rug pulled out from under them.
It's notable that you could have the same effect with none of the downsides with government caps on property ownership and zero down subsidization of first time mortgages & direct government lending
100%. i think an important characteristic of the pre-2008 world that is crucial for any of us "olds" that were adults at the time need to communicate to the newer, younger adults of today is that back then a lot of people trusted the institutions/lenders of america's housing market. buying a home was just a thing everyone was supposed to do and the terms weren't a big deal to haggle over, as the important thing was to get on the property ladder--like many of our parents did--and growing that equity anyway you can. ARMs with introductory/teaser rates that balloon aren't a problem, because of course the lender will let you refinance! a lot of people swallowed that last sentence because of the one before it.
meanwhile, the fix was in and a shitload of people lost their assumed stable jobs, couldn't find work, and then their homes. that's not even getting into how many people bought shoddy new homes from scumbag developers. imagine being upside-down in a house you couldn't even unload if the economy weren't fucked!
i remember seeing the remark 10 years later was that, if one managed to ride out the crisis by keeping their job, kept paying their mortgage and making their retirement contributions without cashing them out for an emergency, they were in "great shape" for the "recovery". and this is one of the more odious features of US political economy: if you beat the odds and are in the small minority of people who clear the hurdles that trip up the vast majority of people vulnerable to the structural instabilities and crises, chances are good you'll end up doing well!
I kind of said this already but want to re-emphasize. Many, many people lost everything. 2008 found us standing at ground zero of an economic nuke. The devastation cannot be overstated. The government knew something had to be done, and when the lifeboats came they sent them for the predatory bankers whose irresponsible greed fueled the crisis and left everyone else to eat shit. The bailout, aka troubled asset relief program, or TARP, was MASSIVELY unpopular. Something like 90%+ of us adults were against it and wanted to let the banks fail.
Congress passed it anyway. They pissed in our faces. They could have nationalized the banks and sent the greedy pigs packing. Instead they bailed them out.
The banks should have known better. People were lied to. What the government did is unforgivable, and a huge driver behind the politics of resentment in which we find ourselves steeped today.
That's me, and I'm fucked if I'd say I'm in "great shape" or "doing well!" considering I'm probably stuck in this house until I die.
A lot of the people who were able to sustain and pay off their mortgages also were only able to actually get them at that time because they were essentially throwing them at anyone with a pulse.
A big part of the current crisis is that there are many millions of people who are consistently making rent but are eternally going to be stuck renting because they cannot get approved for a mortgage, even if that mortgage would be cheaper than their existing rent.
ah, i see. that makes sense.
Good point.