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Where I'm from, the median house price has risen 600% relative to median income since the 70's.
That means that we're dropping more than the entire value of their home as our deposit, while we compete against capital-heavy boomers that benefited from that growth looking to downsize.
There's a reason they could have a house and 12 kids on a single summer job income - they were handed a strong economy that they ransacked for their own benefit before blaming the poor schmucks that are inhereting the stripped wreckage they've left behind. Couple that with the cost of the massive environmental pivot we'll need to make to survive as a species, and I'm sure you'll forgive me for wanting to drive the nose of the next boomer that preaches about smashed avocado toast and bootstraps through the back of their skull.
I'm fascinated by how idioms have gone a complete 180. Now we tell people that they just need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, but that idiom is used to describe an impossible task. You can't pull yourself up by your own bootstraps, it's literally impossible. Same with it's just a few bad apples to excuse bad behaviour. The idiom is a few bad apples ruins the barel, that one bad person or thing jeopardizes the whole thing. I don't get it.
Last month I had this random conversation with an old lady while on vacation. She mentioned that quite lightheartedly, that "we bought our house just on our salaries, we worked hard back then and needed to settle down". I wasn't expecting to have to explain to her that this is not such an easy option for us right now. She seemed genuinely surprised and disappointed at the facts and I didn't know whether to feel enraged or amused by her true or not ignorance.
At least she was open to listening, hopefully you've made an impact on her going forward
I'm solid GenX.
My grandparents bought a house on a corner lot in the northwest suburbs of Chicago for $6000. Which was about a years salary for Grampa, who worked as a welder. This was in the late 60s.
ETA: Their mortgage was around $50.00 a month.
I'm GenX as well and I will straight up admit that my wife and I got lucky, purchased a house in a "distressed" neighborhood in Portland because it was all we could afford, and now, 20 years later, the neighborhood is fully gentrifying and our house and property is worth way more than what we owe on it.
I'm conflicted as to how to feel about it. While on the one hand we very innocently bought the place because it was in a shitty neighborhood and was all we could afford, on the other hand I now know that we were what the urban studies people refer to as "bohemian colonizers," meaning that without knowing it, we were, by moving into the neighborhood as poor artist types, part of a much longer process of gentrification.
Again, I am of several minds regarding how I feel about the whole thing.
be poor
move to a poor neighbourhood
I really don't think that you should feel bad about this personally :)
Meh, gentrification is the result of bad policy, not personal, individual choices (except maybe for people flipping houses and landlords). Neighborhoods, and the people in them, should not stay poor forever. Rent controls, grants for people to start businesses or coops or whatever, allowing mixed-use zoning, and stuff like that can reduce the harmful affects of gentrification.
Pay it forward by voting on low cost housing initiatives and not becoming a nimby.
Which would be round about $55000 in today's money, for those interested.
It's disgusting. And even more disgusting at America and Canada's disregard for the unavailability of owned housing at an even remotely appropriate cost.
I live in a small town in the SE US. I bought my house for $89,900, 12ish years ago. There are 3 vacant houses on my street and they are all listed for $250,00 or more. My house is bigger than all of them. They have all been empty for over a year.
They really should tax empty houses at 100%. You'll see how fast they will sell, and how low the price will go to achieve that.
absolutely agree. It's insane that we allow corporations to hoard housing and artificially jack up the price. I'm just outside the city limits and I see soooo many homeless people now. A lot of them have jobs too, they just can't afford a place to live. Some local churches have opened up their parking lots for people to sleep in their cars.
I don't get the last panel.
Unplugging them from life support is how I read it. I like the darkness.
I’m going to ~~buy~~ inherit a house!
Reverse mortgage says the bank will.
They’re so dense. My conservative uncle gave me a bunch of shit for taking out student loans. He worked at McDonald’s over the summers and paid his rent and tuition for the whole year! Meanwhile I was working full time year round going to school, barely making enough to pay rent without enough leftover to make a dent in tuition. Obviously that world doesn’t exist anymore. This was over 10 years ago, I’m sure it’s way worse now. At least I was able to find “affordable” rent.
I'm English so can't comment on the situation in the US, but reading the comments in this thread it seems quite similar to the one here.
I bought a house in 2010, just before I turned 23 and I'm very much the exception to the rule. I live in an area with some of the lowest house prices in the country. I didn't go to University and got my first full time job when I was 19. It didn't pay well but I lived at home and I was a stoner. I didn't go out much, just to friend's houses to get high. My town is walkable enough that I didn't need to drive (I get that not driving isn't really possible in the US, or even in some parts of the UK).
This meant I saved up a lot of my money without really trying. The house I bought cost £41,000. I sold it in 2022 for £39,000 which should give you some idea of the state of it.
My Dad bought a house in 1986 for £12,000. I can see that house from the one I live in now, which cost me £79,000 in 2022.
Is he going to unplug his life support
Yep
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