conversation: User (divijulius): "So I’ve been doing some back of the envelope math, and am thinking that if you live in the West Coast, Northeast, Chicago, Honolulu, or Denver, you need to be literally made of money and sweat solid gold to ever even dream of home ownership.   \n\nSo where I live, of the three city / county areas I’d want to live to not be an hour away from work, and even looking primarily in areas with bad schools for...reasons, the average house cost is $500k for a WWII era run-down shoebox of around 1200 square feet.  And we don’t even crack the top 10 list of most expensive areas!\n\nGoing by PF logic, I then need:\n\n* 20% downpayment = $100k\n* 3% closing costs = $15k\n* 1% of the cost of the house annually for repairs = $5000\n* Property tax, school tax, asshole tax, you-lookin’-at-me-kid tax, etc:  $925 a month or $11k annually\n* Mortgage payment and insurance: $2500 per month or $30k annually\n\nThen you need 6-12 months of expenses saved for an emergency fund.  So call it 12 to be safe, and we need $30k mortgage + $11k taxes + $5k repairs + $36k other living expenses = $81k.  \n\nSo let’s add all these up and see how much we have to save before we can buy our first (crappy, 1200 sq ft, WWII era) house!  \n\n$100k down payment + $81k emergency fund + $15k closing costs + $5k repair costs = **$201k**.  Just to get in the door and still owe $400k!  \n\nLet’s say the average person can save 10% of their monthly after-tax income.  How long does somebody have to save before they can responsibly dream of owning a house?  \n\n\n* Let’s say you make the US median of ~$50k.  At $50k salary = $35k take home = $3500 annually — a mere **54 years**!\n* Oh, well, what if you make more?  How about $75k, the median for an individual with a doctorate degree?  **38 years**.\n* Or what if you have an MBA and make the median $100k that folk with Professional degrees make?  **29 years**.\n* What if you’re in the top 1.5% for income and make $200k annually?  **11 years!**\n\nEven if you can save 20% of your after-tax income, you’ll just cut these numbers in half.  \n\nWhat is the average time before changing jobs?  Well if you’re above 25 and relatively stable, between 70%-87% of people will still change jobs within 5 years.  So you’re between 10% and 45% of your house-saving goal by the time you’ll get a new job and have to relocate anyways.  \n\nConclusion:  homeownership in highly populated / coastal areas is essentially impossible for 99% of the population to strive for “responsibly.”  \n\nJudging by the numerous all-cash no contingencies offers the crappy shoeboxes all around me get within 48 hours of listing, I’m going to hazard a guess that either nobody is buying a home “responsibly” or the rich are buying up literally every property everywhere and we’re all doomed to be serfs to wealthy landowners forevermore.  And that is my cheerful thought of the day!  :-D \n\nThoughts from folk here?  "
  Self: "1200 square feet is definitely not a "shoe" box. Try moving to the Midwest I recently bought a beautiful 1900 sqft home with granite counters and a 600 gallon hot tub for 66,900. Believe it or not there are a lot more good paying jobs out here than you think."
  