> Rent and invest in something more diversified? Crazy talk. This seems like pie-in-the-sky talk from high-income earners. It's not like people are just freel

> Rent and invest in something more diversified? Crazy talk. This seems like pie-in-the-sky talk from high-income earners. It's not like people are just freely choosing to invest in a house over other investments. Instead, since they have to pay for housing no matter what, they are trying to mitigate loss, if not make a return, on the sunk cost of dwelling. If they are renting, they don't have "extra" money that they can arbitrarily put towards whatever they choose. I don't know the population breakdown in San Francisco, but I would bet that the majority are not developers. Most Americans live paycheck to paycheck and have very little savings. Their house is the single largest store of wealth for people in America. If they do have savings, it's likely to be in an IRA or a 401k, so they aren't free to apply that to whatever area of investment they like, either.