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> The real median income at present in the US is 31k meaning half make less. You will find that the full-time median income is much closer to $50,000 though.
by randomdata 8y ago
> The real median income at present in the US is 31k meaning half make less.
You will find that the full-time median income is much closer to $50,000 though.
> Clearly not everyone who wants to is earning 45k.
But, in fact, as this is a full-time job, you are actually below the median. When you add in high school students working part time, then you're right, but that's not particularly meaningful.
> Median rent is almost 900 a month.
Seems high for the area in question, but regardless, since you are buying a home, I'm not sure why you would also pay rent to someone else?
> 2 crappy cars maybe 400 a month.
Maybe the person paying for the house needs one car to get to work. Why do you need two cars?
> Communications at least another 100.
A landline phone where the house is located is $23.50/month. Another $35/month if you want internet service. That's a long way from $100 and already way more than someone in 1940 would have. If you really want the 1940s house-buying experience, you don't need internet service.
> Incidentally areas where you can buy a three bedroom house outside of the crime ridden hood tend not to have a huge number of jobs so everyone go and move to Ohio isn't a tenable solution for the present economic situation.
I don't know about the economic situation in Ohio, but the place in question has exceptionally low unemployment and substantial job growth. That's why businesses like the one I mentioned have to hire everyone who shows up. If they didn't, they wouldn't have any employees.
I don't think anyone expects that you should be able to throw at dart at a map and be able to afford a home anywhere it lands. Not even people in the 40s and 50s could do that. They had to be quite discerning about where they settled in order to do so. That much remains true today.
- ryukafalz 8y ago>Maybe the person paying for the house needs one car to get to work. Why do you need two cars? Sure, assuming the family doesn't have kids, the other person will never need to leave the house for errands, etc. (Or, you know, they don't want to be cooped up in the house all day.)
- randomdata 8y agoDuring the 40s and 50s the use of a car, even in rural areas, was normally reserved for a special trip once a week to run errands and get out of the house, if you were able to afford a car at all. The average family at the time wouldn't dream of wasting money on a second car, let alone the first one, to 'frivolously' get out of the house on a daily basis for pleasure. That money was needed to pay for the house. It is entirely understandable that expectations have changed. I certainly don't think twice about hopping in my car any day of the week, and own two of them at that. But if expectations have changed, why would we want to even try to to apply 40s and 50s housing logic to modern times?
- michaelmrose 8y agoLets be real the second car is so the spouse can get a job too because otherwise the bank is taking the house.
- hycaria 8y agoThen there's another income to add to the equation
- randomdata 8y agoThe house was already affordable without the spouse needing a job, albeit with some possible unpleasantness like not being able to drive around for fun every day of the week. But if the spouse chooses to take a job, affording that house becomes really comfortable. Which only goes to show just how affordable housing really is.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- tremon 8y agoYou will find that the full-time median income is much closer to $50,000 though. That's household income, not per-capita. It is heavily skewed by two-income households.
- randomdata 8y agoI'm talking about full-time personal income. You are right that household income, which includes households that only have part-time income (and other sources of income, like pensions), comes in at around the same amount.