My experience in Seattle is different. Almost every house or condo in the east side or Seattle is a million plus, and it's really common to put 500k toward one,

My experience in Seattle is different. Almost every house or condo in the east side or Seattle is a million plus, and it's really common to put 500k toward one, and pay a substantial mortgage (more than half a mil). So these can be lost with reduction in value combined with a short term mortgage that needs to refinanced, like happened in 2008. If you are a software engineering with 5-10 years experience and a family looking for a house you are in this game probably. These people have a good job but they don't need and often don't have money to cover the rest of their house. I agree with the comment about lack of density in housing leads to these prices (cause people keep freaking moving here). And the point about not much housing being built for people leaving in smaller apartments like 500 sq ft in the dense area applies here. There seems to be mostly refurbished old housing in that range. I guess developers don't think there's a market for that (single person?) or they can't make money or both. I think we need all these kinds of housing (higher density, also smaller places closer to work and transit). People don't priotize transit enough in purchases I think, but of course you can only buy what's built in condos.