> "the commute is actually okay" is the reason people buy houses in the suburbs. Speaking only for myself, I didn't buy a house in the suburbs because "the com

> "the commute is actually okay" is the reason people buy houses in the suburbs. Speaking only for myself, I didn't buy a house in the suburbs because "the commute was ok", I bought a house in the suburbs because it was the only place I was able to purchase a place to live. My rent on my 1-bedroom apartment near the city was $500 a month more than the mortgage+property taxes in the suburbs. The mortgage is constant, the house is appreciating value, some of the mortgage goes towards the principal and I "keep" that. The rent was going up 5-10% per year. The commute was not ok. But I couldn't afford not to. $500 a month is $500 a month. In the decade or so since, my house appreciated significantly in value, and I was able to purchase a house 5 minutes from work. But I could not have done that without sacrificing much of my sanity for a not-ok commute for nearly a decade. The reality is that housing and traffic are deeply, deeply entwined.