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This is a little cold. To get into the market, most people need to put in all the money they’ve ever saved plus a good fraction of all the money they’ll ever ea

This is a little cold. To get into the market, most people need to put in all the money they’ve ever saved plus a good fraction of all the money they’ll ever earn in the future. People will naturally be anxious about the value of that asset as they may need it to fund their retirement, nursing home, etc.

jeffbee 4y ago
That may be true but as a society we have to end that reality. There is no future for a society where shelter appreciates to such an extent that you can retire on it. Your retirement should be secured by having done something productive, not by merely squatting.
- spoonjim 4y ago
  Can’t disagree with that. I’ve made more (paper) money in the last two years owning my house than working at my job.
- fezfight 4y ago
  How about the folks whose retirements are guaranteed to never happen now? The millenials are the most financially fucked group in modern history.
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    > How about the folks whose retirements are guaranteed to never happen now? The people who were priced out and who never had any possibility of retirement are not going to sympathize. Maybe homeowners will decide to fight with them, not against them.
    - fezfight 4y ago
      Yeah, there's never any sympathy on either side. I kinda think that's by design.
georgeecollins 4y ago
As a policy, homes can be a savings tool (like a cushion against disaster or emergency retirement capital) but if they become investments that is antithetical to affordable housing and thus ultimately economic growth and social well being.
pc86 4y ago
> To get into the market, most people need to put in all the money they’ve ever saved plus a good fraction of all the money they’ll ever earn in the future. This is only true in the most expensive metro areas - nobody forces anybody to live there except for rare combinations like NYC + investment banking, which also tend to be very well compensated. There are plenty of low profile metros with tons of amenities and reasonable housing markets (especially now as home prices will come back from orbit and after some time, rents along with them). My fiance and I bought 3-4 months ago and mortgage + taxes is approximately 13% of our take home pay. We make good money but nothing astronomical (no FAANG salaries for sure, for either of us) and by every reasonable metric we make 2-2.5x what we need to in order to afford this house without dumping our entire lives into it.
- Spivak 4y ago
  > This is only true in the most expensive metro areas This is true in all metro areas. Mortgage lenders are actually having to loosen the "percentage of cash flow one spends on a mortgage" requirements because without spending a third if your income you can't buy into the market. I live in a famously inexpensive housing market and a house that sold for $300k last year is now going for $450k. This is not just NYC and SF, it's the same story in Austin, Seattle, Atlanta, Columbus, Minneapolis, Dever. Nobody forces you to live where the jobs in your field are, got it. I cannot understand how people assume that everyone just has the mobility to just pick up their entire lives (like they don't have friends and family), sell their house (which is taking a loss now), move and be able to find a job anywhere. Like good lord not everyone works in a field where you can work remotely from a cabin in the woods. Some people do actually have to be on-prem. So many people in this thread are vastly overestimating the agency people in real life have to participate (or not) in the systems that surround them. If the SWE job market ever cools off I feel like the tone is going to shift dramatically.
  - pc86 4y ago
    It's not true in all metros. I am within a reasonable daily commute to a major city. Being willing and able to move ~30 miles would add two other major cities. At least one of them, by nearly all metrics, is more expensive than several of the cities you listed. And just because home prices drop a fraction of a percent doesn't mean you're suddenly taking a six figure loss if you sell and move, especially if like your example the price has increased 50% in the last year.

jeffbee 4y ago

That may be true but as a society we have to end that reality. There is no future for a society where shelter appreciates to such an extent that you can retire on it. Your retirement should be secured by having done something productive, not by merely squatting.

spoonjim 4y ago
Can’t disagree with that. I’ve made more (paper) money in the last two years owning my house than working at my job.
fezfight 4y ago
How about the folks whose retirements are guaranteed to never happen now? The millenials are the most financially fucked group in modern history.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  > How about the folks whose retirements are guaranteed to never happen now? The people who were priced out and who never had any possibility of retirement are not going to sympathize. Maybe homeowners will decide to fight with them, not against them.
  - fezfight 4y ago
    Yeah, there's never any sympathy on either side. I kinda think that's by design.

georgeecollins 4y ago

As a policy, homes can be a savings tool (like a cushion against disaster or emergency retirement capital) but if they become investments that is antithetical to affordable housing and thus ultimately economic growth and social well being.

pc86 4y ago

> To get into the market, most people need to put in all the money they’ve ever saved plus a good fraction of all the money they’ll ever earn in the future. This is only true in the most expensive metro areas - nobody forces anybody to live there except for rare combinations like NYC + investment banking, which also tend to be very well compensated. There are plenty of low profile metros with tons of amenities and reasonable housing markets (especially now as home prices will come back from orbit and after some time, rents along with them). My fiance and I bought 3-4 months ago and mortgage + taxes is approximately 13% of our take home pay. We make good money but nothing astronomical (no FAANG salaries for sure, for either of us) and by every reasonable metric we make 2-2.5x what we need to in order to afford this house without dumping our entire lives into it.

Spivak 4y ago
> This is only true in the most expensive metro areas This is true in all metro areas. Mortgage lenders are actually having to loosen the "percentage of cash flow one spends on a mortgage" requirements because without spending a third if your income you can't buy into the market. I live in a famously inexpensive housing market and a house that sold for $300k last year is now going for $450k. This is not just NYC and SF, it's the same story in Austin, Seattle, Atlanta, Columbus, Minneapolis, Dever. Nobody forces you to live where the jobs in your field are, got it. I cannot understand how people assume that everyone just has the mobility to just pick up their entire lives (like they don't have friends and family), sell their house (which is taking a loss now), move and be able to find a job anywhere. Like good lord not everyone works in a field where you can work remotely from a cabin in the woods. Some people do actually have to be on-prem. So many people in this thread are vastly overestimating the agency people in real life have to participate (or not) in the systems that surround them. If the SWE job market ever cools off I feel like the tone is going to shift dramatically.
- pc86 4y ago
  It's not true in all metros. I am within a reasonable daily commute to a major city. Being willing and able to move ~30 miles would add two other major cities. At least one of them, by nearly all metrics, is more expensive than several of the cities you listed. And just because home prices drop a fraction of a percent doesn't mean you're suddenly taking a six figure loss if you sell and move, especially if like your example the price has increased 50% in the last year.