6 ms·

I'm in the highest percentiles of income in Sweden (public data is available) and it doesn't matter. It's basically impossible for me to afford a house / apartm

• brailsafe 4y ago
  I'm in Vancouver working remotely for an EU/US company because I couldn't get anything here. At $100k CAD, my partner and I wouldn't be able to afford a modest upgrade to a 1 bedroom condo... anywhere in the city (from a tiny basement studio) without significantly increasing our take home. The place I just visited would require $4000/m after a 20% down payment (which I don't have). If I double my savings in the next year, assuming I don't get laid off next week and go broke again, I'd have enough for a 5-10% down payment and hypothetically require mortgage insurance, plus still not be able to afford the mortgage. But hey, at least the cops won't arrest me for openly smoking crack on the sidewalk, so that'll help me deal with the stress of trying to be a high performer.
  • jmspring 4y ago
    Back in the mid/late 90s Vancouver was affordable and a lot of flats being built. It was still more expensive that the suburbs, etc. but still cheaper than metros across the border. Sometime in the 2000s money started flowing in and those flats I was seeing in place like Kits for $150-$200k were suddenly going up a lot. Rents were also escalating. A lot seemed to be fueled by foreign money. I was looking at relocating at the time and wish I had followed through.
    • brailsafe 4y ago
      Ya that seems to be part of consensus, and consistent with what I'm seeing in terms of when some places were built. The suburbs around Vancouver gradually decrease in price a bit, but for obvious reasons and not enough to make much of a difference. It's like going from $750k for a 1 bedroom to $550k for a 1 bedroom and that's sort of the spread within reason; an absurd gap to be sure I don't mind them, but I'm just thinking about it terms of being able to stay in my community for once.
    • remote_phone 4y ago
      This is wrong. Vancouver was never “affordable”. My family moved to Vancouver in the mid-80s and it was by far the most expensive place in Canada. Prices had already climbed rapidly by the time we got there and prices never crashed for 40 years. At worst, it was flat for a few years. Our 1000 sqft house in the West End was almost 300k in the mid-80s and our family was struggling financially but we were in the best school district so my parents made the sacrifice. It was almost double the price of a much larger house in suburbs of Toronto. East Van was cheaper but still expensive relative to other cities. Vancouver house prices has always been a mystery because there is no inherent industry to pay for it. Locals blamed Asians but Germans were larger demographic in terms of immigrants but you couldn’t identify them as easily.
      • reducesuffering 4y ago
        Vancouver is not a mystery. Geographically constrained in 3 directions. Only decent-weather locale for Canadians (US has hundreds of release valves for people that get sick of prices in SF / NYC / etc.) Large rich Chinese immigration.
        • brailsafe 4y ago
          For Vancouver's geography to be a legitimate concern, we would have needed to maximize what we could do with the existing land, and it's very, very far from that. I would argue the latter 2 arguments have some bearing, but imo it's more about cheap capital coming in from many directions including locally for so long in combination with artificially choked and inflated development processes for decades. For example, there's a parking lot with an old grocery store sitting there at the busiest transit hub in the U.S and Canada. The proposal to redevelop the site has been repeatedly stalled every year for what is now 6-7 years, meanwhile only the most meager development projects have gone forward in the same neighborhood. That said, because of the other reasons, as soon as it hypothetically went up, all of the units would be purchased by speculators because they'd be wildly out of reach for any regular person anyway, due to decades of the other crap. I went to an open house yesterday for a modest one bedroom with no interesting view or extravagant features, listed at $750k. When I remarked that the cost of the mortgage alone would be a multiple of 2.5 - 3x our current all-in expenses, he simply suggested that in 5 years I can just move out and hang on to it, renting it out to someone and keeping another unit off the market.
  • friend_and_foe 4y ago
    Let me ask you, you live in one of the most beautiful regions on the planet, you work remote, why don't you get a place 2 hours away from the city or something like that? Nice quiet life, the beauty of the pacific northwest not even a bike ride away, cheaper to live, and you don't have to deal with the crackheads. What keeps you in the city?
    • brailsafe 4y ago
      It's an incredibly beautiful region, and that's definitely one of the options I'd consider if I was genuinely forced out, which I didn't mean to suggest I am, it's just that renting is the only viable option. 2 hours away though doesn't really solve that problem if I was trying to unfortunately; things don't get as more affordable as you'd hope. But costs aside, the answer is that the people and things I do in the city are what bring my life substance, and being from the suburbs, it's a deeply isolating sort of existence that relies pretty heavily on having a car. I've personally never aligned with the idea of working remotely and isolating myself further; it would seem to me a recipe for depression. I love being in nature, isolated and away from the city, at times, but not most of the time. I like leaving my place to walk to the grocery store, the cafe, and along the way being able to bump into people I know by name and ask them how things are going. I like walking to the gym, especially when it's raining (a lot), and having my small community of people there. Incredible food is nearby as well, concert venues, easy access to the airport, none if which I'm indulging in all the time but enough that it really brings flavour into my life. I also like biking around, and for that there's actually quite a lot better infrastructure for in the city vs out, and it's easier to just get on a bus and go into the wilderness. The crackhead comment was a bit flippant. I don't have a problem with anyone experiencing addiction, it's just a deep irony I find a little sad, akin to "instead of making it easier to build a life here, we'll just make it easier to fall out the bottom", though I know things are wildly more complex than that. Lastly, aside from all those reasons, there are theoretically more job opportunities in the city, and that's good for my partner who doesn't work remotely and for me during the periods where there is no programming work. To me, a good city is the culmination of social systems including capitalism that benefit from having more people around. A greater social circle of people available, more market, more jobs, more culture, better transit systems, art, etc.. Edit: I'd add the the only aspect of living in a city that's busy or particularly loud are automobiles, and to an extent the train. Very little of any generalized chaos is the result of many people ambiently being around, depending I guess on your individual tolerance for that and where specifically you might be. It's never once occurred to me that there are too many people around.
  • sunsunsunsun 4y ago
    I felt your pain. I live in Victoria and also make $100k but can't afford much more than a 1 bed without destroying our savings goals. Unfortunately my current job is hybrid and they won't let me go full remote. We plan to leave as soon as I find a new opportunity - despite loving living here by every other metric.
    • brailsafe 4y ago
      Victoria has an even more scarce rental market from what I understand too. It's one of those things that I hope will make it harder to keep people around if salaries don't go higher at an average company. $100k is great for a huge portion of everyday niceties and even some larger things—I didn't need to worry to much that a decent coffee grinder would damage me too much, or a trip—but not that one thing. I'd also not necessarily describe it as pain, as much as like some hypothetical existential crisis. I'm not looking to buy a place at this moment, but when I consider the prospect of what happens if our landlords sell (giant house in east van), there aren't too mamy viable options.
• ur-whale 4y ago
  > What's the point? Equality of outcomes: everyone is equally poor. Why are you not moving to another country is the question.
  • jdmoreira 4y ago
    I could. I have zero attachment to places. But it would be though on my wife and daughter (who both are Swedes, I'm the only immigrant) And not everyone is equally poor. Sweden has one of the highest number of Billionaires per capita in Europe. In fact wealth inequality (not income inequality) is almost as high as russia. Source: https://medium.com/@samo.burja/the-family-that-finances-sweden-8441c8a6dc5a https://medium.com/@samo.burja/the-family-that-finances-swed...
    • imwithstoopid 4y ago
      [flagged]
      • jdmoreira 4y ago
        To be fair there are many many great things about Sweden. It just so happens that wealth mobility is not one of them.
      • amrocha 4y ago
        Nothing mythological about Canadian healthcare. It's strictly better than the US's
        • dangwhy 4y ago
          better in terms of costs and access, worse in terms of quality and wait times.
          • amrocha 4y ago
            You can't claim "wait times" as a positive of letting a bunch of people die or go bankrupt Quality is just not true
• jltsiren 4y ago
  Sweden is full of old money, or at least it looks like that from a Finnish perspective. The problem with old money is that if you simply invest the money passively and don't do anything stupid, the next generation is going to be even richer. Both in relative and absolute terms. Being able to live in the most desirable areas is based on relative wealth. If there is a lot of old money, it's harder to make it to the top in a single generation. The usual tools for leveling the playing field are wealth tax and inheritance tax. I'm under the impression that Sweden abolished both a couple of decades ago.
  • jdmoreira 4y ago
    I agree with everything you said. Maybe I should move to Finland! I like sauna and the all the Finns I met were wonderful people!
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  • brutusborn 4y ago
    A better solution is land value taxation because it hits those with old wealth the hardest whilst not distorting markets. Wealth tax and inheritance taxes can be gamed and avoided. Land cannot be moved or hidden. Now that a minority of people own land in many locales, this will soon be a politically acceptable policy. Georgism made sense in the 1800s and it makes even more sense now.
    • visarga 4y ago
      Taking land while letting AI usage get away scot-free? We need to close the lid on both sides.
      • brutusborn 4y ago
        What’s AI?
    • Metus 4y ago
• tpmx 4y ago
  This is the thing I'm always fascinated by in these stories - the complete lack of understanding for why not everyone can have everything in a particular place with finite resources. > I'm in the highest percentiles of income in Sweden Which one is it then? 80th? 90th? 99th? 99.5th? > It's basically impossible for me to afford a house / apartment for my family in the best neighborhoods. Which are the "best neighborhoods" in your mind? How many houses/apartments are there in those "best" neighborhoods? Do you see why these numbers matter if you're trying to learn from this situation rather than just complain and pretend nothing is finite?
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  • jdmoreira 4y ago
    My income is higher than the average income in any post-code in Sweden (as far as I can tell). So the problem is not "income". It's other sorts of privilegies I don't have. For example "time in the real estate market pre 2010". Income != Wealth
    • jdmoreira 4y ago
      also the higher brackets of salary in Sweden are not even high for European standards. They are in fact quite low
      • ptr 4y ago
        As a software engineer (consultant/contractor), you can easily make 80k USD post tax in Sweden. That’s not too bad.
        • tpmx 4y ago
          This is the way.
• simonsarris 4y ago
  Come to America! You might like New Hampshire: The sunshine hours of Portugal and the winters of Sweden in one.
• lawn 4y ago
  The only way to win is to stop playing the game by avoiding the "best" (more expensive) neighborhoods and towns. If you work remotely, as software developers can, you don't have to give up salary either.
  • arthur_sav 4y ago
    Bingo. I moved to a lower tax country and my income almost doubled (no more 50% Swedish tax). Sweden is a bad deal high earners.
    • brodo 4y ago
      What country did you move to?
      • knallfrosch 4y ago
        Probably Spain. You're destroying their property market, but at least you're on the winning side this time.
        • arthur_sav 4y ago
          I wouldn't consider Spain low tax. Perhaps lower than Sweden but it's not low. UAE
      • arthur_sav 4y ago
        UAE
        • 4gotunameagain 4y ago
          So instead of contributing back to the Swedish welfare state that raised and educated you, you decide to move to a petrodollar country so you spend less on taxes. I get it. Sounds sustainable and not the least egocentric.
          • 4y ago
• deanc 4y ago
  I’ve heard about hundred year mortgages in Sweden where you basically never pay it off. Is this an option in the top earner bracket?
• isoos 4y ago
  This looks like a common pattern at other places too: you won't get "best-neighborhood" wealth from being first- (or sometimes even second-)generation high achiever. The root cause seems to be that there are usually more high achievers than properties in good neighborhoods, and old wealth erodes slowly (may take a generation or two), so there is very little pressure for old occupiers to sell their properties.
  • brodo 4y ago
    That, and income is highly taxed but property isn’t.
  • knallfrosch 4y ago
    Why would anyone sell a property that continues to rise in value? Rent it out and vote against all construction, so it gets more valuable all the time. Not even Covid and 100% Remote seems to have stopped the trend.
• brodo 4y ago
  Same is true for me in germany. I know a really wealthy guy inherited his money. I will never reach his level. I know people who have successful start-ups. They earn well, but they will not reach “old money” levels of wealth.
• rullelito 4y ago
  > It's basically impossible for me to afford a house / apartment for my family in the best neighborhoods. Why would you expect to be able to buy a family house/apartment in the best neighberhoods just because you are in the top income percentile? Wealth percentile matters. I'm also in the top income percentile in Sweden, and I can basically buy 99.9% of all houses/apartments in Sweden, which I think should be enough for most people..
  • jdmoreira 4y ago
    Can you explain me how the math works on this? Because I certainly can't afford 99.9% of the houses/apartments in Sweden. Let's forget anything crazy. Let's just talk about a 70sqm apartment in Kungsholmen and of course wealth percentile matters. In fact, I understand that way too well. How do you raise your wealth percentile then? The whole point people are raising is that it's hard to become wealthy in Sweden from income. Actually much harder than in other countries. It might have worked for you in the last 20 or 30 years. Not sure that means it will work for others the same way in the next 30 years.
    • rullelito 4y ago
      > Let's forget anything crazy. Let's just talk about a 70sqm apartment in Kungsholmen Come on.. It's the third most expensive district in Sweden. Also, if you're two 99%ile incomers, Kungsholmen seems perfectly attainable..
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• mclightning 4y ago
  >> I'm in the highest percentiles of income in Sweden (public data is available) and it doesn't matter. It's basically impossible for me to afford a house / apartment for my family in the best neighborhoods. How is that possible? I am an immigrant who moved to Sweden at age 22, and I bought an apartment in Malmo after 2 years of savings in the center of Malmo. I wasn't in the top percentile, didn't get help from anyone else. It was entirely my own savings within that 2 years. Maybe you shouldn't aim for center of Stockholm for your first home purchase...
• MrDresden 4y ago
  Why waste the money and effort to buy something in the "best" neighborhood? Status symbol? Who cares. For the investment? It doesn't seem like you can afford it, nor need it. Just buy someplace you can afford and make a nice home for your family. If there is a genuine reason why that neighborhood is the best for you and yours, then ofcourse that is a different matter.
  • jdmoreira 4y ago
    In cities like Stockholm the inner city is usually very expensive. I personally love European inner city life. I was raised like that. I like the commerce, the shops, the noise, the casual cycling, subway transportation. Essentially everything. It's a very specific lifestyle that only exists in an area of 10 to 15 sqkm. Outside the city center neighborhoods are essentially dorms.
    • MrDresden 4y ago
      Being European I have traveled to plenty of it's cities. I don't think I would want to live in the city centers of any of them. And there is really no need for it. Walkability and public transport is usually exceptionally good. My observation of Stockholm as a tourist is that it is really easy to get around there on a bike, so I don't see the need to live smack in downtown where the price is going to be the highest (especially when you can't afford it).
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