[eli_gottlieb]

>A $150k loan in 1999 at 7.6% would cost you $1,059/mo in mortgage payment. A $300k loan at 4% today will cost you $1,432/mo - a 35% increase over the original price, not the 100% you'd expect. Meanwhile, you aren't paying 2x per square foot - you're getting roughly twice as much house as you did before for that price, for only a 35% increase in payment!

But I don't want twice the floor space in an exurb. I want a modest apartment or condo near transit.

[Spooky23]

So does everyone else. Supply, meet demand. If you don’t want to pay a premium, buy something with lower demand.

[eli_gottlieb]

That's not quite true. Most people don't want to live directly in the urban core (though I do), and the supply of housing in both the urban core and inner-ring suburbs is artificially restricted. Hence all the talk of "missing middle" housing (ie: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/9/24/17896482/b...).

[Spooky23]

The trend is that many professional people want to live in the urban core, because they are delaying having kids mostly.

Missing middle housing is all about the disruption of the boom/bust cycle of housing and long time erosion of middle class earnings, plus a decreased supply of tradespeople that has ballooned up skilled and semi-skilled labor. We have a glut of mediocre college educated people and a shortage of people who do things -- my brother in law is an electrician, his billing rate is up to $150/hr, and he has a 6 week backlog of work.

It's not economical to build a house anymore like it was in the mid-90s -- even if you own the land. We're being flooded with medium density, carve-out rental housing developments because you need that scale to make money, mostly through trading of tax expenses.

Those developments suck because they don't integrate with the street grid, waste space and are universally low quality buildings. When you pass the 15-year mark and interest/tax write downs go away, they will naturally turn into low-income as the landlords profitability melts away. Around that point, these developments flip over to a succession of shittier operators.

[masonic]

  a 35% increase

More like a 5% increase when you factor inflation and compare in real-dollar terms.

[cheald]

The example numbers were already in real (inflation-adjusted) terms.