[chrisseaton]

> Owning a house is becoming more and more a thing for the upper classes

Something like 60% of US people own a home. 30% even own their home completely outright, with no mortgage.

Obviously 30%, let alone 60%, of the population cannot be considered 'upper class', and 'middle class' is probably even a stretch.

The home ownership rate seems broadly stable since the 60s to me, with gentle ups and downs with the economy, so as well as saying home ownership is an upper-class or middle-class thing not being true it's also not the case that 'it wasn't always like this'.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home-ownership_in_the_United_S...

[joh6nn]

4th paragraph of that Wikipedia article: "The name "homeownership rate" can be misleading. As defined by the US Census Bureau, it is the percentage of homes that are occupied by the owner. It is not the percentage of adults that own their own home. This latter percentage will be significantly lower than the homeownership rate because many households that are owner-occupied contain adult relatives (often young adults, descendants of the owner) who do not own their own home, and because single building multi-bedroom rental units can contain more than one adult, all of whom do not own a home."

[jtbayly]

> 30% own their home completely outright...

Which tells me that they likely bought their house over 30 years ago. Which tells me that they have been largely unaffected by the complaint you are responding to.

[rychco]

As someone in their mid 20’s with a tech job, it blows my mind that 60% of people own a home. I can’t imagine having enough money to own a home in a major city.

[chrisseaton]

> I can’t imagine having enough money to own a home in a major city.

Who do you think owns the homes all around you, and in all the suburban streets around the city? Normal people like you. There aren't hundreds of elites living on every US street, clearly. They're just normal people who saved up over a few years or got a little helper money from their parents.

[bashinator]

Don't forget, "or were lucky enough to have the opportunity to buy at a low point in the market."

[EdwinLarkin]

I think you just don realize the scope of numbers you need to play with especially if you dont start with a reasonable amount in the first place.

Real estate is worse than crypto when it comes to speculation.I realized this myself when my property doubled in value in less than 2 years.

[scottious]

Sure, maybe right now when the real estate market is really hot, but imagine people in the market around 2009-2012 getting a really good deal on real estate.

Once you're in the market, it's easier to STAY in the market. If house prices go up, you'll have to pay more to move to a new house but this is an easier pill to swallow because your current house has increased in value.

[rory]

The home ownership rate is a lot higher outside major cities. It's only 30-40% in most major US cities.

Regardless, at current (historically quite low) interest rates, a typical software engineer's salary will qualify you for a very large mortgage.

You'd be surprised. At 30, I saw many of my friends go from thinking they'll never afford a home to each buying one over just a few years.

[nly]

Median house prices in the UK are 8x median incomes. Banks will lend you something like 4-5x income on a mortgage.

Low interest rates aren't helping most people, they're hurting by pushing up house prices. Only those with significant capital for a deposit benefit.

[chrisseaton]

> Median house prices in the UK are 8x median incomes. Banks will lend you something like 4-5x income on a mortgage.

Most people buy as a couple, so this is achievable.

[nly]

Until 1 parent stops working (entirely or goes part time) to help raise the kids

[rory]

Yes, sorry, I was referring to the USA specifically. The real estate speculation problem is a lot worse in other Anglosphere countries (UK, Canada, Australia). Outside California, US prices are still somewhat reasonable compared to incomes.

[McScroogy]

It doesn't say 60% own a home in a major city.

[CrazyStat]

> Obviously 30%, let alone 60%, of the population cannot be considered 'upper class', or even 'middle class'.

Huh? Why can't 30% (or 60%, for that matter) of the population be middle class?

Wikipedia [1]:

> The American middle class is a social class in the United States.[1][2] While the concept is typically ambiguous in popular opinion and common language use,[3] contemporary social scientists have put forward several ostensibly congruent theories on the American middle class. Depending on the class model used, the middle class constitutes anywhere from 25% to 66% of households.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_middle_class

[chrisseaton]

One in three of people do not have middle class professions. Only about 35% of people go to college at all!

But anyway even if you don't agree with that, the original claim was that they were 'upper class'! Which is obviously ludicrous. You do not need to be an elite to own a house - drive down almost any suburban street in American you'll see people who own houses.

[bumby]

>the original claim was that they were 'upper class'! Which is obviously ludicrous

This goes back to the above post regarding the ambiguity around defining class. The traditional definition that I’m aware of uses quintiles, so “upper middle class” is defined as being within the top 20% (minus the top 1%-5% reserved for upper class). With this definition, the upper middle class will always be 15-19% of the population, on a sliding scale of income. This threshold comes out to about $87k/yr. at the individual level currently, I think.

But then people redefine that meaning. There was an article recently on HN saying the middle class is shrinking because more people are moving into upper middle class. They defined it based on absolute (as opposed to relative) income. But if you dig deeper into the research methodologies they normalized income so that a person making $58k/yr is equivalent to $100k if they are single. Magically, the threshold for upper middle class on an individual basis is reduced by 33%. (To be fair, they had reasons for this like the way poverty is defined by the government to factor in the number of people in a household).

I have a couple problems with this. 1) research indicates people are single, longer without kids because they feel less financially secure. It’s hard to square being single as a reason to be vaulted into upper middle class in that context 2) out of curiosity I took the average expenses for a mortgage, utilities, taxes etc. and tried to balance that against the $58k definition of upper middle class. In that case, if you have the average student loan debt you can’t afford the “average” American lifestyle even on an upper middle class income.

The point of all this being, we need to be careful about how we define economic class.

“If you torture numbers enough, they’ll confess to anything. “

[falcolas]

My parents own a home. They bought it in the 70's for a fraction of what the land is worth now (inflation adjusted). My dad was a blue collar worker for Ma Bell, my mom a part time teacher.

[JohnWhigham]

Now break that 60% down by demographic. Also, the rate has been going down over the past 2 decades, and I'd wager it will continue to go down.

[chrisseaton]

> the rate has been going down over the past 2 decades

No it hasn’t.

In fact it’s up since 1990! And about where it was as far back as 1970. It seems relatively stable to me?