[mycentstoo]

Totally agree. This is my personal barrier towards returning to an office in a "tech city." If I could live a reasonable distance and commute, I'd have no major objection to going to an office at least part time. However, affordability is a giant concern.

Rents will follow mortgage rates as well. I just did a quick lookup of 3 bedrooms around Apple's office in Cupertino and they are about $7,000 or so a month which means you're paying about $90,000 in cash a year in rent.