[Loughla]

>places your mortgage can be $2000 a month.

This is shockingly major metro-area-centric. I want you to know that, and I feel like people on this board really need to understand how HIGH urban and suburban costs are.

In many areas of the country, $2000/month is a seriously frighteningly massive home. For reference - in the middle of rural flyover, our 4 bedroom, 2.5 bathroom, 1800 square foot, full basement, 2 car garage, 1100 square foot full workshop home mortgage is 15 years at $750/month. We pay that, plus another $400 /month for the 70 acres the home sits on as well.

[solarmist]

I don’t think that’s still true.

In Spokane, WA 10-15 years ago you could get starter homes for under $100k. Now that price is at least $300k (after cooling off for the last 12 months).

If interest rates hadn’t risen it might be somewhere in between though.

[brightsize]

My 1911, 3br/1ba in-city Spokane house cost me about $90K in 2003, currently appraised+taxed at around $300K as you say. I've no idea how ordinary people [that is, those w/o high incomes and/or high levels of wealth], and especially renters, are getting by. From what I read in it the local forums and see at the food bank every week, a lot aren't getting by.

[solarmist]

OPs comment is true of minor metro areas as well from what I’ve seen. For example, Spokane, WA.