[jwells89]

One’s mortgage payment in even a moderate cost of living area can quickly go from manageable to difficult or impossible if something suddenly curbs their earning potential, and barring a lucky break that pays the mortgage off, this possibility will loom large for decades with the chances of things going wrong increasing with each passing year as health declines.

Decades ago when housing prices and pay were better aligned, there was a much better chance of being able to scrape by if it came down to that, plus it was easier to pay the house off in a reasonable amount of time giving that less of a chance to occur.

Point in case, where I live a pretty typical pre-interest-spike house payment is twice the gross income of someone working a full time minimum wage job which doesn’t cover food, utilities, clothes, etc. Not only does this put ownership out of reach for a lot of people, but makes it possible to quickly turn precarious for even many of those who can afford it.

And this just gets worse for more expensive areas where the disparity is much more extreme like in the SF Bay Area.