Very true. This article would be 90% accurate for Auckland, NZ as well, where the median house price is around $1 million.
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No, more of a proper-punctuation lover. The passive aggression is breathtaking; they won’t change or try to do better. I’ll probably get a huffy email from a moderator now.
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Cool. You figured out my point. It’s a trade off. Want a home in CA? What are you willing to give up? Money or your friends/family/support? For many people, they are willing to give up lots of money. It’s a choice.
People didn’t spontaneously appear in CA. People who moved there often left family/friends/support behind. It can be done.
A few thousand dollars (hundreds if you do it yourself) vs saving 10’s or 100’s of thousands of dollars? Seems a good trade. And yes, many salaries are lower in the Midwest. But because of the cost of living, Ohio actually comes out ahead of California on median adjusted income ( $57,259 vs $56,878).
http://time.com/money/5177566/average-income-every-state-real-value/
You can also do city to city comparisons using real estate tools. I’d have to make 20% more in LA. But my profession pays 6% less there. The LA lifestyle is tempting, but not enough. I’ve made my choice. Others are choosing to live in LA. Good for them. But if they are complaining about their choice, they do have the option to move.
Assuming one has that kind of cash (or spare time) lying around. A significant portion Americans don’t, and that ones that do will likely feel less need to make that kind of move (which experience is, in addition to the other downsides mentioned, ranked third in causing stress and trauma). The Sam Vimes Theory of Economic Injustice applies here.
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Uh, if you don’t have that kind of money, then you aren’t in the market for a house at any price or any location. There’s this thing called a down payment.
Median home price in California (urban and rural) vs Cincinnati (urban) is $600k vs $110k. What kind of down payment are you prepared to make in CA? 5% is ridiculously low rate, but still $30k in CA. 20% in Cincinnati is $22k. $8k difference. You can move for a hell of a lot less than that. And end up owing half a million less.
Still want to live in CA, that’s cool. It’s a great place. But it hasn’t been cheap in decades. Cheap apartments are a future possibility. But cheap houses aren’t coming back.
The problem here isn’t [ETA: the usual brain-dead Libertarian/conservative arguments (ones you’re not making) that] “people are too stupid to move” or “it’s a simple matter of supply and demand.” The problem is in large part the result of a combination of landlord greed, NIMBYism, speculation by private equity firms (foreign buyers are not as big a factor as in other desirable places), developers who will only build McMansions and luxury condos, and the neoliberal mantra of “securitise ALL the things!”
California is currently the 5th largest economy in the world. Until Ohio is adding jobs at the same rate that CA is perhaps we can offer some understanding as to why people who also want to maintain social support networks might choose to stay put in the Golden State despite the high prices and even (gasp!) rent rather than buy.
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Please don’t put words in my mouth. I never said people are too stupid to move. Maybe they are dismissive of other options, but certainly not stupid. And I never argued against renting. Usually I argue against buying a house as an investment (you buy a house because you want one. Financially, it’s a wash).
I am arguing that wanting to live in a particular place AND complaining it is too expensive to BUY a house makes no sense. If someone wants to live in CA, all the more power to them. But it’s a decision, not a fate.
FWIW, I’m using Ohio as a stereotypical example. I don’t live there. Too expensive 
I will edit to clarify that these are the claims the “hey, just move to achieve the American Dream” crowd usually makes. I’m glad you’re not one of them.
By that logic, the complaints of people who are being priced out of neighbourhoods where they and their extended families have lived for decades due to speculation-driven gentrification makes no sense.
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to live in a place and complaining that speculators and greedheads have driven the prices far above the already not-cheap levels for desirable places.
Gentrification is far more complex than that. I couldn’t find the article that demonstrated that people owning homes in gentrifying neighborhoods do well financially (they bought low, get to sell high, just like greedy speculators). But I did find an interesting article. https://www.citylab.com/equity/2015/09/the-complicated-link-between-gentrification-and-displacement/404161/
A lot of “It depends on the neighborhood.”
Yeah, people are entitled to complain. It’s only natural. In this case, it about as pointless to complain about rising prices as death. Find the cause, and address it. If speculation is truly the cause in some place, then that’s worthy of complaining about. But then fix the cause of the problem.
Sorry, I sort of instinctively get annoyed by people complaining about a problem. I want people to be active agents of change in their lives, not just complaining. Sometimes you can change what is around you, sometimes you have to change. There’s probably some Zen koan to that effect. I’m pretty sure AA has one.
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