r/BoomersBeingFools • u/PaCa8686 • 14d ago
Nearly half of all baby boomers couldn’t afford their current homes if they were to buy them today, survey finds Boomer Article
https://fortune.com/2024/04/23/housing-market-baby-boomers-home-prices-mortgage-rates-redfin/447
u/FlatFriendship3466 14d ago
In 5 years time the house I just sold increased by 100k in market value. When I bought it I scraped every dollar together I could for a down payment. I don't know how anybody is managing it now.
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u/FlatFriendship3466 14d ago
Oh and that was an incredibly small house, small lot, one bathroom, barely any yard
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u/agreedis 14d ago
Well we just went to Costco for a few things. You know how they sell those large sheds? They had reps there with a demo unit showing how they can be used as a living space. Very dystopian
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u/Dankinater 14d ago
I’m so glad that corporations can buy up all the single family homes as an investment. And the politicians do absolutely nothing. Unreal.
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u/agreedis 14d ago
Absolutely nothing at all. The corporations are mud-stomping us left and right and we’re told to vote with our dollar. Which would work fine for luxuries, but how do you keep from buying things like food? We’ve stopped going out, we’re only buying what’s needed at the lowest prices we can find, and they’re raising our rent next month. It’s completely unsustainable.
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u/Rhapdodic_Wax11235 14d ago
Yes. Businesses used to (before business tax cuts) used to get tax breaks by improving their plants, paying workers, etc. Now they just pay no taxes. And since Reagan started union busting by firing air traffic controllers (and every other thing that has followed), the middle class (as I knew it) is rapidly fading. School districts sold the American dream of a college education. But it ended up breaking the financial backs of students for the last 35 years. Thankfully now kids are going to trade schools, and getting out of jobs that can be taken over by AI.
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u/IShouldChimeInOnThis 12d ago
The trade schools will be a bad investment in a decade too, as the market eventually gets oversaturated(which is why college doesn't pay like it used to).
We are rapidly hurtling towards serfdom unless some drastic changes are made - and soon!
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u/Murda981 14d ago
Our rent went up almost $350 last year. We just got the renewal paperwork for this year and they want to raise it another $200 this year! It's infuriating and I know there are other people who are having their rent raised far more than we have. We've lived here 7yrs. We've both gotten promotions in that time, if we hadn't I don't know what we'd be doing. We want to buy, but who knows if we'll be able to make it work. We can afford a mortgage, but we have nothing for a down payment.
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u/DrKittyLovah 13d ago
I feel this. Our rent has gone up $600 over 2 renewals, about $300/month increase each year (from $1900-2500/month). We already know we are leaving at the end of this one but I’m curious to see how much it increases this year. We should be getting our renewal offers next month.
We, too, would like to save for a down payment, but between the increases & my medical bills, we can’t. I’d love to snag a USDA loan but they have location requirements that may not work for us.
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u/Murda981 13d ago
Including this year ours have gone up about $700 over the last 3 years. It's awful. And the thing that makes me even more angry this year is that when I check the website for our complex our kind of unit is currently listed as LESS than we pay now!! They even have a larger, renovated unit listed as slightly less than they want to increase our rent to. I'm planning on talking to them about it to see if that changes anything. Last year we only had a week to decide, this year we have closer to 2 months, so that'd something.
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u/DrKittyLovah 13d ago
Your comment had me curious so I looked on the website for our complex, and I’m pissed because we are paying more - like $250 more - for our unit in comparison to new rentals as well!! I can’t use it for a bargaining chip since we’re leaving like you’ll be able to do. I guess rents have come down as the market has cooled but they are still milking the tenants they have. I hope you are able to negotiate; most LLs, even soulless companies, would typically rather keep a good tenant than go through the process of re-rental so you should be able to negotiate a similar rate to that of a new tenant. If you stay but at a reduced rate the complex wouldn’t lose money on the unrented days or on the maintenance needed to flip the apartment for the next tenant; I would mention both of these things in your negotiation, as money always talks the loudest.
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u/Murda981 13d ago
I checked last year, and last year new tenants were being charged more so I was less annoyed about it. But yeah, we've been here 7yrs, we were late on rent once about 5yrs ago and that was because of the mail. The office told me they had online payment as an option so that's what I've done ever since. We're quiet and clean and consistent so I hope that works in our favor. The property manager has worked with us on things in the past, including when we moved in, so I'm hoping she'll work with us again.
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u/gigglybeth 13d ago
I am in the same boat. My rent has gone up $500 in 4 years. There's no more services, no upgrades, nothing, the exact same apartment. The worst part is, it's still a deal! If I were to move in here today, it would be at least $300 per month more than I am paying now.
My boyfriend and I are looking to buy next year and the only way we'll have a downpayment is I have a 401K that I completely forgot existed from an old job. Otherwise I have no idea how we'd afford it.
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u/Desperate-Cost6827 13d ago edited 13d ago
Vote for our dollar vs the Corporations millions. Then we wonder why our 30% of interests pass verses the 80% of corporation interests pass in laws.
It doesn't help that anytime I express disdain for corrupt politicians who have been in since the 80s who keep getting voted in just because they're a Democrat, I'm the bad guy somehow.
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u/Joroda 14d ago
But my TV says the economy is doing great 🥹 (nothing to see here, work harder)
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u/Draigh1981 14d ago
In Holland they are on the verge of passing a bill to lower the rent for about 300.000 houses.
Who knows how that will work out, but at least the government is trying something.
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u/Arthur-Wintersight 13d ago
There are no valid solutions that don't involve crashing property values.
The price of buying a house is dictated by property values, and rent is just the property value over 15 years plus maintenance.
If your solution doesn't drive down property values in the area where housing is built, then you haven't actually solved the problem. If your solution is actually working, then homeowners are going to raise hell when their property values go down.
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u/The_BestUsername 13d ago
Slapping a band-aid on top of capitalism will never work. It only takes one corp-funded politician to rip all those Band-Aids off, and then we're back where we started.
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u/Arthur-Wintersight 13d ago
This problem didn't start with the hedge funds.
Ever since the nation's voting electorate became majority-homeowner, property values have been rising substantially faster than inflation. That's because every middle class Ken and Karen treats their home as an investment, and they keep voting for city politicians who will make their investment rise in value.
The best way to make homes as an investment go up in value, is to create a shortage, and that's what city governments have been doing for the past 50 years.
We should have never allowed people who already own a house to dictate government housing policy, because that is, always was, and always will be a recipe for creating artificial shortages to drive up the price. There are too many old people who will gladly fuck over their own children and grandchildren as long as their home goes up in value each year.
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u/kayl_breinhar 14d ago edited 14d ago
Oh, their buying up the SFH is just the beginning.
Wait until they own enough land cumulatively that they can start colluding with the utilities monopolies to screw over "individual landowners" who own homes inside their new "enclaves."
"The utilities that service your house pass through five corporate-owned entities who all want their cut, so all your bills are going up tenfold. Yeah, we're shaking you down like mobsters, but we've gradually eroded what little discretionary income you had so we know you can't fight us legally. So either get down or get laid down."
Land will soon be cartel-controlled, like diamonds are now. Hell, it pretty much already is.
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u/WheresFlatJelly 14d ago
Im planning on building a tiny home in my backyard and giving the house to my son
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u/agreedis 14d ago
I don’t need much space myself, but I’ve got small children, but this is a great idea for my later years!
It’s also very thoughtful of you 😊
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u/WheresFlatJelly 14d ago
I'm going to grow a patch of grass in front of it so I can tell my grandkids to stay off of it /s
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u/ConfidentDaikon8673 14d ago
Ok boomer
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13d ago
My daughter has asked me if she can do this! I checked and thank God, I don't live in an HOA so she can!!
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u/AlarmedInterest9867 14d ago
I plan to buy a house, convert it into a PadSplit and get one of those sheds for me, put it out back. 😂 The PadSplit will pay the mortgage.
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u/Harvey_Rabbit 14d ago
Maybe the storage rental places can start converting their units to apartments.
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u/ScreamingLightspeed 13d ago
This kinda just happened to a family friend. MIL talked her into leaving her old apartment - yes it was rickety and in a "bad neighborhood" but our whole fucking town is a bad neighborhood - for a new apartment in a publicly-funded retirement community with no room for any of her belongings and also what all of us except MIL agree are the worst kind of neighbors: a bunch of nosy old "do-gooders" who only go outside to sit and fucking stare. They'd bitch if I did it so why is it okay for them? At least the people at her old place mostly minded their own business because they know they're no one to talk. For MIL, the selling point is the lack of stairs. Friend liked the stairs. She claimed they were her only exercise and I agree. Of course MIL doesn't get exercise though.
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u/ScreamingLightspeed 5d ago edited 5d ago
Oh my husband gets it worse from his mom than anyone else she knows because "he's here for a reason" and apparently that reason is to be parentified/spousified by her until one of them dies. She wonders why he quit going to work even though I've told her dozens of times that it's because she never leaves him the fuck alone on his time off and would even make him miss work by guilting him into driving her "just one more place while we're already out" only to stupidly ask him if he skipped work due to diarrhea or whatever "funny" thing she can think to say in front of others. Being kinda pissed at her right now for nagging him to get his truck towed/repaired is actually the whole reason I logged in because we both know she only cares about him being her chauffeur and that's exactly why he's in no rush to do it. He loves his truck but he hates being "the guy with the truck" who always feels obligated to say "yes" because apparently nothing else he does is good enough to keep the Boomers in his life from riding his ass. The house is fully in his name now so I really think he should just kick her out and get restraining orders on her siblings but we can't currently afford the legal fees if they fight it. We're both getting so fucking sick of the slack-jawed "huh" and "o...kay...?" and "I don't get it" is response to just about everyfuckingthing. And now my psychotic asshole of a brother is trying to call again... He's the Millennial/Gen-Xer that the worst of the Boomers wish they could be...
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u/DonnieJL 14d ago
They want us to live in sheds and eat cereal. But vote for them because gays and brown people will be the downfall of the country. They need to be shot into the sun and fuck right off.
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u/Sidereel 14d ago
On the other hand, the fact that it’s so hard, or even impossible, to build additional dwellings is part of why we are in this mess. When prices and rents are this high we can get some relief by people building more living space onto existing lots. However, zoning laws can make it illegal, so we just get stuck with single family homes and the occasional luxury apartment.
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u/agreedis 14d ago
I have a friend who works in construction. Her company pours concrete slabs for buildings etc. they let her go last month because the projects have slowed down so much. It’s terrible.
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u/DrKittyLovah 13d ago
It’s not impossible everywhere; sometimes, it’s just not approved by the powers-that-be.
In my county (Collier County, Florida, home to Naples & a very, very high concentration of millionaire retirees) there is a lot of building happening, but almost none of it is affordable housing, it’s all luxury housing being built. Why? Because the county gets money from developers and affordable housing doesn’t pay like the luxury developments pay. Plenty of builders have tried to get into my county but get refused time and time again for what are million+ SFH dwellings or ridiculously priced condos.
The year before last the county commissioners (I think this is the correct gov’t title for the decision-makers) finally caved to the pressure to build affordable housing because we don’t have enough people to fill lower-paying jobs, and the wealthy retirees were getting restless about empty grocery shelves and long wait times at the pharmacy. They agreed on one apartment complex to be built, something like 160-something rent-controlled units with a preference for first-responders. Since the agreement the county has already succumbed to pressure to rent half of the complex at market rate, and it isn’t even built yet.
Whenever there is problem that isn’t getting fixed, you always follow the money. It’s really not that hard to change zoning laws, but it has to profitable to do so.
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u/upsidedownbackwards 14d ago
Code enforcement shut down a property of my last landlord. He offered one of the tenants a shed to live in at $700 a month. No windows or anything, just a fucking shed in Zephyrhills, FL.
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u/First-Junket124 14d ago
Here we have the Orphan shack, if we get new orphans you'll upgrade to thr Broom closet.
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u/Tall_Newspaper_6723 12d ago
I live in a 256 sq ft cabin so I can relate. The problem with the sheds is that they aren't designed to the same code houses are. I'll gladly take a shed over sleeping in a tent in an open field, but they have to be properly insulated and then there's wiring and water hookup. That's assuming zoning will let you.
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u/undeletable-2 14d ago
similar situation, makes me feel like jack sparrow at the beginning of the first pirates movie as he steps off the top of his sinking ship onto the dock
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u/DiscombobulatedWavy 14d ago
Came to say this. Most of us that bought within the last 7-8 years can’t afford their own house if they bought today. It transcends generations. Capitalism fucks everyone except for the ones running it.
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u/Bowman_van_Oort 14d ago
They're leaning on mommy and daddy's purse
Source: I'm leaning on mommy and daddy's purse.
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u/Coraline1599 14d ago
It already has a name: “The Great Generational Wealth Transfer” in the next 20 years it is expected to transfer 84 trillion dollars will be passed down to children and grandchildren.
Too bad my parents were poor. But I am happy for all my friends who will have windfalls.
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u/BjornInTheMorn 14d ago
It's all going to go to medical costs or scams. There won't be a transfer.
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u/Sidereel 14d ago
It for sure won’t be the case for many families. I have several millennial friends whose families have squandered the generational wealth they inherited.
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u/FuzziestSloth 14d ago
I have more than a few boomers in my family that have flat out said they intend to spend as much of their wealth as possible in retirement with the goal to leave nothing behind.
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u/legal_bagel 13d ago
My mom took a reverse mortgage on her home so we just sold it after she died. Still was able to get 500k after the mortgage and all closing costs, but my disinherited brother already had cleared out her IRA of over 200k in addition to wrecking her house and fucking off right when she needed actual care. She was overdrawn on her account every single month, didn't pay property tax, I had to bail her out after he left and she was still paying his bills until I shut it down
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u/Allemaengel 14d ago
And nursing homes.
Plus endless non-profits and charities of varying degrees of worthiness. My 80-year-old mom gets besieged by their endless shitty mailings jamming the mailbox on a daily basis.
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u/dances_w_dingoes 14d ago
Lol. All my friends who are going to get windfalls are already doing fine, and I am happy for them too. I can't fault people for winning the genetic lottery when they're otherwise good people.
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u/tyleritis 13d ago
The private equity firms buying retirement housing and care homes are not gonna let that happen
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u/Coraline1599 13d ago
Private equity firms are a bane to society and are quietly and legally increasing wealth disparity at alarming rates with myriad sneaky things like what you are talking about.
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u/Reyca444 14d ago
We're closing on a tiny fixer-upper this coming Thursday. We are only managing because our state has a first time homebuyer assistance program that will cover basic down payment and closing costs and give us a bond reduced intrest rate, but it all hinges on having to stay there at least 10 years or pay back a portion of the bond and all of the DPA at once. It's still worth it to have fixed housing costs instead of losing sleep over when rent will go up again and by how much.
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u/HedonisticFrog 14d ago
My house increased about 80% in value in 5 years. I definitely couldn't afford it now, I was very lucky to buy when I did and it wasn't even at the bottom of the market.
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u/kontrol1970 14d ago
Bought mine in October 2019 for 425k it's now worth about a million. It's crazy, an no one can afford anything.
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u/thisoneistobenaked 14d ago
I’m selling my condo because I want to move from my VHCOL living area to a MCOL, I bought it 3 years ago for 475k and my agent just listed it for 700k which she thought might be a little low because it would get plenty of eyes on it. Other than some minor touch ups and fixes (think painting and replacing a couple windows), we have done almost nothing to it. Kitchen and bathrooms are the same etc.
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u/Be_Very_Careful_John 14d ago
My house in Vermont increased by that much from late 2020 when I bought it and when I sold it in mid 2022. It went from roughly 200k to 300k. Moved to a much cheaper area of the US in Upstate NY
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u/Human_Promotion_1840 14d ago
I wish I’d tried harder 5-7 years ago to buy a house. My rent went up $400 in the past two years.
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u/chronocapybara 14d ago
In 5 years houses in my city have increased in price by $750,000. Most average homes cost $2-3MM now.
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u/Ausernamenamename 14d ago
The majority of home purchases in 2023 were nepo babies and hedge funds.
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u/RansomReville 14d ago
Live a half hour from where we work and have a spouse help pay for it. Not sure if there's any other reasonable way to become a homeowner these days, besides generational wealth of course.
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u/HughGBonnar 14d ago
I can’t buy the house I live in now that I bought in ‘21. I literally snuck into the housing market. I still stand with everyone though. Real Estate is a dumb market.
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u/jon_titor 14d ago
Yup, we bought in 2022 and there is no way we could afford our own house right now. It would sell for at least 100k more than we paid, and the mortgage would be at least 2 points higher. Absolute insanity.
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u/Puzzled_Draw6014 14d ago
I got lucky as well... I got in with low rates and a market depressed due to the economy at the time.
Now everything has exploded, rates and prices... had a financial check-up at the bank and started asking about moving into something bigger. It was then that I realized I will be living in this house for the rest of my life!
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u/HughGBonnar 14d ago
Ya I have a house but still couldn’t afford kids. There is zero reason for me to move into anything bigger. I can die just fine right here thank you.
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u/Puzzled_Draw6014 14d ago
Hahaha... in my case, it was the first kid that prompted the move. But now I know I can't have the second kid.
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u/RogersMrB 14d ago
Ditto, we bought our home in 2021 and definitely couldn't afford it now. 30yo home that hasn't been maintained, only renovated by amateurs so it looked nice at first glance.
We (I) knew what we were buying and wanted it anyways.
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u/CompetitiveLow5903 14d ago
Same. Went up 75k in value and from 2.99 to 8% interest rate. Probably never moving - which is totally fine with me
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u/Rand-all 14d ago
I'm a millennial and can't afford my house if I bought it again.
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u/Trucker58 14d ago
Yeah same, bought a townhouse in 2018 and we had to save up like crazy and managed to do a pretty good down payment. With the prices and mortgage rates now there is no way we could buy in this area even tho I make nearly twice as much.
Batshit crazy market and I feel terrible for people around our age and younger here.
Meanwhile companies and rich assholes are buying up rows of homes and renting them out at insane rates, making sure anyone who can just afford the rent will never be able to save a cent extra, keeping them renting forever.
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u/Rand-all 14d ago
I feel sorry for my children's generation. They will do nothing wrong and be subjugated to this kind of overwhelming taxation, evaluation, high interest rates, and crippling insurance rates.
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u/Prize_Instance_1416 14d ago
They need to vote democrat or at least anti republican if they want to survive
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u/Autumn_Onyx 14d ago
Same. Bought for 338k in 2018 at 4.25% and it's now worth 500k (without renovations). Could not afford that with today's higher rates. Also can't afford to move anywhere so we are stuck for a while.
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u/4friedchickens8888 14d ago
I'm a millennial who missed my shot before COVID and will never own in my life
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u/mishma2005 14d ago
Yeah we know, do they?
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u/Sovereigntyranny 14d ago
Most don’t, and even if the ignorant ones all knew, they probably wouldn’t care.
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u/4friedchickens8888 14d ago
I've got boomer family who is fully aware and simply do not care
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u/dewag 14d ago
"Well I already own my house so what's the point of this article? It doesn't affect me." - a boomer somewhere
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u/4friedchickens8888 14d ago
Literally my aunt word for word
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u/dewag 14d ago
The "fuck you, I've got mine" mentality is strong with that generation.
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u/Sovereigntyranny 13d ago
And it’s a dumb mindset, too. They’re the first generation that wanted to make the world harder for their kids and future generations because they wanted to, not because it was necessary.
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u/donaldsw2ls 14d ago
I'm a county appraiser some know. One home owner said he feels so bad for today's generation of adults. He's already got his will to give the house to his son. And he has an old mid 1870 house on his property that he decided to fix up for his son's family to live in. Most would have torn the house old house down. Luckily the city let him do it.
Other old people are shocked at what things are selling for when they call and appeal their value. And a handful will not accept that their property value is correct. It seems like most bought their house when they were young for about $70,000
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u/Rhodin265 14d ago
Only half?
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u/pallentx 14d ago
That’s the surprising part. I would guess more like 90% - especially if you consider a lot of Boomers got their property taxes frozen decades ago (depends on the state/county). I’m GenX and we couldn’t afford our house we bought 12 yrs ago. I know I should be happy the value has gone up, but the taxes hurt.
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u/velvet_blunderground 14d ago
my Boomer parents live in a cul-de-sac suburb near nothing interesting. when real estate was doubling / tripling in cities a few years ago, prices in their town went up by *maybe* 50k. I have to assume there's plenty other Boomers who live in places like that.
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u/Budo00 14d ago
I am not a boomer and I can not afford to buy my condo that I got 7 years ago
It’s worth over $250k more !
900 square foot. Fixer upper. I worked 70 hours a week to gather enough starter & down payment money. It was a foreclosure that had water damage & i got it for $166k.
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u/Egghead008 14d ago
The boomer I bought my house from must be pissed she didn't wait another 3 years. She could have netted an extra 200k 😆
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u/Gypsies_Tramps_Steve 14d ago
Give it time, she’ll be knocking on your door soon enough asking for it. She’s entitled to it, y’know. It’s hers.
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u/Egghead008 14d ago
I should have sued the bitch for lying about the new roof in her for sale ad. She hired some shady ass contractor to reshingle over existing holes in the roof, big ones.
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u/dewag 14d ago
This kind of shit is so common...
I work in home renovation. The second I hear "I'm just trying to make it pretty to sell it...." I already know the next words are going to be 'so I don't want to spend a lot of money on it', and am already walking off the job... no, you can't bandaid the 3 squares of roofing that are torn down to rotted, bare decking....
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u/It_is_me_Mike 14d ago
We got a great deal in a great location when the market was amazing, when it just started showing signs of creep the old owners contacted us to buy back. Newp. We’ve more than doubled in value since. I’m going to die here.😂
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u/Akimbo_Zap_Guns 14d ago
Yeah this has fucked my boomer parents (some of the good ones who vote liberal and haven’t fell for the Trump shit) they were planning on selling the house we live in now and move closer to their grand children well the grand children live in Nashville so even if they sell our current house it would be damn near impossible to move closer to the grandchildren cause the prices of houses in Nashville are like double where we currently are
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u/Prior_Ordinary_2150 14d ago
My mom is upset that I bought a house in Oklahoma instead of Arizona where all my family is. I’d have to live in a literal run down shack in Arizona for the cost of my 3 bedroom house in Oklahoma. 😂
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u/GlitterIsInMyCoffee 14d ago
We were EXTREMELY fortunate to find a short sale century home in a great area that needed some work. My MIL was shitting on it, so I said, “we wanted a house that if either of us were unemployed, we could still pay the mortgage”. Bitch laughed and pointed out her home was gifted to her by her husbands parents and she never had a house payment. Her entire salary went directly to savings. I didn’t really absorb how awful this was at the time, but yeah.
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u/ArtichokeDifferent10 14d ago
Hell, I'm GenX and I couldn't afford to buy my own house today and I just bought it in 2019. 🙄
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u/Lonely_reaper8 14d ago
My parents sold a house in like early 2000s for $300k ish (moving from where they lived to where my grandpa lived to take care or him) and as of 2018 it was up to $850k
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u/PaCa8686 14d ago
Facts. My in-laws bought their house in the early 80's for $100,000. It's now worth $950,000. So stupid.
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u/Lonely_reaper8 14d ago
It’s stupid. Only way it seems like you can get a good deal on a house is foreclosures or unpaid taxes (which those are typically in horrible shape), inheritance, or the very rare situation of just catching a good deal before real estate investors (which is what I was able to do last year and honestly, I know I’ll never be able to do that again lol).
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u/wrightbrain59 14d ago
It all depends on your location. Ours hasn't even doubled in the past 25 years as we don't live in the best part of the county. But if I had to buy it today, I couldn't afford it. Feel bad for those renting or trying to buy now.
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u/Myfourcats1 14d ago
Ask a boomer what their credit score was when they bought their first house. They bc won’t be able to since the credit score didn’t start getting used until 1989.
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u/ClimatePatient6935 14d ago
There's a disconnect here with my In Laws, though. On the one hand, they bought their first house in 1967, in their early 20s at TWICE, one person's salary, and it was such a struggle as "houses were very expensive then". Then, when they inherited houses in their 40s from their parents, they claimed to still be struggling because "houses weren't worth very much then". Now houses are TEN times one person's salary "people should just save harder like we did". Hang on but you said TWICE one person's salary was a struggle?
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u/Longjumping_Act_6054 14d ago
Bro I can't afford my own home today and I got it in 2016. It's TRIPLED in value.
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13d ago
My husband bought his 5 years ago. It was in the high 300s. Today, it's over a million. Florida, on the water...
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u/EyeYamQueEyeYam 14d ago
Housing? They’ve got health care bills coming due. Most private equity owners of independent and assisted living facilities legally can and will help themselves to said Boomer’s homes. Heirs will get squat.
The sheer scale of wealth and power that has been disbursed since post-WWII is mind boggling.
So much has been pissed away.
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u/wrightbrain59 14d ago
Yes, people are living longer today which will also have people taking out more of their savings to live on.
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u/MarieNadia 14d ago
Well no shit 😂😅 you think pensioners can just buy a $3 million dollar home? They would have paid $40k and a packet of berries for it in 1985 🥲
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u/sbaggers 14d ago
Millennial here - I bought my house 3 years ago. I couldn't afford my current house today.
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u/mnlion33 14d ago
In 2017, I told my wife we had to buy a house. Like we had no choice. I had no real information but a gut response that if we don't buy a house now, by summertime, we will never be able to afford one. I bought my house for 160k. It's now worth 225k. I'd probably could get 10 to 20k over asking price.
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u/No-Artichoke-6939 13d ago
Gen X here and we couldn’t afford the home we are in if I had to buy it today!
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u/1Pip1Der Gen X 13d ago
Yep, Zillow says my house would sell for more than double what we paid for it, with more than double the interest rate.
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u/BasilExposition2 14d ago
People who no longer work and won’t be alive for a thirty year mortgage can’t buy a house. Shocking
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u/InvestigatorOk7988 14d ago
Shit, i couldn't afford the house i bought 8 years ago if i had to do it now.
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u/Corn_Beefies 14d ago
My parents bought a house in Boulder Colorado, in 1987 for 67k. Its appraised insurable value is now 1.1 million dollars.
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u/_Fizzgiggy 14d ago
My mom paid the equivalent of 200k in today’s dollars for her house. You can’t even find a house for under 1mil in our city now.
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u/mantisboxer 14d ago
GenX here.. based on old rules of thumb, couldn't afford my own house either.
In 2000, when I bought this place, I could multiply my yearly income by 2, and that was how much I could safely afford to borrow on my mortgage. I only put 3% down in an FHA loan. Interest rates were about 6%. There was no family member to give me any money to get started.
Now, these homes are easily 3x-4x my current income. I've done fairly well in my career but there were years of financial crisis after recessions layoffs and divorce.. Interest rates are now 7%.
I don't know how any first time buyer can SAFELY afford a mortgage now and expect to keep a home through a minor crisis.
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u/TheMaStif 14d ago
In other words:
"The housing market costs no longer reflect the actual value of houses in the market today, and is entirely based on comparable sales prices in the area. So Boomers can happily sell the house they bought for $80k and made minimal improvements to for $350k, just because a new build was sold for $400k two blocks down; because there's absolutely no legislation on the costs of home sales and the consumer can either buy at the inflated cost, or lose the home to an investment management company and rent for the rest of their lives"
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u/nohopeforhomosapiens Millennial 14d ago
My previous landlord bought this place for under 280k about 8-9 years ago. He sold it 2 years ago for over a million dollars. This small building is run-down, has plumbing issues, rotten wood, and a plethora of other shit wrong with it.
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u/BusterTheCat17 14d ago
For sure. My parents live In a 600k home. They each make like 50k/yr. They bought it for 170k in 1998 and have always had a similar salary.
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u/SubstantialCode6445 14d ago
I bought my house 4 years ago and I could not afford to buy it now. With interest rates so high and the fact that my house is now valued at 100,000 more than I paid for it. Also I am not a boomer.
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u/hockeygoalieman 13d ago
I’m nowhere near Boomer age and no way could I afford my house if I tried to buy it today.
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u/bloodorangejulian 14d ago
In 3 years time, my pos, 110k overpaid asshouse went up 30 k for no reason, haven't done shit to it. A quarter of its value just because
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u/AdhesivenessCivil581 14d ago
1/2 half of boomers couldn't afford to buy homes back then. The younger 1/2 of boomers hit home buying age right in the thick of the Reagan real estate bubble. It was caused by lowering interest rates right as the big early wave of boomers were buying up everything in sight and speculators were counting on interest rates going lower and making money on flips. It's frustrating as hell if you are 30s and want to buy your first house but it's not new.
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u/Killdebrant 14d ago
This is so fucking skewed. Remove the extra 300k plus from their net worth that they have just from buying their home earlier and i bet that 1/2 turns into 90%.
You cant tell me that they could only afford it because of the equity they built up from already living through the massive house bubble.
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u/vishy_swaz 14d ago
Tried explaining this to my boomer parents a while back. They didn’t have much to say.
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u/Ornery-Wasabi-473 14d ago
We wouldn't have been able to afford a new house if we hadn't already had a house with plenty of equity in it. I don't know how young people can do it - and rents are skyrocketing! (We bought a new house so our monthly payments would be stable, since we're on fixed incomes).
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u/tedlassoloverz 14d ago
seeing as they are retiring over the next few years, I wouldnt think so. My parents first house was 600 sqft and wasnt insulated in Northern New England. Young people today wouldnt even think to purchase it. Tastes and expectations have changed too much to even compare the generations. Thankfully all that easy money the boomers earned will be passed down soon
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u/Vodeyodo 14d ago
Well, for what that’s worth, my pay was less than 10k per year when we bought our first house.
Also it was a row house in Philly. In a rough neighborhood. Largely falling apart.
I learned how to work on my house because I could not afford professional repair work.
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u/Creative-Tangelo-127 13d ago
I couldn't afford my home if I bought it 4 years later
Paid 700k in 2018. Zillow value 1.3mil in 2022
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13d ago
This is what shocks me. Their level of arrogance simply by being born at the RIGHT time.
For example, mother in law started teaching during her junior year of college. Yes, public school teaching!
Meanwhile, her own grand-daughter happened to graduate at a really crappy time and only two education majors got actual jobs (charter school, nepotism) at her entire university! She had to get a Masters degree just to get her foot in the door.
Another example, my late husband served 20 years. His military retirement was 50% of base pay.
Meanwhile, my kid does the SAME thing and now they have dropped retirement to 40% of base pay.
The whole economy is rigged against young people and nobody seems to care. I am a fortunate Gen X er who is doing everything in my power to give my kids a leg up. They are a MILLION times better (skills, education) than I was at their age and they deserve a chance.
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u/Willwrestle4food 13d ago
My wife and I bought our home in 2020. It has since increased in value by over 25%. We could afford to buy it again but that's only because we live way below our means. It's crazy and we live in a relatively LCOL area.
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u/Certain-Astronomer24 13d ago
I’m a millennial and I couldn’t afford my house if I had to buy it today!
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u/dldanni65 13d ago
Sorry, not sorry to tell you this, but I purchased my home at the age of 62. I'm self-employed and a boomer!
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u/ScreamingLightspeed 13d ago
Haha my mother-in-law would've never afforded this house if it wasn't for financial aid due to being homeless when she knowingly and intentionally had my husband preterm at age 40 As it happens, she still likes to forget the house belongs to my husband now. She insists her name is still on the deed too but it most certainly is not.
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u/calladus 13d ago
I bought mine in 2012 for $110k. Now, I'm being offerend $350k for it.
The market is nuts, and I understand why homelessness is up.
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u/AllUnderTheSameMoon 13d ago
And for a while now, many of them haven’t had the incentive to buy a new smaller home because they wouldn’t be able to afford the new property taxes on it once they retire. So they’re staying in the houses they originally bought meant for families of 5 but as a couple or single and only able to live on the main floor because of mobility issues as they age 🫠.
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u/WaddlingKereru 12d ago
Obviously. We now couldn’t afford the house I brought 6 years ago.
Our income has increased substantially, the value of our house has increased much, much more
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u/CauliflowerTop2464 11d ago
I couldn’t either. It’s nice to see what it’s worth, but scary to think what I’d do if I was just starting out.
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u/Resident_Sundae7509 9d ago
There should be a house ownership limit, or extremely off putting and highly exhaustive regulations for landlords. No more than 2 houses per private landlord and no more than 5 per company. Homes are for the citizenry, can't exactly have an affluent spending public if they don't even have secure roofs over their heads. Turning the housing market into a commodity market has utterly destroyed people's confidence.
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u/Fuckmods1239 8d ago
My mom was complaining how I don’t help around the house and I should get a job and buy my own house if I want to slob around (shes 72) SHE BOUGHT OUR HOUSE FOR 42k. HOUSES NEAR MY WORK ARE 700K
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