Then you commute. Yes, sacrifices are required but it's not the end of the world (or collapse of society, as GP put it). When I moved to a cheaper place over 20 years ago working remotely wasn't much of a thing so I had to drive 60-90 minutes (occasionally 2 hours). It wasn't great but it was a pragmatic solution that allowed me to have a nice place to live and leftover money to save.

> A lot of people would rather struggle to make rent than raise their kids in a community with high crime, bad schools, poor healthcare, limited prospects and a general atmosphere of despair.

There is a very wide gray area of reasonable places with reasonable prices between the extremes of San Franciso/Manhattan vs. economically depressed areas with "a general atmosphere of despair".

How much is this related to inflation compared to the complete refusal of the Silicon Valley suburbs to building new housing? If rich people want to move somewhere, and people living in that area dont build houses for them to move into, its going to drive the prices up, because the wealthy people will go there no matter what.

Also your whole bit about the past being so much better is insane. Hard to tell what is you exaggerating and what is a serious argument. My partner and I make ~100k + 40k combined a year, and we rent an apartment in one of the nicest SF neighborhoods, save for retirement, go out and do (paid) things every weekend, and still save a good chunk of money every month. We also have gym memberships, own cars, buy nice groceries, etc.

Inflation does suck, and the sticker shock is bad, but the high inflation also stems from policies that have let us have insanely good unemployment levels. Post 2008 we saw less inflation, but unemployment stayed high for almost a decade. Unemployment is already down to super low levels post 2020, which is better for everyone. Average and lower wage workers have also seen large growths in what they make.

Yes it is. Just not if you want to live in really nice cities and have a ton of stuff.

If you want to live in a suburb, commute, not own much in the way of technology, and own a house 30% of the size of what people live in now, then yeah, that's doable.

Housing costs have inflated and that's worthy of note. But so have our expectations of comfort and life, and those have outpaced earning potentials.

The 20-something tradesmen have mostly not settled down that much yet just like the 20-something software engineers so they live in apartments wherever.

The biggest difference now compared to the 90s is that the blue collar people have been pushed 20-40min farther out of the major cities. Homer Simpson probably commuted 30min. Now the white collar engineer commutes 30min and the electrician commutes 30min farther because that's where the suburb he can afford is. The white collar engineer lives in what used to be the blue collar suburb. Also in my anecdotal experience it seems like stay at home mothers haven't totally gone away with either group but they've become rarer in the white collar group than the blue collar group.

Everyone blue collar I know bought their first house at 30+/- a few. The people that bought sooner were the people who prioritized it because they were popping out a lot of kids or were beginning to build their own business and needed space. If anything it seems like the blue collar crowd buys a little before the white collar crowd simply because they're more open to living farther out in order to make things affordable.

>Will they ever be able to afford their own home?

Yes. It just won't be in the same suburb as the people on HN.

And salaries are also lower. People don't move to the big city because they want to live there. They go there to study and then to make money so that they can afford any kind of real estate in their home town.

> Everyone just finds whatever job that enables them to do those things, and the priority is life, not work.

The condition of your quote above is that you already own real estate, which isn't true for but a few from the younger generations. Or that you live with your parents until you're 60 years old. Other than that, the deal is "get the hell out" and you're only welcome back if you can purchase some real estate.

It's true what you say about working online though, but then suddenly the whole world is open to you.

You can still do that if you're willing to make sacrifices. A colleague of mine gets by on one income - I don't know what he makes now, but he started at $35k about five years ago. And this is in the SF bay area.

When you do the math having both spouses working doesn't increase your standard of living very much because of taxes and child care.

"Only 1M"

And I mean sure I could have bought a big house in Palo Alto for 50k or whatever in 1950 but that's not really relevant anymore.

Maybe dual tech worker couples can make it work but but there isn't a large pay increase for most other fields in the Bay.

I think both are problems, because if they remain in the middle-America suburb, salaries are a lot lower. A 25 year old living where they grew up often doesn't earn enough to buy the local house either.

Reasonable commute is relative. For example if you live as far east as the end of Pleasanton / Dublin in East Bay you can have a roughly 45 minute commute to the financial and nearby districts in SF.

Point being you can hit your most or all of your marks and not need $300k a year. In fact that's a difficult amount for the average or even above average person to make and it's not always possible to have spouses working.

Let people judge what they can and cannot afford to do. General statements like saying making under $300k is going to be tough isn't constructive and while it may be true in some instances it's certainly not true for all.

You don't need to live in a high cost of living area, except if you're competing American Psycho style.

You could live where the other 95% of people working in the Bay Area live.

I'm pretty sure that the baristas serving those Googlers in cafes outside the Googleplex don't make $270K a year, and still get to work in the same area.

If that means more commuting, that's always an option. People commute 1-2 hours per direction too, to make $50K, I'm pretty sure a 20-something making $270K can handle it.

Heck, even a daily two-way Uber would be totally doable, and other expenses added, they'd still get to save over $150K per year still.

In Manhattan thats the expectation. You’re in a super dense area filled with high rises. Life is good for apartment dwelling.

In Mountain View, you’re in a suburb that’s mostly single family homes that you’re constantly reminded you won’t ever be able to afford.

> How is it reasonable in the least to expect a big house with a garage and a yard

That’s the lifestyle of the peninsula. It’s reasonable to expect the lifestyle you are constantly surrounded by. Back to the Manhattan analogy, $250k absolutely would not be considered good money if it could not afford you the ability to live like the average property owner.

The Bay Area is a stark contrast between the people lucky enough to have purchased 10+ years ago + some FAANGs and everyone else. Everyone else is stuck in a terrible apartment telling themselves stories about how they’ll get out after making their money or whatever.

It’s nice living in a walkable apartment with no car in Manhattan (or nyc in general). It’s dreary AF on the peninsula.

Then don't live in a big city (read: SF, NYC). Not everyone should, nor deserves, to live somewhere just because they want to.

Hell, even in some of the bigger ones, like Phoenix, you could buy a giant home + drive to work in a Tesla for that type of salary.

Living in downtown Palo Alto probably costs 100% more than living in Pleasanton, which is roughly a one hour commute.

> While a bigger garden and spare bedroom soon cease to be novel, every day’s commute is a little bit different, meaning we can never get quite used to it.

I wonder if this is one of the reasons big tech companies run buses — to make the commute less painful and blend into the background of life.

Maybe in 2000. I don't think that's true in any major metropolitan area (say over 1 million). Which is also coincidentally where most people live.

Too much, even if you want to work that much. Do 40 for your primary and then 20 where you are your own boss.

>Based on the neighborhood I live in and my compensation, I am extremely privileged. I don’t have money concerns that my parents had. Most things that I might need, I can buy them without having to think too much or without putting a dent in my net worth.

HN is very likely >90% part of the zoom class. Though you it might not be zoom but rather whatever flavour, teams, etc. Welcome to being rich. You got there because of whatever skillset you have learnt. Good for you.

>But Seattle has become a lawless dump. The east side has started homes for $1.4MM where the inspection report shows you that you’re basically just paying for the land.

Welcome to high energy costs fueling inflation and pushing high energy things like homes so expensively.

>If I have to be a renter my whole damn life and can’t even afford a house, what is the god damn point? Yeah I get paid very well, but I am a pawn of people who earn significantly more.

You're looking at it the wrong way. What is your investment strategy? Rent vs own calculators certainly exist. Maybe you're out of real estate because you predict a crash? If you expect they continue rising. Then buying is the way to go.

For now. Unless you marry another professional, it will be difficult to keep that commute if you decide to start a family.

Part of the problem with the Bay Area and NYC is that it's cradle-to-grave unsustainable. That's not to say people don't make it work, but it's unlikely that the average tech worker in those places has replacement-level fertility or will hang around the area with their kids and grandkids to form a multi-generation household.

I'm not sure where you are getting this from. The mcmansion trend hit the bay area just as much as it hit anywhere else. The burbs are 20-30 minutes away with tech worker job hours. The 2500 sqft homes here cost a million dollars, so your mortgage cancels out the additional bay area income. But that mortgage money doesn't go into a black hole, it's equity. So at the end of the day you can sell your bay area house, go back to oklahoma, and buy ten houses. This is probably the best opportunity going in the world right now to build dynastic wealth.

The example isn't exaggerated at all. Unless you happen to live on a straight bus line to work, it's going to add many hours to take a bus downtown and then out to the office.

Office locations come and go, a house is for the long haul. You're not going to sell and move houses every time you chance jobs.

Reading your comment and others beneath you, I sense many of you have a weird idea of what a city is.

What you describe is true only for a minority of cities. I live in a city with above median housing prices. I live a 10 minute drive from my work. My house is not expensive - in fact, the expensive neighborhoods are farther away.

Initially you may not have much of a choice on where you work, but if you go through your whole career not having that choice, you probably need to work on your career a bit. For everyone I know, they decided to make that compromise (don't want to leave awesome city, etc). For them, not having enough time in the day definitely is a choice.

I agree with the rest of your accounting, but will note that there are weekends. As for gym, I just figured out exercises I can do at home with minimal equipment. It's a lot more flexible (and takes less time) than going to a gym.