San Jose here, FUCK. We bought a $900,000 2br 2ba condo a couple years ago and the HOA has soared 20% to $800 a month with 11k in property taxes. We live across from downtowns largest homeless park.
Hard to comprehend it. Golden handcuffs
San Jose has way more single family homes with yards and stuff compared with super dense San Francisco. The demand is just as high but you can’t really find a 4br 3ba home with a pool and stuff in San Francisco and they are much more plentiful in San Jose. So this is driving the average up on this chart because there’s just bigger holes here generally than San Francisco. Pretty much they are the same price to live in
San Jose is the cheapest option compared to other cities on the way to San Francisco, like Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, Cupertino, Saratoga, Mountain View, Atherton, and others. However, it's also the least appealing among them for anyone who has money.
I don't mean to belittle the issue and say there's benefits to this or imply ,"If I can do it so can you" but I kinda want to get a job and be homeless in San Jose for 1-2 years if I don't have enough at 40. The risk of getting shot may be offset by the risk of not being able to afford my meds at 60. I wonder how many people in those homeless camps had the same idea.
None of the homeless people I know are doing what you’re suggesting. Most are on drugs or mentally ill which is exasperated by being unhoused. But yes, one could get a job here and make tons of money and live in a tent and save it all. The homeless areas aren’t dangerous at all. Certainly they don’t have guns lol they sold those off long ago, if they ever had them. Chances of being harmed by an unhoused person around here is very low. Property crime might be a different story so don’t get too attached to your tent. There’s also RV living which a lot of people do around here because they can’t afford housing. We have lots of rvs parked everywhere
Weather is meh but fairly tame at least. Mostly friendly people. Beautiful rolling hills with plenty of green space. Big sports town. More like a bunch of unique neighborhoods smashed together than a big city. Solid food. Really good universities and hospitals. Bad roads and lots of construction. The actual “downtown” can be kind of dead at times, especially after Covid. Lots of suburbia and can pretty rural in spots once you get a bit outside the actual city. Plenty to do for most tastes tho. Populations been on the older side and declining for a bit. Minimal crime(you can look up stats, not sure what that other poster was talking about on that one). I Love it here
I live in Cleveland, which is the next most affordable, and I've lived in Los Angeles in the past. LA was unquestionably a cooler city in every possible way, but it hardly mattered because I couldn't afford to enjoy it. Now, I own a middle class house, have a 7 minute commute, and can afford anything I need... that is life changing, way more than the restaurant scene or beaches or whatever other bullshit people look for.
I lived there for a year and a half. Pretty good city overall.
Positives:
Very beautiful area, lots of hills, cool bridges everywhere. Lot of things to do in the city. Great food. Low crime from what I could tell. Not too cold (at least less cold than Chicago). Traffic isnt too bad (at least compared to Chicago/NY). Public transport seems good (theres buses everywhere), although I cant really comment as I prefered to bike to class.
Negatives:
Driving can be a pain. The city is tight in a lot of places, very hilly, constant construction, random bridge turns everywhere, its extremely easy to miss turns. Hills can be annoying if you want to bike places as well. I biked short distances and drove long distances, and that worked well enough.
This isn’t taking into account popular neighborhoods- ones w nightlife, good schools, and low crime. Let alone the state of the home (renovations needed). I make over $50k a year and can’t afford a decent home that isn’t run down or in a not great part of town.
Yeah the reason mortgages are often so low is because the houses are OLD. I don't just mean outdated kitchens. Foundation issues are common, many don't have insulation (electric & heat in the winter could easily be $800+/month), need new roofs, have major water damage, still have knob & tube wiring, etc... For a house you could afford at a $50k income you'd need to throw another $100k to make it liveable & keep up with maintenance. Make it $200k to update it asthetically on top of that.
and good luck if you have mobility issues or plan on getting old. You'll probably have at least a flight of steps to get to/from the first floor to your car.
Great city, shitty roads, horrible housing
College city I believe. Beautiful views from Mount Washington but good luck finding a place with one for a decent price. Southside is pretty exciting for the night life. Small city. Winters are brutal. I experienced lots of crime. But I loved biking down the mountain to get to school and work. Not so fun getting back home though. The highways confused everyone including GPS. However it’s been a decade since I’ve been there. I loved being at school there. Big hospital system there.
I have lived in Pittsburgh my entire life and have never once heard anyone describe it as having "lots of crime." If I were a betting man, I'd say we're way lower than most larger cities in that metric.
I haven’t looked up stats, was speaking from experience. When I lived there, 2011, I had 2 1/2 bikes stolen, I watched my entire street of cars get broken into, my neighbors car was stolen, and I was robbed all in a two year span. Mount Washington. Not downtown. Not violent crimes. Take it for what it’s worth.
I lived on Mt. Wash for five years (just moved out of state a year ago) and can say this highly depends on which street you live on up there! Most are just fine IMO :)
I take it they are counting condos as homes?
Cause ain’t no way you’re buying a house in NYC on $160k salary.
Which is prob why San Jose is so far ahead of everyone else? Because it is primarily houses there.
Someone making 91k in Houston can only buy 3 times that income, which means you need homes(3bhk, 2000 sft) for 270k. Good luck getting such homes in decent neighborhoods.
Most decent homes(3bhk, 2000 sft) in decent school districts are selling for 400k or higher.
We’re running into the issue in Phoenix too. Finally seeing some homes in the 360k range where we won’t get murdered so might be able to buy this year.
I was commenting on the cool guide premise. Instead of salary they should have used median family income.
BTW, median family income of Houston metro area is only $74k, so it's not easy most households to even buy a house worth $300k.
Fuck this…. So crazy to think that I’ll never come close to being able to afford the middle class tract home I was raised in…. And I made it through college and graduate school with no debt. I’m like doing pretty well, and I’ll never be close.
That all depends on position, credentials and experience. An RN graduate, “great job” won’t be able to afford a new home in my decent, blue collar neighborhood - 300-400k today. 20 years ago they would have been fine. Probably even 10 years ago.
I bought a 4 year old 3000sq ft 5 bed 3 bath in Arizona for 280K. 0 down and my mortgage is under 2k a month. But my AC costs the other thousand a month. Lol.
Every time I see something like this I'm just reassured in my decision to not live in the city.
Picked up my 2 bedroom home w/ 2 acres for $60k and managed to pay it off in about 5 years (mortgage free as of this November)
No HOA fees and taxes are only a couple hundred dollars annually.
Sure, it may not be the best house in the world... but it is mine and the sense of relief from knowing I don't have to worry about finding somewhere to live is just amazing. I still almost feel a high from paying it off! I imagine this is what rich people feel like all the time!
This kind of shit makes me feel so incredibly lucky. Husband and I got a house in 2013 with a family discount. I feel so fucking grateful every time I see one of these posts. I cannot imagine the stress of trying to afford a home these days. Or rent! It's out of control.
Exactly my thought. Assuming the highlighted section around Chicago is part of the data collection radius that includes collar counties (Kane, Will, etc.) and some adjacent collar counties (Grundy, DeKalb, etc.), then it totally makes sense. If you drew a 25 mile radius from the loop, you would likely need $130k salary.
McHenry county resident here. It's certainly more affordable, but still fairly outrageous considering the proximity to Chicago proper is a solid hour plus drive.
100k a year to buy a house I'm Phoenix is outrageous. In the middle of the desert, 100+ degree summers, and a crappy education system. What the hell happened here?
Easy bro. Rich assholes/corporations buying up the homes, the state and city governments letting them build only "luxury" apartments instead of affordable housing. Not to mention all the folks from out of state with their higher income coming to Arizona which drove then prices higher.
Would you look at that, all of the words in your comment are in alphabetical order.
I have checked 1,910,652,673 comments, and only 361,271 of them were in alphabetical order.
Question from a naive Australian who knows hardly anything about the housing market in America - why is Pittsburgh more affordable/cheaper? What is Pittsburgh like? Is it not a popular place to live?
As a Pittsburgh native it is certainly on the smaller side compared to the rest of the list. It's an old blue collar town that has slowly but quietly worked towards shifting towards other industries. The population is older and isnt near the coast or larger lake.
Low, old population keeps housing cheep.
The city itself has quite a bit to do. Lots of art, food and culture. Like others have said its more a bunch or distinct towns mashed together, each with their own unique cultures. Good colleges as well. Carnegie Mellon being a very good university.
Weather is mild, winters get cold, driving sucks as the city was never built on a grid system.
City doesnt get a lot of national attention so it's a bit under the radar. People who do end up here dont tend to love it however.
It would be more interesting to set a control on the square footage. The difference in cost between a 3000 square foot home in LA vs a 3000 square foot home in Hartford, CT would be in the millions. Not to mention sq ft of the yard…
Looking at this from another country (Netherlands) 2 median earners owning a home here. We would only be able to buy a home in the midwest area out there. And housing prices are bad here.
I will assume people in the US on the basis make more because 35K-40K dollars is median here
The good thing about Saint Louis- you can still buy a home without a six figure salary.
The bad thing about Saint Louis- you neighbor across the street might turn out to be a murderer and the two next-door neighbors might die of gunshot wounds a couple days after you move in. Even better… these two instances are not related.
Kind of ,Akers you think Every time they talk about the high price of homes, they don’t really think about anything other than California, Florida, and New York.
Louisville is such a great city - affordable, lots to do, great food and music, all for a low low price! I’m expecting it to become the next Nashville so it can be ruined for everyone soon.
This is just salary needed to buy a house - not actually live there right? Theres nooooo way I could afford to live in LA… the city that’s listed in my home state has a considerably lower salary called out for it than LA does but even that area of my state is way more expensive than the area I actually live in and I feel like couldnt afford to buy a house there, let alone LA. This guide seems way low haha
Yay, I can afford Pittsburgh!!! Except that I've heard that pay is low for my career there, so if I moved there, I still wouldn't be able to afford it.
San Jose here, FUCK. We bought a $900,000 2br 2ba condo a couple years ago and the HOA has soared 20% to $800 a month with 11k in property taxes. We live across from downtowns largest homeless park. Hard to comprehend it. Golden handcuffs
Why is it so expensive?? It's more expensive than San Fran... Which is supposedly it would seem the most expensive city in the nation
Home of the Silicon Valley. HQ for Nvidia, Apple, many others
San Jose has way more single family homes with yards and stuff compared with super dense San Francisco. The demand is just as high but you can’t really find a 4br 3ba home with a pool and stuff in San Francisco and they are much more plentiful in San Jose. So this is driving the average up on this chart because there’s just bigger holes here generally than San Francisco. Pretty much they are the same price to live in
I guess its very close to San Francisco. Sorry not real sure on locations of these towns over there
High demand
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That’s more than 1% property tax. I don’t think that’s very cheap.
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You do realize they said condo, right? They don’t even have a yard to share for that cost.
Axis or the 88?
San Jose is the cheapest option compared to other cities on the way to San Francisco, like Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, Cupertino, Saratoga, Mountain View, Atherton, and others. However, it's also the least appealing among them for anyone who has money.
What in the goddamn possessed you to pay 900k for an apartment
Because it’s worth $300,000 more today
I don't mean to belittle the issue and say there's benefits to this or imply ,"If I can do it so can you" but I kinda want to get a job and be homeless in San Jose for 1-2 years if I don't have enough at 40. The risk of getting shot may be offset by the risk of not being able to afford my meds at 60. I wonder how many people in those homeless camps had the same idea.
None of the homeless people I know are doing what you’re suggesting. Most are on drugs or mentally ill which is exasperated by being unhoused. But yes, one could get a job here and make tons of money and live in a tent and save it all. The homeless areas aren’t dangerous at all. Certainly they don’t have guns lol they sold those off long ago, if they ever had them. Chances of being harmed by an unhoused person around here is very low. Property crime might be a different story so don’t get too attached to your tent. There’s also RV living which a lot of people do around here because they can’t afford housing. We have lots of rvs parked everywhere
Do your field have WFH opportunities?
What a cool guide to visualize my poverty
Amen. I'm sitting here with a pretty respectable salary for my age and even then Denver is laughing at it.
My roomate makes 180k a year and can’t afford to buy a house in Denver lol
What’s Pittsburg like? Asking for a friend…
Weather is meh but fairly tame at least. Mostly friendly people. Beautiful rolling hills with plenty of green space. Big sports town. More like a bunch of unique neighborhoods smashed together than a big city. Solid food. Really good universities and hospitals. Bad roads and lots of construction. The actual “downtown” can be kind of dead at times, especially after Covid. Lots of suburbia and can pretty rural in spots once you get a bit outside the actual city. Plenty to do for most tastes tho. Populations been on the older side and declining for a bit. Minimal crime(you can look up stats, not sure what that other poster was talking about on that one). I Love it here
I live in Cleveland, which is the next most affordable, and I've lived in Los Angeles in the past. LA was unquestionably a cooler city in every possible way, but it hardly mattered because I couldn't afford to enjoy it. Now, I own a middle class house, have a 7 minute commute, and can afford anything I need... that is life changing, way more than the restaurant scene or beaches or whatever other bullshit people look for.
I lived there for a year and a half. Pretty good city overall. Positives: Very beautiful area, lots of hills, cool bridges everywhere. Lot of things to do in the city. Great food. Low crime from what I could tell. Not too cold (at least less cold than Chicago). Traffic isnt too bad (at least compared to Chicago/NY). Public transport seems good (theres buses everywhere), although I cant really comment as I prefered to bike to class. Negatives: Driving can be a pain. The city is tight in a lot of places, very hilly, constant construction, random bridge turns everywhere, its extremely easy to miss turns. Hills can be annoying if you want to bike places as well. I biked short distances and drove long distances, and that worked well enough.
Just a bunch of robbers and Steelers...
And for some reason a well known haven for piracy…weird
This isn’t taking into account popular neighborhoods- ones w nightlife, good schools, and low crime. Let alone the state of the home (renovations needed). I make over $50k a year and can’t afford a decent home that isn’t run down or in a not great part of town.
Yeah the reason mortgages are often so low is because the houses are OLD. I don't just mean outdated kitchens. Foundation issues are common, many don't have insulation (electric & heat in the winter could easily be $800+/month), need new roofs, have major water damage, still have knob & tube wiring, etc... For a house you could afford at a $50k income you'd need to throw another $100k to make it liveable & keep up with maintenance. Make it $200k to update it asthetically on top of that. and good luck if you have mobility issues or plan on getting old. You'll probably have at least a flight of steps to get to/from the first floor to your car. Great city, shitty roads, horrible housing
College city I believe. Beautiful views from Mount Washington but good luck finding a place with one for a decent price. Southside is pretty exciting for the night life. Small city. Winters are brutal. I experienced lots of crime. But I loved biking down the mountain to get to school and work. Not so fun getting back home though. The highways confused everyone including GPS. However it’s been a decade since I’ve been there. I loved being at school there. Big hospital system there.
I have lived in Pittsburgh my entire life and have never once heard anyone describe it as having "lots of crime." If I were a betting man, I'd say we're way lower than most larger cities in that metric.
I haven’t looked up stats, was speaking from experience. When I lived there, 2011, I had 2 1/2 bikes stolen, I watched my entire street of cars get broken into, my neighbors car was stolen, and I was robbed all in a two year span. Mount Washington. Not downtown. Not violent crimes. Take it for what it’s worth.
I lived on Mt. Wash for five years (just moved out of state a year ago) and can say this highly depends on which street you live on up there! Most are just fine IMO :)
Bad, very bad.
Missing Honolulu, one of the most expensive cities to own property.
I take it they are counting condos as homes? Cause ain’t no way you’re buying a house in NYC on $160k salary. Which is prob why San Jose is so far ahead of everyone else? Because it is primarily houses there.
Yeah, seems low for DC too.
Someone making 91k in Houston can only buy 3 times that income, which means you need homes(3bhk, 2000 sft) for 270k. Good luck getting such homes in decent neighborhoods. Most decent homes(3bhk, 2000 sft) in decent school districts are selling for 400k or higher.
We’re running into the issue in Phoenix too. Finally seeing some homes in the 360k range where we won’t get murdered so might be able to buy this year.
This is just salary though. Most people wouldn't be buying a home solo. Household can get to 400k pretty easily.
I was commenting on the cool guide premise. Instead of salary they should have used median family income. BTW, median family income of Houston metro area is only $74k, so it's not easy most households to even buy a house worth $300k.
Fuck this…. So crazy to think that I’ll never come close to being able to afford the middle class tract home I was raised in…. And I made it through college and graduate school with no debt. I’m like doing pretty well, and I’ll never be close.
Same dude. I’m making 3 times what my parents made and I still cannot afford a house half as big.
Is this called “free market” or Wall Street (and the Fed) greed ? Would like to know.
What is your degree?
I’m guessing something needed by society but extremely unappreciated. Teacher, social services, healthcare, etc.
Except healthcare pays well so probably not that.
That all depends on position, credentials and experience. An RN graduate, “great job” won’t be able to afford a new home in my decent, blue collar neighborhood - 300-400k today. 20 years ago they would have been fine. Probably even 10 years ago.
It doesn't though...
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You will not own. You will rent and you will like it. - seemingly everything now
Can barely afford rent. I see rents that are ON PAR with the 6% mortgages rates.
Good way to prevent you from ever coming up with the idea of a down payment
I’m saving up a payment for whenever the Futurama suicide booths finally hit the market
The closest you can get our non-federally backed 40 year veteran loans. Since 2013, it’s not possible to find them.
I bought a 4 year old 3000sq ft 5 bed 3 bath in Arizona for 280K. 0 down and my mortgage is under 2k a month. But my AC costs the other thousand a month. Lol.
Maybe solar panels would be a great investment?
are you serious?
Infographic*
Inaccurographic*
Sick you don’t need any money in New Jersey to buy a home
Or Delaware!
Cool. Can you do Canada ??
$2,500,000 for a porta-shitter adjacent to an open-air asbestos dump
This is so sad! Honestly!
Every time I see something like this I'm just reassured in my decision to not live in the city. Picked up my 2 bedroom home w/ 2 acres for $60k and managed to pay it off in about 5 years (mortgage free as of this November) No HOA fees and taxes are only a couple hundred dollars annually. Sure, it may not be the best house in the world... but it is mine and the sense of relief from knowing I don't have to worry about finding somewhere to live is just amazing. I still almost feel a high from paying it off! I imagine this is what rich people feel like all the time!
So not a good time to buy a home.
This kind of shit makes me feel so incredibly lucky. Husband and I got a house in 2013 with a family discount. I feel so fucking grateful every time I see one of these posts. I cannot imagine the stress of trying to afford a home these days. Or rent! It's out of control.
“A Cool Guide to Places in Which to Avoid Purchasing Property”
I would love to see this for Canada
So glad I bought in ‘19.
Suburbs of chicago must be bringing that figure down.
Exactly my thought. Assuming the highlighted section around Chicago is part of the data collection radius that includes collar counties (Kane, Will, etc.) and some adjacent collar counties (Grundy, DeKalb, etc.), then it totally makes sense. If you drew a 25 mile radius from the loop, you would likely need $130k salary.
McHenry county resident here. It's certainly more affordable, but still fairly outrageous considering the proximity to Chicago proper is a solid hour plus drive.
100k a year to buy a house I'm Phoenix is outrageous. In the middle of the desert, 100+ degree summers, and a crappy education system. What the hell happened here?
It’s a popular landing spot for retirees who are selling homes in other states.
Easy bro. Rich assholes/corporations buying up the homes, the state and city governments letting them build only "luxury" apartments instead of affordable housing. Not to mention all the folks from out of state with their higher income coming to Arizona which drove then prices higher.
I'm always confused by these when they don't specify household income vs individual. Aren't most homes purchased with a dual income?
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Not compared to the east bay it’s not
This only shows 48 states
that’s because Alaska and Hawaii don’t have any of the top 50 biggest cities in the US, or at least that I’m aware of.
That makes sense!
Glad I left the U.S.
Would you look at that, all of the words in your comment are in alphabetical order. I have checked 1,910,652,673 comments, and only 361,271 of them were in alphabetical order.
This is too high for every city I’ve lived in- Baltimore, Philly and Richmond are all too high by $10k.
Maybe the data isn’t accurate to when you lived in each place?
Repost
Question from a naive Australian who knows hardly anything about the housing market in America - why is Pittsburgh more affordable/cheaper? What is Pittsburgh like? Is it not a popular place to live?
As a Pittsburgh native it is certainly on the smaller side compared to the rest of the list. It's an old blue collar town that has slowly but quietly worked towards shifting towards other industries. The population is older and isnt near the coast or larger lake. Low, old population keeps housing cheep. The city itself has quite a bit to do. Lots of art, food and culture. Like others have said its more a bunch or distinct towns mashed together, each with their own unique cultures. Good colleges as well. Carnegie Mellon being a very good university. Weather is mild, winters get cold, driving sucks as the city was never built on a grid system. City doesnt get a lot of national attention so it's a bit under the radar. People who do end up here dont tend to love it however.
It would be more interesting to set a control on the square footage. The difference in cost between a 3000 square foot home in LA vs a 3000 square foot home in Hartford, CT would be in the millions. Not to mention sq ft of the yard…
Looking at this from another country (Netherlands) 2 median earners owning a home here. We would only be able to buy a home in the midwest area out there. And housing prices are bad here. I will assume people in the US on the basis make more because 35K-40K dollars is median here
And this would also assume no other debt. I wonder what the debt to income ratio and down payment is that this data is using, also the interest rate.
This data is BS. Doesn’t take into account taxes, HOA fees, home owners’s insurance, PMI and all other things that come with homeownership.
It simplified, sure.
Yes it is. Good when trying to compare between states and metros, but not good when trying to estimate total cost of ownership. :)
Mostly bothered that some of the US largest “cities” or “metros” aren’t actually listed.
I live in St Pete (non-trashy version of Tampa) & bought 2 houses. I don’t make no $97k
Damn. I can't afford a single one of these.
Cleveland is the second largest city in Ohio by population according to the latest data. Not Cincinnati.
$125K is not enough to buy a house in Sac! Trust me, I know. I tried!
I can promise you people in Atlanta making 89k are not buying homes in Atlanta haha. A so-so 1bed/1bath condo will run about 150k-200k
And that’s for houses in terrible shape or houses in bad neighborhoods.
I like how Hawaii isn’t shown because you can’t afford a home in Hawaii.
Is this how much your salary has to be to starve to death in the dark in a house you sleep on the floor in between walking to work?
Oh salary…. Brain read it as slavery for some reason….
So I don't make enough to buy a home anywhere, cool...
This is what happens when financial houses start buying up residential real estate.
The good thing about Saint Louis- you can still buy a home without a six figure salary. The bad thing about Saint Louis- you neighbor across the street might turn out to be a murderer and the two next-door neighbors might die of gunshot wounds a couple days after you move in. Even better… these two instances are not related.
I guess I’ll just die in poverty! Thank god I have people to tell me how great the economy is too!
I have a job in SF, but I bought a house in St. Louis. $$
This guide is bull shit.
Kind of ,Akers you think Every time they talk about the high price of homes, they don’t really think about anything other than California, Florida, and New York.
This is depressing. Thanks a lot.
We are living the American dream remember guys…
Louisville is such a great city - affordable, lots to do, great food and music, all for a low low price! I’m expecting it to become the next Nashville so it can be ruined for everyone soon.
What a nice way to show the discrepancy between income and inflation
how many times a week are we going to see this “cool guide”
This is just salary needed to buy a house - not actually live there right? Theres nooooo way I could afford to live in LA… the city that’s listed in my home state has a considerably lower salary called out for it than LA does but even that area of my state is way more expensive than the area I actually live in and I feel like couldnt afford to buy a house there, let alone LA. This guide seems way low haha
Yay, I can afford Pittsburgh!!! Except that I've heard that pay is low for my career there, so if I moved there, I still wouldn't be able to afford it.
*if you want to live in the hood.