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nevercontribute1 t1_j7m1l0d wrote

Reply to comment by Cheap_Coffee in These housing numbers are insane. In some towns the cost to buy a house is 10x the average salary. by LopsidedWafer3269

This is the reality of the situation... it's not "income" that is driving this, it's "wealth". And if you don't come from it, you lose.

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JaKr8 t1_j7nolhs wrote

We split our time between a couple of States throughout the year. In our Connecticut neighborhood the average house is currently about $900k. I know at least 5 of my neighbors had family money, or parents who helped them purchase the house. There is no way the legal secretary 3 houses away could possibly afford a house in this neighborhood on a typical salary for that job. We purchased 15 years ago for about half that amount.

In our Berkshire neighborhood, the houses are probably about $450K. We also purchased that for less than half of that amount about 8 years ago. We are the only people who have bought in that neighborhood in the past 15 years, so most of those people bought for far less than that, and several of the houses there were built on subdivided land from their parents, so there are many multi generation families in the neighborhood as well.

There is a lot of family money floating around, especially in New England.

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Starrion t1_j7pd5k2 wrote

Bet I know where the nicer people are

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SmartSherbet t1_j7ndo2m wrote

Which is why wealth needs to be heavily taxed.

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nevercontribute1 t1_j7nfq40 wrote

Agreed 100%. Wealth tax and inheritance tax should be what we all fight for, but we all get manipulated into fighting over everything else.

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3720-To-One t1_j83xji3 wrote

What we need is for the state to take over zoning from local municipalities.

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