Few milestones in life mean as much to the American Dream as owning a home. And millennials have encountered the kind of trouble totally befitting their generation, which largely graduated into the teeth of the disastrous post-2008 job market. Just as they entered peak homebuying and household formation age, housing affordability is at 40-year lows, and mortgage rates are near 40-year highs.
The anxiety this generation feels about the prospect of never owning their own home affects their entire perception of their finances and the economy, says Moody’s chief economist Mark Zandi.
“If they feel like they’re locked out of owning a home it colors their perceptions about everything else going on in their financial lives,” Zandi says.
Millennials have long been dogged by a brutal housing market. They faced not one, but two, cataclysmic economic events—the Great Financial Crisis in 2008 and the pandemic in 2020. Both of which left them reeling financially and struggling to afford a home. The Great Recession decimated the real estate market as the economy nearly collapsed under the weight of tenuous mortgage backed securities. While the pandemic brought with it a remote work boom that caused millions of citydwellers to flee to the suburbs, sending housing prices soaring.
They aren’t lying. The housing market has become incredibly prohibitive due to how property prices have gone up with speculation and demand.
Maybe the older millennials can afford a home eventually, but they’ll be 10-15 years behind their parents into achieving that goal.
Even in Canada, in the cheapest city to live in, Montreal, 1 and 2 bedrooms go for about 400k. Houses are over half a million. You can’t afford these with our average wages unless you’re in a couple and have a very solid down payment.
I’m with you. In my area which has traditionally been very affordable (mountain ski town in CA), houses are now starting at $500k for absolute pieces of shit and only go up from there. Most of the housing stock up here is compromised of second/vacation homes, many with deferred maintenance due to absentee owners or have been thrashed by years of partying tourists/local renters. A number of these houses should be condemned, but they still fetch a premium.
At this point, it would be cheaper to build a house, but lot prices are through the roof ($100k starting for anything remotely with a yard, no financing possible on land here), and lumber/materials are insane as well. I’m in construction and have plenty of friends in as well, so it’s certainly feasible. And at the end of the day, building our own modest bungalow and expanding as money becomes available would still be cheaper than buying an old piece of junk requiring all the repairs, especially with the reduced maintenance costs and building to modern efficiency standards.
Shit like this is what I am talking about.
This is so deeply out to lunch it’s laughable.
Post your sources for that mate, I live in a major city in Canada and I assure you those numbers are hyper inflated.
I fucking live here. I bought my 2 bedroom condo in 2019 at 380k. My next door neighbor who has a unit line mine just sold his for over 400k.
I’m the fucking source.
How close to the centre? I find near the centre of cities the prices become hyper inflated aggressively, but slightly outside that wtf zone the hyperinflation wears off fast and prices go back to being sane just 1 step out from the centre.
I can understand that price if it’s downtown near the core, but outside of that sounds like a scam.
The same here out west is like 200k if not downtown. Downtown the price can shoot up to 1mil but it’s largely a scam and inflated. Drive like 10min out and the price drops pretty fast and out in the suburbs you can get 2 bedroom houses for less than your condo cost.
Looking it up, Montreal itself has about a dozen or two 2bed homes for 200k-300k that are in good shape, but in that “non core” ring.
And as soon as I expand out to include nearby towns within 45 minutes you get literally like a hundred+ hits that all look solid.
Looks like starters are around 250k to 275k within 30min of the center, and then drop down to 225k if you expand out to 45min.
Very reasonable price, a smidge on the high side but definitely way lower than “400k for a condo”
https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/26284331/5445-rue-de-la-légion-longueuil-saint-hubert-orchard
https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/26332130/240-rue-des-terrasses-saint-marc-sur-richelieu
https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/25733996/12-rue-de-lespérance-saint-charles-sur-richelieu
Two of those are even 3bed houses. So yeah, your numbers are either bullshit, or your condo is near the city centre and way inflated compared to the rest of the city.
Or you got scammed.
I live in Hochelaga. A historically poor neighborhood. The units in my building started at 100k in 2010 when it was built.
I bought in 2019. All the places we visited were sold ~100k over asking price. Ours was 300k but we had to make an offer 80k over asking to be sure to get it.
The prices shown in realtor aren’t the prices the places are actually going for. They put a lower price knowing people are going to offer more. When they don’t get the offer they want, they cancel and start over.
Have you ever even bought a place? Do you even know what the market is like today in reality? Or are you just basing yourself on a few anecdotal posts on realtor.ca? What constitutes a reasonable price for a property for you exactly???
Edit: Who the fuck would live in Saint-Marc-sur-Richelieu to work in Montréal??? That’s over two hours by car in traffic. That area isn’t even considered the “greater Montreal area” because of how far that is. You’d know that if you ever lived here. Your examples are complete bullshit. And I’m sorry but that little shack in Longueuil? For 245k??? Are you fucking kidding? That piece of shit house shouldn’t even go for over 100k. Is that what you call reasonable?
Get the fuck out. You’re a troll.
I have, I bought a quite recently.
While shopping, homes we looked at had been on market for awhile, and there was no such case of what you described. We actually got our house for 15k under listed, as we found a couple minor issues we brought up to get the tag knocked down during inspection.
There continue to still be houses for sale in the area at reasonable prices, I’ve seen some take weeks on end to sell.
And I never found the prices listed on realty sites to be off from actual sale.
Well good for you.
How much was it? What town, if you don’t mind me asking? And how long did it take you too save enough for your down payment?
Edmonton, AB.
265k, 2 bed, 1.5 bath, unfinished basement, no garage, definitely a bot of a fixer (has a lot of landlord specials left behind we had to put work into fixing up)
Took a year and a half to save up the down payment + nest egg at ~$700/month set aside by cutting out a lot of expenses and living sorta frugal. No mcdonalds, no buying fun stuff, meal prepping, canceling subscriptions, etc etc.
We were at the time making a total of 70k combined before taxes. We could’ve prolly saved even more but we didn’t want to go full peasant mode, lol.
I also had a large chunk of crypto from many years prior (~12k value at the time we signed the mortgage) I could’ve dipped into if needed, but we actually never needed to sell out that for the house and I wanted to keep holding it.
Good thing I didn’t give in and sell, because a year later that 12k turned into 22k and I used that to substantially improve the home and build my makerspace in the basement, as well as build my garden in the back.
The house is definitely got a lot of… character… but I’m very happy with it and I don’t need or want a bigger home. It’s small with a big yard which means less space to clean, and all the fixing stuff keeps me busy.
I could do with less electrical issues though, prior owners didn’t seem to give a shit about proper wiring work and I’ve had to basically re-install every switch and plug in the house. Also went on a fun adventure pulling ethernet through the attic to got modern wired gigabit internet delivered to key points in the house so everything didn’t have to use wifi. Added security cameras, a PoE switch and server rack in the basement, and got air conditioning installed recently too.
House feels like a home now, and that’s what matters.
I have lived in several major Canadian cities in my life and I can assure everyone that this guy is a fuckin dumbass.
Come visit me in Vancouver where a two bedroom rents for 3700 on average and avg home price is 1.2m. ‘Avg home’ being a 750sq foot condo with $350/month strata(HOA) fees.
We used to live in Montreal and thought that was pricey when we saw rents hit $2000. I do anything for that kind of rent:space ratio now.