
There Is No Affordable Housing in America - ourmandave
https://splinternews.com/there-is-no-affordable-housing-in-america-1826806586
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anoncoward111
I agree entirely with the premise of the article. However, I don't understand
why they chose to present data based on hourly wages.

I think a better idea would have been an example like this:

1) In XYZ state, median rent for a 2 bedroom is $1500 (I wish in NY!)

2) Depending on taxation, 25th to 75th percentile AFTER TAX monthly incomes
range from $2500 to $4500 per person.

I think it's a lot easier to work with these statistics rather than having to
multiply a pre-tax hourly wage by 2080 hours in one year, and then divide that
number by 12 and multiply it by 0.3 to get the monthly rent rate they're
using...

Side note, I don't know how anyone affords a mortgage in NY in these market
conditions. Property tax alone is nearly $1,000 per month and thanks to SALT
regulations, is effectively paid with post-tax money...

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cimmanom
Quicker version of the math:

Few people work 5 days or 40 hours every week of the year (for minimum wage
earners, it's typically much messier than that, but as long as we're playing
the "minimum wage earners reliably work 40 hours a week" game, we might as
well play the "minimum wage earners get a few holidays and sick days" one
too). So wage * 2000 is an easy and effective approximation of annual income.

Rent should be no more than 30% of monthly income, which is the same as 1/40
of annual income (which is how rental brokers quickly calculate how much
salary earners can afford).

1/40 annual income = 1/40 * wage * 2000 = wage * 2000/40 = wage * 50.

So you shouldn't be putting more than 50 hours' worth of work into housing
every month.

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anoncoward111
Thanks for the math :) I know many people putting an entire paycheck towards
housing alone, not including car, food, different types of insurance, internet
devices etc

And this is just for rent! You don't even get to keep the asset after you've
paid for it. And forget about buying a place-- supply is deliberately
constricted so that we just pay someone else's mortgage instead :|

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cimmanom
Yup. Being unable to pay for housing in 50 hrs/mo is what makes it
unaffordable.

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tunap
Welcome to Wall Street, USA. When it gets really bad, PERHAPS Glass-Steagal
will be reimplimented. As bad as it is, apparently wage slave conditions must
be worse before change is considered. Are 60 year mortgages a thing yet?

