Having lived in Houston in recent years, there is absolutely no way the median single family house price is $141k. Having personally done house shopping in Houston, the absolute cheapest houses available were about $140k and you had to drive 30-45 minutes out of downtown to get there. The source for the $141k figure is a linked PDF that is no longer available.
Additionally, Houston is huge in terms of landmass. Look at housing prices for the vast majority of the people who actually commute to the Houston city center and it'd be massively higher. A Simpsons style house and yard that's "in the loop" could easily be a million dollars in Houston. I know people with smaller houses and smaller yards whose homes are nearly a million.
Just because you don’t like the neighborhood or schools doesn’t mean they don’t exist (image shows homes for under $150k in Houston, assume the ones inside the loop are condos)
Additionally, Houston is huge in terms of landmass. Look at housing prices for the vast majority of the people who actually commute to the Houston city center and it'd be massively higher. A Simpsons style house and yard that's "in the loop" could easily be a million dollars in Houston. I know people with smaller houses and smaller yards whose homes are nearly a million.