Not sure where these numbers come from but they're entirely incongruous with my lived experience and that of my friends.
Edit: to be more concrete, you can today buy a spacious 2 bedroom condo in the South Loop right by the El for about $300k (I know because I used to own one). This would basically get you a broom closet if looking for something by the T in Boston (if you're lucky).
You can read more about the methodology behind those numbers on the cited website. They even provide the data behind the statistics for your own review. The purpose of my citation was to provide statistical evidence to counter your anecdotal experience of living in both places.
Especially nicer areas in Boston (and Cambridge) proper have expensive housing. Not Bay Area expensive, but expensive.
That said, a lot of tech and related industries aren't in the city proper. Indeed, it's relatively recent that tech companies started moving back into the city proper after almost completely vacating it. And suburbs range from fairly expensive to, if not cheap, moderate. (I live about an hour west and my house on multiple acres is probably worth in the $400-500K range.
On the topic of cars, I would say that much of Boston and Cambridge is fairly navigable without a car. But it's not a car-free culture like NY largely is. People I know who live in the city but wither commute to jobs outside, visit friends in the suburbs, do outdoor activities in NH and elsewhere all own cars. You can manage without one. I did as a student. But it's pretty limiting, even with Uber, ZipCar, and so forth, if you want to leave the city on a regular basis.
Well my experience is colored by having moved here from Chicago, which is a city with a lot more going on, while at the same time having at least 40% lower housing cost. Prices are quite comparable to those in parts of say Brooklyn, but there's almost no cool cultural sustenance to make up for it. Just a bunch of biotech bros, doctors and university students.
I could see that. Visiting from the Bay I was blown away by Chicago. Every facet of that city seems studded with cultural gems, whether that be public spaces, museums, public art, history, architecture, nightlife.
The area is colonial in age, but has thousands of college students and thousands of highly paid professional workers. This means both the apartment and the housing markets have huge demand, and people simply pay, because the alternative is to commute through terrible traffic and extra 60 min daily.
That's true although many (probably most) of the tech-related jobs are not actually in the city. In my experience, most people working in those jobs live in the suburbs/exurbs (and even in NH). It's mostly the branches of the west coast companies that are in the city as well as other industries like finance and healthcare.
