But even if the median income were €100k, the €400k level was around the cheapest I could find that you could actually live in and wasn't a weekend house, or a reverse-mortgage you'd only get to use when the seller died, or a building opportunity with no land, or they're rented out and as Germany has fantastic protection for tenants you are not going to move in etc.
If the standard is 4 years, even then you'd be excluding 50% of the households from ownership at €100k/year and €400k minimum prices. As is, €43k/year is closer to 9.5 years income still not being enough for 50% of households.
> not everyone gets to be on software engineering pay scales
Not everyone gets to live the most popular places.
> The median pre-tax household income in Berlin is €43,572
Seems like Germany can not afford to not allow mothers into the work place.
Edit: At a median household income of EUR 43k the issue is not housing prices. in Denmark the median salary (not household) is 73.000 EUR a year. I think Germans need to negotiate their salaries.
> Not everyone gets to live the most popular places.
Definitionally, everyone who actually lives in a place must be able to afford that place. If people suddenly can't, they leave, it's now less popular.
Right now, it's rent controls which allow most Berliners to live in Berlin. Without that, many would be forced to leave, making the city less popular, and thus less expensive.
(Perverse incentives, yay!)
> Edit: At a median household income of EUR 43k the issue is not housing prices. in Denmark the median salary (not household) is 73.000 EUR a year. I think Germans need to negotiate their salaries.
As a salaried person one has a responsibility of putting and upwards pressure on the salary (with the help from unions) - companies have the responsibility of making their ventures profitable.
Anecdotally, Tesla Berlin pays in the range 50-60k/year in Berlin (for SWE roles) - I am quite sure they are able to pay muuuch more.
So either are workers in Berlin less than half as effective as Tesla's other offices or Berliners accepts a much lower pay.
GDP is a number - If the Berliner kebab was priced at 12 EUR instead of 6 EUR, then they could afford paying double the salary - The rest of the world is about to add zeroes to everything. Why wouldn't Berlin?
My thinking is that this is Europeans focussing on "budget rather than profitting".
> If the Berliner kebab was priced at 12 EUR instead of 6 EUR, then they could afford paying double the salary
And then the houses and the land also double, or house builder's salaries real term wages halve and the workers leave and stop building stuff. Land prices are harder to draw conclusions about, but the owners have to want to sell at the price being asked, which is ultimately what the market will bear.
> The rest of the world is about to add zeroes to everything. Why wouldn't Berlin?
At a median household income of EUR 43k there is definitely not a housing cost crisis in the Berlin area - there is a stagnant wage crisis.
This is roughly 1/3 of the Danish household income. If I were German I would riot for higher salaries - we simply can not accept such disparities in a modern world with movement of labor and remote work.
It seems like German fear is what forces the ECB to lower the interest rates causing severe asset price inflation in Denmark.
But even if the median income were €100k, the €400k level was around the cheapest I could find that you could actually live in and wasn't a weekend house, or a reverse-mortgage you'd only get to use when the seller died, or a building opportunity with no land, or they're rented out and as Germany has fantastic protection for tenants you are not going to move in etc.
If the standard is 4 years, even then you'd be excluding 50% of the households from ownership at €100k/year and €400k minimum prices. As is, €43k/year is closer to 9.5 years income still not being enough for 50% of households.