On: Wages in America Are Too Low for the 30% Rule to Work for Renters Anymore

[beej71]

I don't think it's that simple. In my town, we're building like mad (thousands of units) and it is possibly slightly impacting pricing in that the rise is not as meteoric as it was 7 years ago. But new buyers are still priced out. Houses are vacant. There must be other factors.

[shagie → beej71]

The cost of land and labor to build a house is relatively the same no matter what house you build. This also applies to apartment buildings.

Fancy it up a bit (mostly nicer appliances) beyond that and you take a $300k house to a $1M house.

Developers make about 20% on the total ( https://www.nahb.org/news-and-economics/press-releases/2025/... ). They'd rather make 20% of $1M than 20% of $300k. Same work crew either way.

Next question then becomes "is it better to sell 3 houses at $1M each ($600k for the developer) out of 10, or all 10 houses at $300k ($600k for the developer)?"

This also applies to apartments. Do you build 200 "luxury" units? or 200 affordable ones?