Dude, this guy isn't talking about some posh high end part of Seattle. I just sold my "quaint 1200sqft starter house" in a remote South Seattle neighborhood for $675,000. It's 45+ minutes by transit to downtown. You know what I paid for that just 5 years earlier? $350,000.

This is the part of town where the grocery store has security guards all over the place, and the bank has thick bulletproof glass between you and the teller, and the transit options such big time. If you want to live anywhere remotely near where the jobs are, every house is near $1m+ now.

Conclude what you want, you're completely wrong and out of touch with current housing prices in a lot cities.

I don't think you are in touch with the reality of the housing market right now. That "posh" neighbourhood that you're referring to is most likely where people were born and raised and the first place you want to buy a home. I live in Etobicoke, Canada. My neighbour across the street growing up recalled a time they built the houses in the neighbourhood and it was previously farm fields. My parents bought their house, a cottage, and paid both off quickly. Property is now selling for almost $2 million. In 2 generations it went from field to affordable to completely unaffordable, and Etobicoke is far from any kind of "rich people lifestyle".

Here's a fun game you can play: https://www.crackshackormansion.com/part2.html

> If your complaint is that you need to be a millionaire to get basic housing, it's because you live with other rich people.

Hawaii would like to have a word with you, unless you suggest every single non-rich local would just have to move to the mainland. I believe the cheapest home I've seen available, where the neighbors aren't cooking meth, is probably in the $500-600k range and going up.

The sad reality of it is such expensive neighborhoods as we see on east and west coasts, don't actually _feel_ luxurious - there's barely enough infrastructure and convenience associated with them, compared to living far away. The standard of living just isn't as high as the price.

“Rich” is highly relative. If someone lives in an area where everything costs on average twice as much as somewhere else, their money is effectively equivalent to half of what it would be somewhere else. The reality is they’re probably looking to afford a upper middle class lifestyle and make an upper middle class household income. They don’t sound “rich”.

I live in rural BFE utah, (Cedar City, 45 minutes east of St George). Average home prices here have gone from 200k to 400k in 3 years. I'm a freelance dev, earn maybe 80k, but that fluctuates a lot, and 400k is a tough number to swallow when it was 200k a few years back, I keep hoping it'll go back to those days, but I doubt it will.

Not really true. Urban areas suffer from this everywhere due to chronic lack of building (due to government policies mostly driven by nimbyism and similar factors). As a result absolute dumps on the bad side of town go for ridiculous sums.