California housing crisis affecting middle class the most: It's 'a broken system'

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

26. A couple of thoughts.

First is that the median household income is barely above the national median income. And with housing costs exponentially higher.

Essentially, an income that is middle class in most of the country isn't that in California.

Another thought: that people who bought a couple of decades ago in places like California or NYC are sitting on a gold mine.

My income is below the national median. I bought a home where I live, in Santa Fe, NM, in 2009. The price of my home is significantly below the median value and a great deal less than the median home price here. But at that I live in a perfectly acceptable (to me anyway) two bedroom, two bathroom, three skylight place with about 900 square feet. Suits me perfectly.

Having lived in various parts of the country I'm very aware of differential home prices. I've also lived through more than two boom and bust (or bubbles if you prefer) cycles in home prices. So I'm both hard-headed and skeptical of a lot of blanket claims.

Nearly 20 years ago my then husband got a job offer to Southern California and turned it down because even then we didn't think we could afford a home that would suit us, which included two young children. Perhaps we were wrong and perhaps we turned down the opportunity of a lifetime, but I don't think so.

I will say that I don't even begin to understand how a young couple can possibly buy a home in California given the numbers quoted in the OP.