Another thing people are doing are moving in with each other or living with parents for a bit longer…Know some folks in my kids school doing this (stay with parents mostly to get the good area schools).

People think using half income on rent is normal because for places like here and LA and Bay area, that seems to be the norm now. Rent is just too high so unless your income or IPO riches will get you there, I’d suggest most people leave.

If it was me and I had to do it all over again, I’d probably just have roommates assuming I was young (20s). Heck, I did have room mates for a long while when I started work. When you have, say a room in a house in a nice area, each person can split say 4 rooms at 1k/month and that’s not really that bad…Better yet to just “live” at work and not even pay (or live in a camper in the parking lot).

So glad I don’t have to worry about rent going up or down!