I am the equivalent of a long time listener first time caller but I just had to jump in on this one. I recently moved to California after being gone for school for the last couple years. In the meantime I got my bachelors, got married, and am expecting my first child.
Although I make around $80,000 out of school working for a large telecommunications company and my wife also works in finance we are completely priced out of the market. With an income that many envy we couldn’t even afford a tiny condo following traditional lending standards!
Although we are savvy and know better than to buy at the top of the biggest housing boom in history, I can’t help but feel that current home owners are being selfish. They are too concerned with protecting their enormous gains to consider that they are effectively handicapping an entire generation. All the while explaining everything away saying that our generation wants everything now.. like a salary large enough to afford rent and have money left over to buy a little food! Sure there are people that mooch off their rich parents forever…but not all of us. Some of us work and pay our way through college and work long hours to make the ends meet.
Do homeowner “deserve” these gains or were they in the right place at the right time for a huge windfall profit? If we want windfall profit tax for big oil, maybe we should enforce a windfall profit tax for big property owner, no?
Now I don’t want anyone to get me wrong, I wish I was in the position of someone who’s starter home is now a million dollar mansion. If I was older I would love selling off now and handing the gains to my wife who has a history working for Goldman Sachs and other investment banks so we could build a massive fortune.
The point is everyone is so concerned with propping up the price of a home to protect people from their mortgages and at the same time love to write news article about my generation’s “failure to launch”
Well I don’t live with my parents and I have a real job. I rent a one bedroom in a forty year old apartment in Tustin, CA for more than my parents mortgage. My neighbors are young lawyers, investment bankers etc.
Good money in southern California just isn’t good money right now. Can’t wait for the crash.
