Why is it that everyone always forgets about detached vs. attached?
The only way to get “median multiple” of 6.0 in San Diego, is to divide the median DETACHED price of $360k by the median household income of $60k, even though 40% of San Diego county households (and over 50% of San Diego city households) do not live in detached houses. Cunningham’s 4.2 makes more sense.
Naturally, places with “prescriptive land regulation” (read: limited land) have more apartments/condos and places with lots of land have more detached houses.
On the other hand, it appears that whoever did the chart used the correct metric (detached+attached) at least for some countries. In Dublin (Ireland), median HH income is hard to pin down but seems to be around €50k, median detached+attached price is €240k, and median detached price is upwards of €500k. (That’s after a 50% drop from the peak of the bubble.) In Manchester (UK), median HH income is under £30k, median detached+attached price is £150k, median detached price is £300k.
One big difference between San Diego and Dublin/Manchester is that, in San Diego, there are sufficiently many detached houses that they can be seen (erroneously) as “the” real estate market. In Dublin or Manchester, detached houses are almost nonexistent, account for less than 10% of total real estate.
