Thanks Gerty and Strantor for the prices in Tennessee and Houston TX.

I'm a bit shocked seeing MEDIAN house prices of $25k in Detroit! That means average normal houses in normal neighbourhoods? Or are there so many "fire damaged" $1 houses in crime ridden slums it brings the median price right down?

Tennessee is sounding good with $53k houses in nice white neighbourhoods.

I'm not sure about Detroit, I don't want to move somewhere over-run with black gangs and mexican gangs.

 

I wonder what was the wage/housing price ratio before the crash in the US.

Here in my region you buy a middle sized home for about 100k to 250k, which is already cheap for Canada. A technician here where I live earns like 40k to 50k, not much more.

When I see that housing prices in the US dropped by about 40% (I read somewhere) the wages must have been lower as well, otherwise the ratio would be very different, such that you could have paid a house in a few years...

Anyone has the data? Before 2006?

 

I don't have data outside my own perception, but it my area it seems housing prices haven't dropped as much as 40%, and I don't think wages have dropped much either.

 

Here in Utah Wages never increased, it's a right to work state little or no Unions.

Homes inflated like elsewhere in the U.S. but, the wages didn't follow the increase. Homes before the boom a 75k home went to around 160k for a median size 3 bedroom 1 bath. It's back down a bit, the same home is around 120k. Still nothing more on wages, if they do increase it's to adjust for the rising cost of Health Insurance.

 

Here in Utah Wages never increased, it's a right to work state little or no Unions.

Homes inflated like elsewhere in the U.S. but, the wages didn't follow the increase. Homes before the boom a 75k home went to around 160k for a median size 3 bedroom 1 bath. It's back down a bit, the same home is around 120k. Still nothing more on wages, if they do increase it's to adjust for the rising cost of Health Insurance.

Ok, that more or less answers my question. Average salary in Utah for an Electronics Technician would be 40k according to the internet. That means buying a home was/is more affordable in the US than in Canada. Although I don't know how much one would get out of the 40k over there. Here it's about a third that goes away for taxes etc.

 

I wonder what was the wage/housing price ratio before the crash in the US.

Depends on if you're talking before or afte the bubble. Just before the crash, prices spiked up and the ratio would be low.

When I see that housing prices in the US dropped by about 40% (I read somewhere) the wages must have been lower as well, otherwise the ratio would be very different, such that you could have paid a house in a few years...

Wages were stagnant, but many people were out of work, so their wages were zero.

 

Depends on if you're talking before or afte the bubble. Just before the crash, prices spiked up and the ratio would be low.

Ok, I meant before the bubble, back when everything was normal.

 

It vaires by region. In Atlanta, for example, my fiancee's house was valued at around 120K before the bubble. Now, it's valued at about half that. Some places were hit harder than others.

Wages meanwhile stayed flat.

 

Thanks Gerty and Strantor for the prices in Tennessee and Houston TX.

I'm a bit shocked seeing MEDIAN house prices of $25k in Detroit! That means average normal houses in normal neighbourhoods? Or are there so many "fire damaged" $1 houses in crime ridden slums it brings the median price right down?

Tennessee is sounding good with $53k houses in nice white neighbourhoods.

I'm not sure about Detroit, I don't want to move somewhere over-run with black gangs and mexican gangs.

Stay out of TN its the most racist place on earth across the board. If our from a progressive area DO NOT MOVE TO TN. The white people hate the black people and the black people hated the white people. Hispanics were all laborers and farmworkers, almost no other races. Nashvilles not as bad because its not a melting pot but its still way off from anything in the westcoast, FL, or the NE. South or Midwest might be able to handle it. I couldn't. By a year I just wanted to leave as bad as possible and come someplace where people were civilized.

 

Ok, I meant before the bubble, back when everything was normal.

That's actually part of the problem. We talk about "the bubble" as if the bubble were the collapsing home market and as if everything were fine and normal before the home market collapsed.

First, the "bubble" did not happen in 2008 -- it ended in 2008 (or thereabouts depending on what definition you use). The bubble had been growing for many, many years (decades) prior to the bubble "bursting" in 2008. So if you really mean "before the bubble, back when everything was normal", you've got to go back a long time. During the bubble things were NOT normal. They were artificially expanding at unsustainable rates. All kinds of games were played in order to prevent the bubble from bursting but the only games that can do that (or that were found that could do that) worked by continuing to inflate the bubble. There's a limit to how long you can do that and the more you push it the more fragile the bubble becomes until it only takes a tiny pinprick to pop it.

The really sad and scary part is that the housing bubble was not the only one and there are many others -- national debt, social security, Medicare, public pension plans, etc, etc -- that are just as unsustainable and that we steadfastly refuse to deal with since any approach that will actually deal with them will be painful. So we keep kicking the can down the road. But already notice that we used to kick some of those cans several years down the road each time and now we are only able to kick them a couple months down the road. The Piper is coming!

 

The Piper is coming!

Tell me about it. I think I have managed to convince some folks here that basically everything we are doing now and have been doing in the past is not sustainable. The crash is coming.

 

The bubble had been growing for many, many years (decades) prior to the bubble "bursting" in 2008. So if you really mean "before the bubble, back when everything was normal", you've got to go back a long time.

Ok, just had a look at some curves. I would have to go back to 1940. From 1900 to 1940 the real estate index was about steady.

But this is not what I meant. I meant the time when everybody was "thinking" it was normal. Just wanted to have a comparison of how much would have taken it in let's say the year 2000 for a person earning an average salary of for example 40k to pay back his mortgage, and how much would he have had to pay each month.

Therefore the ratio: typical house price/average salary before everything became really crazy. Not for a house that is falling apart nor for one that costs millions.. The average lower middle class home.

 

As you almost certainly realize at this point, the answer to that question on a national scale is not going to be very meaningful. You really need to look at regional data and probably even much narrower.

If I were answering this question in a serious way (and getting paid for it), I would probably track down the median income and median home value on a county-by-county basis and then group the counties by median income. But one problem with this is that the mapping between income and home value is skewed because most of the people that don't own a home are going to be on one side of the median income.

Another source, but it might take some digging, would be to contact the various industry trade organizations associated with real estate and/or mortgages. There's almost some data base somewhere that contains data about selling price and income of each home sale and from which you could get anonymized or aggregated data to play with. I wouldn't be surprised if you could find charts where someone has done exactly this (or something similar) in one of the trade publications.

 

Stay out of TN its the most racist place on earth across the board. If our from a progressive area DO NOT MOVE TO TN. The white people hate the black people and the black people hated the white people. Hispanics were all laborers and farmworkers, almost no other races. Nashvilles not as bad because its not a melting pot but its still way off from anything in the westcoast, FL, or the NE. South or Midwest might be able to handle it. I couldn't. By a year I just wanted to leave as bad as possible and come someplace where people were civilized.

That's a pretty broad brush you're using. I don't know where you lived or when you lived there, but we don't have the problems you describe, and if those situations do exist, they are few and far in between.

 

Ok, that more or less answers my question. Average salary in Utah for an Electronics Technician would be 40k according to the internet. That means buying a home was/is more affordable in the US than in Canada. Although I don't know how much one would get out of the 40k over there. Here it's about a third that goes away for taxes etc.

Yet another good thing about TN...No state income tax.

 

Stay out of TN its the most racist place on earth across the board. If our from a progressive area DO NOT MOVE TO TN. The white people hate the black people and the black people hated the white people. ...

OK, let's please try and avoid any "race issues" which seem to be a problem in some areas of the US.

As far as "disliking black people" is that even an issue if most of the community is white and good hearted law abiding citizens? I've talked with people from Florida and Southern California where there are a lot of blacks and hispanics and very high crime and violence, where people even homeshool their kids because the public schools and the streets are too dangerous to let their kids out...

Those areas are "progressive" to the max. And I don't want to live there.

My preference would be an area with less crime and violence, and it that correlates to an area with less "progressiveness" maybe that price is worth paying?

 

First, the "bubble" did not happen in 2008 -- it ended in 2008

By "bubble" we mean the sharp spike on home prices that occurred between 2005 and 2008 (or so) In many areas, home prices doubled or tripled. My take is the question is more like "what are the prices of homes now compared to before the sharp rise in prices during the bubble of 2005-2008?" My sister's home in southern cal, for example, nearly doubled in appraised price, only to plummet below it's value before 2005. My house in northern alabama didn't get such a large increase in value, but then didn't fall as far when the bubble burst either.

 

Stay out of TN its the most racist place on earth across the board. If our from a progressive area DO NOT MOVE TO TN. The white people hate the black people and the black people hated the white people. Hispanics were all laborers and farmworkers, almost no other races. Nashvilles not as bad because its not a melting pot but its still way off from anything in the westcoast, FL, or the NE. South or Midwest might be able to handle it. I couldn't. By a year I just wanted to leave as bad as possible and come someplace where people were civilized.

I totally resent your condemnation of my home state, and don't agree with it in the slightest. However, you are entitled to your opinions, no matter how irrational they are.

 

Ok, that more or less answers my question. Average salary in Utah for an Electronics Technician would be 40k according to the internet. That means buying a home was/is more affordable in the US than in Canada. Although I don't know how much one would get out of the 40k over there. Here it's about a third that goes away for taxes etc.

40k is a bit high for a Tech Position, but I'll use that figure. They do clever things like throwing in your Health Insurance benefits to account for total Annual Salary. The reality is Benefits Package to them is worth 15k but, you don't see the cash.

(40k - 15k) has just been reduced to around 25k my responsibility is $3,000yr out of pocket for the benefits package, now I'm down to 22k the deductible on the benefits has to be met which is $1,500 before anything major (Surgery etc.) now I'm a little over $20,500k, once taxes hit which is about $4500yr.

The reality is I went from 40k to around 16k.

A Gal of milk is around $2.50 and Gas around $3.69gal.

 

Around here, there are lots (and I mean lots) of houses that are abandoned, or sitting vacant. Most are bank owned...but the banks are un-interested in foreclosing or selling the property. Sometimes, they hire a junkie (recycler) to come in and clean out the house, but most of them are sitting vacant and the bank has no interset in fixing them or even trying to sell them without some kind of a state government assistance program to secure the financing...so they just sit.

Cheers, DPW [ Everything has limitations...and I hate limitations.]