"But you still can't buy a house in San Francisco."

Are you in a dual income family, and have you considered buying areas like the Excelsior, Ingleside heights (excluding Ingleside terrace), Oceanview/Merced Heights, Outer Mission, Portola, Silver Terrace, or other such neighborhoods?

I don't mean to dismiss your question, these are still expensive neighborhoods, probably between 800k-1.2mil for something decent. This is tough for two incomes, as the dual income thing means you're also stuck with high childcare costs, which will probably be ~25k per kid in San Francisco (I'm talking about the kind that allows you to go to work from 8am-6pm - and even then you will have to recuse yourself from meetings to be at daycare by 6pm, officially surrendering your membership in the young people are just smarter and can focus on what's important club in Silicon Valley companies[1).

I do think this is in reach of the group you just described, though. 250k+ family income isn't unusual for two tech workers or other professionals in SF (a programmer and dental hygienist pair, for example, should exceed this).

[1] https://venturebeat.com/2007/03/26/start-up-advice-for-entre...

I agree 100%. I meant to sum up the prevailing attitude on housing out here.

It’s relative on how you define wealth really - ability to provide stability in the form of a mortgage, or amount of money you make.

I feel like in SF or any big expensive city owning a home is not something for the middle or upper middle class - there’s a point that no matter how many brunches or vacations you can take, you can’t trade them for a house except in an area where you’ll be basically going down in economic and social class (live out in Tracy or something, have a 2 hour one way commute, far fewer vacations etc). The trade off for that “stability” isn’t one that a lot of people currently renting think is a good deal. IMO the best way to do it is keep on renting while putting as much money in investments and retirement funds as one can, with the idea of retiring somewhere else, or only buying if you get a windfall.

But I’m terms of lifestyle, those in that 9.9% have a far richer one than the rest, but they don’t have the long term security of owning their own home.

Owning a home is overrated, it owns you.

The problem is, renting often ends up owning you too. I'm no stranger to the anxiety of leaky pipes, dry rot, flooded garages, water damage, crazy people you can't easily more away from. On the other hand, I know people who have had to move a few times now because their rent keeps getting jacked up. Single family houses, as well as apartments in many Bay Area cities, aren't rent controlled, so you never know when you're going to be looking at a huge rent increase.

Choose your poison.

Depends how big the home is.

Relative to your income.

My home was about $120k. It’s easily affordable on a tech industry salary. The median household income in my county is under $30k...

Ahh, so you mean the debt owns you, not the house per se.

I'm not jacob019, who originally made the comment, but as I understand it, the point was not the debt. The point was the maintenance. When the basement floods, it's my problem, not the landlords. When the attic fan fails (I was surprised that attics had fans), it's my problem. When the driveway concrete starts to buckle, it's my problem.

In that sense, the house owns you, not the other way around.

this.

That’s what I thought you meant at first, hence my size comment.

Is this just a general comment about mortgages? As it stands, my mortgage is significantly less than most people's as a proportion of my income.

>Yep, you see it a lot in San Francisco

The median household income across San Francisco and San Mateo counties is $115k. People who make close to that are entirely justified in calling themselves middle class. Spending half your take-home on a crappy $2500 apartment doesn't make you rich just because the apartment is in SF.

Homes in Pleasanton are expensive... not sure what you are on about..