It's a home first and foremost, and a monetary asset second.
If your model is 'grind your 20s-40s away living in a box and then move out' then I implore you to read my comment again.
I am in my late 20s currently, and I'm open to a change in perspective. Maybe there's value in consistency that I will appreciate more at some point. But being told that I won't count as a senior professional until I care about buying property irks me.
My claim is that a senior professional (in _any_ field - not just a senior developer) doesn't care about the cost of rent.
It includes your scenario - of course you should be able to rent and move about if you want to.
If the cost of the rent is heavy on your mind, your position is not that of a senior professional.
The title has become meaningless because it's effectively become an entry-level job.
(Externally it looks like in SF, real entry-level jobs result in, well, homelessness or living in a van or something).
Money-wise, you're no longer throwing it away on rent, but paying down a mortgage that eventually is paid off entirely.
On top of that, you're also no longer racing against the end of the rent contract, and can wait a bit - or move earlier - to find a new place you really like.
The turning point for me was, here in Chicago, when I was renting and my dad sent me some properties with the costs laid out: These places were significantly nicer, and the mortgage cost per month was ~60% what I was paying in rent.
- Illinois is broke and is going to increase real estate taxes every year for the foreseeable future. So while you can also sell to escape the tax bill, the value will just drop to compensate. - There are many fixed costs to buying a place that aren't reflected in the monthly bills. Such as closing costs on both the purchase and sale (including chicago's lovely transfer stamp tax, realtor commissions, etc).
Also keep in mind how many high-rise condo buildings are going up right now. This can only be bad for prices of "old" condos around the city.
I often wonder if London looks worse externally than it actually is (you can afford a house or apartment here if you have a professional job, it's just probably going to involve commuting and not be in a prestigious area).
Of course, if you're something actually socially useful like a teacher or fireman, you're buggerino'd.
I use the term 'house' out of laziness. It's more a commentary on the fact that a 30 year old renting is just incompatible with a decent life in the UK (outside of some secure older council tenancies) whether you live on the ground floor or the fifth floor.
You'll probably have to move every year or two - it's not yours to decorate - the furniture might not be yours - it's not a home, it's a longer-term hotel.
That might be different elsewhere.
You're not going to afford to buy real-estate in San Francisco on a salary. Full stop. You don't buy multi-million-dollar houses when the company might go pear-shaped and leave you without a paycheck, even if your paycheck is in the six figures.
Isn't that double what was discussed in the article?
I think it was good that he focused on rent instead of for-sale price. The sale price includes other factors (property taxes, interest rates, expectation of rent increases) that do not affect the cost of living, and many authors get confused when they complain about rising prices while ignoring rents; see https://www.idiosyncraticwhisk.com/2017/10/housing-part-264-... for further explanation
The median housing price in SF is $1.6M. There is no choice but to rent, or perhaps suffer an absolutely terrible commute.
(And since someone inevitably quips that the entire Bay Area makes $300k+: the $125k in the article is a bit low; the median tech salary is ~$135k. Some lucky souls pulling down massive stock benefits at a FAANG might be making enough total, but those of us not at a FAANG are not so lucky.)
It would be helpful to us who are accustomed to American social life to learn about what you perceive your social life tied into your work life to be like.
There are a whole bunch of people in London doing the flat-share-can't-afford-anything-rent-it-all lifestyle too.
Not everyone wants to live in a tacky huge McMansion that they can fill up with trinkets and garbage they don't use. See? I can make snarky judgemental comments about your lifestyle choices too.
But seriously, not all "competent, rested (???), mature, well-rounded" individuals think living in an rental apartment in a vibrant, walkable neighborhood is the rank indignity you seem to believe it is. They're perfectly happy living in small spaces and spending their money on travel, hobbies, food, and saving for retirement instead.
Sure, the capitalist-economy middle class is defined by having substantial property investments as well as labor income, but there's no reason that has to be in one's primary residence. There are pros and cons of tying up capital in an owner-occupied residence.
The working class worry about making rent.
A senior professional (in any field) cares about building a secure life, buying property, raising a family, saving for retirement.
For a whole bunch of people it's the entire reason they put all of that effort into their craft in the first place (otherwise they'd move out into the country and work on OSS all day).
You're going to struggle to hire competent, rested, mature, well rounded individuals if you expect them to rent tiny flats downtown and have that be their life.
I don't have a visa anyway, but that's part of the reason I haven't bothered looking in to moving to SF.
It seems to be built around the idea that you spend your youth grinding in a rented flat, with rental furniture, using rental cars, buying every meal outside, so that in your 40's you might be able to move out and live a decent life with some modicum of security.
Baffling. Like, what are you going to do socially? You think you'll just "be rich" somewhere else and live in your house with all the other SF migrants?