Salaries in SFBA are higher, but not 5 times higher than in Houston, while houses are in fact over five times more expensive.

Salaries do not need to be 5x in order to have 5x housing, that's not how supply and demand works.

Poop town SF is becoming less aspirational by the year.

And can you really say SF is aspirational if Houston is growing 4 times faster?

Neither of these items are true.

As globalization increases, there is ever more increasing demand for SF/Bay real estate, it's becoming ever more elite due to the fixed nature of housing.

'All things being equal' in terms of cost, SF would be the choice 8 times out of 10 for people as a destination. SF boundaries are fixed, housing is limited, Houston is large and has room for new housing; Houston's growth is due to affordability, not because it's aspirational.

'Tourism' isn't a perfect estimation of livable aspiration, I mean, Orlando gets massive numbers of visitors each year, but SF gets a huge number of visitors as well without 'Disneyland/Epcot' to draw them in, even with a relatively small population, it's a top tourist destination in the US. [1]. Houston doesn't get a lot of tourists.

Also, Houston's population growth has slowed dramatically, with new births accounting for more than the ingress population this year.

[1] https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-most-visited-cities-...

With worker mobility ever increasing in this world, the demand for the 'nice spots' skyrockets.