You may be right, but people come in a normal distribution, with most being just average. To "do whatever it takes" implies a person on the extreme right of the distribution, and most people aren't there. So while it may be possible to buy a home, if it takes extreme effort to do it, most people won't.
Whereas, when I grew up in the 60's, my dad worked as a bag boy at Kroger, then a meatcutter. We had a small 3br house, 2 kids, a car, a motorcycle, a boat, insurance on all this stuff, and mom worked out of the house doing babysitting and ironing. They were still in their early 20's and got married right out of high school. We eventually had 2 cars while still in this house, around '65. Nothing even remotely like this would be possible today.
New House: $25,200.00
Average Income: $10,622.00 per year
New Car: $3,560.00
Average Rent: $150.00 per month
Tuition to Harvard University: $2,600.00 per year
Movie Ticket: $1.50 each
Gasoline: 40¢ per gallon
United States Postage Stamp: 8¢ each
The greatest takeaway for me is that everyone is FAR worse off today and in my generation.
US nationally (today 2021) about 85K is equivalent to the cited 25K 1971 numbers. :: ~10X cost of living (edited, I unconsciously compared to the wrong number.)
Seattle is far more distorted, with housing beyond out of control (I don't know what kind of house was being looked at for the 1971 numbers, but it really doesn't matter, there's almost nothing even remotely near the national price within the region). ::
Seattle's rent is completely out of control; beyond any rational measure. No wonder neither I nor my generation can make any savings; it's all being consumed by rent seeking land owners.
Income 10600 %Income71
House 25200 237.736
Car 3600 33.962
RentYear 1800 16.981
UniYear 2600 24.528
Gas5000mi 100 0.943
Mail500invite 40 0.377
-
USA 2021 Equiv71
House 269000 113151
Car 30500 89806
RentYear 14400 84800
UniYear 26100 106408
Gas5000mi 483.33 51233
Mail500invite 290 76850
-
Seattle 2021 Equiv71
House 750000 315476
Car 30500 89806
RentYear 36000 212000
UniYear 31200 127200
Gas5000mi 533.33 56533
Mail500invite 290 76850
This line of thinking in my opinion is the problem. Before I start, I will admit I have survivorship bias.
The points you mentioned are problems, but in my opinion that's not an excuse. One of your points you mentioned that it's now harder than ever to buy a home because Blackrock is scooping all of them up. While I agree that it certainly makes getting a home harder. I think if anyone truly wants a home and is willing to do whatever they need to in order to get it, they can get it. Same goes for just about everything else, if you want something, and you're willing to do whatever it takes to get it, you can do it.
All the problems you mentioned are roadblocks, not showstoppers. I think these days it's easier to just make the excuse that there are all these things standing in our way thus making it impossible for us to do the things our parents did.