Come on. I just purchased my first home in my late 20s and I am one of the very few in my circle to do it. To suggest anyone has a 400 dollar mortgage payment is just ridiculous and untrue. MY rate is 2.78%. I pay $1000 and thats on the very cheap side for where I live. Average is 1700 and up(I live in an isolated area, but an extremely dense/populated state)

Your comment seems disingenuous. You're also discounting the fact that you need a large downpayment (10,000+) to even get a mortgage in the first place. Do you not live in the USA? Housing prices are a real problem for my generation.

But again, you're missing the point.

People live in homes for their entire lives. If they decide to be owners rather than renters, over the course of their life (actually, typically somewhat less than their whole lives) they will end up mortgage free. This is an important component of most people's retirement planning, in fact.

What's the cost to get to that point? It used to 2x annual salary, it's now nearly 6x annual salary. That's 4 full years of earnings which vanish into owning a home. If you do not reverse mortgage or sell during retirement, you effectively "lose" this money.

>What's the cost to get to that point? It used to 2x annual salary, it's now nearly 6x annual salary.

It's just not. You're not accounting for the interest paid over 30 years of a mortgage.

No, I'm assuming best case: zero interest.

You might be arguing that 1970's cost-as-multiple-of-earnings plus 1970-accumulated-interest exceeds 2020's equivalent. Is that your point?

That "best-case" is unrealistically favorable to the 1970s buyer. In 2020, you can almost get that zero interest mortgage. In the 1970s, you are going to be paying at least 10% on top of that.