Remote work has disrupted countryside housing markets too, since workers moving in make much higher salaries than locals, who often lack the skills for picking up those jobs. A trickle out of metro areas in the millions is a tsunami for towns with population in the thousands.
I couldn't find info about salaries per se, but average hourly wage in the US increased by around 800% since 1970.
according to below, its gone up by 2 inflation adjusted dollars compared to 1979...
https://www.statista.com/statistics/185369/median-hourly-ear...
You can build wealth more reliably and cheaply with automatic transfers to a target date fund than hoping any given real estate market takes off.
I think you misunderstood my point, I was talking about most people barely keeping it together most months and not having income to ever afford buying a home and have a “comfortable” life. It’s not about investing in real estate but inheritance of a house when their parents die.
Investing into index funds regularly is pretty much always gonna be a better investment strategy with higher returns and lower risk than hoping for an inheritance.
And all this is sponsored by the banks and governments because of interest payments and money from taxes.
It's absolutely ridiculous some 80yo shack costs half a million dollars/pounds/euros. There is no justification for it from a technical perspective.