The 10MM figure might be a falsehood, but I think that you're falling for the same thing previous generations have fallen for: Assume that because it worked out for you, it will work out the same for the current generation.

I'm not sure that it's an accurate view of reality this time. And to be clear I'm older than you, so this isn't me being a doomer and throwing my hands in the air about my own future. This is me noticing that if I myself can't afford a house in my city, how is the younger generation supposed to do it? They simply can't, not after only 5yrs of savings at least. Not even if they cut down on avocado toasts.

Leading up to me buying my home, the narrative was about how expensive houses are - especially in my city (Seattle).

But now on the other side, I got so lucky to buy one when I did (2020) due to interest rates.

Savvy also comes into play. The most affordable decent Seattle houses then were like $750k for sub-2k sqft well outside the main parts of the city. But Tacoma had 3k sqft houses for under $600k. 45ish minute reverse commute to Seattle bustling-est neighborhoods for evening fun. When we discovered this we pulled the trigger and it was the best financial decision we ever made along with going to college.

I agree it's a shame that owning in the biggest city (especially the nice parts) is hugely expensive.

> 45ish minute reverse commute to Seattle bustling-est neighborhoods for evening fun

What is a "reverse commute"? Is that just going into the city at the opposite time of day from normal work?

Also, 45 minutes one day (1.5hr total) is a rather large chunk of the evening to spend in transit for "evening fun."

> I got so lucky to buy one when I did (2020) due to interest rates.

It's funny, I remember thinking that people buying in 2020 were nuts because none of us knew what the economy was going to do, and it turns out that those who did buy came out ahead. I cite this among friends as one of the many ways in which I feel like being cautious with money has been the wrong choice (e.g. maintain 6mo-12mo emergency fund, don't make large purchases in periods of uncertainty, etc).

45 minutes both ways to the city is just what being in the suburbs is like. I grew up outside Chicago, and that's how long it'd take to go into the city and see a game or show or museum or whatever. Usually I'm spending 6+ hours in the city (we catch an early dinner at 4 or 5 and then head back after our event at 10 or 11) so it feels worth it to me.

And yeah, that's what reverse commute means. Seattle traffic is awful if you're going where everyone else is, but Tacoma to Seattle in the evening is not busy at all.

I don't know. If you're definition of success is owning a home and having a family, it gets close.

you need to clear 1-2m for that house by itself in any mid-high COL area right now.You need another 1-2m in 18 years to take care of your kids (they can live on less, but is that "successful"?). In 20 years we're already talking about 3-4m dollars before we even dive into the other bills and emergencies to address.

We have to remember that "financially successful" isn't some precise term. Some may treat "able to eat food and keep a roof over head" as successful, where others may see "can raise a healthy family" as so.

Was that survey over total earnings or savings? Like yeah..a few million tucked away will allow me to not work again. Or I can just work for a few decades like a normal person lol.

But precisely because "financially successful" isn't a precise term, the concept can be and is manipulated by smooth operators. It's always possible to construct a plausible argument that true success lies just beyond what you could reasonably expect to make through your own efforts (and therefore you might as well throw your money at me for a chance to achieve it). I don't think we can separate Gen Z's incredibly high standards for financial success from the amount that they're marinading in ads for gambling, crypto, and scam investments.

Any anecdote will suffer from survivorship bias (and also negative anecdotes). The data on the other hand are very clear that people are not doing as well as their parents. Unless you have a theory as to why Americans simply became more lazy, etc. a starting point should sensibly be a systemic explanation.

Also, just speaking about your anecdote, let me add my own. I am also doing fine. Not particularly rich but middle class, good income, and savings for retirement. But I just got hit with compounding dental issues, which despite having the most expensive health insurance from my company that's well known for providing excellent employee benefits, it will end up costing me at least 20k out of pocket, potentially going up to 30-40k due to the need for multiple surgical procedures.

And fortunately we can manage it, but if the same issue had happened to me 5 years ago, I would basically be at the edge of my savings where even a minor unexpected cost would have put me in terrible shape, and 10 years ago I may have had to declare bankruptcy, or more likely, do without either suffering in pain, or pushing off the problem to be handled by even more expensive work a few years down the line, taking on expensive debt, or setting myself up for periodontal disease which leads to a whole host of issues including significantly increased risk of dementia.

Even if one is earning and saving decently, the precariousness of life in the US of A today is incredible.

As someone in the Gen Z age bracket, I believe that they really do have a worse economy than their parents/grandparents due to no fault of their own, and that they're also much lazier than their parents/grandparents generations.

1. Social Security and housing has turned into a huge transfer of wealth from Gen Z to the Boomer generation. I don't believe I will ever receive Social Security benefits, and yet nearly 15% of my salary goes into Social Security. Also, people who own houses vote to keep their housing prices high (through zoning laws), which is... not how "investments" are supposed to work. It'd be like the US government hoarding all the gold when prices get too high. If a house is a place to live (in which case, zoning laws are perfectly fine), property taxes should be high enough that renting out a house is a much worse investment than say, government bonds. If a house is an investment, the protection racket needs to stop.

2. On the other hand, I've seen so many of my peers just... not study. Kids who easily got a 36 on the ACT, but would do the bare minimum in and outside of school. Now they're working pretty normal, white-collar jobs that pay about a median starting salary, but I know they could have easily made $150k+/year in tech if they'd just studied at any point between middle school and college. They probably won't struggle financially, but they won't ever really "make it" ($10m?) either. And, if this is the top of the class, you can imagine what it's like for those without the same natural ability.

So, on the one hand, I absolutely agree that Gen Z should have an easier time with housing, and shouldn't have to pay for their ancestors' unwise debts, but on the other hand, part of the reason they're struggling so much now is because they didn't spend the first twenty years of their life doing the only thing they were asked to do.

I think the data shows Millenials are now doing pretty well. Ofc it's now peak earning years for them.

Funny how that works when the Millenial narrative was very similar to Gen Z's.

Sorry to hear about the dental issues. Is the issue that it isn't covered by medical insurance at all, so out of pocket max isn't at play? Because we had a baby this year and hit our OOPM and it didn't cost nearly that much.

That sort of situation is a problem in America and I wish we'd fix it. But the governing party wants to make it worse and get cheers for that.