"My husband and I, who make over $200K, still can’t afford to buy a house in the neighbourhood where we rent a lovely house for $3000/month. I look at basic little houses with a sad yearning for the stability."

Garth Turner’s post ‘Homeless’ at greaterfool.ca 20 Apr 2010 contains this anecdote from Joan, who is clearly from Vancouver’s Westside -

“I regularly say I’ll never regret staying home with our kids for the last 4 years, but look at what happened to real estate in that time!   Now, my husband and I, who make over $200,000/year still can’t afford to buy a house in the neighbourhood where we rent a lovely house for $3000/month.  Our kids are well entrenched in the schools, so changing neighbourhoods would be a shame. There’s not a day that goes by that I wonder if we should be diving in like the rest of ‘em.  I regularly wonder who these people are who are buying up $1,000,000 tear downs.  Maybe we should be taking out a 35 year loan and paying more than we can afford monthly.  I look at basic little houses with a sad yearning for the stability of owning a house…knowing we can keep our kids in the school they’re in…not needing to pack up and move yet again…. But, I just can’t believe it’s sustainable.”