Who ARE these people and what do they DO for a living?

[fencesitter]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/22/realestate/22cov.html?hp

In Search of the Elusive 3-Bedroom

BUYERS looking for apartments with three or more bedrooms in New York City should brace themselves.

It could be a long, hard search, and even vast sums of money won’t necessarily make it easier.

The elusiveness of these large apartments is hitting people with budgets of, say, $8 million just as hard as buyers with only $2 million to spend. And the fights for the apartments that are available are being won or lost in bidding wars.

As more and more young families choose to stay in the city, demand for three- and four-bedroom apartments far exceeds a very limited supply, making large apartments the tightest part of the current real estate market.

Leticia and Rick Presutti got lucky. They looked at more than 40 apartments over six months last year before deciding to buy a Classic 7 on Madison Avenue for just under the $2.5 million asking price.

******

I mean, NYC is the worst (on the east coast), but even here in the suburbs, 500,000. - 1 million can be an average home cost. I don't know anyone who can afford these prices, do you?

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

1. The same question my friends and I ask as we see development after development of McMansions spring

up around us. :shrug: MKJ

[fencesitter]

3. I asked a realtor friend of mine this question...

She said, young couples, late 20's to early thirties, one or two young kids. Many families the Dad only works. ??? Yeah, but, but, how? She didn't know.

[The Cleaner]

6. Two Words: *Excessive Debt.*

I'm talking six-figure debt. It has to be. And attitudes of personal entitlement: "I deserve this huge 5-bedroom 4000 square foot home."

And car payments and child education costs and utilities and electricity bills and clothing/food, etc. etc. - DEBT DEBT DEBT.

[frogcycle]

11. seven figure

[The Cleaner]

2. Heh, hey listen, I've been asking that question for over seven years.

DC isn't as bad, but when I lived there I saw prices skyrocketing for average homes...expected it to crash around 2001-2002 due to the tech crash, but it didn't. Now it's absolutely crazy, guess it's crazy everywhere!

Yet people still buy the expensive homes...who can afford that? Not everyone is a doctor or lawyer, even they couldn't afford those prices.

:shrug:

Edit to add: okay maybe DC is just about that bad. Average 3-4 bed homes will indeed sell for $400-500K if you go way out to the suburbs. In town it can certainly cost you nearly 1 million, even for just an average colonial.

[ikojo]

4. The same is true in suburban St Louis

Along Ladue Road, which traverses a wealthy area there are new developments going up and one has a sign saying the homes START AT $1.2 MILLION dollars!!! Condominiums in wealthy Clayton MO (a suburb of St Louis) START AT $600 THOUSAND.

No, I don't know anyone who can afford those homes.


About New York, a year ago there was an article about Syrian Jews in Brooklyn who buy houses for their kids and this one particular area of Brooklyn the houses sell for millions of dollars. This is done to keep the kids close to home when they grow up.

All I can say is if anyone wants to do so...ADOPT ME!!!

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/realestate/25cov.html?ex=1185163200&en=911d280a9ed1394e&ei=5070

THE multimillion-dollar teardown is generally considered a suburban phenomenon, a peculiar indulgence of the well-heeled in places of grassy splendor, like Greenwich or Great Neck. But there is a quiet, out-of-the-way section of the Gravesend neighborhood in Brooklyn where it has become commonplace for houses to trade for millions of dollars, only to be torn down and replaced with ever more luxurious mansions.

snip

That puts further upward pressure on prices in the most sought-after blocks, according to brokers and appraisers who work in the neighborhood. Among Syrian Jews, they said, it is not uncommon for the parents of an infant or a toddler to buy an additional house that they envision will some day be a wedding gift.

Mr. Betesh said that over the last several years he had bought three additional homes, which he plans to give to his two sons and a nephew once they are married. The young men are in their late 20's or early 30's. To an outsider familiar with real estate in other parts of the city, it can be hard to make sense of the prices being paid in Gravesend. But the area may not be an aberration at all.

[Nikia]

5. Living in the rural Midwest, I think those prices are insane

Here most people who are able to save a little money are eventually able to buy their own homes, which start as low as $40,000 for something small and in liveable but not so good condition. For about $80,000, you can probably get an alright house. $250,000 gets you a nice new large home. For $2.5 million that these people are getting aprtments, you would get a huge mansion.

[NJCher]

13. Right, but there are few decent jobs there

So it's all proportional.



Cher

[zalinda]

7. Hell, they could by a mansion here

in Syracuse and commute daily to NYC for about $100 round trip, only takes an hour of JetBlue. A million dollar mansion here would be spectacular.

zalinda

[beyurslf]

8. I lived in NYC in the late 90's and worked as a para-legal at a law firm.

One of the jr attorneys and her husband wanted to move into a 2 bedroom place in Manhattan. He was a tenured prof at Columbia. They couldn't afford it so they moved to Brooklyn.

[FormerDittoHead]

9. "Foundation executive"...

Years ago, I remember seeing a "This Old House" featuring a recently renovated house which belonged to a "foundation executive" which was said in reverent respect.

"How do I get THAT job?" I asked myself...

[fencesitter]

10. That's basically a money manager for non profits,

Good paying job though. I know some people who work in non profit foundations similar to the Pew Charitable Trust or Kaiser foundation. Only the very top people make the salaries that could afford these real estate prices.

[FormerDittoHead]

14. I was thinking more of the board of trustees. Like a descendant of Ford, Kaiser, etc. n/t

[Skidmore]

12. Become a Republic and start a think tank to crank out

propaganda for grateful corporate shills and the women who love them.