this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2024
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“There's this wild disconnect between what people are experiencing and what economists are experiencing,” says Nikki Cimino, a recruiter in Denver.

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[–] [email protected] 66 points 9 months ago (6 children)

Her mortgage is $1650/mo, which is incredibly reasonable in Denver. I think this specific person's problems have more to do with her recent divorce. She was used to splitting costs, and probably spent quite a bit on the divorce itself

[–] BottleOfAlkahest 37 points 9 months ago (1 children)

She's paying $1650 for a house? You'd pay more for a house in a neighborhood where every night is the purge here.

[–] fustigation769curtain 5 points 9 months ago

That's supply and demand, for you.

[–] kofe 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

...that's more than I'd make with minimum wage in my state, which I don't think is that far behind colorado. Yikes.

ETA: ok nvm I did math and if you make a little over $10/hr 40 hrs a week, your entire paycheck would go just toward that.

[–] glimse 6 points 9 months ago (2 children)

You're still off unfortunately.

Full time at $10/hr is $1600/month before income tax. For simplicity, we'll say federal+state tax is 15% so now we're at $1360. Social security is 6.2% so take away another $100.

Then, of course, this is the United States where most people have to rely on their employees for "affordable" health insurance - and often still have money taken out of their check for it.

So now we're at $1000-1260 monthly take home pay for a full time job at $10/hr

[–] FlowVoid 7 points 9 months ago (1 children)

"affordable" health insurance

At that income, you would qualify for Medicaid.

[–] jaybone 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Also I don’t think you pay income tax when your income is that low.

[–] iopq 7 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The standard deduction is $13850 so there's no way you're paying 15% tax on an income of $20,000

You're paying about a little over $600 federal plus whatever state tax and usually state tax is less than federal, but depends on the state. In some states you don't pay state income taxes.

So best case scenario you pay a little over 3% federal and no state.

[–] nexguy 4 points 9 months ago

At that salary you'd also get EIC and likely pay no taxes at all.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Someone making minimum wage is unfortunately not likely to be getting a mortgage.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago (2 children)

It's always been pretty interesting to me how crazy the price of living changes. $1650 a month for a house seems insane to me.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago

$1650/mo for a mortgage in Denver, CO at 5.25% interest is a fantastic price. You're going to find it can be a lot less in a lot of places in the US, but not in highly desirable major metropolitan areas

[–] just_change_it 4 points 9 months ago (4 children)

lol i'm looking at paying ~4500/mo for a 3br 2ba ~1300sqft.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

That is absolutely ridiculous

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

You must be in an area like SF or NYC. Or this is a luxury space.

[–] just_change_it 1 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Greater boston area, not inside boston. Malden/Medford/Everett/Chelsea area. Everett and Chelsea are NOT desirable.

The smallest of places are 650k+ here for 2br minimum. You can find 1br condos for 500-600k sometimes.

We're talking about 20-100yo+ homes. Not new construction. There's no "luxury" involved. No yard or acreage. Often no parking included.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

At a certain point - isn't it just cheaper to move to a cheaper area?

Not that it's easy. It's what I had to do. 6 hours away from friends/family.

Wages took a 25% hit. Bills took a >50% hit so came up on top.

[–] just_change_it 2 points 9 months ago
[–] [email protected] -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

In order to keep your mortgage at 1/3 your income, you would need to be making $700,000/yr.

[–] just_change_it 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

You're calculating it based on take home pay or something? because 1/3rd of 700,000 / 12 = $19,250/mo

Household income is about 230k. Mortgage comes out to less than 50% of take home pay. 230k/12 = 19166/mo (gross) 4500 is 23% of gross income.

Afaik every couple around here by 30 with professional experience and a degree is making over 200k (so 100k per person.) I've seen IT support roles for 100k+ (example from the highest paying company i've ever seen, liberty mutual insurance: https://searchjobs.libertymutualgroup.com/careers?location=Boston%2C%20Massachusetts%2C%20United%20States&department=Technology&pid=618496295577&domain=libertymutual.com&sort_by=relevance )

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Nah I'm probably just dumb and did the math wrong. Those figures are still dizzying to me, as a BA in the Midwest. $100,000/yr is considered pretty decently middle class, I can't imagine anyone here paying $4,500/mo on rent. Maybe I'm just very lucky.

[–] just_change_it 2 points 9 months ago

A room is basically ~1k/mo here if you're renting with roommates, maybe up to 1500 if the place is really nice. 1800 for a studio, give or take.

Entry level roles are usually 60kish+ but everybody hits 100k very quickly in any kind of white collar gig. With the pharma industry being here a huge portion of roles in greater Boston are pharma or pharma adjacent with 200k-400k salaries(+bonus/options) which drive up the cost of housing like crazy. Plus some finance and legal too. There's a few ad agencies, plenty of healthcare companies and some world class hospitals. Plus a significant amount of highly desirable colleges that lure in the rich foreign exchange students. It makes for a really expensive housing situation unfortunately.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

$1650/mo hopefully includes taxes and homeowners insurance

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Yes, mortgages include an escrow payment for these

[–] stoly 1 points 9 months ago

I pay more than $2k for a 1-bed apartment in Seattle. Would love that rate for sure.