"Four years ago, I helped a friend in Austin look for a place to buy in the Dallas metro area. Dallas was cheaper than Austin, where he was renting an 800-square-foot apartment for $1,400 a month. The rise of remote work meant he was free to move anywhere. It was an eye-opening experience for this lifelong New Yorker, because we have normalized the astronomical prices we pay for housing here. Shopping in Dallas was like going back in time."
"My friend was on a tight budget, had zero savings and owed thousands of dollars on his credit cards, so I tried to get him to buy a 793-square-foot one-bedroom, newly remodeled with stainless steel appliances, for the preposterous price of $85,000. The mortgage payment, insurance, property taxes and homeowners' association fees would have been $782 per month. The condo had a pool, too. It was so cheap, I thought about buying it myself."
"But my friend had delusions of grandeur, which is how he had ended up in his sorry financial situation at the age of 56, despite being gainfully employed and having no family to support. He wanted someplace better, with more resale value, even though he expected to never sell. In early 2022, he lost a bunch of bidding wars in the $130,000 to $150,000 range. Without my knowledge, he eventually bid $195,000 (which he couldn't afford) for a condo in North Dallas"
A friend renting in Austin pursued homebuying in the Dallas metro after remote work freed him to move. Dallas offered much lower prices than Austin and evoked earlier New York affordability. Park Slope one-bedroom co-ops sold for about $75,000 in 1993 and three-bedroom brownstone condos for $220,000, roughly one-eighth of current prices. In Arlington in late 2021 homes matched early-1990s New York prices. The friend had zero savings, credit-card debt, and a tight budget. A 793-square-foot remodeled condo listed at $85,000 carried estimated monthly costs of $782, but the friend chased pricier units and ultimately bid $195,000 he could not afford.
Read at therealdeal.com
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