Real estate agent Freddie Smith stopped by “The Ingraham Angle” on Friday to discuss how the rising cost of living has impacted young home buyers.
Host Laura Ingraham said that she has noticed how difficult the economic climate has been for young people, even those on her staff. The Fox News host asked Smith to compare the current environment for aspiring homebuyers to a few years ago in 2019. (RELATED: Financial Expert Explains Why The Economy Is Collapsing In One Perfect Tweet)
Smith said that in 2019, the average home in America cost $260,000 with a 4% interest rate. He said that the monthly payment back then was around $1,700, meaning that an individual that made $60,000 annually could realistically afford a home.
“That same home today is going for $436,000,” Smith said. “But the interest rates are 7.5%. So that monthly payment is jumping to 3,700. So you need to make today, yourself or you and a spouse, $115,000 in a salary with zero debt to have a shot at affording the average home in America today.”
He added that those with debt face steeper requirements, needing to earn $140,000 to $150,000.
“So, it’s priced out a lot of Americans just over the past four years,” he added.
Ingraham reflected on her childhood in New England in the 1960s to 1980s, when the working class could afford to live a “good life.” She then asked Smith why things have gotten so much tougher for the middle class.
“I mean, the cost of living is just outrageous. But mainly, it’s the housing prices. And today, there are more people in the household, both of the people working,” Smith said, adding that in his youth most households had a single breadwinner.
He claimed that in prior generations, spouses would occasionally take on part-time work for seasonal expenses such as Christmas gifts. Smith says that the Millennial generation has been forced to take on extra work, like driving for Uber, in addition to full-time jobs “just to pay the rent and the bills.” He argued that the middle class has been “dwindling” and that the rising cost of housing over the past four years has left Americans “strapped.”