Quote:
Originally Posted by Quixote
Price per square foot is the best metric for gauging un/affordability, which is all relative anyway and depends on what kind of housing you're in the market for, how much you can spend, how much you're willing to spend, and a host of other factors.
But how much real estate you can get for your money is generally the litmus test for SFHs. For instance, you find stately looking homes on decent- to large-size lots in prime parts of Westchester and Fairfield Counties for at least half of what the LA equivalent would be, let alone the Bay Area. Yes, you might be paying $25-50K annually in property taxes, but you'd have to own that home for 40-50 years before reaching the cost of what you would've paid for that home in prime CA. That you can get a 4,800-SF home on 1-acre for $2 million in Harrison, NY is something that just doesn't exist here. And because it's Harrison, you save thousands of dollars a year in gas and private school tuition.
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Its not that simple. You can't get a mortgage on your property taxes.
An extra $25K in property taxes is probably equivalent to a ~$1mil in property value.
But in general, I agree, NYC suburbs are not that expensive compared to CA. You can even get properties for like $100K within an hour or two driving distance from the city, which is unheard of in LA or Bay area.