I mean, look at the Bay Area. They command some of the highest rents in the country, and many tech-sector workers are able to "get by" because of higher salaries from their employers. Of course, if you're not in the tech sector, you're forced to live in more affordable outskirts, like East Bay.
In NYC, they have fantastic transit, so if you don't live in Manhattan, you can still get to work relatively easily. That infrastructure investment has helped NYC maintain its desirability.
Meanwhile, Toronto has a similar problem to Vancouver, except we're building tons of condos. As long as you adjust your outlook to realize that you may only be able to afford a condominium (to buy or rent), you can make it work. Otherwise, you can move to the suburbs, but our transit is garbage, so good luck with that.
Of course, I've simplified my points and glossed over the nuances. But I think the solution is really: 1) Higher density housing (i.e. high-rise residential) 2) Much better transit 3) Options for affordable rent-subsidized housing in these developments
If you do those things, I think you'll make it easier for millenials to choose to stay, and still encourage a diverse community that's not made up of just high-income tech or finance workers. Places like Hong Kong, Tokyo, NYC, Singapore, and many more seem to be thriving cities, and I think those are the factors they have in common.
In Manhattan, subways run all night to the different boros, Metro-north, the LIRR, PATH, NJ transit etc. run through the night.
People say NYC is expensive, and living on the upper east side or west village can be expensive. But plenty of safe, cheaper places are a 20 minute train ride from Manhattan, and even more are a 30 minute train ride (and so on). You don't get options like that in the Bay Area.
What changed is the respect the builders have for the people buying and living in their buildings. 5-10 years ago, condos were a bit more rare, so a construction company had to try really hard to make their condo appealing. They worked slower and the architecture was much more livable. Spacious units, sensible parking and elevators, and catchy amenities like pools and fitness rooms.
Now, they pump out condos like a sweatshop. Instead of 8 units on a floor, there are now 12. Instead of a pool, you get a gym, and instead of a fitness room, you get a yoga studio. Elevators that serve more than 30 floors are too expensive, so those 50+ storey condos need 2 elevators; one to take you from 1-30, and another to take you to from 30-50. Every single new condo in the last 5 years is in litigation with the developer due to issues with the building. Contractors like plumbers and electricians know the game now too, so every bill from a contractor will be $999 (regardless of work done) because anything over $1000 requires board approval. Without a strong property management team, I expect half of the condos will be bankrupt within a decade.
If you want to buy a condo, buy one in a building that is more than 10 years old. They will have sorted out the engineering problems by then and their budgets will be inline.
1) Mailboxes are in the basement, so you can't check on your way in.
2) Each unit having a loud spaceship/heat pump instead of one central one. Heat pump is leased, not owned by the unit, so you're paying $45/month in perpetuity. Maintenance not included.
3) Submetering of electricity, where a quarter to half of your bill is in the delivery charge from a random power company (times x units of the building, instead of one for the whole building and incl. it in condo fees)
4) New condo board isn't allowed to fix/improve various promised things until the builder fixes it. Builder waits for it to time-out for 3 years and then the Board has to arbitrate/mediate it with the Builder. Meanwhile, condo board can't touch it.
5) Builders signing exclusive contracts with telecoms, so you can't get service from anyone else.
6) Locks not keyed right, so residents' keys can open mechanical rooms/rooftop access
7) Gym on the second floor, so residents below feel like they're living in a bowling alley
The elephant in the room is why this happened. Everyone talks about "foreign speculation" but in fact most of it is not speculation at all. In mainland China, Vancouver is widely viewed as a nice, quiet small city, good for students and the elderly. It's not a place for "real" work. So they buy homes there to live in part-time. It is quite normal to have the mother and child live in Vancouver while the father continues to work overseas. They pay almost no Canadian tax as they have no Canadian income. With their child in school, the parents can eventually claim permanent resident status thanks to the family reunification program and they can expect to retire in Canada. It's a big win for them and they see nothing wrong with it.
To summarize: introducing vast income inequality has distorted the Vancouver housing market and drastically altered the demographics of the city, making it unaffordable for the people who actually work and pay taxes there.
As far as I can tell, they simply don't. I don't think there is any city that "deals with it", or even tries to, in any way.
Every city I can think of that has value in living in, is experiencing explosive bubble-like growth in them. Even the supposedly "cheap" or "low cost of living" cities are undergoing this process.
I think most cities secretly want this to happen, since it leads to higher property taxes and drives out members of their community they consider less desirable.
You can rent a 100 sqm for only 1000 euros per month!!!!
You can't get 40 sqm for that same amount in Paris.
(Maybe I shouldn't say so. Keep the secret to those who know.)
http://www.thelocal.de/20150707/politicians-struggle-to-keep...
And while rents are still cheap compared to other large western cities, they went (and are going) through about the same curve as these more expensive cities - it simply started lower here.
Maybe you have an European or U.S. citizenship, but they're harder towards South Americans. Also, software development salaries weren't something to write home about last time I checked (that was some a long time ago admittedly).
Edit: According to Glassdoor, Berlin Software Engineer Salary: €48000 (average)
Sydney Software Engineer Salary: $80000 (average)
Visas are pretty easy to come by in Berlin - google "EU Blue Card".
My grandfather was German-born and they didn't grant the citizeship to him, and I remember the ridiculous requirements he faced trying to get it (and he was more German than most actual Germans, a Fischer Reuter Spangemberg and more German surnames all the way down)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/skilled-immigran...
"The paperwork is nightmarishly complex and requires a wealth of information, with endless pages and extra documents. Sometimes translations are required, sometimes not. In fact, she no longer sends the papers off without consulting an expert. Anders works as the human resources manager for Adidas. She is looking for skilled workers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. These days, even a company like Adidas rarely finds new employees in Germany, especially IT experts and designers."
I also know a lot of Israelis who got German citizenships via their grandparents, but there might be special rules that make it easier for victims of the nazis (and their descendants) or people that fled the country.
Either way the salary is probably never a reason to move to Germany (I don't think wages are higher than in any other western country), I meant more like that it's not a reason NOT to move in that particular example.
Here in Boston I'm paying 3700 euros for (poorly maintained) 90 sqm, of course split with five people. Maybe it is time to consider a stint in Berlin.
Are there any resources you would recommend to learn more about the city, and the tech scene?
I'm guessing the equivalent of their hipsters got wise to it and drove up prices a la the gentrification you saw (compare the between the dirty-grimy NYC of the "Taxi Driver" 1970s vs the clean power-tie NYC of the 1980s bond-trading years, or the early 2000s Williamsburg where the rent was somewhat reasonable vs 2010 where anything on the L costed literally 3 times as much because every white kid with a fixie had his parents pay his $2600 rent, etc. $800/mo on a split isn't too bad for Boston if you're anywhere close to a decent spot on the T, considering the supply/demand (it's arguably the biggest college region in the US - between Cambridge, Boston and BC in Newton it's probably the densest student:non-student ratio in the US). Berlin had that vibrant feeling that's hard to explain but yeah the tech scene was (and hopefully still is) spectacular, especially re: the hardware hacking scene when I was there and it's certainly worth a visit.
Edit: http://ccc.de/ In math if you solve something major, odds are you'll wait till that years AMS Symposium to present; if you crack the PS3, CCC is where fail0verflow went to present. (Don't write them off because of their l33t-name, these guys aren't script kiddies -- these hacks are worthy of PhD theses if you see the detail of reverse engineering they go into.).
http://www.cic.gc.ca/ENGLISH/immigrate/business/investors/in...
Out here in the burbs, it's a different story. A development just down the road from me suffered very badly in the downturn, with houses losing as much as 50% of their value. Some of those owners will never be above water on their houses. I'm very glad I chose not to move from my townhouse into a single family home a decade ago, as prices soared, even though I really wanted a place with a mad scientist basement workroom. And as my friends retire, most are moving to warmer and/or cheaper places.
I can't remember where I heard but the city controls the rental rates. Don't want to pay more for a property than you can recoup. And you don't want to leave it unoccupied less you come back to find it squatted; and they have rights as well.
Because it is so highly regulated its not a great investment.
[1] http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/home-and-garden/real-est...