Affordable is relative. You can find a good place downtown for ~ $1500 and the quality you get for the price would be mindblowing to NYC or SF residents while still being pricey for Texans. For most people in tech 1500/mo is very very affordable.
But even leaving that aside, guess what's not going to be at all reassuring to current residents of whatever city is gonna be the "next Silicon Valey" or even "next Austin"? "Oh, don't worry, rents gonna go up a LOT, but it's still gonna be affordable for MOST PEOPLE IN TECH. Just not most of y'all that lived here before all the techies got here."