For what it's worth I live in Denmark, working a private sector full time (37/week, usually less) job with a nice salary - though nothing out of the ordinary for my education and experience. Came from a middle class family: My mom is a nurse and my father is an engineer. No life-changing inheritance from grandparents (~$10.000).

My wife stays at home with our 2 year old daughter.

We own an apartment in Copenhagen that we bought some 5 years ago, though we're obviously still paying a mortgage on it (0% loans definitely made that easier!). We're paying it down aggressively, though still have quite a bit of cash left to invest.

From my experience it's about priorities. We rarely go out to dinner and don't own a car - hopefully never will. Rarely buy new clothes.

While it might not be the norm, it's not something that's completely unheard of.

One major factor though is probably student loans. When my wife and I left the university we both had savings of roughly $15.000. A year later, we bought the apartment. That would have been impossible if we had debt we needed to overcome first. If your friends moved here with significant debt, they're definitely playing catch-up compared to their peers.