I make dramatically more than my parents did when they were buying their first house around my age, but as a fraction of my income and savings, housing costs vastly more.
(It’s also not clear that the skilled trades jobs Gen Z apparently doesn’t want actually pay more than the alternatives. See other comments on this post.)
1990(Q1) average home price $124,000
2020(Q1) average home price $329,000
1990 average interest rate 9%
2020 average interest rate 3%
1990 average monthly mortgage payment $998
2020 average monthly mortgage payment $1387
1990 Average Wage Index (AWI): $21,027.98
2020 Average Wage Index (AWI): $55,628.60
1990 average monthly mortgage as a percentage of AWI 4.7%
2020 average monthly mortgage as a percentage of AWI 2.5%
I'm stopping pre-covid as it doesn't seem like the real estate market has not had time to figure out the rapidly increasing interest/AWI rates.
All of the numbers are based on US numbers.