I noted, just yesterday, that my family have done pretty well when it came to real estate. According to Zillow, our house, which we purchased in September of 2014, is worth more than twice what we paid for it, 109% more. The small rental property we bought in December of 2021 is now supposedly worth 52% more, and the house our older daughter bought in September of 2020, in a more expensive city than ours — we live in a low-cost, poor county — is worth 31% more.

As it turns out, my family are not the only ones who’ve noticed.

Woman Breaks Down Why She Couldn’t Now Afford the House Bought 3 Years Ago

by Alyce Collins | Friday, May 24, 2024 | 10:16 AM EDT | Updated: 11:05 AM EDT

Becoming a homeowner is something that millions of Americans aspire to, but with house prices on the rise and mortgage rates hovering around 7 percent, it’s becoming increasingly difficult for people to turn that dream into a reality.

At the age of 28, Lisa Nicholson purchased her first home in March 2021, telling Newsweek that it had always been “one of [her] biggest goals.” She was delighted when that came true and she moved into her 2-bedroom newly-built townhouse in Seattle.

She began saving in 2014, and by 2021 she finally saved a down payment of $130,000. That allowed her to put down a 20 percent deposit on the home, which she bought for $649,000.

A two-bedroom townhouse, for closer to three-quarters of a million dollars than half-a-million?

When we bought our previous house, in Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, in May of 2002, it was only $87,500. That meant a significant commute for me, but had we bought the same house in Conshohocken, a lot closer to where I worked, it would have been $287,500! Yes, I had to commute, but we were not house poor. $87,500 was significantly less than we made in a year, and, with a 20% down payment, we borrowed just $70,000. Our mortgage payment was easily manageable. Interest rates were high in 2002, but we refinanced when they hit the housing market bottom.

Nicholson, now 31, said: “Buying my house felt expensive at the time, and watching my bank balance drop when the down payment went out was gut-wrenching. My current monthly payment is $2,700. That includes my principal and interest, homeowner’s insurance, and property taxes.”

However, Nicholson explained that, if she was to try and purchase the same property just three years later, it wouldn’t be feasible.

Looking through her TikTok videos, in which she does explain some simple economic facts of life, I noticed one thing: it was clear that Miss Nicholson was exactly that, Miss Nicholson. There was no mention of a husband or even a boyfriend sharing expenses with her. When Mrs Pico and I bought our first house, in Hampton, Virginia, in 1991, we had already been married for 12 years. Forty-five years later, we’re still married.

This is the big clue: while it’s perfectly legal for singles to buy homes, homeownership is something for married couples, couples who have each other on whom to depend if something goes wrong. It only takes, as an old friend used to put it, one little hitch in the giddy-up to lead to a cascade of failures and troubles. Looking at her photo, it doesn’t look to me like Miss Nicholson would have much problem attracting a husband, if that’s what she wanted to do.

House prices have risen dramatically in the previous three years, as according to Zillow, the average home cost around $282,182 in March 2021, but that increased to $356,734 in April 2024. That average value of a home has gone up 4.3 percent in the last year alone.

When Nicholson bought her home, she got a mortgage rate of 2.8 percent, however in 2024 that is now above 7 percent, making it harder for people to get on the property ladder.

“If I were to buy my house now, the down payment would still be attainable, but the monthly payment would be out of reach. I also don’t believe that I’d be approved for a loan of this size due to the monthly payment compared to my salary. I haven’t tried to test it out, but I can safely make this guess,” she told Newsweek. “When I did the calculations to compare buying my home in 2021 vs 2024, I was most surprised by the drastic increase in the monthly payment (it’s nearly $5,000). It made me have so much empathy for folks currently trying to buy a home, and it made me grateful that I purchased my home when I did.”

In her TikTok video, Miss Nicholson also pointed out that it’s not just the price of the home and the interest rate. She stated that her 2021 payment included $657 per month for taxes and insurance, but that, if she bought the same home this year, taxes and insurance would be $650. That’s $93 more a month just for P&I. Put another way, $2.325 per hour for a 40-hour workweek!

Taking the Zillow figures of $282,182 in March 2021, just a couple of months after President Trump left office, and before Joe Biden’s policies could do anything, and 356,734 in April of this year, after 3 years of Bidenomics, that works out to an increase of 26.42%. And despite the government’s claims about inflation being down, the Federal Reserve kept interest rates steady, so there’s little hope that mortgage rates will drop soon.

The left are saying that the government must Do Something to increase the supply of affordable housing, but the online testimony of a woman from liberal Seattle, in very much blue-state Washington shows us just what the President’s economic plans have achieved so far. So, go right ahead and vote for him again, and don’t complain when we see more of the same.