Millennials: Avocados or homes?

[PsYcNeT]

Originally Posted by peter12

Does anyone know what this thread is about anymore?

Who wears their pants closest to their nipples?

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by peter12

Does anyone know what this thread is about anymore?

Something to do with bad old Baby Boomers and the hard done by Millennials. I'm Generation X so I'm not clear if I'm a greedy person that ruined it for everyone or if I should be cursing other generations while drowning my tears of sorrow into a $4 coffee?

[peter12]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

Something to do with bad old Baby Boomers and the hard done by Millennials. I'm Generation X so I'm not clear if I'm a greedy person that ruined it for everyone or if I should be cursing other generations while drowning my tears of sorrow into a $4 coffee?

Meanwhile, I am a millennial, and pretty happy.

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by sun

Vancouver is the third least affordable city on the planet.

Idiots who say we should just buy in Abbotsford are completely missing the point and likely won the lottery of all lotteries when they bought their ####ty Vancouver special in 2005 for a few hundred thousand and now poo poo those who complain about the fact that it costs $1000 per square foot to buy a condo in the downtown east side, where corpses with needles in their arms litter the alleys. Half a million dollars for zero bedrooms - "buy fewer lattes" lol.

I couldn't afford to buy a house in London in the late 70's, I couldn't afford to buy a house in Vancouver in the late 80's as although houses were cheap I was only getting 12 bucks an hour, I could afford a house in Poco though and used that to slowly build up equity to move back into a ####ty house in Vancouver, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone these days though, not because you cant do it, clearly the route is still available assuming you can afford the 2 or 300,000 dollar townhouse in Mission or Abbotsford to start but its pointless.

That said Canada is full of cities that a half competent person can move to and make a life in, there are more options worth while than just wanting a house in one of the most stunning cities on earth.

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by Tacopuck

Plz dont identity tehft me

Don't worry, nobody wants to assume the identity of an engineer.

[DoubleF]

As a millennial (Gen Y), I think millennials are just as big of a problem to themselves as the baby boomers are. Perspective is way off in general.

Living and seeing the mentality of people in the late 80s and 90s, there has been a huge evolution. One of the things that I find huge is that people actually think things are "nothing". Gone are the days of "A dollar saved is a dollar earned". Cheap coffees still adds up. $2 a coffee 5 days a week is $10 a week. Over 52 weeks, that's $520 a year. This isn't including the fact many times confectionery is added to the purchase. This confectionery can probably rival or exceed that $520 a year. But many millennials will laugh off these amounts as "nothing". That's a couple months of groceries for an individual or a luxury good per year.

Alcohol and other vices consumption is also far higher than it was before. Also, eating out has risen immensely. I blame Millennials for the rise in tipping rates. $20-40 per meal completely blows that number out of the water. People think $5-10K is "nothing" on a home price difference?

As a friend of mine once commented, "Why do people say things are dirt cheap? Dirt isn't cheap." He's right. Land values have skyrocketed and potting soil is pretty freaking expensive. I am actually in the process of coaching a few friends on money habits due to them near debilitating debt. The understanding of a "need" vs a "want" is so confused, that they can barely figure out the difference.

What I'm trying to teach them now is vice reorganization. By explaining that stopping that Timmies ritual and going with self made coffee (aeropress, not the pod cup gimmick which is just as expensive) would allow in 1 year the opportunity to purchase a (for instance) Tory Burch bag or Camera lens. I have to trick a friend into delaying gratification, then when they have money, they can either buy a luxury good, or be like, "Oh gosh, I have money to pay my bills!" And yet this friend's mentality isn't uncommon.

But mostly to rewind, I blame people in devaluing things that once were valuable. As afc wimbledon remarked, the lifestyle in the 50s/60s probably is being seen as being lower class in the modern age. Kids used to value worthless things in the same way as gold. We used to fix and reuse things. Now, everything is disposable. People owned things that could cross generations. Now a generation is perceived as 2-3 years. I mean, how many people have been ridiculed for using an electronic that's over 4 years old lately? If someone is thrifty, people fun of them unless they have nice things to show off. Fricking people have made some of the things we valued actually worth as much as gold (ie: Legos).

Sure the baby boomers don't help, but we as millennials aren't helping ourselves either.

[sun]

Originally Posted by afc wimbledon

I couldn't afford to buy a house in London in the late 70's, I couldn't afford to buy a house in Vancouver in the late 80's as although houses were cheap I was only getting 12 bucks an hour, I could afford a house in Poco though and used that to slowly build up equity to move back into a ####ty house in Vancouver, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone these days though, not because you cant do it, clearly the route is still available assuming you can afford the 2 or 300,000 dollar townhouse in Mission or Abbotsford to start but its pointless.

That said Canada is full of cities that a half competent person can move to and make a life in, there are more options worth while than just wanting a house in one of the most stunning cities on earth.

Sweet, you were making around $35/hr in today dollars. Close to double the average salary in town these days. Must have been a good gig. And that house in Poco is worth at least $800k, decidedly unaffordable for someone making $35/hr.

London is NOT a comparable to Vancouver, particularly in the 70s and is irrelevant to everyone but yourself. It's a world class city and the financial capital of Europe while Vancouver is quite pretty and... real estate investments?

Your "back in my day" story means nothing in 2017. Congrats on your $1.5M teardown. Seriously. If I had one, I'd probably have my head up my ass as well.

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by sun

Sweet, you were making around $35/hr in today dollars. Close to double the average salary in town these days. Must have been a good gig. And that house in Poco is worth at least $800k, decidedly unaffordable for someone making $35/hr.

London is NOT a comparable to Vancouver, particularly in the 70s and is irrelevant to everyone but yourself. It's a world class city and the financial capital of Europe while Vancouver is quite pretty and... real estate investments?

Your "back in my day" story means nothing in 2017. Congrats on your $1.5M teardown. Seriously. If I had one, I'd probably have my head up my ass as well.

No worries there son, you already have

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by sun

Sweet, you were making around $35/hr in today dollars. Close to double the average salary in town these days. Must have been a good gig. And that house in Poco is worth at least $800k, decidedly unaffordable for someone making $35/hr.

London is NOT a comparable to Vancouver, particularly in the 70s and is irrelevant to everyone but yourself. It's a world class city and the financial capital of Europe while Vancouver is quite pretty and... real estate investments?

Your "back in my day" story means nothing in 2017. Congrats on your $1.5M teardown. Seriously. If I had one, I'd probably have my head up my ass as well.

Vancouver is one of the top three most expensive places to live on earth, apparently because of foreign investors, that is, by definition, a world class city, now I'd agree it shouldn't be but the Chinese appear to disagree.

To be honest I'm struggling to see what you're hacked off about, you don't get to buy a house in Vancouver? so what, I cant buy a house in West Vancouver.
For most of the previous 200 years you and I would live in barely habitable hovels and watch our kids die of malnutrition, most of the world still lives like that, for a handful of decades our leaders have decided to let all of us spend the countries future wealth like crazy so we get social programs and education and a standard of living most of humanity would consider nothing short of God like, I'm not sure if its a good idea but it is what it is, what the effing hell is the point of getting upset?

Incidently back in the '80's when I was so clearly blessed to be able to buy a house with my massive 12 bucks an hour I was paying around 15% interest on my mortgage, you put interest rates up tp 10% tomorrow I doubt a house in Vancouver would sell for more than 400,000 and most would be under a 100,000

[afc wimbledon]

Originally Posted by sun

Sweet, you were making around $35/hr in today dollars. Close to double the average salary in town these days. Must have been a good gig. And that house in Poco is worth at least $800k, decidedly unaffordable for someone making $35/hr.

London is NOT a comparable to Vancouver, particularly in the 70s and is irrelevant to everyone but yourself. It's a world class city and the financial capital of Europe while Vancouver is quite pretty and... real estate investments?

Your "back in my day" story means nothing in 2017. Congrats on your $1.5M teardown. Seriously. If I had one, I'd probably have my head up my ass as well.

In case you're wondering trying to make a mortgage payment of 1000 bucks a month (that's what 75,000 costs to borrow at 15%) on a salary of $12 an hour is pretty scary, for a while rates went up to 22%, thank Christ I didn't have to renew or I would have had to walk away from it

[Hockeyguy15]

Originally Posted by afc wimbledon

In case you're wondering trying to make a mortgage payment of 1000 bucks a month (that's what 75,000 costs to borrow at 15%) on a salary of $12 an hour is pretty scary, for a while rates went up to 22%, thank Christ I didn't have to renew or I would have had to walk away from it

So basically what people are faced with today?

If interest rates jump up to 7% I wonder how many people will be screwed at renewal time?

[Erick Estrada]

I don't really understand why Vancouver is even being discussed in this thread. Baby boomers have nothing to do with the fact that city is outrageously expensive to live and it's not a right for anyone to be able live there. If you can't afford it you should move to a more affordable city end of story. There are plenty of cities and towns in this country where people can make a good living and it's a matter of choice that keeps a lot of these millennials in larger more expensive to live in cities. Hell I feel Calgary is getting too expensive but that's just me.

[I-Hate-Hulse]

Originally Posted by peter12

I like going out quite a bit and I have never been to a place with $16 cocktails.

Lots of $14 and the odd $15 here... I have to think it's more in Vancouver or TO.

http://prlrlounge.com/cocktail-menu/

[Jordan!]

I just bought my first home, it has an Avocado tree.

Problem ####in solved

[CaptainCrunch]

Why are you people on my lawn? Get off of my lawn?

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by opendoor

And people drank and smoked much more than they do today which resulted in the average family spending more than twice what they do today on tobacco (it was 2% of family income in the '70s) and 20% more on alcohol.



No, it's not true because what you're saying is demonstrably false. Sure standards of living have changed which is why bringing up things like mobile phones, Netflix, etc. is silly in the face of the indisputable evidence that people in the past spent a higher proportion of their income on consumer goods than they do today.

You are completely missing the forest for the trees. The point is that standards of living are higher now - quite a bit higher than the 70s.

Arguing that a higher percentage of incomes was spent on consumer goods is completely irrelevant. That is simple choice.

The relevant fact for this conversation is that standards of living are higher now. Say that out loud. Listening to millenials whine about how much tougher it is is a joke.

It's tough now. It was tough then. It's always been tough for young people.

Stop blaming others and get on with it.

[East Coast Flame]

Millenial buys Sydney apartment by giving up $4 coffees for just 547 years

“I feel like such an idiot” said one millenial standing outside an auction this afternoon. “Here I was thinking it was stagnating wages coupled with rapidly inflating house prices were the cause of my housing problems, when all this time it was the coffee. Boy, I can’t believe I never thought of that.”

http://chaser.com.au/national/millen...ust-547-years/

[CroFlames]

I'll just leave this here and watch the +40 crowd implode

[OMG!WTF!]

I'm not sure if anyone mentions tfsa's yet. If you do have the money but don't use it in a tfsa you are worse than all avocado eaters put together.

[afc wimbledon]

It occurred to me that tuition and University factor in this as well, but perhaps not in the way some might think, when I left school almost no one went to Uni' around 5% if I remember for the mid seventies, you left school at 16 or 17 and went straight to work, by 22 you were expected to be into a career path.

If you are part of the 35% that go to University now at 19 you not only burden yourself with debt but also lose 4 years of earning, and most people then at 23 or 24 still need a couple of years to work out what they are going to do for a living, that has to impact your ability to save for a house assuming you aren't taking a fairly specialised degree that will pay itself off within a couple of years.