WHEN THE MEDIAN INCOME WON’T BUY A MEDIAN HOME: You Now Have to Earn Over $100,000 to Afford a Typical Home in the US.

With today’s high mortgage rates and expensive real estate, the median family income of $91,721 isn’t enough to buy a median-priced house.

In fact, it now takes a record income of $104,496 to qualify for a median-priced house at prevailing mortgage rates, according to the latest data from the National Association of Realtors (as of July). As recently as February, it was only $87,840 — about $3,000 less than the median income.

Even though property prices rose at record rates during much of the pandemic, the ultra low mortgage rates triggered by the economic shock of COVID-19 kept buying a home affordable for the average American household. But mortgage rates have shot up, more than doubling to over 7% amid soaring inflation, and prices are still setting new records because there are so few houses for sale. That’s been a lethal combination for affordability, the NAR data shows.

Previously: Why Team Biden might be purposefully grinding down the middle class.