The will to solve problems

"But if we're serious about fixing homeownership in America, we need to move past AI-generated graphics, random unresearched ideas, and face some hard truths. My mother and father taught me to be deferential. As the last child of lower middle-class, dual income parents, entitlement was as foreign to our household as a new car. We were not taught to question authority, but rather to obey it."

"The recent National Association of Realtors survey from early November painted a sobering picture: firsttime homebuyers now represent just 21 % of all home purchasesa historic lowand their median age has climbed to 40 years old. These aren't just statistics. They are warning signs that a significant portion of an entire generation is being systematically locked out of the foundational wealthbuilding opportunity that defined the American middle class for decades."

"The NAR survey comes with important caveats. A 120-question survey was mailed to 173,250 recent homebuyers for purchases between July 2024 and June 2025; From those 173,250, came a paltry 6,103 responsesa rate of just 3.5%. If you want to ensure a poor response to your survey, pack it with 120 questions and send it to people who've just bought a home. The architecture of the survey introduces selection bias: people who have strong opinions or unusual experiences are more likely to respond."

Housing affordability problems are complex and require confronting uncomfortable facts rather than simplistic social media posts. First-time buyers now account for only 21% of purchases and have a median age of 40, signaling broad generational exclusion from homeownership and wealth-building. The U.S. housing market exhibits structural dysfunction that undermines middle-class stability. The cited survey had serious methodological limits: a 120-question mail survey sent to 173,250 recent buyers produced only 6,103 responses (3.5%), creating selection bias because respondents with strong or unusual experiences are more likely to reply. The data remain important but require careful interpretation.

Read at www.housingwire.com