How far we've come — and how fast
The idea that buying a home used to be straightforward and affordable is one of the most persistent myths in American financial life. The reality across the 1950s, 1990s, and today is far more complicated — and far more interesting — than the nostalgia suggests.
Driving from New York to Los Angeles in the early 1950s wasn't a vacation — it was an expedition. Unpaved stretches, no consistent signage, and towns that simply ended without warning made it a genuine ordeal. One piece of legislation in 1956 changed all of that, and most Americans have never given it a second thought.
Your grandfather probably retired with a pension, a gold watch, and a reasonably clear picture of what his monthly income would look like for the rest of his life. That world is almost entirely gone. What replaced it is more complicated, more personal, and — for a lot of people — a lot scarier.
The median American home cost around $82,000 in 1985. Adjust that for inflation and it looks almost reasonable by today's standards. But inflation adjustment alone tells you almost nothing about what it actually felt like to buy a first home then versus now — and that's where the real story lives.