OT- More WNY Love - Rochester/Buffalo both ranked top 6 in most affordable cities in the world

[matter2003]

WNY continuing to pile up accolades over the past few years...momentum is really building as more and more reports continue to rank us very very favorably compared to many places.

Rochester coming in #2, Buffalo #6 in world's most affordable cities.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/home-prices-affordable-cities-cheap-housing/

[kas23]

Surly this isn’t the most affordable cities to live in the world. In fact, none of these would be within the United States, but rather in South America. That’s even if I exclude some very undesirable places, like Africa, India, and maybe even China. 

[matter2003]

5 minutes ago, kas23 said:

Surly this isn’t the most affordable cities to live in the world. In fact, none of these would be within the United States, but rather in South America. That’s even if I exclude some very undesirable places, like Africa, India, and maybe even China. 

It's based on the average income of the people living there to the housing prices.  Sure, if you find somewhere where people make $200 a month and housing costs $100 a month, it is definitely cheaper but that isn't affordable. Two completely different things you are looking at. Considering 70% of the world makes less than $900 a month, every dollar in those places is worth a lot more to them and every dollar something is more expensive there multiplies that cost far more than it does here. I mean people on welfare make more than that here sitting around collecting checks from the government.

Edited June 16 by matter2003

[Night Train]

It's easy to live in WNY in my opinion.

 I traveled a lot in the military during my younger days. Didn't like the south at all. Worked in San Diego for a few years and  that was expensive.  Upon returning, bought a nice house. Paid it off 25 years ago. Get a VA discount on taxes. Get a bad storm every 10 years. Most of my winters are mild now, compared to youth. Summers here are outstanding. Perfect temp. Lots to do for my lifestyle. To each their own. We all have different lives. 

[JoeSchmoe]

As a very casual observer of Buffalo house prices (from the Canadian side of the border), I feel like it's not even close to as affordable as I used to think.

I used to find similar houses to the Canadian side of the border were maybe a third to half of what they are here. Now they're about half to two-thirds. Then there's some of the highest property taxes in the US on top of that.

Is it that salaries in the WNY area have climbed that much higher, or is this another bunk listicle.

I'd think Texas or the Carolinas would be the cheapest when factoring good jobs, low taxes, and cheap homes. Is that right? Edmonton sounds about right for here in Canada.

Edited June 17 by JoeSchmoe

[Big Guava]

39 minutes ago, JoeSchmoe said:

As a very casual observer of Buffalo house prices (from the Canadian side of the border), I feel like it's not even close to as affordable as I used to think.

I used to find similar houses to the Canadian side of the border were maybe a third to half of what they are here. Now they're about half to two-thirds. Then there's some of the highest property taxes in the US on top of that.

Is it that salaries in the WNY area have climbed that much higher, or is this another bunk listicle.

I'd think Texas or the Carolinas would be the cheapest when factoring good jobs, low taxes, and cheap homes. Is that right? Edmonton sounds about right for here in Canada.

Depends if you decide to work a dead end job or if you have a job in fields that actually pay well.

I live in WNY, work remotely and make well into 6 figures as a senior software engineer.

WNY is becoming a fairly big tech hub as more and more companies move their tech hubs here and more and more successful startups continue happening with the help of 43 North and companies like ACV and Helix Intel making waves.

The Doom and Gloom era is over here and any still wanting to wallow in that need to take their ass somewhere else because we don't need them here anymore.

They are a part of the problem as to why it became that in the first place and the sooner they take that attitude somewhere else, the better.

Edited June 17 by Big Guava

[PerreaultForever]

Affordable correlates with less desirable though. That's why prices are lower. I'm seeing Edmonton on that list, and it is definitely "affordable" compared to other Canadian cities but there are reasons for that. Edmonton is a sh#thole. And it hits around -40 at times in the winter. I don't know much about Buffalo in the last 30 years but there has to be reasons why it's "affordable". 

[Big Guava]

16 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

Affordable correlates with less desirable though. That's why prices are lower. I'm seeing Edmonton on that list, and it is definitely "affordable" compared to other Canadian cities but there are reasons for that. Edmonton is a sh#thole. And it hits around -40 at times in the winter. I don't know much about Buffalo in the last 30 years but there has to be reasons why it's "affordable". 

Well, it's not quite as affordable as it once once. My house has close to tripled in value since I bought it in late 2005...not sure how that compares to the rest of the country, I am sure some places have done well more than that, but it's nothing to sneeze at either.

There is a reason Zillow ranked us the hottest housing market of 2024 and it isn't because of the "gloom and doom" people want to believe in that hasn't been true for the last decade or so here even tho they desperately want to hold onto it.

Edited June 17 by Big Guava

[JoeSchmoe]

16 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

Affordable correlates with less desirable though. 

Salaries and supply and demand of housing are the biggest factors, combined with good incomes.

Edmonton has very good salaries and has developable land in 360deg around the city meaning a greater potential supply of houses.

Cities in Texas and the Carolinas also have very cheap housing and very good salaries. I'm not sure how many people would call them undesirable places to live.

Vancouver has very little developable land and lower salaries. That's why the article ranks it's 3rd last in the world.

[Big Guava]

58 minutes ago, JoeSchmoe said:

Salaries and supply and demand of housing are the biggest factors, combined with good incomes.

Edmonton has very good salaries and has developable land in 360deg around the city meaning a greater potential supply of houses.

Cities in Texas and the Carolinas also have very cheap housing and very good salaries. I'm not sure how many people would call them undesirable places to live.

Vancouver has very little developable land and lower salaries. That's why the article ranks it's 3rd last in the world.

I mean sure, you could move to a place like Wichita Falls, TX which is pretty cheap...and that's because every 5-10 years a 2+ mile wide F5 tornado comes thru and levels the entire city. I mean you could save a few hundred bucks on a month on your mortgage and hope you don't wake up flying thru the air at 3am one night tho.

Also in the cities that are "more affordable" in those places, the median income isn't all that much higher than it is in Buffalo, and in some cases lower.

In the areas that are actually higher income, the house prices are much higher. The average house price in all of NC is 353K. Average house price in SC is 388K. Average house price in Texas is 348K.

In the bigger cities, you are talking average home prices approaching 500K or higher, easily.

Edited June 17 by Big Guava

[JoeSchmoe]

15 minutes ago, Big Guava said:

I mean sure, you could move to a place like Wichita Falls, TX which is pretty cheap...and that's because every 5-10 years a 2+ mile wide F5 tornado comes thru and levels the entire city. I mean you could save a few hundred bucks on a month on your mortgage and hope you don't wake up flying thru the air at 3am one night tho.

Also in the cities that are "more affordable" in those places, the median income isn't all that much higher than it is in Buffalo, and in some cases lower.

In the areas that are actually higher income, the house prices are much higher. The average house price in all of NC is 353K. Average house price in SC is 388K. Average house price in Texas is 348K.

 

What's the average price of a house in WNY. It's gotta be getting up close to those numbers. Also, I'd guess the average NC or TX house is bigger than in WNY when more homes are 50+ years old.

EDIT- just looked it up. Erie county is $275k. I compared it to San Antonio (~Buffalo sized city) which is $301k. However, Erie County is more per sq/ft. $183 vs $173.

Edited June 17 by JoeSchmoe

[Stoner]

I'm not sure it's something you hang your hat on.

[Doohicksie]

The reason I moved from Los Angeles to Fort Worth in the 1980s was cost of housing.  I could never buy a house in Los Angeles, period.  Fort Worth used to be a pretty affordable market, and relatively speaking I suppose it still is.  In the study the 60 Minutes report was based on, It comes in at Number 35, although it's lumped in with Dallas.  It would be interesting to see where it would fall by itself.  Houses here aren't "cheap" anymore, but they were for a long time.  It's only the last 5-10 years that home prices started to jump locally (like, just when I bought my current home 6 years ago).

[PerreaultForever]

2 hours ago, JoeSchmoe said:

Salaries and supply and demand of housing are the biggest factors, combined with good incomes.

Edmonton has very good salaries and has developable land in 360deg around the city meaning a greater potential supply of houses.

Cities in Texas and the Carolinas also have very cheap housing and very good salaries. I'm not sure how many people would call them undesirable places to live.

Vancouver has very little developable land and lower salaries. That's why the article ranks it's 3rd last in the world.

No, not true. Edmonton has a mixture of high salaries and low. They have a massive street drug and homeless problem too. Edmonton neighbourhoods vary tremendously. 

Vancouver has high salaries too. Some very high. The cost of living, rent and real estate is outrageous too though which is why it ranks low in that list. BUT, Vancouver also ranks near the top of lists on best cities in the world. If you can afford Vancouver or inherit your way in, there is no nicer place on earth. The good areas anyway. Every city has it's slum or ghetto and Vancouver is no different. The lower east side is a garbage dump. 

[RochesterExpat]

8 hours ago, JoeSchmoe said:

What's the average price of a house in WNY. It's gotta be getting up close to those numbers. Also, I'd guess the average NC or TX house is bigger than in WNY when more homes are 50+ years old.

EDIT- just looked it up. Erie county is $275k. I compared it to San Antonio (~Buffalo sized city) which is $301k. However, Erie County is more per sq/ft. $183 vs $173.

If we’re looking at monthly housing payments beyond principle + interest, WNY is going to be higher due to property + school taxes. My parents sold their home in Rochester and bought a home that was twice as expensive here and their total property tax here is less than just the school tax was in NY. In fact, they were confused there wasn’t a separate school tax and didn’t understand how their taxes could go down when moving into a more expensive home.

Houses are “cheap” in WNY because outrageously high property taxes relative to the rest of the country effectively capped the market. It’s basically the cash buyer’s dream.

[steveoath]

14 hours ago, kas23 said:

Surly this isn’t the most affordable cities to live in the world. In fact, none of these would be within the United States, but rather in South America. That’s even if I exclude some very undesirable places, like Africa, India, and maybe even China. 

From the report - 94 major markets across eight nations (Australia, Canada, China, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, United Kingdom and the, United States).

[JoeSchmoe]

1 hour ago, RochesterExpat said:

If we’re looking at monthly housing payments beyond principle + interest, WNY is going to be higher due to property + school taxes. My parents sold their home in Rochester and bought a home that was twice as expensive here and their total property tax here is less than just the school tax was in NY. In fact, they were confused there wasn’t a separate school tax and didn’t understand how their taxes could go down when moving into a more expensive home.

Houses are “cheap” in WNY because outrageously high property taxes relative to the rest of the country effectively capped the market. It’s basically the cash buyer’s dream.

This is an important point the article completely ignores.

[matter2003]

1 hour ago, RochesterExpat said:

If we’re looking at monthly housing payments beyond principle + interest, WNY is going to be higher due to property + school taxes. My parents sold their home in Rochester and bought a home that was twice as expensive here and their total property tax here is less than just the school tax was in NY. In fact, they were confused there wasn’t a separate school tax and didn’t understand how their taxes could go down when moving into a more expensive home.

Houses are “cheap” in WNY because outrageously high property taxes relative to the rest of the country effectively capped the market. It’s basically the cash buyer’s dream.

Go factor in house insurance in places like Florida where you will soon be paying more for your homeowner's premium a month than your mortgage payment once more insurance companies leave.  They already are the highest in the nation, with some places averaging an unbelievable 17K a year in homeowner's insurance.  That covers all my property/school/county taxes, NYS state income tax that they brag about saving there and homeowner's insurance and leaves me with a few K left over. There is no way someone paying $2500 a month(or more) for a house that would be $1250 a month up here is "saving money".  Nobody is paying $1250 a month less in property taxes. This should be basic 3rd grade math. I live in a Village and pay some of the highest taxes in the area due to the added village tax, and my tax bill(property/school/county) is under $5500 a year on a nearly 300K house. Is it high? Sure, but not higher than a mortgage payment on a 600K house with their lower property taxes. Not even close.

40 minutes ago, JoeSchmoe said:

This is an important point the article completely ignores.

Just like it ignores homeowner's insurance costs in places like Florida. There are very few places with less costly weather related home issues than WNY.  Yes, we get snow...a LOT of snow many years.  But unless your roof collapses from the weight, it rarely causes any home damage. Outside of that, we don't deal with any of the major costly issues other places deal with. Ie, flooding, hurricanes, tornadoes, mudslides, earthquakes, forest fires, etc.

Like Wichita Falls, TX where your house gets turned into Lincoln Logs or matchsticks every 5-10 years. Plus, most of these insurance companies don't include anything other than basic coverage and the actual issues that cause damage are riders on top of your normal premiums you would need to pay extra, and in many cases, A LOT extra, to actually be covered from these issues. Especially in areas where these events are frequently issues. Very few places in WNY would need to purchase any additional riders like most other places would.

Edited June 17 by matter2003

[JoeSchmoe]

59 minutes ago, matter2003 said:

Is it high? Sure, but not higher than a mortgage payment on a 600K house with their lower property taxes. Not even close.

If you had to choose between the two, the 600k house gives you far more equity in the end. Doesn't mean much unless you're changing housing markets or leaving an inheritance, but you'd still want to take the money over taxes.

[matter2003]

5 minutes ago, JoeSchmoe said:

If you had to choose between the two, the 600k house gives you far more equity in the end. Doesn't mean much unless you're changing housing markets or leaving an inheritance, but you'd still want to take the money over taxes.

Calculate the difference in interest you'd be paying over the life of a 30 year mortgage between the 2 and then let me know how much better you'd be doing...hint, if you are lucky you'd break even because the difference is over 500K in interest over the life of that loan. And that doesn't include the opportunity cost of not being able to take that excess money and invest it and actually MAKE money on the difference over time, which even at 8% would end up being worth far more than the more expensive house alone.

This is the type of financial math you need to be doing when trying to figure these things out and most people are very very poor at it.

Edited June 17 by matter2003

[JoeSchmoe]

21 minutes ago, matter2003 said:

Calculate the difference in interest you'd be paying over the life of a 30 year mortgage between the 2 and then let me know how much better you'd be doing...hint, if you are lucky you'd break even because the difference is over 500K in interest over the life of that loan. And that doesn't include the opportunity cost of not being able to take that excess money and invest it and actually MAKE money on the difference over time, which even at 8% would end up being worth far more than the more expensive house alone.

This is the type of financial math you need to be doing when trying to figure these things out and most people are very very poor at it.

Gotcha... I was going off the basis of how you said monthly payments were the same for mortgage + taxes. 

[...]

12 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

Affordable correlates with less desirable though. That's why prices are lower. I'm seeing Edmonton on that list, and it is definitely "affordable" compared to other Canadian cities but there are reasons for that. Edmonton is a sh#thole. And it hits around -40 at times in the winter. I don't know much about Buffalo in the last 30 years but there has to be reasons why it's "affordable". 

It's because of Lake Effect Snow, salt on the roads, high taxes, government for the government (and not the people), and we're viewed as the Rednecks of North. Rochester and Buffalo are equal sh#tholes.

There's not a destination on that list that I would want to move to when we leave WNY.

[matter2003]

25 minutes ago, ... said:

It's because of Lake Effect Snow, salt on the roads, high taxes, government for the government (and not the people), and we're viewed as the Rednecks of North. Rochester and Buffalo are equal sh#tholes.

There's not a destination on that list that I would want to move to when we leave WNY.

Hurry up and go...the people like you with your attitudes are why it's taking so long for it to improve...it's having to be done kicking and screaming over people who want to live in negativity. But the momentum is clearly not in your favor at this point.

Edited June 17 by matter2003

[LGR4GM]

2 hours ago, matter2003 said:

Go factor in house insurance in places like Florida where you will soon be paying more for your homeowner's premium a month than your mortgage payment once more insurance companies leave.  They already are the highest in the nation, with some places averaging an unbelievable 17K a year in homeowner's insurance.  That covers all my property/school/county taxes, NYS state income tax that they brag about saving there and homeowner's insurance and leaves me with a few K left over. There is no way someone paying $2500 a month(or more) for a house that would be $1250 a month up here is "saving money".  Nobody is paying $1250 a month less in property taxes. This should be basic 3rd grade math. I live in a Village and pay some of the highest taxes in the area due to the added village tax, and my tax bill(property/school/county) is under $5500 a year on a nearly 300K house. Is it high? Sure, but not higher than a mortgage payment on a 600K house with their lower property taxes. Not even close.

Just like it ignores homeowner's insurance costs in places like Florida. There are very few places with less costly weather related home issues than WNY.  Yes, we get snow...a LOT of snow many years.  But unless your roof collapses from the weight, it rarely causes any home damage. Outside of that, we don't deal with any of the major costly issues other places deal with. Ie, flooding, hurricanes, tornadoes, mudslides, earthquakes, forest fires, etc.

Like Wichita Falls, TX where your house gets turned into Lincoln Logs or matchsticks every 5-10 years. Plus, most of these insurance companies don't include anything other than basic coverage and the actual issues that cause damage are riders on top of your normal premiums you would need to pay extra, and in many cases, A LOT extra, to actually be covered from these issues. Especially in areas where these events are frequently issues. Very few places in WNY would need to purchase any additional riders like most other places would.

People forget that taxes do in fact pay for things. The suburbs of Buffalo have some really good schools with a lot of support services that get paid for by property taxes. I know a friend with a child that has a speech issue, they lived in the burbs here and in pre-k were getting services. They moved to texas and get nothing. They are now paying extra for a private speech pathologist, but hey! Their property taxes are lower. 

That said, to each their own. Some ppl value the longer summers and more moderate climate, some like winters, some like the services they get here and some want lower taxes. Live where you want, all places have pros and cons. 

[JoeSchmoe]

36 minutes ago, ... said:

It's because of Lake Effect Snow, salt on the roads, high taxes, government for the government (and not the people), and we're viewed as the Rednecks of North. Rochester and Buffalo are equal sh#tholes.

There's not a destination on that list that I would want to move to when we leave WNY.

I think Rochester and Buffalo are both nice, especially the suburbs... Though North Buffalo is also very nice IMO.

Pittsburgh is a really good city in my opinion. I'd easily live there. Cleveland is okay too, though not as good as Pittsburgh from my limited experience. Detroit is still a pass for me, though it's coming around. The rest I haven't been to, but I'd like to see Cincinnati as I understand it's made a recovery similar to Pittsburgh.