I live in Western Montana. I have so now for over 15 years, & at one point thought I would spend the rest of my life in this part of the country. For many reasons, that has changed for me over the last several years, but one of the chief reasons has been the DRAMATIC rise in housing prices.
In the town I live in, the average house was between $250K - $300K back in 2019. In 2025, you would be lucky to find a house for under $600K, & it’s actually worse in several nearby towns.
Also, spoiler alert, our wages have not anywhere doubled in that time…
If you are not already a homeowner in this state, it feels like a monumental task becoming one. More and more people are being forced to rent for longer periods of their lives & the “American Dream” of owning your own home feels further away than ever.
Combine that with ever increasing rental costs, rising food costs, rising utility costs, let’s be fair - everything is more expensive. This economy is making it damn near impossible to save money at all, so how can we manage home ownership?
Simultaneously social services are being cut & towns everywhere are now criminalizing homelessness, so it feels like our society is turning a blind eye to everyone who has been left behind.
The housing crisis takes many forms for many different people. Which is why, regardless of your political affiliation, this has been a true binding issue for millions of Americans under the age of 45.
So now we get to Donald Trump, & his declaration that he has no interest in helping housing prices go down. To which, it’s not shocking to hear that to be his position, but nevertheless it does remind me how very few seem to care about this crisis.
Home ownership is supposed to be the best way to generate any kind of wealth or equity for working class people, and yet my generation has been turned into a permanent rental class & told to get over it.
The average age of a first time homebuyer was 40 years old in 2025, a record high in America. Up from 38 in 2024, and 35 in 2023. Noticing a trend?
The average age of anyone buying a home in 2025 was 59 years old.
I write all of this, not because I ever expect Trump or MAGA to care about what comes next for working class Americans - they have never cared about us. Rather, the point of this discussion is to bring this topic back to the forefront.
We all strive for a day when MAGA will no longer occupy our government & we attempt to undue the damage that has been done.
Of course we will have to:
Sure up our democracy
Abolish ICE
Safeguard public health
Reinvest in education
End our militarism around the world
Tax the billionaires
Save our planet from fossil fuels
Tackle the broken healthcare system
But I hope we will give a special focus to the housing crisis.
We can’t afford to allow this to continue at the rate it’s been going.
Wages need to increase
More housing must be built
Limits must be put on Air BNB’s
Wall street must be banned from buying residential properties
Zoning laws must be changed
Interest rates must be dropped
We need to reinvest in home ownership in America. That starts with leaders who actually give a damn about how many millions are suffering.
Until next time
Desmond
If you can, please upgrade & become a paid subscriber, to support this account & independent journalism.
