<prompt> Human: Ive recently immigrated to the U.S. Bay Area with a H-1B visa. In my quest for settling in, Ive discussed the whole housing situation with friends and have come to establish that, across most of the United States, the following statements hold: People tend to consider their house as investments that appreciate over time over the long term. In effect, that housing prices rise forever. Tuition is expensive and not getting any better, leading to new workers having further and further negative net worth at the beginning of their career. Wages are not increasing a lot at least certainly less than housing, meaning that new workers cannot offset their further-negative starting net worth by getting paid more.The logical conclusion is that as long as all of these are true, home-ownership will become less and less of an attainable goal over ones lifetime, until it becomes a luxury.Yet nobody seemed really panicked about this. How can this be considered sustainable over the long term?Or maybe Ive just looked into the wrong area for houses Bay Area. Are other areas more affordable, not just in terms of absolute price but also slower growth?Assistant: Youre right, its not sustainable. But theres demand and a bubble so we dont yet know how high it will go. People want to live out there and the salaries in tech jobs tend to make it worthwhile. Eventually it has to come down 2008 housing market anyone? but tech is still a growing field. Until something new comes along or the next Silicon Valley opens up in Iowa or something, expect California and New York to remain the capitals of the Tech world, and the high salaries that come with it. Outside the very unrealistic bubble of SF the rest of the world is still reasonable. Girlfriend is buying a 40k house pretty soon, and I pay under 600 for rent each month. Good luck finding a 40k anything out in California. Its definitely the exception, not the rule. Human: Thanks for confirming my suspicion. My rent is about 4x yours for a 1-bedroom apartment. That makes me sad.Im not sure if I should be scared of an impending housing crash and losing my job andor the wealth Ive barely started to acquire, or happy because it means I can finally stop paying through the nose in living expenses.  <response>: Im a bay area native. Things were insane in 1999, then crashed. Things were insane in 2008, then crashed. Things are insane in 2015... Now, thats not a sure thing a crash is coming soon, or at all. The first bubble was dot com. The second one housing-driven with some dot com thrown in. The current is largely social driven, and a lot of social outlets, while popular, have proven very difficult to turn profitable. If Twitter falls, it could shake a lot of confidence in social and general dot com investing and VC.However, the bay area might never actually be cheap again. As little as 30 years ago there were still orchards here, and new space to build. Now its all full, and even if 10 of the population moves away, there isnt really room to stretch out, just ease the crisis slightly. 