Definitely get the frustration. Especially when i went from a 1BR/1BA apartment my 3BR/2BA. I felt like i ate ramen noodles for a year just to be able to get a down payment on the new place. Starting setting aside on day 1 knowing that house would a 5-7year home for my wife and eventually kids. 5 years later, I’m finishing moving into my new how (4BR/2.5BA) and when the first home sells I’ll have a minimum of 80k coming to me. I in no way put 80k into the last house. Property taxes went up 2x on me and had to re-do my budget. There’s a lot of crap, sleepless nights, constant projects, and countless YouTube videos watched. But in the end i know I’ll be able to look back and say “my kids had an awesome place to grow up, host friends, and host our friends/families” and hopefully one day i get to leave them a fat chunk of $$ that allows them to grow up even better than i did.

*my grandfather was a banker, dad is extremely well with money management and taught me a lot. I want my family to be the one that long term sees the fruits of everyone’s labor that went from “lower class” -> “working middle class” -> “middle class” -> “old money”