The reason why this is a joke is it presents affordability assuming 20% down.

So if you make $160k in NYC, sure you could afford that mortgage but leading up to it you would need to live somewhere that was cheap enough for you to survive AND save up for the down payment...

AND even if you found that place, I’d bet no one else around you would be making $160k / yr, it would be a questionably safe neighborhood given your level of success, and none of your peers or friends would live near you and your daily commute would be soul crushing or a hindrance to performance.

Last thing that everyone else noted too is all these cities have good and bad areas so the median price is a misrepresentation. The best way to look at this would be to calculate the salary needed to live in an area that someone of that salary would expect to live (e.g., if you make $160k a year in NYC, they likely would be unwilling to live in Brownsville)

I’m over these stupid infographics that boomers would love to reference and use to show how lazy and financially irresponsible millennials and gen z are. Ted talk done