It’s that time of the month again… that time when the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Composite index reports yet another 19 percent YoY increase in home prices in 20 major U.S. cities.

For the past two years, news outlets have recycled some version of the headline, gawking as nationwide home prices smash record after record. A range of reasons is trotted out as explanation—under-building from the last recession, supply chain disruptions, lowest-on-record mortgage rates, a stock market gone gaga. In an environment where newly-minted millionaires tender all-cash offers six (and seven!) figures above asking price, desperate buyers are grasping for whatever they can, making 20 or 30 no-look, waive-the-appraisal offers just to go home to something.

The frenzy is discouraging to all would-be buyers, but is especially challenging for single women seeking starter homes. Thanks to the pay gap, ballooning prices force women to expend 49 percent of their monthly income on mortgage payments, versus the 32 percent outlaid by their single male counterparts. This disparity not only exacerbates the existing gender wealth gap, but also harms women of color, who experience domestic violence and homelessness at disproportionately higher rates.

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Happily Never After: False Homeownership Notions Are Increasing the Gender Wealth Gap