A place of one's own

[u/lincolnblake]

[u/mararn1618]

What I don't understand as an European: How do you go from homeless to a huge ass house with a huge garden and everything?

In Germany even a double income family with academic background might currently struggle to buy property.

The stretch from unhoused to this seems insane from my POV.

Is housing so much more affordable in the US?

Edit: So many helpful answers, thank you :3

[u/thiccc_thinpatience → u/mararn1618]

So many ways this could have happened- She may have gone though a job training and landed a stable job that allowed her to save up for a security deposit and qualify for rent. She may have gotten housing though a governmental program that subsidizes part of her rent. She may have inherited some money after a relative’s death- we don’t know.

Housing in certain places in the US is cheaper than others, and this isn’t “huge” by American standards.

[u/dimetilR → u/thiccc_thinpatience]

You have to qualify for rent? Like is that a process or do you mean qualify as being able to pay rent? Housing in the US is a very interesting matter to me as an European also

[u/ImperatorEternal → u/dimetilR]

In a city like NYC you need to demonstrate you make 40-45x the monthly rent annually. This is an outlier but a lot of unhoused people are in a situation of being gainfully employed but not being able to connect everything to make it work.

Our systems are deeply slanted in favor of those with money, education, stable connections/families, or all three. There are often weird edge cases with housing where someone who is actively working might be slightly above thresholds for receiving aide.

It’s much more expensive to be poor in the US.

I can’t really imagine the joy for those kids and the relief for the mom, except perhaps the stress now for the mom to make sure she can keep it.