Eh, a lot of your examples are pretty blanket. I grew up in Scarborough as a kid of one of those immigrants you say worked so much harder and got so much less. Me, and all of my friends growing up, came from parents who were immigrants, who also worked white collar jobs, pretty much off-the-bat. Typical situation is mother works downtown in some experienced office role (probably started as an admin assistant), father may work something more blue-collar like being a factory supervisor, but not always. Either way they got these jobs with no experience and no education and kept them for 30+ years.at1212b wrote: ↑ The best example I can give today is the Scarborough homes (includes semis, townhouses). Has gotten more affordable again lately. But even up until last year, there were areas that still affordable. And it still is today. Talk to any millennial, I also know and have alot of close friends from work, and they all just shun it. Absolutely shun it. The immigrant generation before didn't look at it that way. The contemporary most visible version are the Sri Lankens. They took the dirtiest jobs (cooks, dishwasher, fastfood). Bought the more older houses in areas that are undesireable and some rented out. Moved up from there. The millennials of today need to study that group more instead of shunning that idea because it doesn't look like HGTV and you don't feel like you're in a Hollywood relationship.
In my case, my mom actually came from Sri Lanka, wasn't a refugee, was sponsored by extended family who came as I think a doctor or lawyer or so. She started working as an insurance agent at 21, and just retired as a Sr Underwriter two years ago making ~$90k. My dad came over a few years after her from the Netherlands, met my mom, got married, and got a job working for an Airline, and has been moving between them ever since (Air Canada now). They bought their first home literally after getting married, resold it, bought a bigger home after having my second brother, then bought our current home 15 years ago for like $300k (worth ~$850k now). Always had money in the bank, could afford to pay half of each of our tuition without even having an RESP, have a ton of money for when my dad retires too + a pension. And they started all this when they were 28.
I'm 26 now, getting married next year, and all I want is this:
But I won't be able to afford a house like that for another 10+ years. Don't know anyone who wants a new build. Hell, I don't even want to live in the city. I just want a 70s-80s era house (ideally remediated), with a little backyard for my kids, I don't really care where. Unfortunately as someone who does work blue-collar, these are the houses I work at, hired by millennial home flippers who swipe them up, slap stucco and other costmetic bullshit on them, to resell them at a bidding war between foreign and local investors.Another example, I was at a open house in Ajax where it was older and not pristinely reno'd. Relatively 'good' price. Near a Durham bus stop too. Young 'Canadian modern' Millennial couple walks in, walk out almost immediately. The people that came and stayed? South East Asian. They saw what the house represented and how it fit into their future plans to get ahead. They see the fundamental benefit in it. It might turn out to be a great future, but they're not counting on it like that. They're looking at it like "we'd rather build here than spend on a cool neighbourhood".
So personally, I feel like you might have seen only one side of the situation, and I probably have too, but come on, there's no one single Millennial mindset, let's stop this.