Yep my parents were pretty poor but were still able to buy a house in the 90s. It was $74,000. We had a one-income household, my parents had no college education. My wife graduated college in 2009 with a finance degree and couldn't buy a house for 10 years.

The only reason we could buy this house was that she got a job offer in a small city with a bad reputation. It was very cheap for it's size. Two years later it's one of the hottest markets in the country. Our home value has risen 29% in those 2 years. Which is great because we need a new roof, new siding and I learned yesterday I've got a couple years left on my AC. The combined estimates for those repairs are around $30,000-$40,000.