Where a home of their own is an elusive dream

Plummeting affordability figures
But with the average mortgage interest rate up a full point, or nearly 20 percent, and housing prices up 15 percent since then, the nationwide affordability number has fallen to 106. 

And that’s fat city compared with the Brennans’ neighborhood, where the affordability numbers, as calculated by Washington State University, are  between 70 and 80. That means the average family there could afford only three-fourths of the payment on the average house if they could come up with a 20 percent down payment, which would be nearly $100,000 in King County.

WSU keeps a special set of statistics on housing affordability for first-time buyers. Those numbers are especially dismal, indicating that the average first-time home-buying family or individual couldn’t afford even 40 percent of the mortgage on a starter home in King County. The comparable figure for Snohomish County is less than 50 percent. 

“We pay to play here in Seattle,” Darby says with a sigh. “It comes with the ZIP code.”

But inside the neat white stucco rancher that they rent for $1,050 a month, a real bargain in the area, Dale holds forth with optimism that would impress Norman Vincent Peale: “I think America is a great place to live and if you put your mind to it you can accomplish anything in this country.”

It’s a perspective that Dale came to after growing up poor and in a “chaotic” single-parent household, then spending time in the military.

“The whole concept of a squeeze on the middle class just baffles me,” he says. “I don’t see it all.”

The problem for a lot of the middle class is a consumer mindset, says Dale, a devoted listener of talk radio who says he quickly transformed from a liberal Democrat to a conservative Republican after becoming a father and going to work in a small business.

Robert Hood / msnbc.com Dale Brennan loves his job as the manager of a Seattle-area produce stand.

“Things are to be earned, not for instant gratification,” he explains. “It’s not what you have; it’s getting there.”

It was instant gratification provided by subprime lenders, he says, that drove up home prices across the nation in a “false economy” that is now triggering mounting foreclosures  and falling prices in many markets, although not yet in Seattle. “I look at what’s going on right now as a good thing for people like us,” he says.

Even so, Dale figures it will take five years for him and his wife to save enough for a down payment on a house. To maximize savings, they bake their own bread, plan every meal on a spreadsheet, take no vacations and seldom dine out.

“You can buy two pounds of oatmeal for a dollar and that makes breakfast for a month,” Darby points out. “I’m proud of what’s on our grocery list.”

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