On: Two leading economists disagree about the flagging...

[mrep]

As long as you avoid the west coast, you should be fine as inflation adjusted price per square foot hasn't really changed [0].

[0]: https://www.supermoney.com/inflation-adjusted-home-prices/

[mywittyname → mrep]

But houses across the board are much larger than before. I live in a mostly 1950s era neighborhood and the houses are tiny by America standards. Almost all of them are <1,000 sq ft, two bedroom with a one-car driveway and no garage.

A modern house in much of middle America is going to be at least 2,000 sq ft, but 3,500 is certainly common, as the average size currently stands at around 2,800.

[vkou → mywittyname]

> But houses across the board are much larger than before.

The problem, of course, is that in any given neighbourhood, the price of a smaller home is nearly the same as that of a larger one.

[p1necone → mrep]

As someone in another thread pointed out - this doesn't help because all the houses are bigger (as land price has increased while construction cost has not). You don't have the option to buy a smaller house for less.