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Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

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Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#51

Post by tiltowait »

nlawalker wrote: post #33
yolovoe wrote: post #28

Just a single data point against this. I got interviews with 4 companies out of 30 or so I applied to. Cleared all the onsites. Think FAANG, famous hedge fund, popular data analytics platform, and defense. 4 different industries. Job market's not the best, but it's also not that bad if you have 5 YOE+. Offers were good, ~$50-100K over my current pay. So many people are using AI during the interviews to cheat, as long…

> interview […] AI use Can you elaborate? People don’t do well in the interview and say they could do it if they had AI with them? Or…? Edit: Sorry, I missed “using AI during the interviews to cheat”.

Not the OP, but I interviewed a candidate for a remote position. He was kind of halting in his responses, until he suddenly wasn't. Borderline erudite, and I recognized some LLM speech patterns. I told my manager I thought he was using an LLM, but we hired him anyway.

After a few months on the job, he hadn't done any meaningful work. His responses to support tickets were clearly written by an LLM and offered only the most generic (and therefore unhelpful) support. He was eventually let go, and deservedly so.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#52

Post by rr808 »

bsder wrote: post #20

Nobody is switching jobs because if you move you likely have to switch two jobs rather than just one. Improving mobility means that you have to make a single earner household a viable pathway again. That means bring house prices down and subsidizing childcare. Which would cost a bunch of billionaires a couple of pennies. So it will never happen.

I'm surprised you were downvoted because it is a huge difference with previous generation. Its also a reason people move to big cities because its easy to get a variety of jobs for each partner.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#53

Post by rr808 »

yolovoe wrote: post #28

Just a single data point against this. I got interviews with 4 companies out of 30 or so I applied to. Cleared all the onsites. Think FAANG, famous hedge fund, popular data analytics platform, and defense. 4 different industries. Job market's not the best, but it's also not that bad if you have 5 YOE+. Offers were good, ~$50-100K over my current pay. So many people are using AI during the interviews to cheat, as long…

I'm finding it really hard to detect who is using AI and who isn't for leetcode questions. I'm not even sure its a big deal because as soon as they start they get all the AI tools anyway. I try to talk more about their work experience now.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#54

Post by mingus88 »

Dig1t wrote: post #45
chao- wrote: post #30

It is difficult to balance the competing priorities of "home ownership is widely affordable" and "home prices must always go up". When the balance is not broadly possible, our system seems to favor "home prices must always go up", at least in the short term.

There are many places in the US where you can buy a house for less than 50k. If you want prices to drop in popular areas then we have to make it easy for people to actually build houses and increase supply in popular areas. Of course giving homeowners a say about whether housing is allowed to be built near them, of course they are going to vote against it because they have an incentive to keep prices high.

I think it’s natural for homeowners to be resistant to new builds in the same way office workers hated the move to cubicles.

I was in the Midwest recently and it was wild to see a block of high density houses in the middle of farmland. Houses that look exactly the same, shoved onto tiny lots with little gap between them, and surrounded by miles of corn.

These are obviously attractive to developers as they are maximized profit vehicles, but the downsides to everyone else are enormous.

In my opinion, we need to build housing above stores, so communities can actually work. Build a town, not a subdivision. What’s the point of a $50k home if you have to spend two hours a day driving to make it work?

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#55

Post by chao- »

Dig1t wrote: post #45
chao- wrote: post #30

It is difficult to balance the competing priorities of "home ownership is widely affordable" and "home prices must always go up". When the balance is not broadly possible, our system seems to favor "home prices must always go up", at least in the short term.

There are many places in the US where you can buy a house for less than 50k. If you want prices to drop in popular areas then we have to make it easy for people to actually build houses and increase supply in popular areas. Of course giving homeowners a say about whether housing is allowed to be built near them, of course they are going to vote against it because they have an incentive to keep prices high.

I agree with all of that, but I think there is additional nuance. I would love if the path were as simple as:

(1) Make housing easier to build.

(2) Receive sufficient housing supply.

Even if you make it easier to build houses, there is a market for the capital that housing developers access. Currently, that market also assumes that prices will go up (or at least not go down). Thus, once we go far enough past the point where existing prices are higher than the return on new housing, even all of our dream reforms may not lead to a flood of new housing starts.

I want to be clear: loosening zoning, reforming regulations, and so forth, are all still worth doing. It is better than nothing. But if the result is a shock of supply, the financing for new homes from the biggest players will dry up. That doesn't make a solution impossible, but it does complicate it.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#56

Post by delfinom »

hibikir wrote: post #41
Esophagus4 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think if you believed 7-8% loans were normal, you might be more likely to bite the bullet and make your move. But if you believe 3-4% is normal, then you’re probably waiting for rates to return to “normal.” I think it’s a side effect of years of low interest rates… people are conditioned now to believe low is normal, and they want to hang on until we get back to that. I was hoping rates would stay “high” for a whil…

It's the other way around. If you think 3% is normal, you buy now and refinance while people think that the house is unaffordable. Remember that lower interest rates make home prices go even higher! If you think it will stay at 7%, that 3% loan you already have is a treasure to keep using for a decade or two.

Yep, it's insane that people think 3% loans will magically fix the housing market. It's beyond delusional that they refuse to accept it accelerate home price increases and bidding wars.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#57

Post by ipnon »

yolovoe wrote: post #28

Just a single data point against this. I got interviews with 4 companies out of 30 or so I applied to. Cleared all the onsites. Think FAANG, famous hedge fund, popular data analytics platform, and defense. 4 different industries. Job market's not the best, but it's also not that bad if you have 5 YOE+. Offers were good, ~$50-100K over my current pay. So many people are using AI during the interviews to cheat, as long…

Let me guess, you went to an elite university and you worked in Big Tech? I think you should be proud of your success, but it's not indicative of the larger American economy or the tech industry in general. There are reports that new grads in CS have higher unemployment than philosophy majors. Something is structurally unsound, even if the kernel of the industry composed of people like yourself is sound.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#58

Post by khernandezrt »

donatj wrote: post #22

I've been casually job hunting for a couple months since rounds of layoffs started at my company. I've applied to umpteen places and haven't had a single callback. In my twenty+ years working as a dev, this is the worst I've seen it since about 2005.

I’m in the same boat. I’ve been employed since 2019, got laid off 3 weeks ago. I’ve applied to over 70 jobs and not a single has replied other than to reject me. This is brutal.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#59

Post by garciasn »

SoftTalker wrote: post #29
Esophagus4 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think if you believed 7-8% loans were normal, you might be more likely to bite the bullet and make your move. But if you believe 3-4% is normal, then you’re probably waiting for rates to return to “normal.” I think it’s a side effect of years of low interest rates… people are conditioned now to believe low is normal, and they want to hang on until we get back to that. I was hoping rates would stay “high” for a whil…

7% is close to normal, historically. But not for the past couple of decades, so people forgot.

You're missing the median income to home price ratio is at an all-time high: https://www.longtermtrends.net/home-price-median-annual-inco...

So, while interest rates are at historical 'norms', affordability is not.

Re: Nobody’s buying homes, nobody’s switching jobs, America’s mobility is stalling

#60

Post by kdamica »

Esophagus4 wrote: post #4
petra303 wrote: post #3

Why get out of a 3-4% loan just to get into a 7-8% loan?

I think if you believed 7-8% loans were normal, you might be more likely to bite the bullet and make your move. But if you believe 3-4% is normal, then you’re probably waiting for rates to return to “normal.” I think it’s a side effect of years of low interest rates… people are conditioned now to believe low is normal, and they want to hang on until we get back to that. I was hoping rates would stay “high” for a whil…

I know that 3% interest rates are never coming back and that’s exactly why I’ll probably never move again.
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