You Can Almost Afford a House. That’s the Problem.

Why housing is shaped - by the system, not by people - to stay just out of reach. Modern housing: A shelter for people, or a vault for capital? Image generated by the author via AI I thought I understood how buying a house works. Earn well. Save consistently. Upgrade when ready. Simple. Then I opened a few listings in a major Indian metro. ₹1.2 crore. ₹1.6 crore. ₹2.2 crore. And something didn’t make sense. Because technically, it was affordable. But practically, it didn’t feel that way at all. The Illusion of Affordability That’s the strange part about housing today.