How many people are rich

[innerSpaceman]

Originally Posted by Alex

Really? I feel like I could do all of those things now (assuming "pay off" doesn't mean paying the full price on the house but rather servicing a mortgage on the house since you're not going to buy one every year).

It reads that way, but I didn't take it that way. Although it's becoming increasingly difficult for middle-class families to pay off a mortgage, buying a home on such terms is decidedly a middle-class circumstance. It's only a rich circumstances to buy a house outright, so that's what I took SL's statement to refer to. And if it did not, that's what I refer to.