LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Angel Mora has a stable job as an executive sous chef at a Las Vegas restaurant.
At 29, Mora was in the market for a new home for about six months before closing on a $335,000 house on the east side of Las Vegas on Friday.
"I'm a hustler so I was going to make sure it happened," Mora says. "I was going to do whatever it took to get into something for what I qualified for."
The home, Mora says, wasn't in his top choice of neighborhoods but he's happy to be a homeowner.
"I think there are only about two homeowners in my entire family," Mora says.
Mora's story is a successful one. But for many others in the Las Vegas valley these days, that's not the case.
According to figures from the Las Vegas Realtors trade group, the median price for an existing home in Southern Nevada is $465,000, up 9% from the same time a year ago and nearing an all-time high of $482,000. As high as our home prices here seem, Stephen Miller, a professor of economics at UNLV, says homes are actually a bargain here compared to many other cities in the western United States.
"The closer you get to the Pacific Ocean, the more expensive homes get," Miller says. "We're actually at the bottom of the pack compared to places like Salt Lake City, Phoenix, LA, San Francisco, San Diego and Riverside."
Miller says it's possible that the median price of a home here could reach $500,000 for the first time ever in the coming months. The economic winds, he says, don't seem to be blowing in a direction that would discredit that prediction.
"Assuming a family makes the median income here in Las Vegas, that family can only afford about 14% of the houses on the market now," Miller says. "In a balanced world, you'd like that number to be about 50%."
Suldenil Alvarez, a guest room attendant at Caesars Palace and a member of the Culinary Union, moved to Las Vegas about 14 years ago from Cuba.
She rents but has been wanting to buy a home. It's just very difficult to find anything that's affordable, she says.
"It's very expensive," Alvarez said before a long pause with a deep sigh. "Rent is too high. I need to work more than one job. I want to pay to own a home because in the future, that will be mine."
Homeownership has long been one of the cornerstones of the American dream — a way to control one's own destiny while also building wealth with an asset that usually appreciates over time. However, that dream seems out of touch for many now and politicians are noticing and jockeying for position during a key election year.
On Thursday, Gov. Joe Lombardo, R-Nevada, sent a letter to Democratic President Joe Biden. In it, he noted that, according to statistics from the Federal Reserve, a household in Nevada would need to pull in over $111,000 annually to afford a median-priced home here.
"I know people are finding it tough out there," Mora says. "I hope I can become an example for my family, for my daughters. I want to be that role model."
