Why this single photo of a house has angered many Australians – and what it says about the housing crisis – how it compares to America

A recently sold duplex house with no car space in Sydney is beyond the reach of even the top one percent of income earners – sparking anger among many Australians.

The three-bedroom Queens Park home sold in May for $3.45 million, despite having no car space and only one bathroom.

This staggering amount would be unaffordable even for most specialist doctors, unless they were a brain surgeon.

The duplex house would be considered a bargain in this part of Sydney’s eastern suburbs, where the average house price is $4.17 million, despite being two suburbs away from the beach.

The sales price is drastically higher than many homes sold in the United States with a seven-bedroom, five-bathroom home selling for around AUD$580,000 in Chicago.

A photo of the Queens Park home was shared with X, where the new owners were sarcastically congratulated.

“Congratulations to the young couple with three children with a combined pre-tax income of $600,000 per year who has worked hard over the past decade to save for a 10 percent down payment on this entry-level, six-month loan. house without parking and single bathroom,” the caption read.

Social media users were left discouraged as many wondered how they would even stand a chance of getting a foot on the property ladder.

“I don’t know a couple with a combined income of $600,000. They will be fine,” one person wrote.

Another added: “I bet this isn’t their first home. People who spend millions tend to climb the property ladder.”

The house, which provides no car protection during a hailstorm, would be beyond the reach of even the top one percent of income earners.

Just 117,930 Australians earned $421,936 or more, putting them in the top 0.7 percent of the country’s 15,935,395 taxpayers.

But banks can only lend 5.2 times what someone earns, meaning even the top cohort can only borrow $2.194 million to buy a $2.743 million home.

To afford this $3.45 million duplex — with a hefty 20 percent down payment of $690,000 — it would take a salary of $530,769 to borrow $2.76 million.

That would be beyond the reach even of anesthetists who had an average taxable salary of $431,193 in the 2021-2022 financial year.

Someone buying this duplex for themselves would have better luck as a brain surgeon, who had an average taxable income of $593,221.

Ear, nose and throat surgeons, also known as otolaryngologists, typically earned $576,925, compared to $543,818 for urologists and $608,669 for plastic surgeons.

Only eye surgeons, known as ophthalmologists, earned more with an average taxable income of $644,898.

Sydney’s average house price of $1.4 million is particularly expensive by world standards, with US think tank Demographia rating Australia’s most populous city as the second most unaffordable market in the world after Hong Kong.

The median home price is 13.3 times the median household income in the lower six figures, compared to Vancouver’s equivalent debt-to-income ratio of 12.3.

Sydney is also more expensive than California’s major cities, including San Jose in Silicon Valley, which had a debt-to-income ratio of 11.9, compared to Los Angeles’s 10.9 and Honolulu, Hawaii’s 10.5.

Melbourne’s ratio of 9.8 makes it even more expensive than San Francisco’s debt-to-income ratio of 9.7, which is on par with Adelaide but ahead of San Diego at 9.5 and Toronto at 9.3.

But unlike Australia, the United States has cities that are very affordable for middle income earners, with Atlanta having a debt-to-income ratio of just 4.3.

Chicago has an even more affordable debt-to-income ratio of 4.2.

In this midwestern city, a large house with seven bedrooms and five bathrooms is on the market for $384,900 or $A580,273.

In Sydney, $600,000 won’t buy a median-priced house in any suburb, just a one-bedroom apartment in Hornsby.

The $3.45 million duplex in Queens Park previously sold for $2.310 million in 2017 and $315,000 in 1994.

The last price was 35 times an average full-time salary of $98,218.

Just seven years ago, the sales price was 28 times the average wage of $81,531.

Thirty years ago, this duplex cost 9.8 times the average salary of $32,240, meaning it was actually more affordable for the average worker than an average-priced house in Sydney’s west is today.

A $1.4 million house in Sydney now costs 14.6 times the average full-time salary of $98,218.