system
A chat on subreddit /r/me_irl
human
I don't know who's making above 58 to bring that average up, but it ain't most of us, and even less of those people are hanging around in a thread about housing they can't afford. 

I'm from a smaller town around Columbus, the federal minimum wage is still under 8 bucks, almost any job you can find at a factory, retail or fast food is going to slot you in between 10 to 15. And almost all of those are not giving you full time hours, a good trick is to keep you right under full time benefits eligible, so enjoy your 32 hours a week. 

So let's bump that up and say you work in Cbus at..Ikea..I'd imagine 15 is your starting salary. Maybe 18ish if you're lucky.  If they're doing the 30 some hours full time trick to you, that's about 30k a year at 18 an hour. But that also means you have shit to no benefits. Also, it's Ohio, so public transportation isn't much of an option outside downtown Cbus, so. 

That's 2000 to 2500 a month range pre tax, so what, 1700 to 2250 a month after taxes. 

Let's give us 2k a month after taxes. I just bought a 110k house making more than what I just described, it's at a 7.5 interest rate and I lay 1100 a month in mortgage for that. I don't feel like finding the info on a 190k house in Cbus proper, but I can't imagine you're gonna do much better than 1300 a month mortgage on something like that. Lets add lights and water and internet and a beater car, another 350 to 400 for those types of bills. 

Oh shit I've got 200 for the month and I haven't ate or paid gas for any days this month. Let alone ANY other expenses. 

It just doesn't work.
gpt
If your household has only one single person working 32 hours a week at near-minimum with no benefits, *that's not a normal job*. That's a shitty job. That puts you in the bottom quintile of household incomes.

7.5% interest is pretty high too. Bankrate is showing me 5% in Ohio assuming credit is good. A 100K house with 20% down at 5% is like $430 a month plus $220 of taxes and insurance for a monthly of $650. A 200K house at the same is like $850 a month plus $350 insurance and taxes = $1200 all-in. Might be tax breaks too that I'm missing, I'm not an accountant.