Affordable-ish Housing in Pittsburgh: $100,000 question edition

Quick, of all the things that have exploded in price in the post-pandemic/inflation era, what costs about $100,000 more than it did 10 years ago? A tank of gas? (No, just seems like it). A dozen eggs? (Not even when our ubiquitous local avian megafauna drop them). A power-hitting third baseman? (Uh, that wouldn’t even get you Bobby Bonilla, and he retired in 2001. The Mets still pay him $1.19M every July 1 , though).  Recall that this column is supposed to have something to do with housing (maybe not so much lately) and Pittsburgh. So, is the answer a house in Pittsburgh ? DING DING DING! According to ConstructionCoverage.com , “between 2016 and 2026, Pittsburgh experienced a +$100,274 increase in its median home price. That’s a +73.1% increase in median home price in just 10 years. The newest income data shows a +64.3% 10-year increase in Pittsburgh’s median household income.” That can’t be right. (Looking up my own house … oh). OK, so buying a house on a joke of a journalist’s salary — honestly, it felt like I was paying them for a while there — was actually a good investment. So, my best advice is to simply build a time machine and set that shit for Pittsburgh in the early 2000s. If it’s any consolation, Pittsburgh only has the 89 th -highest home price appreciation among mid-sized cities in the study. For sale: 2315 McNary Blvd. , Blackridge. $277,000. Something about this house just button-mashes the nostalgia centers in my brain like time is running out in “Super Smash Bros.” Something about a sturdy, simple brick house with the barest hint of stone ornamentation, a winding path to the door, and that combination of azure skies and deep-green foliage reminds me of my grandparents’ house in O’Hara Township. My grandpa built it himself after the war on a blacksmith’s salary at Heinz, and that was a fairly normal thing to do then. There are, of course, plenty of these homes in Pittsburgh from around t