How Is This Avocado Story BACK

Photo credit: T.Tseng, CC BY 2.0.

Hey, remember last fall when Australian columnist Bernard Salt wrote that Millennials would never be able to buy homes because we were spending too much money on smashed avocado toast?

Smashed Avocado Is Not Keeping Us From Home Ownership

Yeah, that was a thing, and the internet talked about it for like three days, and then we all kinda agreed that maybe this guy was wrong. Avocado toast costs, at most, $20—and that’s if you’re eating at a really fancy brunch place. If you’re looking to buy a $200,000 starter home or condo, you’d need to skip your $20 weekend brunch for thirty-nine years to make the $40,000 down payment.

But, thanks to the rising price of avocado, the Avocado Toast Factor is back.

Millionaire to Millennials: Stop Buying Avocado Toast If You Want to Buy a Home

Freely spending on avocados — the pricey, popular superfruit beloved by young people — may be one of the reasons why some young people can’t afford a house, according to Australian millionaire and property mogul Tim Gurner.

“When I was trying to buy my first home, I wasn’t buying smashed avocado for $19 and four coffees at $4 each,” Gurner told the Australian news show 60 Minutes.

Wait, are we drinking the four coffees all at once, or is this meant to represent a week’s worth of homeowner-prevention luxuries? Or maybe we’re buying the four coffees to treat our friends, and we’re all sharing the one plate of avocado toast because that’s all we can afford.

And okay, maybe “millionaire and property mogul” Gurner really wasn’t buying avocado and coffee, back in his younger days. But he didn’t become a property mogul by saving $35 a week. When Gurner was 19 years old, he was able to take over the lease on a gym, thanks to a $34,000 gift from his grandfather:

It all started with a tiny gym in the suburbs.

While many Gen Ys are battling to scrape together a deposit on their first home, Tim Gurner is making millions.

[…]

His grandfather gave him $34,000 to kickstart the project and Mr Gurner spent four weeks renovating the space while getting his gym license by correspondence. Within six months, the place was pumping.

A $34,000 gift, not a loan. To a nineteen-year-old. And Gurner’s real estate career developed from there.

But sure, he was able to do it by being frugal and skipping the brunch and coffees. And we could too, if we only had the same levels of self-denial and financial prudence!

It kinda makes me want to go smash an avocado into something.

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