People have a hard time understanding that in a capitalist economy, everyone is bidding against each other for resources like housing. If two areas have comparable median income levels, they will tend to have comparable costs of living.

But that “cost of living” includes way more than just the mortgage payment. If people are paying more for property taxes, homeowners insurance, and commuting costs, there’s less money in the budget to go to the mortgage payment. Areas where property taxes, insurance, and commuting are cheap have high housing prices. Texas has extremely high property taxes, insurance, and commuting costs, so people can’t afford to bid the houses themselves up as much.

And this effect can trap people. The real value of a mortgage goes down with time - inflation helps you. But property taxes and commuting costs go up with inflation. And insurance costs rise much faster than inflation due to climate change. If your wages don’t keep up with inflation, then your total cost of housing goes up with time rather than down.