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Monday, August 24, 2026Vol. II · No. 24 · Omaha, Nebraska
MoneyHole

Shoveling You Deeper Into Financial Wisdom

Omaha, Nebraska

MARKETS
HOPE-4.2%RENT+11.8%WAGEunch.VIBES+212.5%DOOM+3.7%ROCK+9.1%BEANS-0.03%EGGS+14.6%DEBT+6.9% · recordDGNTY-18.0%SLEEP-2.4%PTO-100.0% · expiredRSUHALTED · pending vestPLSMA+2.2% · twice weeklyPNTS+1,400 ptsLATTE$7.25HSTL+45.0%STRTRno bidTMSHRlimit downIRA-0.9%SSA255$255 · unch. since 1954BOOMR+52.0%GENZdelistedCOPE+18.4%LUCKunch.FICO-41 ptsEQTY+0.0% · theoreticalDDCTBL+$3,400TIPS+22.0% · prompted at kioskTIME-24 hrsMOMLNrestructuredBRNCH$61.00LOYAL-0.4%PENSNno longer quotedSILVR+1.1% · still not gold

The National FabricM · Revealed Preferences

M13M

Leafy, Liberal & Loaded

A $2.2 million colonial, a yard sign about housing, and a zoning board that has not approved an apartment since 1987.

Reference marketFirst identified in Wellesley, Massachusetts (ZIP area 02481).

Also found inWinnetka, Illinois; Lexington, Massachusetts; Scarsdale, New York; Chevy Chase, Maryland; Piedmont, California.

Thesis

The household votes as if housing were a right and lives in a town that has treated it as a privilege since the canopy closed.

Progressive politics sitting on an extraordinarily exclusionary housing asset, with no sense that the two are related.

Portrait

In their own words

  • Age48
  • Income$385K
  • Net worth$2.8M
  • Education100%
  • Home$2.24M
  • Ownership100%
  • HouseholdTwo earners, two children, one colonial, zero apartments on the block
  • VehicleA Volvo XC90 and a 2016 Subaru that is described as the practical car
  • Debt$1.1M at 2.875%, refinanced in 2020, called luck
Vice
The zoning hearing
Most likely to
Testify for affordable housing in a different town
Signals
Oak canopy, blank-blue lawn sign, independent-school tote

Who they are

Two earners, 48 and 50, $385,000 combined, net worth $2.8 million, of which $2.24 million is a 1924 colonial bought in 2011 and refinanced in 2020 at 2.875 percent, a number they introduce as luck. Both hold graduate degrees. Two children at a school that costs $41,000 a year and is described, in the brochure, as diverse. She sits on the housing committee of a town that has added almost no apartments since the oaks closed the canopy. The lawn sign is about belonging. The minimum lot is 20,000 square feet. He can explain exclusionary zoning correctly and has never once applied the explanation to the street he lives on.

Our neighborhood

White clapboard, black shutters, a brick walk, and a canopy that keeps the light off the lawn until April. Eighty-seven percent owner-occupied, eighty-eight percent single-family detached, thirteen percent of the stock built since 2010. A library wing named for a family that still lives here. A grocery that smells like flowers. The high school sends a reliable number of children east, and town meeting has not approved a building over three stories in anyone's working memory. Median home value sits at $2.24 million. The next town over has the apartments.

Shopping

The independent-school tote, the grocery that smells like flowers, and a farm share picked up on Saturdays in a lot that used to be a farm. Furniture is inherited or catalog and is not discussed as furniture. The Volvo was bought because of the snow. The Subaru is the practical car. Both are practical cars.

Spending

Income $385,000 against a $1.1 million balance at 2.875 percent, the best financial decision the household has ever made and the one it takes the least credit for. Tuition is $82,000 a year for two and is paid from current income, which is the point of current income. Charitable giving runs $9,400, the largest line of which goes to the school. A housing organization receives $250.

Media

The Times, a podcast about democracy, and the town-meeting warrant, read closely and in advance. She follows three housing economists and quotes the one who agrees with her about supply, except on this street. The lawn sign is replaced every cycle and stored in the garage between them.

Interests

The housing committee. A values conversation about diversity conducted among people who have already been selected. Tennis, badly. A capital campaign. The children play two sports each and will apply somewhere that requires a counselor who knows the family.

Where they live

Darker is more of them.

M13 · LEAFY, LIBERAL & LOADED

ZIP CODES

—

How thick on the ground

$177K

Median household income

2.46× the national median

$1M

Typical home value

3.89× the national median

5.8×

Home value against income

1.54× the national median

65%

Bachelor's degree or higher

2.79× the national median

86%

Owner-occupied

Share of occupied units

$3,135

Median gross rent

Monthly, contract plus utilities

2.86

Average household size

Persons per occupied unit

43.2

Median age

Years

How they compare

Against the average American household.

  • Median household income

    2.46×

    $177K here$72K everywhere else

  • Typical home value

    3.89×

    $1M here$267K everywhere else

  • Bachelor's degree or higher

    2.79×

    64.9% here23.3% everywhere else

  • Home value against household income

    1.54×

    5.80× here3.77× everywhere else

Who lives next door

Household types that turn up on the same blocks.

The receipts

No.SignalAgainst the countryReading
  1. 01Typical home value95th$1M
  2. 02Progressive politics beyond what the housing stock reflects90th0.53
  3. 03Bachelor's degree or higher94th64.9%
  4. 04Households over $200,00097th42.6%
  5. 05Graduate or professional degree93rd31.0%
  6. 06Democratic two-party vote share87th62.3%
  7. 07Households with children81st37.7%
  8. 08Income arriving as dividends, capital gains or partnership84th21.2%
  9. 09People per square kilometre82nd856 /sq mi
  10. 10Owner-occupied70th86.2%

SourcesFigures from the Internal Revenue Service, the U.S. Census Bureau, Zillow, the MIT Election Lab, the Department of Education and MoneyHole Research. Everything else is observation.