Im in the process of buying my second house, much bigger on a nice chunk of land. I make good money nowadays but we absolutely 100% would not be able to afford anything at all if we didn't already own a house to sell. We bought it for $100k in 2021 from a grumpy old guy who wouldn't leave during showings and scared everyone off. Thankfully I grew up around grumpy old guys and he liked us enough.

We're now selling that house for $230k, granted I also entirely rebuilt it the last 4 years and I think we could get more but I like the people buying it. We got lucky all the way through.