Lets look at money and what it gets you shall we since there is some confusion.
http://www.christinakai.com/Listings...rest_drive.htm
This house sold for near $1.7 million in North Van. It's a nice house but nothing too special. I sure wouldn't call it 'baller status'. You can bet there is no Ferrari parked in the garage either.
So lets break this down.
Assume you have $500,000 saved up which if you think is easy, ask your parents if they have $500k in cash ready to do something with, someone making $340,000 a year will just qualify to buy this home. A home that again, is nice, but nothing special.
This also assumes that the said person has no other debt. So there isn't going to be that awesome $1000 a month lease payment. For fuck sake, even to finance an Infiniti is close to $100 a month. Not going to happen.
Throw in luxury items such as food, clothing, perhaps some furniture and a holiday and you're right on the edge.
There are many reasons for this, the biggest is that wealth (significant meaningful wealth) has and never will be created from wages. The other side is that Vancouver is so overpriced and fucked up, that this is where a doctor can live and that's pushing it.
You look at the US. Less tax, more money, and housing that is about 1/3 of what it is here (right now in some places it's more like 1/10th) you have to ask yourself what in the fuck?