Who didn’t read today’s New York Times story about the guy living in the 1,200 square foot apartment in the West Village, and paying under $400 for it? Made me happy — that somebody, somewhere, in this big expensive city is still living well. Made me sick, too, thinking of how much rent a lot of people pay. I can’t complain too much about my rent since I pay under-market for a one-bedroom that was advertised as a studio (perhaps the only time in history someone undersold an apartment.)

I grew up in a house my parents still live in, and we slowly took over the three-family home for ourselves as I grew older. I’m lucky; we had space. We still have it. I’ve moved back there twice as an adult, and I’m not embarrassed. I bet your landlord doesn’t make your pancakes when you ask.

Real estate is a sick obsession in the city, more than any other place (so I’ve heard, I’ve only ever lived here.) My parents talk to me about apartments they visited decades ago in a wistful manner, talking of cheap brownstones and duplexes they didn’t buy the way other people talk about great loves that somehow missed them. My mom talks about the crappy brownstones near the school she worked at in Carroll Gardens in the 1970s. Cheap, she says. Really cheap. But she didn’t buy. She gets mad driving down that spot on Hoyt and Union — and who wouldn’t, looking at the beautifully renovated three-story brick buildings that look like they have $1,000 bills hanging from the window sills.

My dad tells me about his Aunt Frances’ apartment in Jackson Heights; two apartments combined, in a six-story building on a now-landmarked street. It overlooked a courtyard. It had five bedrooms, two kitchens, two living rooms, closets. I would honestly kill someone for that apartment right now. And I think any New York jury would sympathize.

There are the shitty apartments, too. My mom spent most of her childhood above a paint store on 86th Street in Brooklyn. She hated the smell of paint more than the roar of the subway, but she didn’t like either. My grandfather lived in a tenement at 110 Christie Street. It’s a Whole Foods now. I’m sure he’d be glad to see that dark, stuffy building go.

I had a friend recently ask me if she should leave her apartment in the Village — not too expensive, but not that cheap, either — for a cheaper room in a friend’s place in Ditmas Park. Am I giving up the only nice little apartment in downtown Manhattan I’ll ever be able to have?, she asked. Probably, I said. But maybe it shouldn’t make her sad.

New York City keeps changing so fast, into a luxury product that’s pushed by the mayor and the bankers and whatever else people do to get rich. Why stay mad? It’s not our fault we’re so crazy about apartments — the ones we live in, the ones our neighbors live in, the ones we passed on, the ones we’ll never get. I’m happy these people live well for next-to-nothing. I’m sure they don’t talk about the ones that got away.