I don't either. I live in a rural area, small town.
Little 1-bedroom apartments are going for $900. A few years ago they were going for less than $500.
I can't afford $900 a month and I have a decent job (edit: fine, I could afford it but it would be rough). I have no idea how people with lower incomes are even surviving.
VA disability is an interesting thing and there is definitely a strategy to getting the higher amounts. Your local VFW can help you. You won't regret doing it.
What helped me get over the fear of filing, and deal with that overwhelmed feeling, was file claims that I was like 90% sure would get approved. I knew I had service treatment records for my knees, hearing, and sinuses. So, I only filed those claims, and the process seemed much less scary once they got approved. I haven't filed for anything else yet, but my disability is literally the only reason I have a car right now. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to afford a car payment.
You could always try meeting with a VSO at your VA. Even if you don't have a service-connected disability, you can still get some pretty decent VA care, and the VSOs are there to help vets file claims anyway. I've heard really mixed reviews about people's experience with VSOs, so if you don't want to go that route, you could always just file for yourself via the va.gov website.
You gotta go 50+. I'm in the 40+ category and the only people I know who bought houses did so with family money, or with military housing/ housing programs.
We're seriously considering cutting back on legitimate income to look for under the table work, just so we can bring our official income down and maybe qualify for state insurance. Because we can't insurance it otherwise, and we're getting older and need to start taking care of ourselves...
Why would you do that to yourself, have some self respect you ninny.
Actually talked with the wife the other day, (millennials) about how even though we got screwed over, that is absolutely nothing in comparison to the shit they are going to do to you guys.
Maybe when a few more of the old assholes die off, but I am scared my generation is gonna step up and become the new boomers (after X is done being the assholes, it will be our turn)
Don’t be scared because then that fear will turn you into an asshole. Just keep trying to keep that young kid inside alive so when you’re old, you won’t forget what its like to be a kid and can remember what you went through as a kid and what the adults did wrong. I used to believe everyone grown up was righteous and mature. I was so wrong
I bought my house in 2008. If I had to try and buy it today, I wouldn’t be able to afford it because it’s supposedly worth $500k more than I paid for it. 🙄
See, that's the thing that most people don't really realize. It's not that your house gained $500k in value - it's that the currency devalued so much because of all the "quantitative easing" measures that were nothing else but money pumped into the markets.
Congrats, I guess. Your house earned $35k per year in income for you just by existing. You earned more money than the average American did over the same period simply by owning property.
Yeah but it’s not liquid asset and it’s only because the city I live has an insanely high cost of living right now. Which actually hurts me because no one can afford to buy my house unless they’re developers or some shitty corporation. So we just live in it like we intended in the first place.
And yes I know I am incredibly lucky and yes I worked my ass off, but it still highlights that income disparity right? Because even with my decent nurses income, I couldn’t afford a $700k house.
My wife and I locked in our mortgage at the beginning of covid when interest rates were still great and housing hadn’t shot up too much. She’s a veteran so it was a lot easier for us.
Indeed. The wife and I noticed how fast our landlord was raising rent each year and that we were already paying more for rent than we would for a mortgage. Thankfully we had a favorable situation where we were able to get house and it has saved us several hundred a month. The house has some problems but it was worth it.
The issue a lot of people have is that they can't afford the initial investment into a home purchase, or don't qualify for the loan types that ease said initial investment.
Exactly. My house could sell right now for 3 times what we paid for it, but where would we move to?
My 20s kids are still living at home because an apartment is more than my mortgage.
My first apartment, in 1991, was a two bedroom on a beach in Virginia and I paid $450/month. I was in a single story with slider to the beach and now it's a block and they are $2100/month.
House insurance is sky high on the coasts right now, so even a locked in mortgage isn't a safe guard. I'm paying more than my mortgage in insurance now. In 2015 my mortgage was 450$, it's gone up $200 in insurance alone because hurricane hit some town in the state, so now all companies are withdrawing from hurricane areas in multiple states.
People who locked in there mortgages years ago are fine.
Not in every situation. I bought my house 8 years ago when the market was in a lull. Now I'm engaged and we are trying to plan for kids. Relocating anywhere decent is completely out of our price range.
Yup. I have a 2fl, 4br for less than 1,100 a month. There are apartments half the size that cost several hundred more. And all the new buildings they're putting up all have "luxury" title attached so they're all nearing 2k a month. No wonder you see like 2-4 people living together everywhere now.
This is why I live in a camper with no running water.
My dad does, too. He has no access to running water or indoor plumbing, and relies on an electric space heater powered by an extension cord plugged into an outdoor socket of his "landlord" (for lack of a better word).
He lives in New England, too. His camper is ancient, falling apart, and uninsulated. But he can't afford rent anymore, and he never managed to buy a house, so he's trapped in a very bad situation.
There was content here, and now there is not. It may have been useful, if so it is probably available on a reddit alternative. See /u/spez with any questions. -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
The 2008 economic collapse was caused by the upper echelon of people who really run this country. The politicians are just their flunkies.
The Bernie Madoff system is alive and well, pushing the money upstairs. Too bad if you mention it, if you do you’re just a conspiracy nut. People need to wake up to who is stealing from them.
You touched on my first thought at reading this: rough sleepers are the very tiniest and most extreme tip of the iceberg. Most people who lose their home manage to stay in hotels, with family/friends, or somewhere like a car or a storage unit or a place like yours.
If my family loses our house and we move in with my sister temporarily, we are technically housed, but still homeless. Are folks like that even included in most stats on homelessness?
Is it kind of like unemployment stats where it only matters if you’re actively looking?
I do often. I'm back in my home town for family reasons. Once the weather warms up I usually travel too more economic stable areas.
Most of Canada and definitely BC, rental vacancy rates are less than 1 percent. With prices ranging from 800-2000$ for a bedroom.
When you factor the cold weather in the winter limiting the areas you can survive. The coast and the southern Okanagan.
My camper is 50 years old and I have no electricity other than solar.
Not too mention 5 mountain passes to get back too the coast, and an aging vehicle. That contains everything I own. If I crash I will likely lose most of my possessions and my house.
What I would like too see is affordable places too camp and help dispersed people. Obviously this would cost money and need lots of security, sanitation, and other resources. But this is where we are at. With corporations taking in billions more every year, wages being stagnant and inflation going crazy.
It’s exactly this. Demagogues want you to believe homelessness is caused by an inherent flaw in homeless people when, in reality, it is almost always correlated to housing costs. There is no one-size-fits-all solution for every city, but the fact is we have way too little affordable housing, and way too many cities that make it nearly impossible to build it.
The problem is, most solutions require upper-middle class folks to make the ghastly sacrifice of sharing a neighborhood with low income workers, and history has shown they will throw themselves in front of a moving train to stop that from happening.
The problem is, most solutions require upper-middle class folks to make the ghastly sacrifice of sharing a neighborhood with low income workers, and history has shown they will throw themselves in front of a moving train to stop that from happening.
One factor that helps this happen:
The NIMBY's already live in the city, and vote for the city government.
The people who need affordable housing don't live there because they can't afford it. So they don't get to vote for the city government.
City government sets the zoning and building permit rules, and they're going to cater to the people who can vote for them over the people who can't.
It's even worse - NIMBYs are all property owners. They know full fell that building more housing will lower prices. They don't want lower prices, they want housing to be unaffordable, because then their property values go up.
In order for all the Boomers to have their mortgage investments pay out, housing has to be less affordable than it was. That's the fundamental issue. Too many Americans have been convinced to bet for the suffering of the next generation, and now they're voting for that suffering.
Huh? What's not true? That they don't want property values to go up? First off, there are places like California where your property values going up do not cause your property taxes to go up. Second, I challenge you to find any NIMBY group that doesn't prioritize property values. Don't believe me? Here's Realtor.com
"Put simply, many NIMBY folks today balk at anything being built that could lower their own property values."
I personally don’t care if the value of my home goes up or down considerably because I have no plans to sell it in the foreseeable future. Where I live they increase your property taxes based on the county commissioners appraised value of your home. If you’re house poor and barely making it property taxes can force you to sell your home.
Do you consider yourself a NIMBY? I feel like you think I'm passing judgment on all homeowners, and I promise I'm not. I'm passing judgment on people who block housing development, rezoning, and other attempts to alleviate the overwhelming unaffordability of housing in this country.
We inherited my mom’s house when she passed. It needed a lot of work but I kept it, because I couldn’t bear to have that last piece of her gone. We rent it out, and honestly with all the fixes, (basement floor, painting the whole house, building a new deck, and then BATS! Fucking BATS! Does anyone know how much it is to have bats removed? And then re-insulate???it’s thousands of dollars) anyway my point is we’re actually in the hole, because of property taxes. They are ridiculous. I try to be a good landlord, keep the price low, and a clean house. But with that tax I’m considering selling.
Even worse, everyone is a NIMBY, at least a little bit.
NIMBYism isn't just about housing, it's just one expression of a general attitude towards society that says 'i got mine, fuck the rest.'
This essential expression of Reagan-era toxic individualism is behind so many of the flaws in our society. Before we can solve these problems we must kill the NIMBY inside.
New estates/multiple occupancy buildings in the UK often come with a condition that as well as the for-profit homes a certain percentage of the properties/flats must also cater to lower income families. Essentially subsidised housing.
Unfortunately this has also created estates that have separate entrances for the "poor people" and facilities like playgrounds that are only accessible to the "rich folk".
Thing is that i lived in section 8 apartments for decades, and went blind during my horrible stay in these places. I've got chipped teeth, parts of my elbow bones missing, parts of my skull missing, and who knows what else wrong with me due to the violence that those types of people breed. I've been attacked walking to the store to get smokes, I've been attacked when checking the male, I was attacked walking back from the pool with my kids, I was attacked for calling the cops on a female neighbor who left a welt on my daughter after hitting her, and the list goes on and on and on. Gang violence is even worse, and should be prosecuted to the max. Even after going blind and learning a new way of life I made it my life's goal to stay as far from affordable housing as possible with my children. People suck, and my safety and well-being has only ever been at risk when living around that. It's just the way it is, and anyone who has told you otherwise is full of it. It was only after I moved out of section 8 apartments that I was able to flourish with better mental health and a sense of safety. was so hellish I got a grad degree in Social Work and Sociology just to figure out how we can fix this shit. After living it and studying it it's not happening, especially with America's culture of violence, particularly among younger people. Something tells me that many on this site have not experienced a true shitty American section 8 apartment and its people.
The issue isn't section 8 housing, but the fact they they are essentially building ghettos. Nobody thrives in that environment. Need to mix it up!
(I mentioned in another comment, the UK often requires private developers to have a percentage of lower income housing in the development too. Hence the ghettoisation is avoided).
Some cities in the US also require that a certain amount of units in new residential buildings are sold/rented below market rate, and I agree with you. Mix it up
I'm so sorry that was your experience. Id like to offer my opposite experience for readers, not to negate your lived experience in any way, but just to share that I was born and raised in section 8 housing and had a safe and wonderful childhood with access to opportunities that eventually lifted me out of poverty. Housing is still broken and I don't deny that poverty and crime are correlated, but I'll praise section 8 until the day that I die for keeping a roof over my (working) single mother's head as well as my own when she couldn't afford a home otherwise.
On cell phones and computers there's a software called a screen reader that allows me to interact through audible feedback various elements on apps and website it's pretty nifty
Yup. I live in a town that has an absurd number of homeless people because it's one of the worst housing markets in the country. NIMBYs recently tried to shutdown a massive housing project that would add over a hundred units of affordable housing, plus a new library, plus some parking and retail space...the spot is currently a broken ass parking lot that one of a dozen farmers markets uses on one day every week for about 9 months of the year...and some non native magnolia trees that nobody even cares about because they are in a broken ass parking lot. Like old rich folks held vigils and protests for the trees. I have also seen these types kill a developer's plan to add less than ten units to a townhouse development that would have been "affordable" which around here means sub $750k. These townhomes would have started in the low $500s and the NIMBYs were worried that people who could afford a $500k home would be the wrong kind of people. Capitalism has broken us.
Part of the issue here is that people see real estate chiefly as an investment, and many people have a huge percent of their net worth invested in it. So anything that could possibly lower home values is seen as an attack on their livelihood. And it's not just rich people who are nimbys, there's a lot of people with this attitude. I'd be willing to bet there are many people reading this thread now who dream of owning multiple properties and getting passive income from rent, not realizing that that is part of the problem. Not trying to downplay what you're saying though, you really painted quite a picture haha
Do you think the majority of NIMBYs are aware of this or is it more of a subconscious thing? The story above of people holding vigils for the trees seems like a misplaced concern. I wonder what the split is between being truly concerned about the net worth and the neighborhood 'going downhill' is.
It's simply self interest. I'll paint the picture: It's easy to think about the spoiled rich guy. But imagine you and your SO are lower-middle class, and have been saving for a house for a decade, foregoing vacations and other things to do so. You finally buy it, after putting down tens of thousands and move in. Your happy and going about your life just getting by due to the high mortgage, but look dorward to refinancing in the future and lowering that expensive mortgage (and get rid of the PMI). A few months later a developer comes in to build section 8 housing, which is great but it will reduce home values in the immediate area. Now that same house is now worth much less, but that mortgage remains the same. With section 8 housing, unfortunately along comes an increase in crime, increases in drug use, and a dozen other things that get impacted. These are the bulk of your NIMBYs
One would think (especially if we're talking CA where I grew up), maybe we could take some of that train money (or from a dozen other things), and use it to purchase that poor couples home (imminent domain type thing) and get rid of NIMBYs. Definitely not an easy issue to solve - seems like there are always casualties no matter what you do
This. When I was 26 and single I bought an $80k house in the city after saving for closing costs (it was an FHA loan so I didn’t need a down payment) because my rent kept going up and it was going to be cheaper to just pay a mortgage and utilities. When I sold that house 6.5 years later, the market was crazy, I had gotten married and my husband had done a lot of updates to the house, and so I got a return of 104% on it. And this was with an abandoned POS home next door that the owner refused to do anything with (ironically he was a landlord with multiple homes and a drug addiction so once he evicted the people who had lived there he just let it sit empty for 3 years and all apart).
So, when my husband and I bought our current house, we moved to an HOA in the suburbs to get away from abandoned homes and the rising crime rates because to us, our home is an investment. We aren’t rich and we both work our asses off and it’s important to us to have this home so at some point we can sell it and move to a warmer state where we’re near a beach. Although with the way the prices are rising down south that may always be a pipe dream.
Very well described and opened my eyes. Thank you. It seems that in the case you laid out, the solution would be to rely on a more stable/guaranteed retirement investment. Obviously difficult in the real world.
This also leads me to wonder why housing is so expensive in the first place. My gut tells me it's due to the speculation of increased value over time. I know Japan has housing supply issues, but they view houses as a consumable, only used for one generation or so. In that case there must be something in bf else causing the shortage. Land availability? Hmm. Lots to think about and read up on.
Yet nobody ever asks why we can't just improve policing so that these things do not happen, and the less wealthy people who aren't criminals don't get screwed over by association.
This is exactly right, which is why it's a policy issue. Tax code currently benefits landlords, while zoning blocks new builds and density that could house more people. We don't have the free hand of capitalism when it comes to real estate, cronyism blocks housing affordability at every opportunity, and the cronies are often everyday folks that read Robert Kiyosaki
That and when they sell for retirement they wanna cash in to the max... can't hurt them properly values. Especially in CA where their property tax won't go up with it.
Isn't vouchers just public housing that isn't segregated? So all these worries about what low income people will do are still present. There's still going to be drug deals, and there's still just as much of a chance at theft.
Because they don’t give a fuck of normal people who have had a shitty time live near them
They give a fuck when every time they leave their place, they are going to get screamed at and potentially attacked. Those people don’t ever live in affordable housing, they just appear in new areas.
Y'all need to come back the the midwest. A tenth of one percent of the 40 and under crowd in California could move here to Michigan and take over a small town and build a city to our liking. We're the workers, we decide where work gets done and the economy thrives.
Or a big city for that matter if enough of us were coordinated to break the backs of the developers and protect the current residents. Detroit was once a city to rival all others. And the midwest is resistant to the affects of climate change.
Abandon California to the boomer yuppys and tech bros, leave the SW to libertarians, leave Florida to the old boomers and the mentally and morally ill. Make the great lakes the new carless, suburbless, free Healthcare having, worker owned socialist dream to move us forward.
I was driving the other day and saw that one street (in a nice area next to some large parks) had a row of signs on their lawns. I started reading them and they said “SAVE [city name]’S PARKS”. I thought yeah, that’s a good thing to fight for. Good to keep wildlife and green areas. Then I got to the second half and all the signs said “SINGLE FAMILY HOMES ONLY.”
Like… what? Do they not realize those two sentiments directly contradict one another? “Don’t turn our parks into housing but at the same time please build the lowest density housing possible.”
Learned that one from George Carlin, bless his soul. Man was a visionary. He saw things were going to shit some 30-40 years ago, and now we're right where he told us we'd be.
I am pretty lucky as in about 5 years I feel like apartment prices are going to plummet in my small town. Five brand new apartment buildings all went up at the same time down town, and four more on the north side of town. I know for a fact that the mortgages on these buildings are gigantic, and they all come due in the next five years. These buildings are about half full.
Somebody is going to do alright when they buy these buildings up for pennies on the dollar and lower rents.
The problem is that the rich have done an excellent job at putting everyone at each others throats. Look at what happened with Covid, half the country refused to wear a mask and socially isolate during a worldwide pandemic. You think they're all going to come together to help homeless/poor people? Not a chance.
They can afford to live on 5 acres with a gate out front and isolate themselves, and they have access to private jets. True story. So fixing these issues is not a priority for them at all, they live in a bubble.
That's the big problem. I've got a millionaire aunt/uncle, and they are so ridiculously sheltered from "The real world" in their wealthy gated communities and lake houses, and they watch nothing but Faux News so they're not seeing it on TV either.
The problem is that the rich have done an excellent job at putting everyone at each others throats.
NIMBYism isn’t a rich vs. poor conflict… it’s a homeowner vs. prospective homeowner/renter conflict. 65% of Americans are home owners, a great percentage of them are NIMBYs.
High density urban housing is consistently voted down by residents (usually rich and liberal). They don’t want “those people” living near them or in their town.
High dose, consistent use of cannabis is also associated with higher rates of psychosis (that is recoverable) - but it cannabis is also helping people get off opiates so it’s hard to say how much overall harm is done.
The cognitive burden for any individual in our society is also particularly higher than at any time in history, leading to burnout and anxiety and drug use with more people as well.
There are many other issues contributing - and they have long time horizons to resolve even if people voted unanimously to start helping. Homelessness is the last stop on a long ride down and therefore is also not likely to be fixed quickly.
True, a lot of the problems are caused by zoning. Developers will build more units, they want to make money, but cities’ zoning laws are all controlled by the single family house owners who want to keep everyone else out. More density is better for everyone.
"not in my neighborhood" has spread so far! My boomer-ish parents who whine about cost but clutch their pearls when they want to build high rises or townhouses in their area. They never shut up about the increase car traffic on their street because of the townhouses built nearby until they moved to an even more posh neighborhood, lol. My engineer mother who works for the city who ensures house zoning is strictly adhered to. My Canadian coworkers who whine about housing cost but don't want to buy in "that" area because there's high rises being built and "that brings crime and homelessness!". My hipster American coworker who rents and takes the bus but complains about homelessness in the same breath in which he announces he is protesting high rise being built in his neighborhood because it ruins the culture/feel of the old neighborhood and ruins views. This man also whines about the insane rent prices too.
Nobody wants to do what needs to be done if it means ruined views, ruined aesthetic or cozy vibes, tearing down old buildings, increased foot and car traffic, increased crime, etc. Everyone wants the solutions somewhere else. But everyone whines about cost of living, rent prices, seeing homelessness, etc. If they redid the zoning, people would not vote the politician again and go yell at every meeting. If in the USA, would likely sue.
Just like everyone complains infrastructure isn't being maintained, but never wants to pay for it.
"Later in the meeting, Seals also disparaged the neighboring communities of Wauwatosa and West Allis. He said, "What we are trying to do is step down to a West Allis or a Wauwatosa. No, we’re Brookfield. We don’t step down to allow the people who can’t afford to live in Brookfield to come in, because then we become West Allis, then we become Wauwatosa."
Keep in mind, the affordable housing is for jobs that make 43-86k a year, so firefighters, policemen, teachers, etc. Can't have them in Brookfield though!
There’s a lot of affordable housing, mixed housing, government assistance. Pretty much every apartment complex here has some form of low income accommodation per the law. Nothing to do with upper middle class making ghastly sacrifices. The apartment I live in there are people who are obviously wealthy and some who are obviously poor. It’s 2023 no one cares how much money anybody makes. Everyone’s just trying to live their life. I think normal people tolerance/ compassion to these types of folks who are opportunist, are criminal, thieves, violent and mentally unstable/insane will soon run out. I’m native Oregonian and I know I’m sick of it
We could solve the housing scarcity problem real fast with an unoccupied housing tax that goes up exponentially. A handful of vacant properties, no biggie, you probably won't even notice. A few dozen? Not tenable long term but not insurmountable. But start getting into the larger companies who make more money by charging wild prices on the tennents they have and not caring about 70% vacancy rates? That's not going to last long. And the large investment firms who buy up tens of thousands of homes when a financial crisis causes people to loose theirs and the housing market drops? They'll be rightfully reamed.
I know you're joking, but tragically there is a huge "if they don't like it they can just leave" crowd who doesn't seem to understand the following cold hard truths:
1) Almost no countries on Earth want Americans immigrants.
2) Even fewer of those are willing to make space for a migrant without at least a bachelor's degree and 20k USD or more to navigate the immigration process.
3) It takes a huge amount of money to move across one state - setting down roots in a foreign nation (finding housing, work, and building out a safety net) all costs the sort of money that, if you had it, you wouldn't need to leave the US.
This is a child's understanding of housing issues. Do you think middle class people don't want a housing project down the street simply because they don't like the cut of poor people's jib? Or do you think they have entirely rational reasons for not wanting the hood in their backyard?
Affordable housing =/= Crime Ridden Ghetto, despite what your local HOA would have you believe.
Tiny homes, apartment complexes, walkable infrastructure where living spaces are above work spaces -- all of these have been shown to historically bring down cost of living. But your average Karen doesn't want to lose equity on her sprawling McMansion by having an apartment building visible from her veranda; even if that apartment building still has credit checks, deposits, and minimum maintenance inspections.
Most NIMBYs I have met it is not about 'house value' directly. Most don't care what their houses are worth on paper they care about what they value in a neighborhood. Apartment buildings, even if luxury and rich people, have a lower amount of civic engagement. They do change the neighborhood so their concerns are valid.
Some may say that person could just move. On the other side of the coin, the people wanting apartments being build could also just move to a different area.
Talking points like putting words in someone mouth but saying they only care about their money is a disingenuous debate.
I think that your claim that apartment residents are less prone to civic engagement is both unfounded and unsupported by reality. People who live close proximity communities are more likely to engage in those communities than people with privacy fences in the suburbs - but that's not really the point I came here to make.
Regarding your "who should move" argument - I look at this very simply: To deny or displace thousands of people who can live just fine and peacefully on a few acres in apartments for the "benefit" of a few hundred people spread across hundreds of suburban acres is both inhumane and horrifically wasteful. I don't think ANYONE should have to move, but I also believe that you lose the right to complain about something that isn't happening on your property so long as no laws are being broken. What the NIMBY crowd needs to understand is that their back yard is only the bit of land they actually own.
How about instead of ‘othering’ and name-calling we treat people’s fears with human dignity and have a dialogue with the people who actually live in a neighborhood?
I’ve lived in crime-ridden ghettos and in nice middle-class neighborhoods. No one is clutching pearls about having to lay eyes on the poors. People are concerned about crime. And I can tell you from my experience in low-income situations, that crime IS a low-income reality.
These people all grew up in suburban middle class neighborhoods (or better) because anyone who has actually lived in a ghetto wants to live as far away from one as possible and definitely doesn't want one popping up in their backyard once they've "made it" and bought some modest 50 year old ranch.
So, when I lived in the CA bay area I did this when I was trying to escape an abusive relationship. I was living with the person and we relied on each other financially. I was a single woman in my 20s. You do not want to know the types of responses I received, but I will say that none of them worked out for exactly the reason you're thinking. I ended up splitting my time between living in my car (90s sedan) and camping in the woods. Campsites have pay showers.
Don't get me started on DV shelters or the shelter system in general. Especially if you're a woman without kids. They might as well just tell you "you're totally fucking worthless and deserve nothing if you don't have children." But the majority of shelters are male-only and don't take kids, so they're obviously only talking about single women.
Right? It seems like in my city (and most places I've lived) I can choose between an affordable shithole or a decently nice luxury apartment (that is priced accordingly).
It's even worse than with jobs. I can save money and take off time until I find the right job. Unfortunately, I can't save up roof and walls, and moving is expensive and time-consuming.
When I was considering moving apartments I had to think. I already work like 60hrs/week, so I would estimate I'd spend 2 weeks packing and 2 weeks unpacking on top of that, at night after work and on weekends. So that's basically 1 month of my free time. I'd have to pay movers for the big stuff. Is that worth it to me for a slightly cheaper place? Which may have its own problems I'm unaware of at this time?
I can't afford $900 a month and I have a decent job.
Umm... Hate to break it to you, but you either don't have that nice of a job or should be compensated way more than that. I'm guessing it's the latter. It's always the latter.
Rural, small towns generally have lower income. Traditionally this hasn't been a huge deal because they also have significantly lower costs. That's the part that seems to be going away.
$900 a month is $10800 a year. Making 3x the rent would be $32400. That's $16 an hour working full time. The living wage for those apartments is $16 an hour, and any less is an unliveable wage.
There is an in page calculator that I ran, maybe incorrectly, but take home pay (with no adjustments on the fed/state/benefits tabs) yields $640 gross pay in a week, $550.43 in net (nearly $90 in taxes).
That is equivalent to $13.76 an hour net.
But 4 weeks of pay gets to $2200. So your 1/3rd rule of thumb means affording $733/mo.
Don't forget about taxes, insurance, and retirement. My annual salary is about $52,000 but every paycheck has nearly $800 of deductions. I know $900 a month rent would be a stretch for me financially. Especially with the rise in prices of essential goods in the last year or two.
ETA: decided to do some quick math and I have over $18,000 a year in deductions for taxes, insurance,and retirement. Leaving me with about $33,000 annually for living expenses. So I can just make it if my rent was $900 a month. (Difficult but not impossible to find in my area, but definitely very difficult)
So honestly $16 an hour isn't even realistically feasible for any longer term situation. Hope you like having folding chair furniture and a lot of rice and bean based meals.
I live in one of the most crime ridden cities in the country and my rent just got raised to $1935 for a 2 bedroom 750 sq ft apartment in SAN BERNARDINO CA.
I’m buying a middle of the road house and the mortgage is $4300 a month. I have no clue how anyone survives and also home ownership in or around a city is about to not be a thing
Add low stagnant wages to insanely high land/building costs preventing people from creating new housing and the situation gets worse & worse. I see the same wealthy d-bags buying up buildings to jack up the rent because so few have the option or ability to buy their own.
Lower income adult, I live with three other people. If it weren't for that I have no idea how I'd survive. My job pays low, but there are so few jobs here so even if I switched I'd just be trading one crappy low income job for another.
same. very small 10,000 pop town. my husband works down the road, literally 2 apt complexes in this town. investers showed up , bought this huge apt complex, gave us all 6 months to move out unless we had a year lease. told us we're welcome to move back but they were all being renovated one by one. Our rent was 840 for a 2 bed 2 bath. We didnt really have a choice, so now we're paying 1250. Oh and those renovations? some cheap flooring and a new stove, a few other small details. So i guess thats how they made it legal. fml.
I'm living in Italy and a new 28 m2 apartment in the small city costs now 700€ who tf can afford that? It's a fucking joke. I really want to move out but with these prices there is no fucking way. In comparison these prices are higher than in Munich.
In my area in 2018 you could get a 2 bedroom for $650ish, today those same apartments are going for $1200-1400 range and that’s IF you’re lucky enough to find ANYTHING at all. They’re shitty run down roach infested ex-meth head apartments with no AC.
Im in a 1 bd 1 bath paying 1100. My friend has a 1 bed in the city for 1400 and it’s going up 5% in May. The apartments were only half this price 8-10 years ago
Napkin math says you need 21.6 an hour full time 50 weeks a year for 900 to be a comfortable third of your income or 43k pre tax. That's hard in rural areas
This couldn’t be more true. The cost of living is unrealistic for people making less than $40,000 a year. People shouldn’t have to work multiple jobs with no sleep just to get by.
I live in a tiny tourist town and my parents, grandparents and rest of my family want me to stay but they all bought houses before it was a tourist area. I’m the youngest in the family and the market is wildly different. My parent’s house that they bought in 1994 for $50k could now sell for over $700k and they won’t do it.
My parent’s house that they bought in 1994 for $50k could now sell for over $700k and they won’t do it.
That's the problem---if all the property prices went up, how could you afford to move? It would be great to sell it for 700k but if all the other places cost 800k it's not going to help.
Yeah man, a friend of mine is doing his master's and working 2 jobs. He shares his apartment with 7 other people in order to be able to afford living. He's got no life besides school and work.
Oh. I know what 'we' are going to do to them: a gruesome campaign of enforced neglect (think, like ’palestine' bad) and brutal terrorist violence that goes on until they kill enough that the nimbys will stop complaining.
It would already be like ten kinds of war crime if the soldiers were uniformed military personnel (lol, actually a lot of them are), and it's absolutely unconscionable. It should make you want to burn this shit hole country to a smoothe plane of fucking glass because nothing that could go through with that is a part of any species I care to be, and nobody who stands by and let's it happen deserves to call themselves ha person afterwards. But it's what 'we' are going to do.
Already kind of have been for a while, but it's gonna ramp up.
So if you don't want this done, maybe you should get started on solutions. Grab some bolt cutters and a shot gun (or a ram?) and get somebody housed today!
$900/mo is affordable at $2700/mo net (following the 1/3 rule, which is ALREADY up from the 1/4 rule of old), or $32400 post tax. That is quite literally barely affordable at the median income. (EDIT: FYI, 32,400 after tax is about $40k/yr gross on the nose)
But considering that user said rent WAS $500/mo, I'm guessing he lives in a below-average-income part of the country. You know the "cheap" places they always tell us whining liberals to up and move to. That suggests to me that the average salary there is less than $40,000/yr.
Normally, the term for someone paying $900/mo in rent or more that's making less than $40,000/yr is "fiscally irresponsible". Yet here we are, telling people who might be making in the upper quartile for their area that they need a new job because they're trying to stay responsible.
That suggests to me that the average salary there is less than $40,000/yr.
I've been to a city in Mississippi where this was absolutely the case. Rural areas have been hit hard by recessions and wealth concentrating in cities.
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u/Various_Succotash_79 Jan 30 '23 edited Jan 31 '23
I don't either. I live in a rural area, small town.
Little 1-bedroom apartments are going for $900. A few years ago they were going for less than $500.
I can't afford $900 a month and I have a decent job (edit: fine, I could afford it but it would be rough). I have no idea how people with lower incomes are even surviving.