This is such an important topic. Housing now is a full-on commodity. Older people who own multiple homes have cheap mortgages, have been collecting rent that's gone up, up, up, while wages of younger people have not pace.
Many Boomers and Silent Gen in our community own multiple homes. When you have capital (i.e. assets) you can make more capital, right? Rich get richer. They hop from one home to next, which makes it hard for community connections to be built. Sometimes they just collect homes to rent out--no incentive to build. That's the case for our landlord, who is very nice by the way, but owns many dwellings in the valley, which has helped drive prices up.
Younger gens struggle mightily. Can't imagine having enough money to own home, put down roots, have kids.
In my own little enclave of 7 modest dwellings, 3 are unoccupied for large portions of year--one empty except for Christmas. All semi- or barely-occupied dwellings are owned by Boomers. It's hard to see them constantly dark for 2 reasons: 1) they are sitting empty while so many lack housing 2) because they lack people, they aren't contributing to a strong community. The other 3 ARE occupied, all by younger people who actually LIVE here. All bought just before housing melt-up. Now...no way.
It seems like we need to realize the cost to society and well-being of (mainly older folks with money) owning (multiple) homes--not living in one full-time?
As your brothers friend with the truck I have the same concern about rents. We bought our house in 2002. It is now worth (according to Zillow) almost 4 times what we paid. Rents in the neighborhood are more that 2x to 3x our mortgage payment. But there are very few vacant lots to build on so very few new houses being built.
I don't knoiw if zoning affects that. Our lot is big enough for another house but zoning doesn't allow us to build one.
I could write a lot about the cost of housing and how my family got profoundly lucky after years of renting, but I don't want to overlook the parts about your wild roommate stories!! :) Yikes! I would read more posts about some of those adventures. My wildest story was when the two brothers I was living with had a fight in our front yard one night. A physical, punching, one-gave-the-other-a-black-eye sort of thing. And yet I would have trusted both of them to take care of me if I ever needed it. Living with people (especially people you don't know all that well) can be wild!
I feel so fortunate to own. Will soon be selling my condo...even with owning a condo the assessment fees are on the rise. How high can things go? I guess we will find out...
This is such an important topic. Housing now is a full-on commodity. Older people who own multiple homes have cheap mortgages, have been collecting rent that's gone up, up, up, while wages of younger people have not pace.
Many Boomers and Silent Gen in our community own multiple homes. When you have capital (i.e. assets) you can make more capital, right? Rich get richer. They hop from one home to next, which makes it hard for community connections to be built. Sometimes they just collect homes to rent out--no incentive to build. That's the case for our landlord, who is very nice by the way, but owns many dwellings in the valley, which has helped drive prices up.
Younger gens struggle mightily. Can't imagine having enough money to own home, put down roots, have kids.
In my own little enclave of 7 modest dwellings, 3 are unoccupied for large portions of year--one empty except for Christmas. All semi- or barely-occupied dwellings are owned by Boomers. It's hard to see them constantly dark for 2 reasons: 1) they are sitting empty while so many lack housing 2) because they lack people, they aren't contributing to a strong community. The other 3 ARE occupied, all by younger people who actually LIVE here. All bought just before housing melt-up. Now...no way.
It seems like we need to realize the cost to society and well-being of (mainly older folks with money) owning (multiple) homes--not living in one full-time?
As your brothers friend with the truck I have the same concern about rents. We bought our house in 2002. It is now worth (according to Zillow) almost 4 times what we paid. Rents in the neighborhood are more that 2x to 3x our mortgage payment. But there are very few vacant lots to build on so very few new houses being built.
I don't knoiw if zoning affects that. Our lot is big enough for another house but zoning doesn't allow us to build one.
I could write a lot about the cost of housing and how my family got profoundly lucky after years of renting, but I don't want to overlook the parts about your wild roommate stories!! :) Yikes! I would read more posts about some of those adventures. My wildest story was when the two brothers I was living with had a fight in our front yard one night. A physical, punching, one-gave-the-other-a-black-eye sort of thing. And yet I would have trusted both of them to take care of me if I ever needed it. Living with people (especially people you don't know all that well) can be wild!
I feel so fortunate to own. Will soon be selling my condo...even with owning a condo the assessment fees are on the rise. How high can things go? I guess we will find out...