Rents become a disgrace here in WS

[vincent]

The hilarity of people who insist on desirable housing ( where they want ) always being affordable in spite of what every 4th grader understands about supply and demand aside…..

From what I understand West Seattle was kind of a crime ridden dump 10 years ago. And suffered some of the worst of the depressed prices in the city. The crime rolled back and people figured out that living in the suburbs wasn’t all it was cracked up to be, there was very little *housing bubble* in Seattle, prices just caught up with the rest of the west coast for in city living. You want to see housing bubble, look at Vegas, or Florida, those people are screwed.

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[beachdrivegirl]

Vincent you forgot Arizona.

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[Anonymous]

Yes, BDG, I can personally confirm the Arizona mention. I think I’ve mentioned before, but my friends have been hit pretty hard there. Thank goodness none of them are considering moving any time soon! I think, what I’ve heard anyways, is that Vegas and Arizona have been the worst hit so far.

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[TheHouse]

Say what you want, Jen/Jan. You’re both making someone out their rich every time you write a rent check. I never said that I’m better than you, I’ve just learned from my mistakes and you two apparently haven’t yet (one day you might realize I’m actually trying to show you that you can own). It’s not me thinking that I am superior, it’s the two of you both have inferiority complexes.

Yahtzee…have fun writing another rent check! You’re making your landlord richer!

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[vincent]

But house, I shouldn’t have to change my lifestyle to afford something. It should be affordable because I want it to be. Like gas.

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[JenV]

not.everyone.can.own.

what part about that don’t you understand? big deal, I am “making my landlord rich” as you say. It is the only way I can afford to live where I want. My friends wanted so badly to buy a house- and they had to settle down in TACOMA because they couldn’t afford to live here. But home ownership was more important to them. Not to me. I want to live in West Seattle. I barely make enough $$ to rent here, let alone buy. Good for you, House, that you are so fortunate in your life that you can buy a house. Just realize for one freaking moment that not everyone else is as fortunate…and you just come off sounding like an elitist jerk most of the time.

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[barmargia]

JenV, I agree with you. I love Seattle, sadly it is very hard to afford to live here. Evidently if House had his way all renters would be banished to some far off land so that we wouldn’t sully up his utopia of only home owners. Yes I would love to own a home, something other than a 400 sq ft condo, because right now I can barely afford that, but I’m also glad I rent and don’t own. When my boyfriend was over in Iraq for a year and a half if I had emergencies at the house I could call my landlord to come fix things. My landlord has raised the rent since I’ve lived here, and yes I would prefer he not, but he’s a great landlord and I understand why, but it’s still way less than a mortgage would be. But I’m guessing that House is the type of person that had a rental he would charge as much as he possibly could simply because he wanted to punish renters.

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[JanS]

“I’ve just learned from my mistakes and you two apparently haven’t yet (one day you might realize I’m actually trying to show you that you can own). It’s not me thinking that I am superior, it’s the two of you both have inferiority complexes.”

smugness is wonderful isn’t it? No, I’m not morphined up yet..give it a few more hours.how are you trying to show me that I can own? Are you saying that you have an extra 40-50K that I can have for a down payment? I certainly don’t have it to spare. ‘Cause if you’re willing to help out, I’m all for it….could we maybe go for something big, so JenV can have half?

you are a jokester, House…and, no I DO NOT have an inferiority complex. One of the things that you may unfortunately learn is, that you may be a ” millionaire” now, but it can be taken away in an instant…and that’s the truth. Be smug as long as you can, my friend…I hope that you have a long and perfect life, and that calamity doesn’t ever hit you…

I hate it when I can’t sleep :)

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[JenV]

Jan- you’re a lot nicer than I am. I don’t see him as a “jokester” or “friend” – he has done nothing on this board but insult people simply to build himself up.

It’s useless to argue with him, because he’ll always have an answer…an answer that suits House, and House alone. I personally wont give this little gnat any more of my time….

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[charlabob]

What Jen said. :-) I have noticed smug people, in general, only have answers to questions that further their agenda. They don’t seem to deal well with ambiguity,

I’m really glad we have NR as a regular poster from the right, though incorrect, side. Otherwise, I could smugly decide all Repugs are like H — and that’s most definitely not the case.

Oops…this is lapsing into being political and c doesn’t do that anymore. Lordy, I do miss it, but the tremors are starting to subside a bit.

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[JimmyG]

EVERYTHING in life is about choices. How we RESPOND to things that happen to us is our choice.

I was like JenV, I wanted to live in WS as my chosen place of residence and I couldn’t afford it if I had to rent here. So I moved to god-awful Puyallup for 3.5 years of pain, lived in a crappy duplex and saved every dime. That’s how I was able to afford our house here in WS on one income.

It’s not the right way for everyone, but I wanted to be a home owner here in WS so I found a way to make it happen.

And as I said earlier in this thread, you can’t blame the landlords–people are obviously able to afford the rents here in WS–otherwise the market wouldn’t be able to support them.

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[beachdrivegirl]

and i do have to speak up for the landlords. some landlords do not even cover their mortgage(s) on the properties that they rent out.

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[Anonymous]

There are also people who choose to rent over owning. No property taxes or homeowners insurance. No appliances to purchase or repairs to finance. Try pricing a new roof, sewer line, plumbing, etc. Often you don’t have yard maintenance. Your utilities are included. The cost to get in is minor compared to a down payment. And, it is much easier to pick up and move to a new street, city, state, country.

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[Anonymous]

JT – That is exactly true, with us anyways.

Although the thought of “throwing away money every month” is not appealing (to anyone), it can make more economical sense for some.

Our water heater went caput on Christmas Eve. It was promptly fixed and we didn’t have to spend a dime. Also, as you mentioned, the taxes.

Not to mention the fact that my significant other is currently seeking another job due to an unforeseen buyout that recently took place. We are really glad that we have not purchased yet as relocating may be required.

We have the means to buy, have been able to own for quite a long time now. Thank goodness my guy had the foresight to wait until the market started correcting itself.

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[Shibaguyz]

Going to poke my head back in because I can’t be quiet anymore… I’ll say the first thing that will tick off half of you then I’ll say the second thing that will tick off the other half.

I don’t always agree with the WAY a lot of people post their comments on these forums. I think most of it sounds like a bunch of name calling and neener neener. However, there are some valid points if you can weed through that garbage… and I’m talking from BOTH sides.

Yes, people get into unfortunate circumstances. Yes, bad things happen that are out of our control. We know that just about as well as anyone. It’s relative to talk about what is “bad” or a “bad circumstance.” But we all have choices to make once we get into those circumstances and that is up to the individual as to how they deal with it and not something for anyone else to judge.

However…

As for our circumstances, we wanted to buy. We wanted to not have to buy a starter house and just wanted to get into the house we would retire in and there it would be. That couldn’t happen at the time. So we whined about the housing market and how it wasn’t fair and we griped and complained. Fat lot of good that did us. Our landlord raised the rent on us and charged us more for parking. More complaining.

Then we took our heads out of the sand. A friend gave us a book called “The Automatic Millionaire.” Don’t care if you like the guy or not, but we INSTANTLY made changes in our financial planning situation that put us on the track to having a real retirement and real savings. That lead us to buy another of his books “The Automatic Millionaire Homeowner.” I am not exaggerating when I tell you that one year later we were in our home.

It wasn’t easy, it took sacrifices… a LOT of sacrifices (again, a relative thing therefore different for everyone). But we were able to put together a financial profile within a year that gave us the chance to buy our first home. We are not wealthy. We did not have perfect credit. We did not take out one of those horrid zero-down loans. But, we did not pay $45K for our downpayment. That, as we found out, was pretty antiquated thinking and it was the re-education we went through that showed us how to do it.

I’m saying all of this because I don’t want some renter reading this to think that there are NO options out there for them. In my opinion, it is better to rent than to own so that the money is going back in my pocket and toward my investments. Again, go back to the top of this if you’re hacked off now and re-read what I said about everyone’s circumstances being different. I would just hate for someone to be reading this and think there is no way out if they feel like they HAVE TO rent. Believe me, we thought the same thing and lived that way for years because we were stuck in our own ego of self pity about the housing market.

But you can get out if you want to. It just takes time. And, yes, you might have to give up your expensive coffee habit for a while and you might have to take public transportation instead of driving that car everywhere or you might have to work a second job or a heck of a lot of overtime. You might even have to stop going out to eat as much and put as much money away as possible until you have enough $$ wrangled away to make up for your other deficiencies. But, if it is that important to you to own your own home, then you will gladly do those things and not think twice about the value of making those decisions.

I hope that this is not interpreted as being “holier than thou” or “elitist” in any way. If it is, then so be it. We worked our butts off to get what we have and to have what we want. Yes, it could all disappear in a flash and that is why we work equally as hard on making sure that our ego is not tying up our self worth in our material possessions. And, for now, we are going to enjoy it without fearing every day that it will be taken away.

Thank you for indulging my horribly loooong post. I know I said I was going to stay out of it with all of the name calling and such going on in this post but I figure if you all can do that, maybe it’s okay for me to post equally passionately in the positive side of things to offer another option for people out there read this that might get discouraged about buying a home.

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[TheHouse]

After being called smug, better than other people, holier than thou, etc it gets equally annoying to me when many of you automatically assume you know everything about me. I was in many of your positions 10-15 years ago (renting). I wasn’t born with a silver spoon in my mouth, worked extremely hard to pay my way through college, start a career and become partially successful (I am by no means a millionaire as someone mentioned above). I met a wonderful woman who also has contributed greatly to our success. All of this was a struggle and I moved from Atlanta to Miami and to Seattle to get to the position I’m in today. I made many sacrifices.

The big difference between most of the people that posted above and me is that I had an “A-ha” moment and told myself that I’m going to stop living like a loser (that’s the way I viewed my personal lifestyle at the time) and began living my life so that I have a strong future.

If you don’t change the way you spend/save today, you will never have that 10%-20% down for a house. Einstein stated

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Thats the way most of you appear on here to run your lives.

I really could care less if you continue renting. I’m simply stating that anyone can if they want to….you just have to change your mindset.

Just like an alcoholic, the first step in solving your problem is recognizing that you have one.

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[Anonymous]

JimmyG, Shibaguyz and House – Congratulations on becoming homeowners. I want to thank you for sharing your stories of hard work, determination and sacrifice in order to get to where you are today.

I congratulate you, too, on not taking the much-to-easy “victim” mentality (well, Shibaguyz, it sounded like maybe you did, and then you pulled yourself out of it).

Yes, rents have gone up. Gas has gone up. Everything has gone up, it’s inflation and it happens. I guess you can either choose to keep up or not.

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[Jiggers]

House…I would never move to any of those citie’s that you have mentioned. Detroit wtf? Dallas? sorry…. I moved to Seattle because it fit me, and I’ve been to a lot citie’s were its down right nasty. I guess I’ll have to adapt and downsize my living conditions if I want to stay in the 206.

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[JenV]

I don’t consider myself a “victim” that I cannot own a house- I consider it a fact of life. Home ownership is simply out of reach for some of us. But that does not make us “victims” or “losers”. What we are is below the median income to buy a home. If I were making what I am making here, and wanted to move to some crappy little burg in Nevada, yes, I could become a homeowner. Whoop-ti-fricken-doo.

Nor do I vilify anyone who owns a home. My boyfriend was smart enough to snatch up a great house with his sister in 2001 just before West Seattle really exploded price-wise. I am very happy for them that they were able to buy a nice house in a GREAT neighborhood, and I am happy that their house is now worth a lot more because of the price-boom.

And yes, my rent is high. My rent is high because I choose to live in the neighborhood I live in. When I lived in a less desirable neighborhood, I paid a lot less. I have lived in West Seattle for a long time, and have seen the rents rise as this becomes a more desirable place to live. This is still where I want to live, though. So, like Jiggers, I just have to buck up. But I am damn sick and tired of people telling me that I am less than nothing because I don’t own a house. People act like it is the end all be all. It isn’t.

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[Anonymous]

I don’t think you are less than, and actually I don’t really think house does either. Tact may be lacking, but the point was, *IF* homeownership is your priority, it can be done.

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[JoB]

here we go again…

if there is a wide gap between those who have in our society.. and those who work hard to have something…

there seems to be an even wider gap between those who work hard to have something and those who may also work hard and still have nothing.

Ok.. that was a diplomatic way to say that although some of you may think your financial situations were tough.. and you wised up and changed them.. you have no idea what tough is.

What if you have already given up the coffees and the dinners out and the new clothes… and the car… and the new furniture… and… ?

what if you have never purchased anything new in your life… bought everything second hand… didn’t splurge… never took a vacation… don’t drink.. don’t drive… take your own lunch… etc… and you still don’t have the money to do anything other than rent.. and often share rentals at that… ?

Yup, you can be a hardworking person in our society and live exactly that life… barely scraping together enough money to exist.. and hope against hope that nothing happens to make it impossible for you to work.. even for a week or two… because there is no safety net.. no savings… no family.. no friends…

now imagine you are living like that and raising children as well…

or… imagine you are older.. on a fixed income that doesn’t rise with inflation… yet food, rent, medications.. just keep going up.

Imagine you had spent most of your adult life making a home and raising an family and your husband decides he would like a newer and younger model and by the way he doesn’t want the responsibility of raising a family…

Oops… life just changed. You just became poor because he didn’t honor the commitments he made that you made your life choices based on…

Imagine you are working and prospering… and one day you get ill.. and they can’t figure out what is wrong.. and you don’t die and you don’t get better and you are way to sick to work.

Now imagine that the disability insurance you paid for determines that your condition is psychological… in spite of your having no history of psychological illness.. because there is no definitive physiological test for your illness.

Oops.. your life just changed.. all because you got ill and your insurance didn’t cover you the way it was supposed to.

What some of you don’t seem to understand is that you can make good choices.. you can prosper.. you can do everything right… and still s..t happens…

Your company gets bought out.. the economy tanks and suddenly you find yourself without a job… you fall off the waterski and puncture your lung as you land.. suddenly narrowing your options…

life happens…

and it can happen to you as easily as to the rest of us…

no matter how well you make our choices.

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[Trick]

JOB,

I think that is a very fair way of explaining that life can have it’s surprises. I won’t get into mine, and yes I’m a homeowner, but my life has had many curves to prevent me from making those next steps in the ladder. However I don’t regret taking care of my brother, or mother when they needed me the most. Those choices were mandatory for the sake of my conscious and principle.

Also Shibaguyz post was also encouraging as well.

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[flipjack]

What HOUSE didn’t mention is that he lives in his car.

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[JenV]

AAAAAAND scene. That’s a wrap folks!

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[Trick]

This is a test, only a test of the emergency broadcast system, we return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

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[Author]

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