Apartment Woes

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Rajaah

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Keep in mind this is very specific to where I'm living. I don't know shit about Conneticut. Anything in the 195 corridor is going to have prices comparable to the outskirts of boston metro. 1200 has become the generic price point for a 2-to-3 bedroom apartment in the poorer places. It's more like 1300-1500 as the starter elsewhere, like the commuter towns and burbs, especially if you're living in one of the new complexes they've thrown up all along 95/195 to court the Boston commuters.

You might get a smaller/shittier apartment for 1000-1200 in some of the lower income areas. 600-850 a month is what you can expect to get charged for having a single room/studio with shared spaces, though the lower end is in real rat holes like New Bedford, Fall River, E Providence. This is all related to apartments you can find in the larger cities. In the smaller and more rural towns there are less available apartments, less complexes, sometimes completely nonexistent in the rich white enclaves on the coast--unless you're talking a place like Newport RI, which has plenty of apartments with most of the non-shitholes being in the 1800-2200 range. There's houses where they're unironically asking for 3k a month for a 2-bedroom in a triple decker houses built in 1910 and never upgraded.

The further away you get from the highway, shit changes, but it's all contingent on which direction you're going. Don't bother looking for anything affordable on the Cape, it's simply not going to happen. West and North of Boston are the commuter communities where its overpriced 5-to-1 box apartments and not much else. If its on the coast you will pay more.

From the sound of things no matter where I go around here it's going to be ridiculous, unless I want to live in a slum.
 

Zaara

I'm With HER ♀
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Yes. And we have many slums. The problem is that even the slums have become largely unaffordable if you're going by the 30% rule and are living on a single income. There's a squeeze happening on the lower class and you can see it here in real time, where you have 6-7 people living in a two bedroom apartment, people working the Section 8 carousel. Homelessness in the area has skyrocketed.

The hilarious thing is that you need only drive ten minutes off the highway in some cases, and you are in some of the richest and most beautiful enclaves in New England. They don't build apartment complexes in those towns. They don't even let the fast food franchises in. New construction is almost exclusively developments where they'll put up a gaggle of McMansions and charge 650k out the gate- nobody is making starter homes or smaller units, unless they are townhouse developments where they bulldoze a home and build 4-5 townhouses on the same footprint. Those have become more prevalent and it is actually fucking ridiculous, considering they're charging anything from 320-450k for a place where you can touch your house and your neighbor's house at the same time with your arms spread.
 

Izo

Tranny Chaser
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Question, and I don't know what other forum to ask it on: What's a good site for apartment-finding? I need to look for one and there are a million sites like this. I saw a screenshot of a map somewhere on these forums recently that showed all of the available apartments for rent in an area and their prices (good way to check property values in an area). Didn't ask what it was from and can't find it now to ask. Something like that would be hugely helpful though. Looking for something in New Hampshire if that helps.
funeral im back GIF
 
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Rajaah

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Yes. And we have many slums. The problem is that even the slums have become largely unaffordable if you're going by the 30% rule and are living on a single income. There's a squeeze happening on the lower class and you can see it here in real time, where you have 6-7 people living in a two bedroom apartment, people working the Section 8 carousel. Homelessness in the area has skyrocketed.

The hilarious thing is that you need only drive ten minutes off the highway in some cases, and you are in some of the richest and most beautiful enclaves in New England. They don't build apartment complexes in those towns. They don't even let the fast food franchises in. New construction is almost exclusively developments where they'll put up a gaggle of McMansions and charge 650k out the gate- nobody is making starter homes or smaller units, unless they are townhouse developments where they bulldoze a home and build 4-5 townhouses on the same footprint. Those have become more prevalent and it is actually fucking ridiculous, considering they're charging anything from 320-450k for a place where you can touch your house and your neighbor's house at the same time with your arms spread.

The Section 8 carousel is nuts, and unfortunately becoming necessary for people. I've been asking people about their rent situations, often randomly when they mention where they live, and it's blowing me away how many of them say they're on Section 8 or some other housing assistance.

The kicker is that the people on assistance are paying what would have been considered "normal" earlier in my lifetime.

There's also quite a bit of Affordable Housing (rent-controlled) that I've stumbled upon, and even those are insane. Like $1200 a month, that's bad but doable... but then you see other "Affordable" listings that are 1800-2200. If that's considered rent-controlled for a 1BR, Jesus Christ.

We really are witnessing a horrendous consolidation of wealth and people being frozen out of housing. Soon some corporation will swoop in with a "solution" in the form of people living in pods or whatever the Great Reset has planned, but first it has to get worse until it reaches critical mass.

I didn't want to go back to having roommates (I'm fuckin' 37) but at this point I might well need to do that if I want to save any money at all because standard rent is so out of control.

Looks like renting a room in MA, you can expect to pay around $900/mo. That's with roommates. Last time I had roommates (2014) I believe it topped out at around $600/mo to rent rooms in the same areas, and you could get one for $400 fairly easily. I had a SWEET wood-paneled room in a house back in 2011 that ran me $400 a month, had a nice street-view, had some space to it, etc. I had no idea how good I had it. Maybe I'll swing by there and awkwardly ask whoever lives in the house now if the room is available and how much it is now.
 

Fucker

Log Wizard
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The Section 8 carousel is nuts, and unfortunately becoming necessary for people. I've been asking people about their rent situations, often randomly when they mention where they live, and it's blowing me away how many of them say they're on Section 8 or some other housing assistance.

The kicker is that the people on assistance are paying what would have been considered "normal" earlier in my lifetime.

There's also quite a bit of Affordable Housing (rent-controlled) that I've stumbled upon, and even those are insane. Like $1200 a month, that's bad but doable... but then you see other "Affordable" listings that are 1800-2200. If that's considered rent-controlled for a 1BR, Jesus Christ.

We really are witnessing a horrendous consolidation of wealth and people being frozen out of housing. Soon some corporation will swoop in with a "solution" in the form of people living in pods or whatever the Great Reset has planned, but first it has to get worse until it reaches critical mass.

I didn't want to go back to having roommates (I'm fuckin' 37) but at this point I might well need to do that if I want to save any money at all because standard rent is so out of control.

Looks like renting a room in MA, you can expect to pay around $900/mo. That's with roommates. Last time I had roommates (2014) I believe it topped out at around $600/mo to rent rooms in the same areas, and you could get one for $400 fairly easily. I had a SWEET wood-paneled room in a house back in 2011 that ran me $400 a month, had a nice street-view, had some space to it, etc. I had no idea how good I had it. Maybe I'll swing by there and awkwardly ask whoever lives in the house now if the room is available and how much it is now.
I've seen nearly a whole state become off limits to people of modest means, and it happened in nearly a blink of an eye. You used to be able to buy a nice little house for $70k and live a comfortable life without wrecking yourself to have it.

POOF. GONE. This is going to be the entire USA soon.
 
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Borzak

Bronze Baron of the Realm
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In 1990 6 months from dropping out I put an offer in on a house on a house in 100% minority suburb for $105k and it was accepted. Decided to move out of state. I looked a few months ago. Houses on that same street now are selling for $300-$350k.
 

Lanx

Oye Ve
<Prior Amod>
60,073
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In 1990 6 months from dropping out I put an offer in on a house on a house in 100% minority suburb for $105k and it was accepted. Decided to move out of state. I looked a few months ago. Houses on that same street now are selling for $300-$350k.
you can move to ks and the money you'd use for a downpayment, you can outright buy a real working (not pretty house)
5cbeba6434475c86c48c8e166ca55319.jpg


only 4 minutes away from a church too!
51d6b0047203454571c1b8600db16e99.jpg
 
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Hateyou

Not Great, Not Terrible
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Good news Rajaah Rajaah . We’re booting people out of “affordable” housing at record rates, maybe you can get something “affordable”!

 

OU Ariakas

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The Section 8 carousel is nuts, and unfortunately becoming necessary for people. I've been asking people about their rent situations, often randomly when they mention where they live, and it's blowing me away how many of them say they're on Section 8 or some other housing assistance.

The kicker is that the people on assistance are paying what would have been considered "normal" earlier in my lifetime.

There's also quite a bit of Affordable Housing (rent-controlled) that I've stumbled upon, and even those are insane. Like $1200 a month, that's bad but doable... but then you see other "Affordable" listings that are 1800-2200. If that's considered rent-controlled for a 1BR, Jesus Christ.

We really are witnessing a horrendous consolidation of wealth and people being frozen out of housing. Soon some corporation will swoop in with a "solution" in the form of people living in pods or whatever the Great Reset has planned, but first it has to get worse until it reaches critical mass.

I didn't want to go back to having roommates (I'm fuckin' 37) but at this point I might well need to do that if I want to save any money at all because standard rent is so out of control.

Looks like renting a room in MA, you can expect to pay around $900/mo. That's with roommates. Last time I had roommates (2014) I believe it topped out at around $600/mo to rent rooms in the same areas, and you could get one for $400 fairly easily. I had a SWEET wood-paneled room in a house back in 2011 that ran me $400 a month, had a nice street-view, had some space to it, etc. I had no idea how good I had it. Maybe I'll swing by there and awkwardly ask whoever lives in the house now if the room is available and how much it is now.

If you are single then why are you so dedicated to the NW? Try a moderately sized town close to an airport in any flyover state and I guarantee you after living there for a year that you will wonder why anyone lives in the shithole crowded coasts to begin with. At least fucking Cali has good weather.
 

Koushirou

Log Wizard
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Good news Rajaah Rajaah . We’re booting people out of “affordable” housing at record rates, maybe you can get something “affordable”!


This article is fucking flabbergasting to me. Literally, more affordable homes are coming onto the market because people can't fucking afford them. Jesus fucking christ.
 
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Rajaah

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This article is fucking flabbergasting to me. Literally, more affordable homes are coming onto the market because people can't fucking afford them. Jesus fucking christ.

Yeah. I'd like something at about $1k/mo as that's what I got used to (before it got jacked up multiple times).

Any more than that and I start cutting funds from the lifestyle I'm used to, aka being able to afford things finally after growing up poor. With $1k rent I'm able to live comfortably and have discretionary spending money. Raise that by even 400-500 and suddenly I'm having issues where issues didn't exist for years.

Though I will say that not having a GF the last couple years saved me a TON of money. So I've been in a better than normal position and I'm still having rent infringing on my livelihood now.

I hear that in places like Germany and Sweden, rent is capped to prevent these kinds of situations of year-by-year raises. Guy I know in Stockholm pays like $450 for a 1BR because it never goes up. Cost of goods there is lower too. I'd rather stay in the U.S. though. Every European state has some deal breaker for me, whether it's language, high cost of living, or driving on the wrong side of the road. If it came down to it I wouldn't say no to living in Switzerland, but it's one of the "high cost of living" scenarios. Maybe north Italy.