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Happiness Commando posted:I'm not well versed in the other places other than to have heard of them as small/mid-sized urban areas, but Montpelier VT does not belong on that list at all. It has a population of 10,000 and downtown such as it is is literally 2 blocks. in Vermont, Burlington is the major metropolitan area with all of the amenities. That's where everyone wants to move and surprise, surprise, the highest housing prices in the state. The better comparison than Montpelier is Rutland. Think of it as Pittsburgh with a former industrial base of marble. It has a "reputation" for being dirty, run down, dying. "Who would want to live there?" Except it's totally fine. Plenty of amenities. For example, my wife has gone down there for a couple of surgeries at the medical center that were both easier to schedule and cheaper. If we were not in Vergennes which is in Burlington's orbit, I'd happily move to somewhere within Rutland's.
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Aug 16, 2022 22:47
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Tiny Timbs posted:I grew up near Buffalo. Not sure this argument is going anywhere interesting, there’s always going to be some kind of excuse for someone not to do something. That doesn’t seem all that relevant to the argument that there are many mid-size cities that offer appealing lifestyles. "Excuses to not do something" is also not the point. It's not excuses, people have good reasons to not move. Many people simply aren't as mobile as the Ideal Real Estate Person. Yes there are appealing mid size cities that offer some sort of lifestyle for some sort of people. And if a ton of people moved there, they wouldn't. Talking about meal prep when people are talking about the rising cost of food doesn't address anything other than an option that some people might have. It's a sidestep of a discussion, presumably because the actual solutions aren't politically realistic. Do you think the only reason people aren't moving to Buffalo or KC en masse is because "they've heard it doesn't have good nightlife" or something?
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Aug 16, 2022 22:50
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:A bubble requires artificial demand for the product. Even if prices are inflated right now, there are still a lot more people than there are houses (especially in high-demand urban areas), so it is going to be a long time before a true "pop" of the bubble. It will likely just float down and then back up over time rather than a full pop. At least, in the short term. No, but you are going to have a ton of buyers discover that they can't pay as much for a house, and a ton of sellers thereby discover that they can't get as much for a house, due to the recent rise in borrowing costs. The historically borrowing costs we saw put a thumb on the scale by generating that artificial demand you talk about.
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Aug 16, 2022 22:54
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I think a big thing here is that no matter how well argued, "there are still cheap places to get on the property ladder to maybe escape the fate of those who cannot" is fundamentally a rearguard effort. There are lots of places that were the reasonable places to get a starter home outside of or even near metro areas 10 years ago, and now homes there cost more than the metro area ones did 10 years ago. These places being discussed as good options will not be for long, unless the root of the problem is addressed. Given that there is either nil or next to nil political willingness to even acknowledge this as a bad thing, it takes a lot of the punch out of the argument. The solution to the problem "a wildfire is rapidly approaching" is not "run forever", nor is it "you lucked out and it dodged you, hope it keeps doing that." You need to put out the fire. In this case, it is recognizing housing-as-investment as a plainly incoherent scheme coming to its unavoidable end and building a housing policy that matches rhetoric that housing is a right or the fundamental truth that it is a baseline requirement for human life.
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Aug 16, 2022 22:58
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Epic High Five posted:The solution to the problem "a wildfire is rapidly approaching" is not "run forever", nor is it "you lucked out and it dodged you, hope it keeps doing that." You need to put out the fire. In this case, it is recognizing housing-as-investment as a plainly incoherent scheme coming to its unavoidable end and building a housing policy that matches rhetoric that housing is a right or the fundamental truth that it is a baseline requirement for human life. Yes. That's why it deservers maybe an afterthought mention. But none of the firefighting solutions are at all politically tenable so the rearguard is the only real possibility for discussion I guess?
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Aug 16, 2022 23:02
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Yeah, I mean the solution is to use eminent domain to seize a bunch of land, massively invest in mass transit, and plop gigantic hong kong style mixed use condo complexes to up urban density and put that mass transit to work. Combined with banning investment firms from owning single family homes, regulating AirBnb into the dirt. Of course, that's all completely politically non-viable, so instead, maybe we get a highway bill and some hogs screeching Nimby things at anything larger then a duplex?
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Aug 16, 2022 23:05
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Epic High Five posted:I think a big thing here is that no matter how well argued, "there are still cheap places to get on the property ladder to maybe escape the fate of those who cannot" is fundamentally a rearguard effort. There are lots of places that were the reasonable places to get a starter home outside of or even near metro areas 10 years ago, and now homes there cost more than the metro area ones did 10 years ago. These places being discussed as good options will not be for long, unless the root of the problem is addressed. Given that there is either nil or next to nil political willingness to even acknowledge this as a bad thing, it takes a lot of the punch out of the argument. The places being discussed now as good options also weren't good options 10 years ago, they became good options because the good options 10 years ago became popular and too expensive so people started moving to them instead. Presumably if the same thing happens there will be a new list of up and coming cities 10 years from now, that's how urbanization happens. That doesn't help people who can't relocate though so it's not like we don't have a problem, but there is a certain amount of intractability to the issue of the most popular places to live are going to be really expensive because there's more people than land. Good policy can move the margins but the fundamental problem is people with lots of money wanting to live in a place means people without money get priced out.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:05
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E-Diddy posted:Not to take away from your point since it's a good point, but Fresno is between 3 1/2 and 4 hours from LA. Do you mean Lancaster, maybe? Oh boy, something I can speak authoritatively about! Lancaster, CA (and it's AV sibling Palmdale) is a absolute loving wasteland and should never be used as a positive example of anything. It is nearly as close to Hell on Earth as a terrestrial place can be. All of the sprawl of LA, none of the good parts, and a city council completely dominated by a bizarre Baptist splinter cult. Evangelical, busybody chuds; biker gang Nazis; and wanna-be gangsters are the least of your worries. The tallest building in the city is the courthouse, and the only police with jurisdiction (outside of the freeway that separates the city into the "terrifyingly awful" side and the "slightly less terrifyingly awful side") is the LA County Sheriff's Dept. You know, the one with actual gangs. With no real industry or jobs outside of the couple thousand of available at nearby Edwards AFB or the related military contractors, it's also desperately poor. It's regularly over 110 degrees in the summer, and floods during the bi-annual rainfall. The entire city is built on a 1 sq mile grid with a completely byzantine combination of untimed traffic lights, rotaries, unmarked intersections, and good ol' medians and stroads everywhere. Houses are built where their residential street is actually a 50 MPH 6-lane collector road; combine that with drivers who's skill makes you question the value of humanity and you get an unwalkable, extraurban hellscape. I don't think anyone was arguing Lancaster was actually a good place to move to, but having lived there for just over 5 years before escaping, it's my solemn duty to warn others whenever it comes up. forbidden dialectics fucked around with this message at 23:10 on Aug 16, 2022 |
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Aug 16, 2022 23:07
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Epic High Five posted:I think a big thing here is that no matter how well argued, "there are still cheap places to get on the property ladder to maybe escape the fate of those who cannot" is fundamentally a rearguard effort. There are lots of places that were the reasonable places to get a starter home outside of or even near metro areas 10 years ago, and now homes there cost more than the metro area ones did 10 years ago. These places being discussed as good options will not be for long, unless the root of the problem is addressed. Given that there is either nil or next to nil political willingness to even acknowledge this as a bad thing, it takes a lot of the punch out of the argument. No disagreement there. It's not an actual "solution" to the housing shortage. It's just a thing that a lot of people overlook because they don't think areas outside of the major urban core are livable. Almost all of the growth in Seattle is from people moving into the city from outside. Many of those people could move over to Spokane and it would reduce costs for both themselves and the people in Seattle. But, nobody wants to "move to the west coast and go to Spokane," they want to "move to the west coast and go to Seattle." Jaxyon posted:"Excuses to not do something" is also not the point. It's not excuses, people have good reasons to not move. Many people simply aren't as mobile as the Ideal Real Estate Person. Okay, I think I see the miscommunication. Nobody is saying that everyone moving to Buffalo is a solution to housing policy. Just saying that most of the growth in major urban areas is from people moving in from out of state. Those people don't consider other urban areas at all and they get a bad rap. They are all perfectly fine places to live. People moving across country to go to Seattle and complaining that there is nowhere affordable can get a very similar lifestyle with a much lower cost by picking a different spot in the metro area, but very few of them consider it an option. Nobody is saying people who have lived in Seattle forever need to pack up and move to Buffalo or Spokane.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:09
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I'm just glad people were talking about Fresno in a not overtly negative way. We have some cool things, like that we are a day trip at most from the actual cool things in Cali.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:18
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Everything I've ever read(admittedly, could still be wrong) is that Americans are less mobile then ever, largely because the average American is getting older but also because people don't just don't want to move because of various reasons mentioned in this thread. Whatever the merits of people moving to other places to solve social or economic problems, it doesn't seem like that's the future until/unless we all become climate refugees in truly dire circumstances. I feel like the spiraling cost of housing just reinforces the endemic precariousness of modern American life that makes you really not want to shake the boat too much if you're already getting by somewhere, even if maybe you could do better elsewhere.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:19
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It also doesn't help that moving loving SUCKS, and is reliably twice as expensive as whatever a best guess as to the most it could possibly cost would be.Jarmak posted:The places being discussed now as good options also weren't good options 10 years ago, they became good options because the good options 10 years ago became popular and too expensive so people started moving to them instead. Presumably if the same thing happens there will be a new list of up and coming cities 10 years from now, that's how urbanization happens. There's a lot of reasons things keep getting more expensive, I'd argue the biggest one is probably that our entire economy is essentially built on these numbers going up forever. After all, your rent doesn't go up because any improvements were made that year, it goes up because going up every year is what rent does. Even if it is purely explained by a rational market hypothesis, it's still a looming existential crisis whose endpoint is a middle class revolution to usher in whatever mind bogglingly stupid variant of fascism the US will materialize that's only second to meat becoming too expensive to have at every meal in terms of how likely it is to be the reason. Jaxyon posted:Yes. That's why it deservers maybe an afterthought mention. Well my standpoint in discussing it online at least is that people at least don't try to spin the looming flames as a beautiful daybreak or something. It's okay to call something grim if it is indeed grim. This is after all a "hey make sure this doesn't happen in your capitalist economy" thing that predates even Marx, and is one that is in no way limited exclusively to housing. We're all going to be pining for the days of right now when the cold realities of the free market are applied to things like water access for people unfortunate enough to not be born as a golf course.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:20
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Epic High Five posted:Well my standpoint in discussing it online at least is that people at least don't try to spin the looming flames as a beautiful daybreak or something. It's okay to call something grim if it is indeed grim. This is after all a "hey make sure this doesn't happen in your capitalist economy" thing that predates even Marx, and is one that is in no way limited exclusively to housing. We're all going to be pining for the days of right now when the cold realities of the free market are applied to things like water access for people unfortunate enough to not be born as a golf course. Yeah. Japan has many, many issues, including on real estate but I do respect that their zoning has made it so that Tokyo is still relative affordable despite having roughly the entire population of California in one metro area. We can make urban areas work, but we won't.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:23
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Kalli posted:Yeah, I mean the solution is to use eminent domain to seize a bunch of land, massively invest in mass transit, and plop gigantic hong kong style mixed use condo complexes to up urban density and put that mass transit to work. Combined with banning investment firms from owning single family homes, regulating AirBnb into the dirt. The WA state legislature, with full support of the governor, was only two votes shy of forcing anything from a duplex up to a six-plex on R1 lots, depending on the population of the municipality where the lot was located or if it was within a certain distance of mass transit every 15-20 minutes. I think it was 20/40/60/80/100k or mass transit for a 2/3/4/5/6plex on the lot. It would also remove the use of environmental impact studies as a way to delay housing from being built. It will most likely be brought up again in the next session. It's not the immediate solution that just building housing would provide, but it's a rather easy thing to implement, allows for a lot of flexibility and blows away the whole "single-family home or 5 over 1" dichotomy. It's also a really great way to increase density in the suburbs.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:25
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joe football posted:Everything I've ever read(admittedly, could still be wrong) is that Americans are less mobile then ever, largely because the average American is getting older but also because people don't just don't want to move because of various reasons mentioned in this thread. Whatever the merits of people moving to other places to solve social or economic problems, it doesn't seem like that's the future until/unless we all become climate refugees in truly dire circumstances. I feel like the spiraling cost of housing just reinforces the endemic precariousness of modern American life that makes you really not want to shake the boat too much if you're already getting by somewhere, even if maybe you could do better elsewhere. There’s a growing number of nomadic folks. Many jobs are remote and it can be less expensive (but not always). Some are doing this because they simply can’t afford anything else. It’s a gradiant from homeless to driving around in a fancy motorhome.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:25
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Jaxyon posted:Yeah. What is the actual breakdown for Tokyo anyway? Is it cheaper for equivalent or just cheaper because a lot of the places are just a lot smaller so it being nutso per square foot doesn't result in such eye popping numbers? I don't think it was here but this came up in another thread recently and I'd forgotten to look into it more. I'm a little bearish on any schemes that still view housing as an investment and speculative asset ever being able to deliver something significantly different in the end than where the US is right now.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:27
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Epic High Five posted:What is the actual breakdown for Tokyo anyway? Is it cheaper for equivalent or just cheaper because a lot of the places are just a lot smaller so it being nutso per square foot doesn't result in such eye popping numbers? I don't think it was here but this came up in another thread recently and I'd forgotten to look into it more. I'm a little bearish on any schemes that still view housing as an investment and speculative asset ever being able to deliver something significantly different in the end than where the US is right now. It seems like Tokyo real estate is about 10% cheaper per square foot than New York real estate, but the average house is about 37% smaller than the average NYC house.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:36
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Epic High Five posted:What is the actual breakdown for Tokyo anyway? Is it cheaper for equivalent or just cheaper because a lot of the places are just a lot smaller so it being nutso per square foot doesn't result in such eye popping numbers? I don't think it was here but this came up in another thread recently and I'd forgotten to look into it more. I'm a little bearish on any schemes that still view housing as an investment and speculative asset ever being able to deliver something significantly different in the end than where the US is right now. Sorry misunderstood differences. 1LDK in Tokyo is about 1100-2000 depending on ward. 1BR in LA starts at like 1500 and goes up to "a lot", though I imagine the top end in Tokyo is similar. 1LDK could be about 40m/sq which is about 450ft/sq I saw a couple of articles saying you can still do a 2br for under $1000 Tokyo, if small. Jaxyon fucked around with this message at 23:45 on Aug 16, 2022 |
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Aug 16, 2022 23:40
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Kalli posted:Yeah, I mean the solution is to use eminent domain to seize a bunch of land, massively invest in mass transit, and plop gigantic hong kong style mixed use condo complexes to up urban density and put that mass transit to work. Combined with banning investment firms from owning single family homes, regulating AirBnb into the dirt. You don't even need to seize land. Just upzone it to allow apartment buildings. There are lots of complex economic problems but this is one that is remarkably simple: if housing is too expensive, glut the supply until it's not. This is one of those rare cases where there really is a simple answer.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:44
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https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2202.html#:~:text=The%20nationwide%20average%20monthly%20rent,start%20from%20around%20100%2C000%20yen. Per this site: quote:The nationwide average monthly rent, not including utilities, for a one room apartment (20-40 square meters) is between 50,000 and 70,000 yen. Rent for similarly sized apartments in central Tokyo and popular neighbourhoods nearby usually start from around 100,000 yen. 100k Yen is about $750 currently. The population of Tokyo is about 14 million and the metro area is 40 million.
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Aug 16, 2022 23:51
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Jaxyon posted:Sorry misunderstood differences. How the hell is a 1BR in Crashville more expensive than LA?
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Aug 16, 2022 23:54
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Epic High Five posted:What is the actual breakdown for Tokyo anyway? Is it cheaper for equivalent or just cheaper because a lot of the places are just a lot smaller so it being nutso per square foot doesn't result in such eye popping numbers? I don't think it was here but this came up in another thread recently and I'd forgotten to look into it more. I'm a little bearish on any schemes that still view housing as an investment and speculative asset ever being able to deliver something significantly different in the end than where the US is right now.
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Aug 17, 2022 00:01
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Pretty much what my wife (Japanese citizen) tells me. Its pretty common to rebuild as well.
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Aug 17, 2022 00:02
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ryde posted:Pretty much what my wife (Japanese citizen) tells me. Its pretty common to rebuild as well. And if they can do it in Japan we can do it here, folks, it's not like Japan has secret strategic reserves of concrete.
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Aug 17, 2022 00:05
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Zotix posted:How the hell is a 1BR in Crashville more expensive than LA? 1500 is the absolute bottom for 1br. Most are well above that. Looking at padmapper I'm seeing 1700 in some fairly rough areas As for Japan I'm talking rents. Single family homes is a whole different thing.
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Aug 17, 2022 00:13
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Epic High Five posted:It also doesn't help that moving loving SUCKS, and is reliably twice as expensive as whatever a best guess as to the most it could possibly cost would be. This cannot be emphasized enough. Between growing up as a military brat and living as a millennial nomad, I've moved some 20 times in my 30 years on this Earth, and every time it was a major financial blow In addition to being completely draining. My husband and I are moving to Colorado to escape Ohio, and just the movers set us back five grand. That's not even talking about all of the hotels and gas and meals and other travel costs that we're going to have to shoulder on the drive over. Moving is physically, emotionally, mentally, and financially taxing, and however bad you think it happens to be, it is worse.
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Aug 17, 2022 00:21
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The smaller your city, the worse your dating options are, too, and vice versa - which is a huge difference for anyone single that cares. Some of the cheaper options are also dating deserts for quite a few reasons, which can be an issue that affects some people more than others. Going back to my Detroit example; its 1/4th - 1/3rd cheaper than right next door Chicago, but due to the lack of people in the city, and other things, it's one of the worst dating cities in the whole country and has one of the highest depression rates among people doing okay financially. Chicago is pretty much the exact opposite.
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Aug 17, 2022 00:35
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cr0y posted:I never really understood the hate, I'm obviously biased but Pittsburgh is loving awesome. Off topic, but help me out here, then - I've read that Pittsburgh has terrible air. The data shows this. Residents complain about the smell and waking up coughing or with scratchy throats. How true is this? (I've been thinking about moving there from Brooklyn.)
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Aug 17, 2022 00:56
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Moving blows because no matter how organized you are you absolutely have no idea how much poo poo you accumulate over the years once you start emptying cupboards. I just moved from 1,000 sqft house to another, I threw away literally a dump truck full of stuff and I still managed to fill a 28 ft U-Haul plus several back and forth trips with cars and SUVs and whatnot. It's also emotionally taxing because the new place doesn't feel like home for a very long time. Moving after you've been in a place for several years is extremely destabilizing.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:02
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small butter posted:Off topic, but help me out here, then - I've read that Pittsburgh has terrible air. The data shows this. Residents complain about the smell and waking up coughing or with scratchy throats. How true is this? (I've been thinking about moving there from Brooklyn.) I didn't notice bad air when I visited a few years ago but the bar and arcade scenes were great and everyone I spoke to indicated they liked living there.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:07
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protip to literally everyone is to make sure you get rid of at least one, idk, laundry basket of stuff every month whether you think you need to or not. You'll save so much time and energy later. If you're in a big house, get rid of a trunkload of stuff or w/e
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Aug 17, 2022 01:08
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Huh, the Tokyo/Japanese housing situation on the ground is a lot more interesting than I'd thought and I'm a weird person who is into these kinds of things lol. Thanks everybody, I'll definitely have to do some more digging in on it. One question though, since I'm largely ignorant of the details when it comes to these things:Jaxyon posted:Sorry misunderstood differences. What's an LDK? In context is sounds like what I'd know as a studio but I don't think things map out 1:1 here
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Aug 17, 2022 01:08
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Herstory Begins Now posted:protip to literally everyone is to make sure you get rid of at least one, idk, laundry basket of stuff every month whether you think you need to or not. You'll save so much time and energy later. If you're in a big house, get rid of a trunkload of stuff or w/e Extremely good advice, and I'd like to add: Prioritize your closets. If something has not left your closet for a month or more and isn't a special tool or a seasonal garment, you probably don't need it.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:15
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1 living dining kitchen
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Aug 17, 2022 01:15
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Epic High Five posted:
It's actually bigger than a studio, or more rooms at least. Their naming conventions are a little different but LDK means: Living/Dining/Kitchen. The LDK is a separate room that contains all those things and is undivided. So a 1LDK apartment is basically a 1 bedroom here. You have 1 bedroom, plus a living/kitchen/dining room. It'd look something like this: A studio would be more like a 1R, which in this case just means room and has everything in the same, undivided, room. A 1DK is also similar I guess and, as stated, means 1 bedroom + dining/kitchen. The difference is there'd be a small door dividing the bedroom from the kitchen/dining space. It'd be more like a galley kitchen in US terminology. E: here's a diagram 
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Aug 17, 2022 01:18
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Jamwad Hilder posted:It's actually bigger than a studio, or more rooms at least. Their naming conventions are a little different but LDK means: Living/Dining/Kitchen. The LDK is a separate room that contains all those things and is undivided. So a 1LDK apartment is basically a 1 bedroom here. You have 1 bedroom, plus a living/kitchen/dining room. Thanks! That makes a lot more sense, I actually knew a guy who lived in a studio that was set up like this many years back and it seemed like a pretty slick setup provided you don't need a lot of space or privacy. Bedroom wasn't behind a door but was a separate sort of loft.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:22
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Moving is alienating. It separates one from place and family and any material support they offer. It’s modernity and capitalism breaking those things. Which can be good if those things suck for a specific person. More often it’s bad. So just move to a cheaper place ignoring this, is a bad argument because it is fundamentally an incomplete argument not addressing the whole of a person’s life.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:41
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It's basically the same thing as "make coffee at home and stop eating avocado toast and you'll have more money". It's technically true but it's not useful advice for anyone.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:46
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This has been said a few times already, but I guess I'll say it. I don't think anyone ITT is saying "if you are poor, then you should just move to a cheaper place." What a lot of people are saying, is that if you already made the decision to move anyway and you have the ability to choose where to go, then cramming yourself into one of the massively overpopulated expensive areas while just completely dismissing the many other perfectly good urban areas around the country is probably not a good idea.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:51
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Rigel posted:This has been said a few times already, but I guess I'll say it. I don't think anyone ITT is saying "if you are poor, then you should just move to a cheaper place." What a lot of people are saying, is that if you already made the decision to move anyway and you have the ability to choose where to go, then cramming yourself into one of the massively overpopulated expensive areas while just completely dismissing the many other perfectly good urban areas around the country is probably not a good idea. Remote work, while more common now and likely to remain more common than it was in 2019, is also not a guarantee.
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Aug 17, 2022 01:54
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