Rents Are Through The Roof >10% Over PrePandemic Levels; In 0 of 50 States Can a Minimum Wage Worker Afford Housing

Who's in?

Would you take free land in rural America?​


In the midst of a national housing shortage, towns on the Kansas plains are giving away free land and ultra-cheap houses. Is the offer worth it?​


header-8.gif



Sitting in the basement of a historic courthouse in Lincoln — a wind-swept town in north central Kansas — Bradley Roberts laughs while comparing his current situation to his previous life in San Francisco.
Roberts was like many people in the Bay Area: Savvy, successful, and drowning in housing expenses. When he bought a house ~15 years ago, he and his partner went $300k over their budget. Rent at his last place in San Francisco was nearly $4k a month.
“It was awful,” Roberts, 50, told The Hustle.
Roberts, whose grandparents were from Lincoln, bought a converted barn home in the middle of town last year for $22k. His annual housing costs in Lincoln are about the same as what his monthly housing costs were in San Francisco.
“When I moved to Kansas,” Roberts said, “I was like, ‘holy ****, they’re giving stuff away.’”


roberts.jpg



In Kansas small towns, the houses are cheap, with quality homes going for $100k and fixer-uppers costing far less. Land, a commodity over which NIMBY battles rage throughout the country, can actually be obtained for free in several counties.
The downside to living in rural Kansas, of course, has always been economic opportunity. High-paying jobs don’t grow as easily as the milo.
But price-conscious urban dwellers have been drawn to places they never thought they could live. After a year of soaring real estate prices in every city and suburb, long-depressed and depopulated Kansas is going through a lower-key real estate boom of its own.


“It always used to be the case that we said there’s a big difference between what’s going on in the larger cities and the rural areas,” said Stanley Longhofer, a professor and founding director of the Wichita State University Center for Real Estate. “And the answer now is not as much. It really is kind of across the board.”


Are the Great Plains the greatest option left for an affordable lifestyle? And can small towns reverse the market forces that have long made them financially risky and undesirable?


During my visit, Gourley showed me the ultimate real estate bargain: an olive-green Dutch Colonial house with, an ad states, “enough woodwork to cause anyone to swoon.” It’s a fixer-upper but not beyond repair.

freehouse.jpg



The price tag: $0.00.


The only catch is the house must be moved. But the free lots are just down the street. A buyer could put the free house on a free lot.


There’s more: One of the grants Gourley secured can be used on the house, meaning income-eligible buyers could get $30k to spend on renovations.


As of last week, the house was still available. It could be yours, if you’re willing to have someone pay you to take it.






Pops has owned a few blocks near the university of Houston since the 90’s. There are up and coming areas of Houston with what are called shotgun houses. Developers are paying to tear them down. My pops has begun to move them to his empty lots and rents them out $600 a month a pop. For the area, $600 a month is considered low income. The city took notice and gave him $10 million to continue. A property purchased with the $10 million must provide affordable housing for the next 80 years.
 
Miami is up 49% since 2020. I need to find that whole article but sheesh that was just the one I remembered most.
 
Average 1 bedroom price in Manhattan is at all time high, 3700$. And in New York, "bedroom' is usually allowed a lot of leeway. Rooms be 7x7 with no window and closet and still be having the nerve to count those
 
Pops has owned a few blocks near the university of Houston since the 90’s. There are up and coming areas of Houston with what are called shotgun houses. Developers are paying to tear them down. My pops has begun to move them to his empty lots and rents them out $600 a month a pop. For the area, $600 a month is considered low income. The city took notice and gave him $10 million to continue. A property purchased with the $10 million must provide affordable housing for the next 80 years.
That is the horrible part of gentrification. Those shotgun houses in third ward are historical. It’s sad for the families that have been there for generations
 
Who's in?

Would you take free land in rural America?​


In the midst of a national housing shortage, towns on the Kansas plains are giving away free land and ultra-cheap houses. Is the offer worth it?​


header-8.gif



Sitting in the basement of a historic courthouse in Lincoln — a wind-swept town in north central Kansas — Bradley Roberts laughs while comparing his current situation to his previous life in San Francisco.
Roberts was like many people in the Bay Area: Savvy, successful, and drowning in housing expenses. When he bought a house ~15 years ago, he and his partner went $300k over their budget. Rent at his last place in San Francisco was nearly $4k a month.
“It was awful,” Roberts, 50, told The Hustle.
Roberts, whose grandparents were from Lincoln, bought a converted barn home in the middle of town last year for $22k. His annual housing costs in Lincoln are about the same as what his monthly housing costs were in San Francisco.
“When I moved to Kansas,” Roberts said, “I was like, ‘holy ****, they’re giving stuff away.’”


roberts.jpg



In Kansas small towns, the houses are cheap, with quality homes going for $100k and fixer-uppers costing far less. Land, a commodity over which NIMBY battles rage throughout the country, can actually be obtained for free in several counties.
The downside to living in rural Kansas, of course, has always been economic opportunity. High-paying jobs don’t grow as easily as the milo.
But price-conscious urban dwellers have been drawn to places they never thought they could live. After a year of soaring real estate prices in every city and suburb, long-depressed and depopulated Kansas is going through a lower-key real estate boom of its own.


“It always used to be the case that we said there’s a big difference between what’s going on in the larger cities and the rural areas,” said Stanley Longhofer, a professor and founding director of the Wichita State University Center for Real Estate. “And the answer now is not as much. It really is kind of across the board.”


Are the Great Plains the greatest option left for an affordable lifestyle? And can small towns reverse the market forces that have long made them financially risky and undesirable?


During my visit, Gourley showed me the ultimate real estate bargain: an olive-green Dutch Colonial house with, an ad states, “enough woodwork to cause anyone to swoon.” It’s a fixer-upper but not beyond repair.

freehouse.jpg



The price tag: $0.00.


The only catch is the house must be moved. But the free lots are just down the street. A buyer could put the free house on a free lot.


There’s more: One of the grants Gourley secured can be used on the house, meaning income-eligible buyers could get $30k to spend on renovations.


As of last week, the house was still available. It could be yours, if you’re willing to have someone pay you to take it.






If there are no occupancy requirements, sure.
 
*Laughs In Miami*

I sold my first home in November of 2021, made a decent chunk of change due to the current market, my mortgage was $1630, the new owner was an investor who rents properties. Within A WEEK he already had someone moved in there, paying $3000 a month. I was blown away by that number, and the quickness with which the home was occupied.

With the mayor having this filthy obssession of making Miami the new “Silicon Valley” and all these people working remotely with their NY and Cali salaries its real tough for local people to afford housing these days, homes are sold days of listing, often times with offers over asking price. Its wild out here.
 
The worst part is…..everything not working. And rent is still due.

I stay in what you would describe as a relatively good area, just outside of DC. A nice lil section of black folks getting to it. We got in at a good price regarding rent. But the management/landlords etc are NOT holding their end of the bargain. And still expect people to pay on time etc. Feels like an overpay, and getting finessed on the low. We are luckily good on my end, but I see the crumbling of society and living conditions on a daily. It’s wild to watch.

Fobs not working. It has has taken at least 7 months to fix the garage. Amazon hub been broke for a month. Random **** happening all the time. Appliances going up, after a quick small power outage. I had to wild out the leasing office the other day to get a new oven asap.

And they got the nerve to complain about a lil smoking here and there 🙄.
 
They just fd me on my lease renewal because they could. I pay too much here in Charlotte, but my place is so damn convenient, especially with back to the office here in a few months. Sucks because even as early as June my boy was being offered two months free, no longer. SMH

I feel bad for my boy in NY, he is paying under 2k for a studio in a luxury building in Brooklyn (pandemic pricing) Thats going all the way back to 2899+ lol
Man that's crazy ... I live in sheepshead bay now. My studio just went up 30 bucks. 😂 I'm paying waaaaaay under 2k. I couldn't imagine dropping 3k on a studio.
 
All these remote jobs high key screwing us over.

Got folks from California and New York moving to cheaper places and running prices up
 
All these remote jobs high key screwing us over.

Got folks from California and New York moving to cheaper places and running prices up

False. That’s what the media wants you to think. That’s not what the data shows. The number of people that moved to your state from California and New York is sooooooo small compared to the number of people already living there. Net migration is not the reason.

Pt 1
It’s a lot of stuff but it’s mainly because residential real estate has changed from a place where people live to being an investment. In 1995 single family homes were owned 99% by just regular people. In 2021 the shift is 74% regular people and 26% foreign investors, LLC, corporations like Zillow, Opendoor. They’ve taken an already small supply and tightened a noose around it. Makes everything so damn expensive.

Pt. 2 people with deep pockets scared to rent out places because of renter laws being so tilted that way. They’d rather just let the place sit empty and look to sell it for a profit someday instead of taking the risk of having a renter that destroys the place or becomes a big problem. The vacancy rates in major cities are disturbing.
 
All these remote jobs high key screwing us over.

Got folks from California and New York moving to cheaper places and running prices up
This is not the reason IMO

There is not that much outmigration from Cali and NY to cause rents to increase all over the US at this high of a rate.

Californians being moving to Vegas in droves since the 90s and rents haven't jumped as much as it did in the past year

I feel it has more to do with housing supply. There are not enough homes, single but especially multifamily, being built so renters that would transition into a single-family home are staying in apartments longer. And there are not enough apartments being built to apply downward pressure on prices.

People will look for any reason, any disruption from the norm, but if we had enough housing supply all those other things wouldn't matter that much

Basically, the same thing that made housing expensive in Cali and NY, is the same thing affecting the entire country
 
False. That’s what the media wants you to think. That’s not what the data shows. The number of people that moved to your state from California and New York is sooooooo small compared to the number of people already living there. Net migration is not the reason.

Pt 1
It’s a lot of stuff but it’s mainly because residential real estate has changed from a place where people live to being an investment. In 1995 single family homes were owned 99% by just regular people. In 2021 the shift is 74% regular people and 26% foreign investors, LLC, corporations like Zillow, Opendoor. They’ve taken an already small supply and tightened a noose around it. Makes everything so damn expensive.

Heavy on the part 1. Lots of people didn’t realize America has been for sale. It’s been ugly

Shoot, the last president dabbled in this heavy (his trademark), and directly led to this.
 
The fed caused this.

When COVID hit, they dropped interest rates. This was meant to help the average joe but the reality is during times of uncertainty, people are less likely to make big purchases like housing.

What really happened was investors/wall street took advantage of the stupid low interests and bought up real estate all across the country as investment opportunities

Here's the kicker. As a result of this, this led to an artificial scarcity. This scarcity led to the inflated values of property. Now you have idiots that went and bought a house for 500K when in reality that house is worth 300K.

When the market corrects, these people will be stuck paying a mortgage on a house that is worth less than what they initially paid for. And ultimately what will happen is people will default on these loans, the banks will seize the properties, investors/wall street will buy them back. Rinse and repeat

This country has long been seized
 
While high gas prices are a real problem for working people, it gets so much attention from the media relative to high rents.

The mainstream media's choice of what to cover and what not to cover, is usually based on the hopes, dreams, fears, and prejudices of middle-upper class homeowners. In that context, high rents and home prices are a good thing for their audience. Meanwhile, high gas prices, which are mostly a nuisance for homeowners, is treated like a national emergency. But when rents go up five, ten, fifteen percent and do far more damage then high gas prices, it gets very little attention in the mainstream press. If anything, rising rents are used as an occasion for personal finance gurus to tell struggling workers to stop being poor (and then invest in whatever financial institution is funding that segment).
 
For those that living in GA - they’re trying to spend all the govt pandemic funding before giving it back.

They will pay your rent up to 18 months - no proof of Income needed - this includes house rental. Get approved instantly!

 
A lot of great points in here that IMO start to tell the whole story.
I lived the terrible market when I bought my house last year. We put in 9 bids before one hit. The townhouse we landed we don't even like and we paid well above my rational market value. We were outbid on all our other bids by 10-80k. Our first bid was in January and the final one we hit on was April. We were out every single weekend looking at houses and needed to have our offers in the day the house went up or it would be gone. These investment firms were waiving inspections, cash offers and buying homes sight unseen. And here i am walking around houses asking about the HVAC and Roof age..... *puts on clown makeup*

All this to say we were priced out of our DC rental when the land lord wanted us to pay $3,100 for our 900sq foot place. I had some money saved for a down payment and I couldn't fathom paying that much in rent when my job was leaning toward remote at the time. I fully expect all of this to come crashing down knowing I will probably be upside down in my current house.
 
Revolution long overdue, worldwide.

The price of EVERYTHING is up, but wages aren’t. That’s the definition of a scam. Gas is about to be higher than the federal minimum wage. Baby formula can’t be found. Rents are getting silly. Medical bills ready to wipe any little savings you have.

We’ve been begging for $15 minimum wage for so long, it’s no longer a livable wage anywhere in the country. Spend all day at work just to give it back in taxes and bills. Too many of us can barely afford to exist at this point, heaven forbid if you want to start a family, or buy a house.

In 1960, the median home value in the US was $12000. The median household income was $5600. Today the median home value is $350000 and median household income is $68000. We’ve gotten WAY off track from where we used to be.
 
The fed caused this.

When COVID hit, they dropped interest rates. This was meant to help the average joe but the reality is during times of uncertainty, people are less likely to make big purchases like housing.

What really happened was investors/wall street took advantage of the stupid low interests and bought up real estate all across the country as investment opportunities

Here's the kicker. As a result of this, this led to an artificial scarcity. This scarcity led to the inflated values of property. Now you have idiots that went and bought a house for 500K when in reality that house is worth 300K.

When the market corrects, these people will be stuck paying a mortgage on a house that is worth less than what they initially paid for. And ultimately what will happen is people will default on these loans, the banks will seize the properties, investors/wall street will buy them back. Rinse and repeat

This country has long been seized

Nah, not really.

What the Fed did with interest rates when Covid caused a recession was Monetary policy 101, it was the right thing to do. It wasn't just meant to help the little guy, it was meant to help prop up the macroeconomy in a time of contraction.

Interest rates were not even that high before Covid anyway. Institutional buyers were coming regardless

Covid just accelerated a problem that was already there, in all areas of the housing market and general economy.

America doesn't build enough housing. Partly because after the last housing crash there has been less investment into building new housing but also because American homeowners themselves routinely undermine efforts to build new housing. But mainly because zoning laws and parking requirements now are just used to limit new housing being built because homeowners are NIMBY as hell and want to boost the value of their own homes (also there is some racism involved with white people). Incumbent homeowners are ****ing over prospective homebuyers big time.

All these companies buy up homes and openly say the one thing that will hurt their bottom line is if more housing got built.

I don't know how this ends. A recession looks 50/50, and a housing market crash looks less so; but a recession will get a cooling in home and rental prices. But at the end of the day, until we build more homes and apartment buildings, this will be and issue.
 
Last edited:
I don't know how this ends
Government intervention and regulation of who can buy existing housing stock is the best outcome we can hope for at this point; otherwise, people will revolt.

Housing is the most important driver of middle class wealth, but it is first and foremost a basic need that any member of society should have reasonable access to. If capitalism and its actors can't regulate themselves and take actions that endanger the fabric of society, the government must check them; a nation of homeless people is no nation at all.
 
Back
Top Bottom