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Not that I think of him as any more than a interesting crazy character.

It seems to me to me the rise of the managment companies seem to be driving rent up more than demand or lack of housing in most places I've lived.
It seems to me that these companies are price fixing.

Its George Bush's fault.

The rent is TOO DAMN HIGH!



and I don't get paid enough.

I think its goes back further than that lol.
Landlord vs. Tenants has always been a contention for societies.

On one side I believe you have the right to charge someone as much as you desire for the use of your property, because its yours. In itself being landlord is not any way a bad thing.
You maintain the property, they renters pay for the convenience of not having too. (ideally)
But as more often the case renters have no choice.... (I guess you could choose to be homeless.)
It seems an all together unequitable situtation for a buisness transaction.

Tun_Tau wrote:Landlord vs. Tenants has always been a contention for socialists.

FIFY.

Tun_Tau wrote:On one side I believe you have the right to charge someone as much as you desire for the use of your property, because its yours. In itself being landlord is not any way a bad thing.
You maintain the property, they renters pay for the convenience of not having too. (ideally)
But as more often the case renters have no choice.... (I guess you could choose to be homeless.)
It seems an all together unequitable situtation for a buisness transaction.

Renters are being forced to live in buildings where they are charged high rent? Holy crap! Alert the authorities!

In many areas, particularly those with rent control, the rent is too damn low.

biccat wrote:

Tun_Tau wrote:Landlord vs. Tenants has always been a contention for societies.

FIFY.

It was right the first time, though the terms "landlord" and "tenant" are relatively recent.

Isn't the issue of high rent due more to reduced supply then to significant demand in certain areas?

Yes. Rent (and indeed new homes as well) is fairly low here, because of the abundant space for development.

But in places with more limited space such as most of Europe, California, New York, etc, it's much more expensive.

I live on Long Island New York and I can tell you a studio apartment that isn't in a gakhole in a bad neighborhood in someones basement will at minimun go for $800 a month, most go for around $900. So everyone around here lives with thier parents(to the detrement of both)

Roommate and I pay $1350 for our place. It's in the historic section of St. Louis, about half a mile away from Busch Stadium, and the place is a 3.5 bedroom loft. There's also a full kitchen, an offstreet parking space, and washer/dryer.

I'd always happily pay less, but I can not say in any amount of honesty that my rent is too damn high.

That place sounds excellent, daedalus!

I see we're practically neigbors, daedalus.

I live in Maplewood (which is about as centrally located as you can get in the St. Louis metroplitan area). We pay a bit under $500 for a two-bedroom apartment AND we avoid that pesky 1% City Earnings Tax. So no, our rent isn't all that bad. It is a bit cramped, though.

My sister lives in SanFran though, and the rent on her house per month is almost half of what I pay in a year! I have no idea how people survive out there, I truly don't.

Wow, you got a good deal. I have a friend who lives in that general area that pays $500 for a one bedroom hole in the wall. City Tax is annoying, but walking distance of more pubs than I can count isn't. You at least have the Bottleworks over there though!

I guess the point is that there exists lower rent if you want to go that way.

$500 for a 2 bedroom is a pretty damn good deal anywhere.

Amaya wrote:$500 for a 2 bedroom is a pretty damn good deal anywhere.

I think he means they pay $500 each. It's still a fairly good deal though.

Paid 700 for an outdated place.

Land lord was a cheap bastard. Heater barely worked.

Had to fix the entire bathroom without being reimbursed. Land lord said he was going to fix up the bathroom, or his idea of fixing it up. Which was taking a bucket of white primer abd painting the entire bathroom with it... everything. The sink, the tub the toilet.

Cabinet doors fell off after a month.

Place was going to hell in a hand basket.


Bought a house and my payment is 425 a month. Heating bill is almost 1/3 what I had payed.

In my area there is not an issue of rent being too damn high. Land lords being cheap stupid bastards.

Hazardous Harry wrote:

Amaya wrote:$500 for a 2 bedroom is a pretty damn good deal anywhere.

I think he means they pay $500 each. It's still a fairly good deal though.

Not necessarily. I've seen rents like that.

Just in case you want a comparison to an expensive part of England, I rent a bedroom in a shared flat for £620 a month here in Oxford. That's just under $1000 at the current exchange rate. I earn around $21,500 a year before tax, bringing in roughly $1580 a month after tax.

No comment, just providing a basis for comparison, if you're interested.

Landlords are going to charge whatever the market will bear. Just like any other business.

Matthew Iglesia in the MoneyBox section of Slate has a number of quick hit blogposts about rent and urban plannings impact on rent. I think he may even have a book coming out on the subject.

You might find them interesting.

Frazzled wrote:

Hazardous Harry wrote:

Amaya wrote:$500 for a 2 bedroom is a pretty damn good deal anywhere.

I think he means they pay $500 each. It's still a fairly good deal though.

Not necessarily. I've seen rents like that.

Yeah, I lived in a place with a roommate that was only $325/mo. Total.

Granted, the place was directly adjacent to section 8 housing and utterly terrifying at night, but I was working two part time minimum wage jobs, so it was a requirement.

Jesus, the cheapest rent I ever had was $600/mo in college living with 5 other guys. Granted, it was a fairly big house, but still.

daedalus wrote:Wow, you got a good deal. I have a friend who lives in that general area that pays $500 for a one bedroom hole in the wall. City Tax is annoying, but walking distance of more pubs than I can count isn't. You at least have the Bottleworks over there though!

I guess the point is that there exists lower rent if you want to go that way.

Well, to me the location of the nearest pub is about as useful as the location of the neareset OB-GYN; I don't go to either. The location of the nearest Fantasy Shop on the other hand...

But Game Nite (over by Yorkshire Plaza) has the nicest gaming area in town. Thursday night is Warhammer night, and I'm usually there.

Back at home, the rent varies hugely based on where you are living. Out the countryside it's dirt cheap, get in towards dublin, it's very high. I used to pay 650 euro for my room in an apartment in the centre of dublin, and I felt that was pretty damn good for what I was getting (though I was pretty poor at the time).

When I lived in Maynooth (small university town outside Dublin) I paid 200 euro a month, but the house was pretty old and awful.

Now, I'm living in Essex, and I'm paying £375 a month plus lowish council tax for a 3 room (sitting/bed room, kitchen and bathroom) flat in the red light district of an already pretty crappy town. I think my rent is pretty cheap compared to other people's in the area, but considering I live in an absolute dump of an area with lots of violence, I think the rent in this whole town is too high. It's commutable to london, but that's hardly a good excuse to my mind. Essex seems to suffer from this a fair bit.

Moving to Dusseldorf soon, and rents seem reasonable enough there again. I think the English, in the South East at least, are getting screwed on rent. Especially when I compare wages, seems like the English generally don't get paid as much. (There again, Government housing seems so easy to get that I know very few people actually paying their own rent...)