General Discussion
Showing Original Post only (View all)The Rent is to damn high. [View all]
Just got off the phone with my friend who was in tears. Her rent is going up another $200 a month. Her rent is low for the area (1600) and she lives in a rural area but rents are up almost 30% in our town this year and they are not slowing down.
She is a single mother of two including a special needs child, but she makes too much for any government support. She looked around for another place to rent, but thier prices were even higher. In many cases, there is simply no room at the inn.
We talk about inflation, but there are two types of inflation. Homeowners have seen capital gains in the tens of thousands while their mortgage stays unchanged. Renters pay twice the average homeowner per month and have seen nothing but misery. It is a real divide.
Our area has a moratorium on building new apartments while the county catches up with schools and roads. Also, environmental groups are banning them as well as people concerned with the disappearing open spaces. So new housing of that type is not in the cards anytime soon. Meanwhile, the already built ones simply increase in price.
For the renter the inflation rate is not 6% it is closer to 25%. We need to keep that in mind.