Comments on: Defining Minimum Acceptable Housing – And How It Varies From Person To Person http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/ Financial talk for the rest of us Sat, 16 Feb 2013 01:14:45 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 By: CBus http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-80196 CBus Mon, 01 Oct 2007 19:53:34 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-80196 Yikes!

The four people you lived with in the 2bdrm apartment were *also* infested with mice? Glad to see that your situation has improved.

CBus

]]> By: Flounder http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-46759 Flounder Sun, 15 Jul 2007 20:16:56 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-46759 I am super excited to be moving to a better market. I have been living in Los Angeles, in a half ethnic half gentrified neighborhood that is quite often dodgy. I don’t feel unsafe but many people would as we hear gunshots and ghetto birds often. I live with my fiance in a two bedroom one bath apartment (tiny 2nd bedroom as an office) and really no other amenities. We have a storage garage that we split with a neighbor. We pay $1632 (would be $70 less if the neighbor ever paid us).

We are moving to Indianapolis where the place we are hoping to get is a 2 bed 1 bath HOUSE with basement, garage, washer dryer dishwasher central air yard and NO connecting walls with neighbors for $900 in a good neighborhood. It was still more than I wanted to pay but 10% goes towards down-payment if we decide to buy it (for 137k).

We will be making approximately the same salary as we are now but it will go MUCH farther and we can pay off all this LA credit card debt. A salary comparison shows LA as 1.87 times more expensive than Indianapolis. It is still a nice metropolitan area with plenty of culture to go around.

So moving from NYC/LA/etc doesn’t mean you have to go rural to live a lot cheaper/better.

]]> By: xshanex http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-46668 xshanex Sun, 15 Jul 2007 13:01:08 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-46668 why would you “make it work” for what would be a minimal savings of a few hundred a month if that? Wouldn’t that drastically increased commute time be better spent working a part time job you like or investing in yourself through school or putting in overtime or any number of things which put you in a similar financial situation as the “make it work” scenario while sucking up less of your time and quality of life

the commute from a cheaper place to save $ thing simply doesn’t work in many high cost areas and is not a blanket fix

]]> By: Time is of the essence http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43154 Time is of the essence Thu, 05 Jul 2007 17:50:28 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43154 I just want to say that I didn’t mean to be so mean and harsh–please forgive me.

But, NYC is a very intense housing market and population and anything you put out there about housing is going to be pummeled. And I still think you didn’t do enough research. The first research point lacking: the subway does not go to Tarrytown. Repeat: no subway to Tarrytown. Tarrytown is not in NYC. I don’t even live there and I can tell you that. There are many “what’s wrong with this picture” problems with the analysis you presented, but that one’s a showstopper.

]]> By: Trent http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43134 Trent Thu, 05 Jul 2007 16:48:24 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43134 Also, I did do my research. On the NYC line, this map clearly shows that there is a line directly from Tarrytown to Grand Central Station. I was also able to see that there were trains running from 6 AM to 2 PM between Grand Central Station and Tarrytown using qwiket. The price for a month pass on this track is $200, easily verifiable from a Metro site. Tarrytown is a rather safe area, as people mentioned, so you could walk from the station to the apartment in the link above, which I’d estimate to be about a twenty minute walk depending on where exactly it is.

The point is that you can make it work if you want to, but it is inconvenient. Weighing those inconveniences reveals your housing biases.

]]> By: Trent http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43128 Trent Thu, 05 Jul 2007 16:34:03 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43128 I fail to see how this post – or the discussion it’s raised – is “simple-minded” at all. This is an excellent discussion of housing biases.

]]> By: Time is of the essence http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43117 Time is of the essence Thu, 05 Jul 2007 16:02:21 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-43117 I think Trent has lost all validity in my eyes with this simple-minded post and his response in the midst of the comments. I’m dropping this site from my RSS feed.

]]> By: Sarah http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42534 Sarah Wed, 04 Jul 2007 04:46:59 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42534 Oh, the great “fifteen minutes to Midtown” fib. I can’t believe anyone still trots that out who isn’t a broker. (I doubt you’ve ever been a woman waiting alone at a PATH station at night, Alex; not fun.)

]]> By: david http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42523 david Wed, 04 Jul 2007 03:38:22 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42523 hi. i have just started reading your blog. i live in seattle now, where for instance the house i used to rent doubled in value in four years, and i was in ohio previously. it sounds like you understand the midwest real estate market, but this post is not correct at all. i’m sure it’s apparent by now that living in westchester isn’t a sacrifice that you make to live in new york. that’s not your readers’ “biases”, that’s geography.

also, like someone else said, not all sacrifices made to live in nyc are about being close to more shoe stores. maybe people’s lives are more complex than yours. i know you don’t write the blog to apply to everyone but as someone who doesn’t know your blog very well this mary-poppins real estate fix sounds flippant to me.

i understand the point you’re trying to make – we have no picture of what’s really necessary vs desired. you do fine at explaining it as it relates to your life. but, next time if you have a theory about someone else’s life you should do better research or barring that ask your readers if you’re correct so it doesn’t hurt your credibility.

]]> By: Alex http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42423 Alex Tue, 03 Jul 2007 22:40:59 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42423 If you avoid the waterfront and first few blocks of downtown (more expensive,) you can easily get a decent, clean two bedroom apartment in one of several safe and family-friendly neighborhoods of Jersey City for less than $1000. You have a less-than-15-minute ride on the PATH(24 hours a day) to anywhere in Manhattan from the WTC site upto Midtown for about $50 a month ($1.20 a ride if you buy 20- or 40-ride cards.) And you can transfer to the subway if you need to get anywhere else.

]]> By: Sarah http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42352 Sarah Tue, 03 Jul 2007 19:34:40 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-42352 Geez, Trent, you really dropped the ball on this one. It’s one thing to say “well, maybe your financial situation requires that you move out of an expensive city” (might be presumptuous, but in some circumstances might also be accurate), it’s another to make lazy misstatements about the facts about the NYC housing market.

I live in a sub-300-sq-ft fourth-floor walkup studio. The bathroom is literally too small to put a litter box in. It looks out on a wall maybe fifteen feet away and gets sunlight for about two hours in the afternoon. It’s got a budding mouse problem and the occasional water bug (four-inch-long GIANT ROACH-LIKE THING that apparently lives in the walls and likes to hang out in the shower). I pay $1850/mo. for this and consider myself lucky, because it’s on the fringes of a solid neighborhood with good subway access. My job has me in the office upwards of 70 hours a week sometimes (no exaggeration) and very frequently has me coming home past ten at night–I cannot spend an hour each way commuting and I cannot be in a neighborhood that is not lively (and thus safe) at night. I don’t have to own a car, and I can shop locally in my very limited free time instead of driving out to the area WhateverMart.

It took me three weeks of panicked searching to find this place. But, what the heck, you understand so much about the NYC market, next time I’ll just ask you to find me a place that costs half as much but doesn’t compromise my safety, require car ownership, or keep me hours from work! Should be no problem!

]]> By: Imelda http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41918 Imelda Mon, 02 Jul 2007 19:23:45 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41918 I think people are being unduly harsh on Trent, especially Shawn, and I was going to make a post defending him (despite his mistake).

But I am getting so annoyed with everyone who says “it’s your choice to live there, so don’t complain.” How dare you presume to know something like that about a person? Would you say that to people living in projects in the Bronx? Yes, just pick up and get another job, and leave. It’s really quite easy–it’s your choice not to.

Or my parents, who have lived here on rent control and couldn’t afford to move out. They also make the choice to stay in NYC, instead of putting my sister in an institution, because the she gets good social services here. I guess you’re right– they’re just prioritizing, choosing what they *want* and not what they *need.*

These are just examples. Plenty of people are stuck, for different reasons, and it’s not necessarily a “choice” that they are making. I am shocked by the callousness of posters here who imply that we are all equally free to find a new job, find new housing, and change our lives. How dare you?

I won’t even get into how blacks and immigrants in a place like NYC make the “choice” to stay in this expensive place, instead of moving South or Midwest.

]]> By: Tyler K http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41889 Tyler K Mon, 02 Jul 2007 18:10:13 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41889 @Michele:
“You can’t complain” is really missing the point. People who are reading and commenting on this blog are here to improve the financial well-being of themselves and their families, not to complain. Those of us who live in more expensive areas and aren’t planning to leave have made a conscious choice for non-financial reasons, whatever those may be. We’ve decided that those reasons outweigh the potential cost savings of leaving. It’s not helpful at that point to criticize that choice. with this constraint in mind, we would still like to find a way to continue to improve our financial lives. It’s not a matter of complaining, it’s a matter of making our finances work when we’ve decided that moving away is not going to be part of our strategy.

]]> By: Caroline http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41876 Caroline Mon, 02 Jul 2007 17:33:10 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41876 Michelle – I live in Hoboken, NJ (just across the river from NYC), and am PAINFULLY aware of how expensive it is to live here. In fact, my husband and I chose to move out to NJ from Manhattan to save some money, but we are finding that it’s not that much cheaper once you factor in transportation into the city, etc. The rents in Hoboken are not that far behind Manhattan rents.

While you are correct that it is “definately” a choice that someone makes to live in an expensive area, other factors (i.e.: family obligations, job situations, etc.) may make it impossible to just pick up and move across the country. I don’t think the New Yorkers on this board are complaining about their cost of living, but please understand that people often have obligations that tie them to a particular area, and it can often be frustrating to keep up with the expenses there.

]]> By: Michele http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41869 Michele Mon, 02 Jul 2007 17:27:13 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41869 I agree with some of the comments posted from other people. You can’t really complain about the rent that you are paying if YOU choose to live in that area. I’m from Brooklyn and moved to Albany NY around 10 years ago. My rent was $1000 back in the 90′s for a 2 bedroom apartment in a nice area of Bushwick. My current rent in Albany is $700 for a 2 bedroom apartment, newly remodeled kitchen (including a dishwasher)and the place has a pool. I chose to move out of NYC because I knew My kids and I could live a better life. Yes, I do miss the shopping. But the Woodbury outlets are and hour and a half away and Manhattan is only 2 and a half hours away by car.

]]> By: Michelle http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41856 Michelle Mon, 02 Jul 2007 16:47:02 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41856 I can’t see why anyone would choose to live in an expensive city and then complain about it. Just live somewhere else, there are other job opportunites. I live in Phoenix where you can get a beautiful spacious 2 bedroom apartment for under $700 per month. You will need a car, but for that price you can afford one. It is definately a choice you are making, so be comforatble with your choice and don’t complain about it.

]]> By: Tyler K http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41855 Tyler K Mon, 02 Jul 2007 16:41:22 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41855 The thing I find funny about this discussion is that nobody seems to be considering the differences in minimal acceptable housing based on area and family situation, etc. Especially where in some areas, you are putting your physical well-being at risk by living too far below your means. I don’t think most people would realistically say that the tradeoff there is worth it. Double that if you’ve got young children. I want to afford retirement someday, but if it’s a choice between that and walking my kids past crackheads outside every day, I’ll just have to work at Walmart when I’m 65. Anybody disagree?

]]> By: Grayson De Ritis http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41849 Grayson De Ritis Mon, 02 Jul 2007 16:11:21 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41849 The commenter quoted at the top of this post obviously has his/her own problems that has manifested into a mean-spirited comment here on your site, Trent.

I’ve lived in a few places that were under my acceptable standards, because that was what I needed to do, financially speaking, at the time. Now I’ve gone through higher education and am in a much more comfortable position. It definitely pays off later, to sacrifice earlier.

]]> By: Lacy http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41821 Lacy Mon, 02 Jul 2007 15:05:37 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41821 I think what some people are annoyed by – beyond the fact that different people have different needs and minimal standards of what is acceptable – is the fact that Trent acted like it was the easiest thing in the world to find affordable NYC housing if you’re willing to – five minutes of research or googling and viola! there is your affordable housing.

Only, that apartment isn’t in New York City, and it isn’t on a subway line, and it’s in a place where you basically have to have a car – all of which I think should be noted in the original post. It’s disingenuous, IMO to act as though those things don’t matter, and that living in Tarrytown is equivalent to living in Manhatten proper, or even something like Brooklyn or the Bronx. Yeah, you can make the choice to live outside of the five boroughs but that wasn’t what I originally thought the post was going to deal with.

As for myself, I definitely have things that I’m not willing to compromise about my housing situation, and I too live in a ver expensive market (DC). But, some things can be trade offs, in a sense – I prefer to live near a metro station for ease of getting to work, and that shows in my rent price. However, it also means that I can survive not having a car.

]]> By: Trent http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41806 Trent Mon, 02 Jul 2007 14:06:44 +0000 http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/07/01/defining-minimum-acceptable-housing-and-how-it-varies-from-person-to-person/#comment-41806 The reason I wrote this post is because I knew many of my vocal readers would lay it all out there like this – the comments illustrate my point. Everyone has biases, everyone has different minimal needs. When such issues are touched on, though, people can get really irate and defensive – talking about money in a serious fashion, when you’re exposing your own biases (as I do here all the time) requires that you have a thick skin and are seriously willing to look at your situation and consider change.

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