Rent is getting ridiculous in Columbus..why? (Cincinnati, Clinton: real estate market, 2014)

[jbcmh81]

Originally Posted by Natural510

Along with demand due to more people moving to cities (like Columbus), the housing collapse added many more renters to the pool who previously were homeowners, and landlords have been able to take advantage. People are starting to buy again, but not nearly as much as during the bubble.

The building permits point out these trends pretty obviously.

Housing Trends of Columbus | All Columbus, Ohio Data

The collapse of the single-family market is very evident, and it shows no real sign of coming back yet in comparison.

[bjimmy24]

There is plenty of cheap housing in Columbus. The problem is that the amount of space in the city that is desirable, urban, walkable areas isn't really all that much. So if you want to move to German Village, Victorian Village, Short North, Clintonville, etc., you're competing with thousands and thousands of other people that all want to fit into a maximum of like 10 square miles of the city. This will raise the rents considerably. If you don't want to live in those areas, I promise you, there are still a lot of places to go. Maybe you can help bring about the next cool neighborhood.

[Natural510]

Originally Posted by bjimmy24

There is plenty of cheap housing in Columbus. The problem is that the amount of space in the city that is desirable, urban, walkable areas isn't really all that much. So if you want to move to German Village, Victorian Village, Short North, Clintonville, etc., you're competing with thousands and thousands of other people that all want to fit into a maximum of like 10 square miles of the city. This will raise the rents considerably. If you don't want to live in those areas, I promise you, there are still a lot of places to go. Maybe you can help bring about the next cool neighborhood.

This is a great point. I see 3BR houses in Merion Village listed for under $1000. Due to its proximity to German Village and Downtown, it should be the next hot neighborhood in Columbus.

[jbcmh81]

Originally Posted by Natural510

This is a great point. I see 3BR houses in Merion Village listed for under $1000. Due to its proximity to German Village and Downtown, it should be the next hot neighborhood in Columbus.

Or Franklinton, which has a ton of fixer-uppers.

[Bodycount]

My mortgage is $900 a month. I could in theory rent out my house for $1100 a month easy.

That's what a lot of people who bought up repo's are doing. Fix it up a little bit then rent it for 10%-50% over their mortgage payment.

I would do it in a heartbeat if I had a down payment for another house. I'd get one of those house appliance insurance plans for $300-$400 a year and let them repair the high priced stuff if it breaks down so I'm almost maintenance free.

[ohioaninsc]

The bottom line is the greedy elites in this country need to start hiring workers...and paying fairer wages and prop the people up so we can afford to live.

And they need to start building more in the desireable areas...for instance, downtown has so many ugly surface parking lots...every one of them could support a 5+ floor apt building...you'd bring more residents downtown...build up critical mass to bring retail back downtown, and push up public demand for an actual mass transit system. With all the surface parking lots downtown, there is no lack of space to build thousands of new apartments down there that would be very desireable.

[masonbauknight]

As other posters have said, higher city rents are a global phenomenon. There have been articles in the German and French press about escalating rents of late in larger cities (especially Berlin, Munich, Paris and Nice but also less-trendy cities like Düsseldorf, Bremen, Nancy and Rouen). In the US too, most desirable cities over 100,000 have seen big jumps in monthly rents in the last few years.

Columbus is a dynamic, growing midsize city and young people want to live there, so Columbus is no exception to the above. I am quite jealous of the Columbus rents quoted here. Where I live (Queens, New York City), you pay $1,400/mo. or more for a decent one-bedroom apartment -- i.e., in a decent neighborhood, decent building. New York City has a very good quality of life except for one thing: housing costs. That brings down one's overall quality of life here considerably. Rent is the killer -- always.

[SteelCityRising]

Even here in Pittsburgh, which has been battling population decline for generations and was always highly-touted as being an "affordable" city as a result, rent has been skyrocketing over the past few years. It is indeed a global phenomenon, as others have said.

Many developers were unable to secure financing during the "Great Recession" to build residential projects at the same time as people were leaving foreclosed homes and searching for rentals while many Millennials were also graduating college and seeking to start their own households in a rental. This all combined to create a sharply-increasing demand for rentals, especially in urban areas, which led to a price spike.

Our neighborhood's median rent for a 1-BR unit has gone from around $550/month when I moved here in 2010 to around $800/month today, and I fully expect that to continue its upward trajectory. Simultaneously real wages have pretty much declined for many people over that same timeframe, meaning many people are feeling squeezed as they devote a higher percentage of their monthly income towards rent than they previously were. If left unchecked, then these people who are now limiting their discretionary income to offset the increased rent could spark another economic downturn as demand for goods and services decreases UNLESS our landlords, who are reaping the rewards of an INCREASE in rental income, go out and spend, spend, spend. Judging by my landlady and some of my friends' landlords, all of whom are just "sitting" on that extra income, while we would all be using that extra money to stimulate the economy, this doesn't bode well.

[SteelCityRising]

With that being said Columbus still has relatively cheaper rents overall. I just did some exploring in/around Easton Town Center, and the apartments there, Easton Commons, are around $875/month for a 1-BR. That includes being walking distance to shops, restaurants, a movie theater, employers, fountains, etc.---not to mention the complex's amenities of a swimming pool, fitness center, in-unit washers & dryers (those are a luxury item in Pittsburgh), etc.

In contrast, Pittsburgh's South Side Works, which is also a "lifestyle center" (on a MUCH smaller scale than Easton Town Center---with an ALDI in walking distance instead of Whole Foods and Trader Joe's), has apartments that are around $1,400/month for a 1-BR unit in a comparably-appointed complex. Many other 1-BR units under construction in Pittsburgh are going for closer to $2,000/month. It's come to the point where my partner and I are seriously reconsidering whether or not we want to stay urban-dwellers.

[bjimmy24]

Originally Posted by SteelCityRising

With that being said Columbus still has relatively cheaper rents overall. I just did some exploring in/around Easton Town Center, and the apartments there, Easton Commons, are around $875/month for a 1-BR. That includes being walking distance to shops, restaurants, a movie theater, employers, fountains, etc.---not to mention the complex's amenities of a swimming pool, fitness center, in-unit washers & dryers (those are a luxury item in Pittsburgh), etc.

In contrast, Pittsburgh's South Side Works, which is also a "lifestyle center" (on a MUCH smaller scale than Easton Town Center---with an ALDI in walking distance instead of Whole Foods and Trader Joe's), has apartments that are around $1,400/month for a 1-BR unit in a comparably-appointed complex. Many other 1-BR units under construction in Pittsburgh are going for closer to $2,000/month. It's come to the point where my partner and I are seriously reconsidering whether or not we want to stay urban-dwellers.

Didn't realize those kind of prices were prevalent in Pittsburgh. Is that in a trendy neighborhood? In contrast, my neighborhood in Boston would be about $1600 (absolute minimum) for a one bedroom (a non-hip, non-trendy, really mediocre place). 1-bedroom in Columbus for $800, $900, or $1000 even sounds pretty damn good to me!