Hey Houstonians , you think your rent is to dang high!? (to live in, eat)

[kemahkami]

Originally Posted by jfre81

Beyond that, "quality of life" is subjective, too.

/thread

[Spade]

Originally Posted by LocalPlanner

I agree that parking minimums need to go away, but also know that builders aren't going to drop garages anytime soon - the general consensus is that homes will be less marketable without them. Same goes for apartments - new ones would continue to have over one space per unit until the market decides it can accept otherwise.

Speaking of parking minimums. Anybody heard an update on the progress of eliminating parking minimums in Midtown and East Downtown? I remember the leaders of both neighborhoods wanting to hold a meeting back in September of extending the elimination from downtown but have heard nobody talk about it sense.

https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/09/...friendly-city/

I think businesses such as restaurants, retail, and bars will take advantage of this if approved.

[Jack Lance]

It's ironic in a way, that how many times on this forum have you read posters encouraging newcomers to Houston to rent for a year until they know the city better. It now appears those same people are still leasing more than a year later, which is driving up rents on rental homes, and stressing the rental market in general. Creating the need for people to come on to CD and complain about how their rents are to dang high ! It's a vicious cycle isn't it ?

"Bowe’s experience is not unique. The number of Houston families choosing to rent rather than buy single-family homes surged last month, data from the Houston Association of Realtors show. While year-over-year home sales have flagged or stayed flat over the last three months, single-family rentals soared 27 percent in February compared to the year earlier.

“This suggests that many consumers are opting to rent until they find the right home at the right price at the right interest rate to buy,” Shannon Cobb Evans, chair of the Houston Association of Realtors, said in a press release."

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/bus...s-13686575.php

[jfre81]

Originally Posted by Jack Lance

It's ironic in a way, that how many times on this forum have you read posters encouraging newcomers to Houston to rent for a year until they know the city better. It now appears those same people are still leasing more than a year later, which is driving up rents on rental homes, and stressing the rental market in general. Creating the need for people to come on to CD and complain about how their rents are to dang high ! It's a vicious cycle isn't it ?

The only other two options are:

-Telling them to buy a house, sight unseen, in a place they've never been to, which is about the worst piece of advice you can read here, or

-Telling them to stay where they are and don't come here at all


Which of those would you choose?

[Jack Lance]

Originally Posted by jfre81

The only other two options are:

-Telling them to buy a house, sight unseen, in a place they've never been to, which is about the worst piece of advice you can read here, or

-Telling them to stay where they are and don't come here at all


Which of those would you choose?

I was just commenting on the irony not suggesting any course of action. But obviously many who take this advise end up liking Houston, and choose to stay. Which is contrary to the hopes of some, who hope they will become disillusioned with this city and leave it all together...

[Scientific]

Where's the irony? Surging population, will typically be followed by surging housing costs. People have to live somewhere, so its either buy or rent.

Originally Posted by ScrappyJoe

The point is that compared to other major metros, including SF, LA, and NYC, Houston still remains quite cheap. As far as the price-gap diminishing, I addressed a specific cause of that, which is the city-code regulations for parking and setback: they significantly drive up development cost, and payments are subsidized through rent.

Parking? That is what is ailing the city? There is no singular root cause. It is expensive to live in almost every major city. There's nothing complicated about that. We all know Houston tends to be cheaper for too many reasons to list. I just find it patronizing to tell native Houstonians, who have never lived anywhere else, they should be so grateful we're not NYC.

[LocalPlanner]

Originally Posted by Scientific

Where's the irony? Surging population, will typically be followed by surging housing costs. People have to live somewhere, so its either buy or rent.


Parking? That is what is ailing the city? There is no singular root cause. It is expensive to live in almost every major city. There's nothing complicated about that. We all know Houston tends to be cheaper for too many reasons to list. I just find it patronizing to tell native Houstonians, who have never lived anywhere else, they should be so grateful we're not NYC.

Historically, Houston had surging population without the surging housing costs. After the boom that started in 2011, the situation has been different.

That said, prices aren't increasing at anywhere near the rate currently that they did in 2011-2014. Thank goodness.

[Scientific]

That's true, but the city's core can only absorb so much population growth. At some point, supply and demand dynamics catch up. And yeah, I know a lot of people who are breathing better now that its plateaued.

[jfre81]

Originally Posted by Jack Lance

I was just commenting on the irony not suggesting any course of action. But obviously many who take this advise end up liking Houston, and choose to stay. Which is contrary to the hopes of some, who hope they will become disillusioned with this city and leave it all together...

Believe it or not, there was a time around 10 or 11 years ago when I had the reputation of being a "Houston booster" on here. But even then, I wasn't in the business of promoting growth for growth's sake, and the photo threads I posted weren't any more to booster Houston than to show just how hostile this place can be to anyone not driving a car to get around it. I always told people what they were getting into.

It's just now that we've entered a new price point, I'm even less inclined to make excuses for poor planning, lack of vision and misplaced priorities. When the price of admission goes up, my expectations for the show get higher too. That's the way it should work for anyone.

Right now, we're at a point where we can really only sell Houston as a cheaper alternative to the extremely expensive slivers of the coasts, and the more people come from there the more expensive it gets here. Are you sure that's what you want to encourage?

I'll sooner be that guy flying banners over downtown saying "don't move here" the way you see in Austin during SXSW.

[Jack Lance]

Originally Posted by Scientific

Where's the irony? Surging population, will typically be followed by surging housing costs. People have to live somewhere, so its either buy or rent.

Parking? That is what is ailing the city? There is no singular root cause. It is expensive to live in almost every major city. There's nothing complicated about that. We all know Houston tends to be cheaper for too many reasons to list. I just find it patronizing to tell native Houstonians, who have never lived anywhere else, they should be so grateful we're not NYC.

Perhaps I'm mistaking irony for cause and effect, but in this case I was saying that certain posters encourage newcomers to rent before they buy (which is good advise in many cases) but it appears those people are staying in their rentals instead of buying at some point, which is causing rents to surge, and now those very same posters who encouraged them to rent in the first place, are posting on CD, that their rents are too dang high!

Originally Posted by jfre81

Believe it or not, there was a time around 10 or 11 years ago when I had the reputation of being a "Houston booster" on here. But even then, I wasn't in the business of promoting growth for growth's sake, and the photo threads I posted weren't any more to booster Houston than to show just how hostile this place can be to anyone not driving a car to get around it. I always told people what they were getting into.

It's just now that we've entered a new price point, I'm even less inclined to make excuses for poor planning, lack of vision and misplaced priorities. When the price of admission goes up, my expectations for the show get higher too. That's the way it should work for anyone.

Right now, we're at a point where we can really only sell Houston as a cheaper alternative to the extremely expensive slivers of the coasts, and the more people come from there the more expensive it gets here. Are you sure that's what you want to encourage?

I'll sooner be that guy flying banners over downtown saying "don't move here" the way you see in Austin during SXSW.

We're completing the circle here , You say don't promote growth for growth sake, I post if your not growing you're probably dying. I would prefer to have higher quality growth, but much of the growth we have now is quality growth, and besides its the higher quality growth that makes prices go up the fastest anyway.