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This has led me to ask "Where are the city's elderly going?" Are they just dying off in rapid numbers, as BrianTH would likely suggest through his demographics research, or are they being displaced already in great numbers either to other city neighborhoods or to the suburbs?
Speaking of my own experience with old-timer neighbors in Lawrenceville, one of three things happens.
1. They die.
2. They get to the point where they either can't take care of themselves, or they have a spouse who has serious problems they can't address, they move in with children, who usually live in the suburbs.
3. In some cases, they make the decision to move earlier, and move to the suburbs generally. If they are well enough to drive still, this can make sense, as rowhouses are hard dwellings to age in, due to the number of steps (and often the lack of a bathroom on the first floor). Here moving to Shaler tends to be the most popular thing, due to being close to Lawrenceville, and having numerous split-levels and ranches.
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Originally Posted by SteelCityRising
If the latter is the case, then will we potentially run out of a supply of those "elderly refuge" neighborhoods over the next couple of generations as more and more of the city gentrifies, or do you predict that today's youths will still favor the youthful vigor of the city as they age in 30, 40, or 50 years? More importantly, will they all be able to afford the city in retirement if they choose to stay here? I've already begun to aggressively save and invest for my retirement, even though I'm only in my mid-20s, because I foresee the Pittsburgh of 2050 being a much more expensive place.
I don't see this as being a huge problem. Elderly people are disproportionately likely to own their houses outright, and don't have to worry about a mortgage payment. Property taxes can be killer if they've aged in place and the community has gentrified enough to really up their annual payment. A much bigger issue is mobility concerns I outlined above - people who cannot or will not leave a house which isn't really safe for someone of their age to live in. A lot of seniors basically move downstairs (if that's where their bathroom is) and abandon the upstairs. Those in appreciating neighborhoods have an easy out, but those in neighborhoods on the decline are trapped unless the Housing Authority builds more dedicated senior housing.
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Originally Posted by SteelCityRising
We've been celebrating the influx of educated and diverse 20-somethings into the city over the past several years on this sub-forum, but have we discussed if the city will still offer great living options for all life stages as this "boom" in the city ages? Will most leave for the suburbs once they have children in search of better schools, or do you foresee enough sticking around and holding their ground to force the Pittsburgh Public School system to improve organically? Will the property tax burden here that people such as h_curtis and I believe groar (and a few others) have specifically been concerned about increase in the coming years to the point of pricing out the ability of most in this demographic to retire here while owning their own property in the city?
I don't think that Pittsburgh Public Schools is actually in as bad of shape as people often bemoan, given students in the magnet system and the Lower East End do as well (adjusted for demographics) as kids in the top suburban schools. All we need to bring it along more (which will be politically contentious) is to make the magnets have a stronger component based upon academic achievement and less upon lottery systems, as it would take the uncertainty out of the system for people whose children are approaching school age. As it is I think we're in better shape for public schools than places like Philly and DC, but in worse shape than Boston or New York.
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Originally Posted by Goinback2011
The 20-somethings I know are generally college graduates, married, and living in the suburbs in their first home. The singles live in the areas in which they grew up, also the suburbs. Those in their 30's and 40's are living in places like Peters, USC, South Fayette, Mt. Lebanon, North Hills areas, Cranberry or Fox Chapel. There is a relatively small cadre of people in their 50's as this is the age group that moved away when the economy collapsed c. 1975-85.
I live in fairly small office. Only around a dozen people work in the office full time, but.
1. Everyone under age 40, with the exception of one guy in Edgewood, lives in the city.
2. Including myself, there are four parents with children under 18. Again, excepting the guy in Edgewood, live in the city.
3. Everyone sends or is planning on sending their kids to PPS or Woodland Hills schools.
4. All but four of my coworkers take the bus into downtown. Of those who don't, two have assigned spaces in a nearby garage, one had her bus eliminated years ago, and one only works out of the office infrequently although he lives nearby.
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Originally Posted by SteelCityRising
I brought up the recent conversation about Lawrenceville because everyone always seems to think of the word "gentrification" with a negative connotation for the rationale of the process upending and uprooting native residents (in the case of that particular neighborhood the "old-school Pittsburghers"). I personally see glimmers of hope for renewal in nearly every city neighborhood, and my general concern is one of "if we gentrify EVERY neighborhood where will those who are NOT young professionals and those who are otherwise being displaced be able to find a home"? The Lower North Side, South Side, Downtown, and nearly all of the East End have undergone heavy gentrification since 2000. I'll be purchasing a home in a NON-gentrified North Side neighborhood early next year, and I'm encouraging friends of mine who are also priced out of the East End to follow suit, which will, unfortunately, also lead to the gentrification or "displacement" of the natives in yet another neighborhood. I'm not naive. If places like Polish Hill, Bloomfield, and Lawrenceville all become red hot seemingly overnight, then who's to say that process won't spread throughout the entirety of the city over the next couple of generations?
Housing is not just about demand, but supply. As hot as Lawrenceville is these days, if too many long-time residents sold at once, property values would crater, because while demand outstrips supply at the moment, it's not infinite by any means.
I appreciate your thoughtful and balanced insight as always, eschaton. Thanks for sticking to the topic at-hand instead of cherry-picking ways to nip at me personally.
Will Pittsburgh still offer something for everyone in the future? My answer is "probably." At least to the same degree as it does now; it would be hard to screw that up. Now if you change the question to "Will the East End still offer something for everyone in the future", then I think it gets a lot more questionable....I would say that to some degree it already isn't offering something for everyone, as you and I have both found in the real estate market lately. But there's 3 other sides of the city to pick up whatever slack the East End might have in offering "something for everyone."
Will Pittsburgh still offer something for everyone in the future? My answer is "probably." At least to the same degree as it does now; it would be hard to screw that up. Now if you change the question to "Will the East End still offer something for everyone in the future", then I think it gets a lot more questionable....I would say that to some degree it already isn't offering something for everyone, as you and I have both found in the real estate market lately. But there's 3 other sides of the city to pick up whatever slack the East End might have in offering "something for everyone."
If when someone says East End they include East Hills, Crawford-Roberts, Garfield, Glen Hazel, Hazelwood, Homewood North, Homewood South, Homewood West, Larimer, Lincoln-Lemington, Middle Hill District, Terrace Village, Upper Hill District, then there probably still be "affordable" places to buy or rent there for at least...the foreseeable future. I may have missed some.
There are still many, many low-income renters as well as many Sec 8 renters living in places like Lawrenceville, Bloomfield, East Liberty, Friendship, so I would guess as long as there are places for Section 8 renters (it seems like most of the Sec 8 vouchers get snapped up for life by those on SSI rather than the working poor who, if anyone is going to get a subsidy rather than live in public housing projects, really should be the ones to get them, although they don't have social workers steering them to all the public assistance goodies the way the SSI bums do) there are still affordable elements (the max pre-subsidy rent an apartment can have and be allowed to participate in Sec 8 is $650 per month). The income limit to live in a public housing project is $35,000...you can't earn more than $22,000 and still receive Sec 8.
Although, as I have seen first-hand, some landlords are ending their participation in the program...to wit: Aishel's O'Hara place complex on Liberty has a fairly large supply of current Section 8 tenants, but is no longer going to accept vouchers from Section 8 renters in the future and is transitioning to all-market. That is, as long as the property managers there are not outright lying to me. It's $695 for a 1 bedroom, though, which I guess again raises the question of what is 'affordable'. Maybe being a staid kind of guy following a fairly modest budget, I think it's crazy to fork over that much* (plus electric) to live in a one bedroom apartment, where you can't even keep a washer and dryer and with no hope of ever achieving any kind of equity or even getting a dollar (unless the SD is refunded) back someday when you decide to leave. You can buy an $80,000 house and, even after including property taxes, pay less toward your mortgage than that. That's just my opinion though.
*If you follow the "30% guideline", then rent there is 30% of about $28,000, which is in that sense affordable for a lot of people. The City median income for males is $32,128 and for females $25,500. So, it looks like they are shooting for squarely around the median income earners at Ohara (which, it should be noted, would still likely exclude the bottom 30-40% of all earners, which is a lot of people), and in practice I suspect many renters will probably pay >30% of their income to live there. I must just be an old school Pittsburgh guy who expects housing prices to be dirt cheap.
No doubt, Clint. It definitely depends how you define "East End" and "affordable." However when looking for a demographic such as "lower middle class home owners" it already seems like there's very few options in the east end, especially if you add in caveats like the area being generally considered safe or having good schools.
The rental market is still pretty affordable, though.
Yeah, the neighborhoods like Larimer, Homewood, Lincoln-Lemington, etc., fell a lot further than Lawrenceville or Bloomfield and would be a riskier proposition, especially if you don't want to wait around for possibly decades for things to really turn around.
I don't know a lot about how things were in the area 20 or 25 years ago, but it seems unlikely that some of those hoods really were ever that bad...like, it doesn't seem so much Lawrenceville was a ghetto and flipped, but that it was depreciating working class and it then started to reverse. Compare that to places like Homewood, which had a really bad reputation. People in the suburbs where I lived didn't say, "oh man Bloomfield and Lawrenceville are war zones". Has East Liberty really had much residential development that last several years, or has it all been commercial? If it has been mostly residential and just mixed-income subsidized development, then now that I think about it, none of the 'bad' communities that suburbanites thought of as ghettos have really turned around much at all...Larimer, Homewood, Hill District, Hazelwood, Lincoln-Lemington - they aren't as bad as circa 1990, but not many places in the U.S. are. The "up and coming" East End neighborhoods, like Bloomfield and Lawrenceville Friendship have always been mostly white and maybe a little rough around the edges but never near the same category as a place like Homewood in the popular mind around here for the past 25-30 years. Those places will be a much tougher sell. Other places, like Shadyside and Squirrel Hill and Point Breeze, have always had good reputations. Interesting.
And then there is the Hill, which I've always thought should really be a premier location, but there is a lot of heavy lifting to do.
like, it doesn't seem so much Lawrenceville was a ghetto and flipped, but that it was depreciating working class and it then started to reverse.... People in the suburbs where I lived didn't say, "oh man Bloomfield and Lawrenceville are war zones".
I disagree re: Lawrenceville. As recently as 5-6 years ago, my (suburban) coworkers would tell stories about being scared, getting lost driving in Lawrenceville. (Granted, these were comically sheltered people.) When I was in high school (circa 1997-2001), I only knew one kid who grew up in Lawrenceville and the stereotype of that area was that it was full of junkies. It was very much seen as a "ghetto." That's literally all you ever heard about it.
I disagree re: Lawrenceville. As recently as 5-6 years ago, my (suburban) coworkers would tell stories about being scared, getting lost driving in Lawrenceville. (Granted, these were comically sheltered people.) When I was in high school (circa 1997-2001), I only knew one kid who grew up in Lawrenceville and the stereotype of that area was that it was full of junkies. It was very much seen as a "ghetto." That's literally all you ever heard about it.
Perception and reality are 2 different things. I put very little stock in the opinions my suburban coworkers have of city neighborhoods. Even as recently as this year I would catch flack for living in the Mexican War Streets; a few years ago someone said I would need a gun since I lived in Bloomfield. Just totally out of touch.
I don't know a lot about how things were in the area 20 or 25 years ago, but it seems unlikely that some of those hoods really were ever that bad...like, it doesn't seem so much Lawrenceville was a ghetto and flipped, but that it was depreciating working class and it then started to reverse. Compare that to places like Homewood, which had a really bad reputation. People in the suburbs where I lived didn't say, "oh man Bloomfield and Lawrenceville are war zones". Has East Liberty really had much residential development that last several years, or has it all been commercial? If it has been mostly residential and just mixed-income subsidized development, then now that I think about it, none of the 'bad' communities that suburbanites thought of as ghettos have really turned around much at all...Larimer, Homewood, Hill District, Hazelwood, Lincoln-Lemington - they aren't as bad as circa 1990, but not many places in the U.S. are. The "up and coming" East End neighborhoods, like Bloomfield and Lawrenceville Friendship have always been mostly white and maybe a little rough around the edges but never near the same category as a place like Homewood in the popular mind around here for the past 25-30 years. Those places will be a much tougher sell. Other places, like Shadyside and Squirrel Hill and Point Breeze, have always had good reputations. Interesting.
Although I wasn't around then, my understanding is much of the Lower Northside was definitely a ghetto, and is no longer. Lower Manchester still has a lot of gang warfare 15 years ago, IIRC.
Yeah, the neighborhoods like Larimer, Homewood, Lincoln-Lemington, etc., fell a lot further than Lawrenceville or Bloomfield and would be a riskier proposition, especially if you don't want to wait around for possibly decades for things to really turn around.
I don't know a lot about how things were in the area 20 or 25 years ago, but it seems unlikely that some of those hoods really were ever that bad...like, it doesn't seem so much Lawrenceville was a ghetto and flipped, but that it was depreciating working class and it then started to reverse. Compare that to places like Homewood, which had a really bad reputation. People in the suburbs where I lived didn't say, "oh man Bloomfield and Lawrenceville are war zones". Has East Liberty really had much residential development that last several years, or has it all been commercial? If it has been mostly residential and just mixed-income subsidized development, then now that I think about it, none of the 'bad' communities that suburbanites thought of as ghettos have really turned around much at all...Larimer, Homewood, Hill District, Hazelwood, Lincoln-Lemington - they aren't as bad as circa 1990, but not many places in the U.S. are. The "up and coming" East End neighborhoods, like Bloomfield and Lawrenceville Friendship have always been mostly white and maybe a little rough around the edges but never near the same category as a place like Homewood in the popular mind around here for the past 25-30 years. Those places will be a much tougher sell. Other places, like Shadyside and Squirrel Hill and Point Breeze, have always had good reputations. Interesting.
And then there is the Hill, which I've always thought should really be a premier location, but there is a lot of heavy lifting to do.
A few points:
Lawrenceville was pretty rough in the late 90s. There was a lot of heroin there and from what I've heard, even more before then. Just 9 years ago there were lots of walking junkie-zombies, open air drug dealers, prostitutes, etc. 'Operation Sweatpants' Bags More Than 24 Johns - tribune review pittsburgh - August 05, 2006 - Id. 192392247 - vLex It wasn't a scary neighborhood, but you definitely had to watch your back when you were walking around in the evening there. I never had a problem, but I know of others who did.
Regarding East Liberty;
There has been a lot of market rate residential development in East Lib in the past 5 years. I'd say that 60% of it was done to create a for sale market while a lot of it was homeowners buying a place that they would essentially gut rehab and live in. A lot of it was facilitated by East Liberty Development. They got their hands on properties going through foreclosure or that were just sitting vacant. They land banked, developed, sold to future homeowners, partnered with developers, and created a true real estate market that has been overlooked for the past 2 decades.
Of the for sale housing, in the last few years there were:
-5 condos on Rippey St that sold for around 200k each this year.
-5 houses on the 700 block of N St clair that went for 270-305k this year (2012).
-2 other homeowners bought and renovated on that block within the last few years. There were already a number of other homeowners on that block.
-7 new construction houses and 2 flipped older homes on 700 block of N Euclid selling from 210k to 331k plus other homeowners already there.
-4 new construction (in 2006) and 5 rehabbed brick rowhouses on 700 block of Mellon plus about 12 new owner occupied 3 BR 1.5 Bath houses 12 years ago.
-3 flipped older brick homes on the 600 block of N Euclid and more in the works.
-2 flipped row houses on the 600 block of N St Clair - sold in the lower 100's. 1 large victorian is almost done on that block and I believe 2 others might be started soon enough.
-1 flipped brownstone on 700 block of Beatty and a few more (3-4, but not brownstones) in the works.
-1 completely rehabbed house on the 600 block of Mellon.
-5 gut rehabbed houses on flipped Baywood - 4 sold up to the mid 300's, 1 for sale for 425k. Others have bought run down houses to do an to live in. Another is slowly under construction.
-3 houses under construction on Margaretta St to be for sale (opposite East Lib Blvd) to be net zero - solar powered (like 2 on N St Clair and 1 on N Beatty).
-4 major renovations on Hays St between N St Clair and Obama IB school within the last 2 years.
The above is all in the core residential area north of Penn Circle and South of Stanton Ave (Highland Park).
There's the Highland/Wallace project that'll bring higher end rentals to the area. There are lots of smaller rental rehabs happening in the area as well that are 2 or 3 units. Plus the subsidized housing that was built near Target to replace the high rises that were razed. They have more of a neighborhood feeling to them that monstrous run down high rises.
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