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This is another one, the kind of situation people are vulnerable to given how many need roommates to be able to afford housing. If you only have the local transient population from which to choose roommates, no matter how responsible and hard-working you are you can still end up without shelter overnight. You are at even more risk in Key West than on other Keys islands, given it has the highest cost of rent in the Keys generally speaking, and the most drifters vying for rooms. This guy sounds like a considerate, hard worker - but that is not enough to get by, or to keep you from becoming homeless in the Keys - especially in Key West. You need skills, a lot of savings, good credit, and a plan with multiple backups. Note the mention of Keys Disease - an ailment marked by laziness and excessive partying that as yet has no medical treatment (lol)!:
---- 200 a week I have 2 jobs (key west)
Hi my name is ____ I have 2 jobs. Lost my friend to keys disease in which I was homeless working both jobs for 72 hours with 2 hours of sleep a day. One of my coworker now friends have takenme in for a few days. They trust me and dont ask a dime from me. Problem is the house is full and I do not want to be in the way. I work and sleep offering 200 a week starting wed. I'm 34y. o. white Caucasian male. I'm dependable and very cool laid back person. I was actually interviewed and put in the paper the other day about the _____ article. I would like to meet so feel free and contact. No alcoholics please social o.k. thanks for reading.
Last edited by StarfishKey; 10-12-2014 at 06:07 PM..
I stayed at the Sigsbee RV camp on the Naval base recently and noticed many of the folks who were supposedly recreational campers where actually employeed on KW and coming back to their RVs from work - one guy had his electrician's truck next to my trailer - he was in the pop-up camper next to me ($23/night). I'm not sure how the camp is keeping track of who is homesteading and who is actually there for recreational camping. Seems unfair to the retiree population looking for few days at the camp but get blocked out by homesteaders.
I stayed at the Sigsbee RV camp on the Naval base recently and noticed many of the folks who were supposedly recreational campers where actually employeed on KW and coming back to their RVs from work - one guy had his electrician's truck next to my trailer - he was in the pop-up camper next to me ($23/night). I'm not sure how the camp is keeping track of who is homesteading and who is actually there for recreational camping. Seems unfair to the retiree population looking for few days at the camp but get blocked out by homesteaders.
What is unfair about it? The owners of these parks rent to all, and encourage long-term contracts. Such parks are often the most affordable if dangerous during the rainy season) way to live long-term in the Florida Keys. All up and down the islands, the majority of trailer parks and "camping" parks are rented by long-term rentals on a monthly or annual contract, with the few spaces they have left remaining open taken by seasonal and short-term vacation people. This is a fact of life down here, and actually tends to keep the parks very stable and quiet because the majority are residents who work hard and want to come home to some peace and quiet. The main problem is for those who remain through the hurricane season, if we get a big one, people are at severe risk either staying, or all packing up and crowding the roads to a point that none of us can get out. To some extent, although we have thankfully never had to test this, we have more people down here than we have sufficient road to evacuate. That's why vacationers are given a mandatory evacuation ahead of locals, to give them adequate time to get out before all the locals fill the roads and perhaps get caught in part of the storm. Of course, tourists complain that this is excessive and they're missing part of their vacation, sometimes for a false alarm, but it is the only way they can assuredly get out alive if a bad storm does end up hitting us directly. We have to be evacuated in waves, and even then many will choose to stay behind or get stuck, and deal with whatever consequences may come. At least islanders are generally more experienced and knowledgeable about such storms and their effects here.
No vacationer is guaranteed booking simply because they want to go somewhere. Like anywhere else in the world, it is a matter of money offered, and good timing. If it's all booked up, it's all booked up. What is really unfair is that people with long-term secure local contracts to do government work as teachers, construction, military personnel, infrastructure personnel, etc. may be paid 40k or more and yet are reduced to camping, sometimes with their entire families, for years because there are no apartments available and which they can afford. Local landlords will give apartments out to the highest vacation bidder, meanwhile there are no rent controlled apartment complexes or anything reserved for our own essential workforce given the salaries they are paid down here. I am astounded that the military in particular has such a major presence in Key West, and yet can't manage to secure adequate military housing for their personnel, which should be the responsibility of the government to provide, such that the other housing for civilians like teachers and construction isn't all eaten up. The source of the problems are multiple and rather complex.
What is unfair about it? The owners of these parks rent to all, and encourage long-term contracts. Such parks are often the most affordable if dangerous during the rainy season) way to live long-term in the Florida Keys. All up and down the islands, the majority of trailer parks and "camping" parks are rented by long-term rentals on a monthly or annual contract, with the few spaces they have left remaining open taken by seasonal and short-term vacation people. This is a fact of life down here, and actually tends to keep the parks very stable and quiet because the majority are residents who work hard and want to come home to some peace and quiet. The main problem is for those who remain through the hurricane season, if we get a big one, people are at severe risk either staying, or all packing up and crowding the roads to a point that none of us can get out. To some extent, although we have thankfully never had to test this, we have more people down here than we have sufficient road to evacuate. That's why vacationers are given a mandatory evacuation ahead of locals, to give them adequate time to get out before all the locals fill the roads and perhaps get caught in part of the storm. Of course, tourists complain that this is excessive and they're missing part of their vacation, sometimes for a false alarm, but it is the only way they can assuredly get out alive if a bad storm does end up hitting us directly. We have to be evacuated in waves, and even then many will choose to stay behind or get stuck, and deal with whatever consequences may come. At least islanders are generally more experienced and knowledgeable about such storms and their effects here.
No vacationer is guaranteed booking simply because they want to go somewhere. Like anywhere else in the world, it is a matter of money offered, and good timing. If it's all booked up, it's all booked up. What is really unfair is that people with long-term secure local contracts to do government work as teachers, construction, military personnel, infrastructure personnel, etc. may be paid 40k or more and yet are reduced to camping, sometimes with their entire families, for years because there are no apartments available and which they can afford. Local landlords will give apartments out to the highest vacation bidder, meanwhile there are no rent controlled apartment complexes or anything reserved for our own essential workforce given the salaries they are paid down here. I am astounded that the military in particular has such a major presence in Key West, and yet can't manage to secure adequate military housing for their personnel, which should be the responsibility of the government to provide, such that the other housing for civilians like teachers and construction isn't all eaten up. The source of the problems are multiple and rather complex.
just wanted to clarify that there is plenty of unused military housing in key west. I f you are enlisted in the military you can get rent controlled housing in key west on the naval base. depending on your rank and family size. Key West Family Housing | Balfour Beatty Communities
the navy will also give enlisted members a housing allowance to live anywhere off the base too. Many enlisted personnel choose to live off the base helping contribute to the housing crunch/high rents. they can afford more rent because their rent is subsidized by the navy. they just have have to add a little out of pocket cash to the subsidy and send in their rent check for off base rental housing.
the real travesty was the recent transfer of 125 affordable housing units from the seahorse trailer park in big pine key to a new hotel/marina being built on stock island. their is already a shortage of affordable housing in the keys and they just gave up 125 affordable housing units to the for profit money making developer. thus putting 125 families out on the streets most likely having to leave the keys for lack of affordable housing.
just wanted to clarify that there is plenty of unused military housing in key west. I f you are enlisted in the military you can get rent controlled housing in key west on the naval base. depending on your rank and family size. Key West Family Housing | Balfour Beatty Communities
the navy will also give enlisted members a housing allowance to live anywhere off the base too. Many enlisted personnel choose to live off the base helping contribute to the housing crunch/high rents. they can afford more rent because their rent is subsidized by the navy. they just have have to add a little out of pocket cash to the subsidy and send in their rent check for off base rental housing.
the real travesty was the recent transfer of 125 affordable housing units from the seahorse trailer park in big pine key to a new hotel/marina being built on stock island. their is already a shortage of affordable housing in the keys and they just gave up 125 affordable housing units to the for profit money making developer. thus putting 125 families out on the streets most likely having to leave the keys for lack of affordable housing.
I would agree. But I think the functional word in my comment there was "*adequate* military housing." Although I am not very familiar with the issue of Key West's available military housing, it clearly is not deemed "adequate" for whatever reason (perhaps if not in quantity, then in quality) by a large percentage of military personnel, because you see them posting looking for affordable housing all over craigslist all the time. So either they think they can't get spots, or there is something so deficient about living on base that they will put themselves through hell trying to look for almost anyplace else to live.
The buy-out of the Keys by corporations and private investment groups is certainly killing life for the average local worker. More and more land is being sold off to such groups for highrises and luxury resorts to be built, and while those are in one way good for the economy, more tourist money is not helpful at the point where you have no place to live but those very same hotels the tourists are staying in for vacation dollars, rather than regular daily living dollars. This whole fear around "job creation" has led people to lack common sense where we at least have to have housing to support those jobs in the first place. I haven't lived here long enough to know the answer. I myself bought a private house on the upswing, and the lack of available space will serve to make my investment a sound one. I can also legally rent my house out for a month at a time, and the market would support high rent if I wanted to go that way... so as an owner do I choose to keep costs low [while my own costs for owning this house are in fact high], simply out of sympathy for the surrounding workforce, when I can in fact get top dollar if I wanted to? Keeping the rent low also leads to a different issue as a landlord, which is to attract all of the worst applicants from around the islands because my place would then be one of the only ones anywhere with a lower rate, and my house is much nicer than those with the lower rents. I could perhaps use that to be very picky, but the majority of people I'll have to weed through would be the renters with lower credit or other issues because my place would stick out as one of the lowest rents available. But the vacation rental prices are obscene and offensive - in many cases double the owner's likely mortgage for a single week in their crumbling house.
We are in a mess that is hard to get out of. We need to somehow dramatically increase a rent-controlled form of housing in a state with no rent control, and yet ensure that housing is both hurricane safe, and goes only to certain essential workers in our community, particularly those with government or government-contracted jobs. The population who comes down here on nothing but a dream will just have to find their own way, and thus the remainder of housing will adequately regulate how many can stay here at any given time. But we would need to have the public funding for such a project, the public land to put it on, and it would need to have a great many rules to ensure the right people get it, and have lots of oversight to ensure it does not become a big public housing project of the slum variety. Or, as some have suggested, a voucher program encouraging local home owners to rent to essential (non-military) workers in exchange for a little extra cash to supplement the lower rent being charged to that worker. Either way, it's money, and a lot of government involvement - pure unregulated capitalism is destroying the Keys' natural habitat and resources for inhabitants at the same time. Sure, it may work well for me in my house, but it's not going to help keep my community a functioning one in which I want to live.
At this time we have yet to come up with solid solutions.
We come to the Keys for several months each year, in a motorhome. Through the years we have noticed large down turn and depressed areas up and down the entire Keys. The park we stay in has a difficult time keeping workers. This is understandable as they pay them $8/hour and $350/month for their site. Food prices are high and shopping is extremely limited, or in our opinion, unavailable. We make a trip to Miami every so often to shop. There is no Target, Wal-mart, BJ's, Sam's Club, etc., even though they tried to build a Wal-mart on Rockland Key (industrial area), the people voted it down. Instead they want to keep the ambiance of the Keys, whatever that is. The areas are run down, places close year to year, homelessness has increased, crime seems to be increasing, Key West, known for Duval Street, has also become a bit seedy.
Sincerely, it has been interesting to read your posts about Key West - thanks for taking the time - I venture down there every few years for a week. Maybe next time I'll stop short of KW and see what the other areas offer. It's a very enjoyable, scenic 100 mile drive, though.
Avoid the ride in the winter months. It seems every week there is a fatality on the 7 mile bridge. Not sure what they were thinking, allowing passing on both sides of the road. Twice people were killed "surfing" i.e. driving back and forth, in and out, of South and North lanes.
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