Home prices are wildly high around Pittsburgh and they are selling (Dormont: rent, insurance)

[Goinback2011]

Tyovan, why not look for a job in the suburbs? If your employer isn't adjusting salaries for the new downtown reality, it's the alternative.

[SteelCityRising]

Although I've vowed to not post here as much since I was spending too much time on here I would love to do a breakdown in a few years of changes in the city on a neighborhood level from 2000 to 2010 to 2020 once the official U.S. Census is conducted.

I'd like to do things such as analyze the percentage change in median household income vs. the percentage change in median home value and the percentage change in median rent during the same timeframe. I sit and play with figures and numbers and statistics all day at work.

If, per se, the median household income in "Neighborhood X" was $31,000 in 2000; $45,000 in 2010; and $67,000 in 2020, then I'd want to compare that to the median rents and median home values at those same points in time to figure out if the median-earning person in each neighborhood is paying a greater or lesser percentage of their income on median-priced housing as time progresses. If the typical neighborhood resident was paying 18% of their income on rent/mortgage in 2000; 22% of their income on rent/mortgage in 2010; and 27% of their income on rent/mortgage in 2020; then that neighborhood will be labeled by me as "gentrifying", and, as such, should be cause for alarm because, if left unchecked and that percentage of income spent on housing continues to grow, then the neighborhood's rents and home values are rising faster than real wage increases for the typical neighborhood resident and will price out everyone but the affluent or those subsidized by the government.

That should alarm everyone, yet, for some reason, I have a suspicion this is the case for neighborhoods now in Pittsburgh while most on here view that growing housing unaffordability as being a positive.

I don't care if Polish Hill's rents rise quickly as long as the rise in median wages is also rising commensurately so that someone paying 25% of their income for rent in the neighborhood in 2010 is also paying 25% of their income for rent in the neighborhood in 2020. If that percentage is decreasing, then that could mean that wages are rising faster than rents/mortgages, which means the neighborhood's residents will have more discretionary income to patronize city businesses (a good thing). If that percentage is increasing, then that means that more people are feeling the squeeze as their wage increases are being outstripped by housing price increases, which is a bad thing for me and tyovan4 but a good thing for everyone else on this sub-forum, apparently.

Anecdotally I know more people who are paying a greater percentage of their pay on housing NOW in my neighborhood than a decade ago when I moved here, but I'll reserve judgment until such evidence can be presented as fact once the 2020 Census stats are broken down to the neighborhood level. Why people on this sub-forum think that people paying a progressively larger percentage of their pay for housing as the decades progress is a positive is confusing to me.

[Merge]

Originally Posted by eschaton

I'm not saying I don't sympathize, but there's a big difference between living in the Pittsburgh MSA - where gentrification means you can't live in your top choice of a neighborhood for a rock-bottom price any longer, and living somewhere like the Bay Area where you might have to commute for two hours for work or share a room with four other people because of how expensive things are. Fundamentally there are still a crapton of affordable parts of the city, county, and metro.

Bingo!

[gg]

Originally Posted by gladhands

It’s not just those cities. Pittsburgh is cheaper than places like Baltimore, Providence, Hartford or Richmond. It’s cheaoer than Charlotte or Raleigh. Most importantly; it’s cheaper than the national average.

Again those are not isolated rustbelt cities.

[tyovan4]

Originally Posted by Goinback2011

Tyovan, why not look for a job in the suburbs? If your employer isn't adjusting salaries for the new downtown reality, it's the alternative.

Because I have a great public sector benefits package, including a pension, and I feel good about the ethics of my chosen profession - certainly much more so than when I was a replaceable cog in the Evil Empire known as UPMC.
That being said, I'm a few years away from vesting in my pension. Once I'm vested, I have begun considering trying to apply for a job at a State government office that is more convenient to where I'm living in Pgh. And then, once my son graduates high school a few years after that, I can try to transfer to a job in Harrisburg and return to my home region - where I'm much happier with the culture.

[Doowlle34]

[The Port Authority is working on a TOD plan for Dormont Station which will result in hundreds of new units right next to the T in the South Hills.]

Just to pull out one part of this excellent response, this is an exciting opportunity for Dormont -- although as I quickly review the plan, I believe the projected number of apartments is around 115, rather than "hundreds". I'm not sure how this plan will ultimately fair, however, as there appears to be a strong, vocal group who oppose development (and not necessarily for entirely specious reasons). For example, a developer is currently proposing to renovate a former church on Alabama Ave. into 25 apartments (although apparently with only 14 parking spaces), and the folks who live on nearby lots are none too happy.

[PGH423]

Originally Posted by gg

Again those are not isolated rustbelt cities.

I think people are just reading and responding to your first message, which didn't really give the full context of your thoughts. Later you clarified that you meant Pittsburgh is expensive compared to how dirt cheap it used to be and compared to rust belt cities whose economic situations we don't want to be similar to. But people don't necessarily scroll down that far, or they may wish to expand the discussion anyway.

[SteelCityRising]

Originally Posted by Doowlle34

[The Port Authority is working on a TOD plan for Dormont Station which will result in hundreds of new units right next to the T in the South Hills.]

Just to pull out one part of this excellent response, this is an exciting opportunity for Dormont -- although as I quickly review the plan, I believe the projected number of apartments is around 115, rather than "hundreds". I'm not sure how this plan will ultimately fair, however, as there appears to be a strong, vocal group who oppose development (and not necessarily for entirely specious reasons). For example, a developer is currently proposing to renovate a former church on Alabama Ave. into 25 apartments (although apparently with only 14 parking spaces), and the folks who live on nearby lots are none too happy.

Yeah. There's a TON of NIMBYism in this region for some reason that perhaps others can explain to me. I see no reason to oppose increased density.

There are talks of turning the former Bloomfield Shur-Save into a high-rise residential project. I'm a proponent of this. Most others seem to be opposed because "we already have too many apartments". When I bring up "why is my rent increasing if we already have too many apartments" people just segue into insularity/provincialism saying they have "more of a right" to dictate what gets built because their family goes back 8 generations vs. someone whose family doesn't go back any generations. I'm chronically embroiled within these sorts of debates on NextDoor.

Same with the proposal to transform the Shakespeare Street Giant Eagle in Shadyside (residents argued with me on there that this is actually East Liberty, but that's for a separate discussion) into a dense residential project. "We have too many apartments". What sort of credentials do these NIMBYs have that they can say "we have too many apartments"?

My yuppie Polish Hill neighbors opposed a residential high-rise that was proposed for an EMPTY VACANT LOT in the Strip, near Savoy, because "it will affect views" and "change the character of the neighborhood".

Again, if we already have "too many apartments", then why are rents in the East End still increasing? If it's NOT a supply vs. demand issue, then is it just yinzer landlords being greedy?

If people oppose density then move to the exurbs/outer suburbs. Those are specifically designed for people who want a lot of elbow room. Some of us moved to the city to have density levels high enough to support transit and having more commercial opportunities to patronize within walking distance of our increasingly-expensive domiciles.

[szug-bot]

Originally Posted by Jay_F

Saw this today... FWIW.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/money...es/3668178002/

Most affordable metro areas:

Pittsburgh ranked second.

Share of ZIP codes where at least half the homes are affordable: 95.8%

Share of ZIP codes where none of the homes are affordable: 0.5%

Share of ZIP codes where all the homes are affordable: 22.4%

there is always more to a story told by statistics! Pittsburgh is the second most affordable metro area, yet the clamor for affordable housing...and recently, there is proposed legislation to force developers to provide a certain amount of affordable housing.

[gg]

Originally Posted by PGH423

I think people are just reading and responding to your first message, which didn't really give the full context of your thoughts. Later you clarified that you meant Pittsburgh is expensive compared to how dirt cheap it used to be and compared to rust belt cities whose economic situations we don't want to be similar to. But people don't necessarily scroll down that far, or they may wish to expand the discussion anyway.

True. I was only comparing Pittsburgh to Pittsburgh 5 or so years ago. Prices soared over that time for Pittsburgh. My mind wasn't comparing Pittsburgh to San Francisco. We will never get there unless San Francisco falls into the ocean.