Posted on 08/31/2014 7:53:15 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Between 1970 and 1990, the population of Philadelphia shrank by a quarter, dropping from 1.95 to 1.59 million. Like many American cities, it seemed caught in a downward spiral.
Since then – like many American cities – Philadelphia has stabilized. The population now appears to have bottomed out at the millennium, and has been regaining residents over the past decade. But as it rebounds, Philly is becoming a different kind of city.
In the two most recent decades, which comprise the bounce of the city’s population curve, owner-occupied housing dropped even more steeply than in the ’70s and ’80s. Between 2000 and 2012, the percentage of Philly houses and apartments inhabited by owners dropped from 59 to 52, the second-sharpest decline among big U.S. cities during that time.
Meanwhile, renter-occupied housing exploded. More units are rented today in Philadelphia than in 1970, despite 400,000 fewer residents. According to a report from Pew Charitable Trusts, the size of the Philadelphia rental stock has grown by 37,000 since the millennium — a gain of more than 10 percent.
Philadelphia is a concentrated case of a larger trend in American housing: We are increasingly renting instead of buying our homes. Rental household growth is rising at double the rate it has in previous decades. Developers are building more multi-family units than they have in years. Last month, the homeownership rate fell to a 19-year low, down to 64.7 percent from a peak of 69.2 percent in 2004.
(Excerpt) Read more at salon.com ...
I agree buy a small place and add on. That is what we will be looking at. Plus you have to plan these things, we have 1,2,3,5 years plans on projects. Plus we have to be flexible and watch our investments to maximize our money and not have to take out loans.
Contracts for deed can be helpful to those who are not wanting to take out a loan. We did this then sold some stock to pay off the whole thing so now it's free an clear. So what we would have been spending for mortgage or rent we can save until we decide what we want to do.
Homeownership is a fetish.
No job and no home and liberals are happy!
The problem with rentals is that they are not maintained as are homes that are owner occupied. What happens when these rentals start deteriorating to the point that no one wants to live in them? I guess that is when HUD offers the owner a section 8 voucher so the neighborhood can be completely destroyed. Swell.
Today's architects are copying rabbit hutches and chicken coops!
That's exactly what I did. And when interest rates fell, I refinanced and used the $600 a month savings to pay down the principal. After less than nine years I was able to sell my house and walk away with enough cash to buy a retirement house in Arizona for cash. Now I'm retired with no debt and a six figure income for life. Some con game!
America is so over careers: Why the shift to a day laboring economy might actually be a good thing.
Then...
America is so over marriage: Why the shift to a non-committal lifestyle might actually be a good thing.
Then...
America is so over democracy: Why the shift to an imperial government might actually be a good thing.
-PJ
Where your narrative falls apart is when you look inside the owner-occupied home and the rental one. They are not identical in any way shape or form. The owner-occupied home has upgrades and luxuries that the rental never even thought about. Better paint, higher quality carpet, nicer windows, better appliances, etc. The list goes on and on. Unless you compare a rental that is a recent foreclosure with an owner-occupied in the same development.
I own rentals. I know what carpet to put in. The better grade is soaked in pet poo within a year, and is useless after two years. So is the cheap grade. Buy the cheap.
In 40 years of home ownership I have never put hole in the wall of a home I owned. Every rental I have has a few fist-sized or larger holes in the wall when the old tenants move out.
Every maintenance item is ignored by renters, even though calling me will get it fixed fast & free. Owners, at least there is chance they have been maintained.
I rent.
I have never put a fist through a wall. Have never damaged a carpet with pet piss.
I clean the place I live in.
Not all renters are dirty scumbags. I treat my property and other’s property with respect.
Oh, and I would NEVER rent from you if your rental contained cheap carpet and low end appliances.
Maybe if you made your rentals nice you would attract a better class of renters.
I rent now because it is cheaper for me to do so. I am an empty nester, recently single again.
One day, I hope to buy some land in the country. When I do, I am going to build a small ~600 sq concrete dome home. I am more interested in land than a mcMansion in the suburbs so the greedy county I currently live in can tax me silly. Been there, done that before. I won’t be doing that again.
It’s not just liberals with their diabolical planning. This isn’t about lowering your expectations, just becoming more realistic. Students need to start letting their hands dirty and stop thinking that a degree gives them some right to a fat paycheck. Second, not everyone is going to end up living like Tom Cruise and people don’t have the right to a celebrity level lifestyle. Not everyone is going to make millions in life and no one has the right to a millionaire lifestyle. Celebrities live the way they do because they can afford it, not because it was handed to them. They do work for it and do put in a tremendous amount of effort.
~Thanks; to me, you can buy a small house and build as you need it and avoid getting soaked in debt. Frankly put, this whole housing issue has contributed to the collapse of the economy.~
Bingo. I hate an idea to be indebted. If I can’t purchase a thing using existing assets, I’m simply moving along for a thing I can afford. I might lack an opulence of people who lives out of their means but I feel myself a free man, not a slave to a job, a bank etc.
Same here; of you’re single and fit, you don’t need a huge house to impress. A bank account and a good nest egg with plenty of control over my life is all I need. Besides, with a huge house and a massive layout, you sometimes never know if someone has just broken into your home and is in there with you.
So many people got pulled down because they maxed themselves into debt to buy a huge house, adding to the debt burden. In no way is all this solely because of people on welfare.
renting makes it so much easier for govt thugs to search your dwelling.
never again. i’ll live in a camper before renting and giving up so many rights.
A real person must have a property by my book.
you are every landlords dream renter. I do HVAC in Texas and I can tell you firsthand most renters do zero maintenance on their AC units which often just replacing the filter is too much for them. If I was a landlord, I’d hate to be intrusive but I think I’d show up monthly or semi-monthly to change the filter. Often times the indoor coil is so filthy the only remedy is replacement. Landlords, too, do not like to part with their money either.
Outside of Center City, Philadelphia housing is disposable. I grew up there and good working class white neighborhoods were absolutely destroyed by Section 8 Housing. In one neighborhood I lived in our kids could play in the streets and you could walk down the back alley at midnight and not feel threatened or scared one bit. Now, I wouldn’t walk down the black I mean back alley unless I was with an armed militia.
I went back to that neighborhood not a decade later after I left and one thing really stood out to me. When I lived there the days were quite and not many cars were parked on the street because quite simply everyone was at work. When I went back to visit during the day time the street was loaded with the brothers hanging out everywhere.
Oh, look: a leftist is trying to generate new lies to defend Obamanomics.
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