Posted on 03/16/2012 7:22:59 PM PDT by dewawi
A weak economy and high debt levels are prompting more young adults to return to the family nest, a new survey shows. Perhaps surprisingly, most are happy with their living arrangements.
(Excerpt) Read more at csmonitor.com ...
I was making $1.75/hr and renting a 2 bedroom home for $65/mo.
In 8 years I was able to save $7,000 for a down on a $34k home, in 1966, in a wealthy neighborhood, ( wages had risen to $$3.50)
I think if you could force the news folks to analyze the real story...you’d end up finding that most college graduates (especially four-year degree folks)...are employed, and that few of these people live out of dad’s house because of the bad economy.
The vast majority of these “kids” (I even hate using this term for a 22-year old)....are simply the ones who passed out of high school and maybe had a job at Best Buy, or some book store, or Piggly Wiggly. They might have gotten a year of community college, and maybe even gotten some work as a clerk or mechanic.
They were on the marginal side of life to start with, no real skills to market, no fall-back position, no savings, and no plan-B. On the positive side, Mom and Dad did the right thing. Course, two years from now....as the economy still lingers, and Junior is still living out of the house and barely bringing in $400 a month while delivering pizzas...the question will be how long do they really stay?
You have to feel positive about this....at least we aren’t creating an entire government program to catch these poor folks and provide vast sums of government funding to house and feed them.
A friend of the family had a tough situation to deal with.
Their son had dropped out of college, was living at home, working minimum wage in a restaurant.
The son wanted to move his non-working girlfriend into his bedroom at home!!
The parents said, no way. They said, you can live your life as you want when you are completely on your own. But you will not have a live-in girlfriend in your bedroom here!!
To make a long story short, the son moved in with his non-working girlfriend, and is now supporting her and him. He is on a tight budget. But, the parents say that they have seen a change in their boy. He seems to have learned some life lessons about being responsible for his own life, which he didn’t have when he was still living at home.
The parents are not thrilled about this girlfriend, who seems to have her own issues, nor are they thrilled about their boy living in sin with a girl. But, they saw their son, to coin a phrase, grow up and be a man when he saw what he needed to do, to live his own life as he wanted to.
What was the average income in the '50s, and how big was the average house?
I grew up in a three bedroom 800 sq.ft. house, something my parents could afford in 1954. How many of these "young adults" would settle for that? There probably wouldn't be any room for their 50" TV and sound system.
Wow - you had one of those high paying jobs. My first one was typing collection letters on a manual typewriter at $.76 an hour. Worked a whole lot harder then than I do now! Still managed to put myself through college with no debt. Eventually got a job for $260 a month. Bought our first house in the early 60’s - brand new 3 bedroom, 2 bath for $28,000 - also bought a new Ford Mustang for $3,000. Life was good.
“How many of these “young adults” would settle for that?”
I pay 550 a month for a 10x10 room at present.
“I was making $1.75/hr and renting a 2 bedroom home for $65/mo.”
That’s 37 hours of work to pay for a house - not a room.
You were getting paid the equivalent of what would be 14.84 dollars an hour, for what I’m paying for a room. Presumably full time?
How many 14.85 an hour/full time jobs do you see today?
Most of the jobs out there - if they pay that much, are going to pay you part time - say 20 hours a week, or sometimes less.
Or they cut your pay to about half of that and you work full time.
My last part-time job pays me about 10/hr and I only get about 20 hours a week. Still have the full commute. I would much rather work double shifts, I could put in a full weeks work, in 2 days, easily.
And I’m one of the lucky ones who has the job, having taken the job available.
I rest my case.
Let’s not forget the free medical coverage for the price of a course at the local community college!
Lots of people with once needed degrees are going wanting as well.
Thank you for the historic perspective. Society is indeed structured differently these days. It's more anti-marriage and anti-family and more pro- "extended (irresponsible) adolescence." Babies are seen as an annoying side effect of sex. It's disgusting.
Yeah, imagine if Bush was still president. Williams would have ripped him a new one being solely responsible for decimating the job market and forcing these yutes to live at home.
It must be great to be a Democrat Party president presiding over a deepening economic Depression and having your own media propaganda arm run interference for you.
If McCain was president, Williams would have screamed “McCain depression forces jobless youths back home!”
I don’t understand your point about “keeping housing prices high”.
Las Vegas is down 65% from peak. A home priced at $200,000 today was worth $600,000 during the peak of the housing boom.
Miami is down 51%.
San Francisco is down 41%.
Los Angeles is down 41%.
Portland Oregon is down 29%.
San Diego is down 40%.
Seattle is down 32%.
Tampa Bay is down 47%.
Who is keeping housing prices high? Where? I think your information is a little bit out of date. Housing prices are down to 2001/02 levels as if the housing boom never happened.
About 90% of marriages nowadays start with a boy and a girl living in sin before they say "I do".
Times change.
Really? A degree in comparative literature, and she can't find a job? /sarc
BTW, where DOES one work (above minimum wage, I mean) with a degree like this?
Damn! Where do you live?
I guess I've been out of the rental market for too long.
“I don’t understand your point about ‘keeping housing prices high’.”
http://dailycapitalist.com/2011/06/01/home-prices-vs-gold-vs-inflation/
That’s the median housing prices adjusted for inflation.
Currently the workforce levels (trough) are at 1983, housing is still about 10 percent overpriced (across the board), and moreso in most jurisdictions.
And that’s not taking into account the fact that corrections tend to overcorrect.
Deflation is just killing the housing market and this thread is evidence as to why. The young people who are supposed to be the market for new houses aren’d buying because they simply aren’t getting jobs that pay enough or give them enough security to want to purchase a home.
Until that changes - housing prices are going to be in frefall until the median is 3x the median income in the US.
Current median housing value is about 165k, and median income in the US is about 51k. So we’d expect that the median housing prices would drop to about 150k or thereabouts.
That would be the correction that has been overdue for some time. However, there are other factors at hand which suggest a permanent decrease in US demand for housing. That is what this article is touching. If housing demand drops, then yes, you’ll see the prices drop even further.
I wouldn’t even touch a house more than 100k right now.
I live in Texas at present. I love it here, housing + rental costs are reasonable compared with other jurisdictions.
The reason mine is so high is because that includes utilities on the house - we split the entire bill. Without utilities, it would be a much more reasonable 350 or so.
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