Immigrant Homebuyers See Bias Against Relatives Sharing The Same Roof

Wall Street Journal | Jan 10, 2002 | Jonathan Kaufman

[ohioman]

The people in this article are the kind of scum that ruin property values and neighborhoods all over America.

[Dakmar]

A friend of mine was renting a house near downtown Indy when a Puerto Rican 'family' of about 20 moved in next door along with their goat and several chickens. Was my friend within reason to complain or simply a Puerto Rican hating racist?

[MizSterious]

I moved out of the city, and would never again live in one. I've seen first-hand the damage that can happen to neighborhoods when 3rd world immigrants are permitted to impose their 3rd world style of living on the rest of us. I agonized with my friends when their house lost most of its value to this practice. Lately, on the news, I see how formerly good neighborhoods are lost to meth labs (sometimes literally, if they blow up). I can only wish the same fate on those who support such practices.

People have never, ever, been permitted "to do what they wish" in their own homes. Even now, if I wanted to commit crimes or be a nuiscance to my very distant neighbors, legal problems would ensue--as well they should.

[ikanakattara]

No, you *don't* have an absolute right to do whatever you wish with your property. If someone builds a meth lab next door and blows himself up in a neighborhood where the lots are fifty feet wide, likely he's going to take some neighbors' houses with him. If someone else decides to set up a uranium ore refinery in his garage, and decides to pour the sludge into the sewers, that is going to have a little bit of an impact on everyone.

Zoning laws exist for a reason. When too many people are crowded into an area without paying taxes, the costs to everyone else increase - sewers, schools, roads, etc. If strict zoning codes aren't enforced in these suburban communities, they're going to eventually wind up like the inner cities, only worse - because the 30-Mexicans-to-a-house poor in the suburbs won't have access to the charities and social services that proliferate in cities.

So those who want to adopt strict "libertarianism" in this regard obviously have no regard for those who live in suburbs, and who are going to watch billions of dollars in real estate across the nation lost through devaluation if this trend continues - not to mention the precipitous decline of the school systems in these suburbs.

[blackdog]

How are these people getting through the mortgage qualification process? Mortgages are supposed to be in accordance with some very strict rules. The money is there because investors are willing to take low returns on mortgage securities in return for low risk.

As to the laws regarding number of occupants in a dwelling, renting out a room,etc... Welcome to the Balkanization of America. Those laws only apply to certain ethnic groups. To make efforts at enforcing those laws, is only an "ethnic assault".

The real risk is in the homeowners insurance coverage. Use of realestate other than what is in very narrow scope in your policies, really lowers the integrity of the issuing insurer. A home with 14 people in it, has a much greater risk factor than one with a single conventional family.

[MrB]

In agreement.
It is not "immigrant bashing" or "Mexican hating" to say that all ethnicities of people in a neighborhood must obey the same laws.
And this right to "do what they want with their property" goes only so far as it does not infringe on someone elses rights to their own property. The laws are in place to protect the property (values) of all the home owners.

[jimfree]

The ultimate rights are property rights, to the security of ourselves and our stuff. The right to be permanently separated from the riff-raff by appealing to the government is not one of those. Neighborhoods change. My boyhood home was in a basically peaceful majority caucasian neighborhood with some hispanics. My folks remain 30 years later in a basically peaceful majority hispanic neighborhood with some caucasian families. I strongly support this new group of homeowners. I further strongly support the right of those complaining to buy a house anywhere else that they please.

[THEUPMAN]

Coming to your neighborhood soon, slums and ghettoes.

the subdivision .... people living so close that their rights overlap to the point of socialisim.

get some land .... move to the country

[Rebelbase]

In my cities S.E. Asian community I've seen 16 people living in a three bedroom rancher with a full basement. There were 2 families in the basement and 1 family in each bedroom.

Nearly all families have extended members living with them, i.e. grandparents.

I have the utmost respect for people who take care of their elderly in their own home instead of sending them off to die in a pathetic rest home.

[Cleburne]

You want to make it illegal to sleep outside of your bedroom? To have more than six people in your home? Oh man, I don't know why the founders didn't put that in the Constitution, they should have known the horrors of these things! How did we ever survive 200 years...

[Dakmar]

But don't we have a right to expect that zonig ordinances will be enforced when we buy a home? Can I buy a house next to yours and set up an auto salvage operation in my yard?

[MizSterious]

You're living in a fools' paradise. The logical progression is that no one who wants high standards of living will be permitted to live in a house for more than a few years. That's idiotic. We should let them impose the values of their country (consider: how did it get so messed up that they wanted to move here in the first place?) on the rest of us? I think not.

[Valin]

Puerto Rican 'family' of about 20 moved in next door along with their goat and several chickens. Was my friend within reason to complain or simply a Puerto Rican hating racist?

No but then most cities have laws about keeping "farm animals" inside the city limits.

[blackdog]

Very good point. When we purchased our farm, the mortgage companies demanded that the land portion be excluded from the loan. A 100 acre farm can only mortgage the house and 10 acres. The remaining 90 acres must be paid for in cash or under a separate commercial loan because it is used for business purposes. In most cases, that land is far more valuable than the house. But mortgage rules don't see it that way.

[MizSterious]

Ordinances are not made willy-nilly. If you don't like those kind of ordinances, talk to your city representatives. But I would say a law permitting no more than 6 people for a 2 bedroom home is reasonable and prudent.

Even if you set aside the property values concern, you have to consider public health and impact on city services. The garbage pickup alone must be incredible. And neighborhood parking? The front yard must look like a used car lot.

But, if you prefer living that way, have at it--in your neighborhood. Leave the rest of our neighborhoods alone, please.

I notice that a lot of the people who argue for this kind of living, don't live that way themselves. I would pay more attention to these people if they lived in the heart of such neighborhoods and still claimed to love that way of living.

[Dakmar]

We have laws like that here but apparently don't enforce them. Or only selectively enforce them.

[Valin]

You might want to take a look at the way people lived in say NY, Boston, Chicago....at the turn of the 19th century. This is nothing new.

[blackdog]

The same time period where maybe 2% of the population owned real property?