U.S. Housing Prices Explosion Making Repatriation a Less Realistic Option for Many?

[EVENKEEL]

11 minutes ago, Gecko123 said:

You weren't insulted a single time in my post. Only because you've lorded your property ownership over those who happen not to own property in the US, I challenged you to qualify what property you own. Sorry if you are offended, but that's not an insult.

Offended? on the contrary, it was hilarious, thanks for the laugh.

[Yellowtail]

8 minutes ago, Gecko123 said:

You weren't insulted a single time in my post. Only because you've lorded your property ownership over those who happen not to own property in the US, I challenged you to qualify what property you own. Sorry if you are offended, but that's not an insult.

I don't think anyone has an issue with people  retiring early. Some people have an issue with people retiring early, burning through whatever savings they had, and then when they are dependent on a small Social Security payment, expecting the people that did not retire early to be taxed to "help" them. 

[Jingthing]

Returning expats have every right as citizens to apply for any paltry government programs they may be eligible for as anyone else.

But I've been clear all along that I think most lower wealth expats should remain as expats for life if they possibly can. Rents already through the roof aren't going to magically become affordable.

Why choose misery?

[Yellowtail]

9 hours ago, Jingthing said:

Returning expats have every right as citizens to apply for any paltry government programs they may be eligible for as anyone else.

You are absolutely correct. Anyone repatriating should investigate carefully and take advantage of every program they qualify for. 

 

 

 

 

[Longwood50]

18 hours ago, Jingthing said:

As stated before I think both sides of the political spectrum have failed Americans seeking affordable housing. 

And as I have said before, the fact that those who can not afford the housing are in many cases the same people who do absolutely nothing to improve their lot in life by getting skills that provide for a better job. 

If by doing nothing a person recognizes that somehow society will provide them with food, shelter, clothing, medical assistance then why try to provide those things for oneself. 

Since 1964 when LBJ declared the war on poverty the USA has spent an estimated 22 Trillion dollars on poverty programs excluding Medicare and Social Security.  There are 122.8 million families in the USA.  That means over the course of 58 years the USA has spent $179,158 per family.  In 2020 there were an estimated 7.3 million American Families living below the poverty line.  That same 22 trillion equates to $3.136 million per poor family.  Now that is over 54 years so on average each and every year for 54 years the USA has spent $55,809 per poverty family  to "help" those in need.  How has that worked out?  In 2020 there were 11.4% of the USA defined as being in poverty.  In 1964.  That means that the rate is approximately the same if not slightly higher than in the early 1970's despite spending trillions of dollars.  

By contrast a mere 20 years ago almost 50% of the Chinese population lived in poverty.  Today that percentage is approaching zero.  They have no "welfare" programs.  How did they accomplish that in a shorter period of time with a much larger population.  Easy.  They got jobs for their people. 

Liberals don't understand there is a difference between "helping" and "enabling"  If I train a person and allow them to be employable at a living wage I am helping them.  If I hand out money including subsidized "affordable housing" I am enabling them.  The problem does not go away.  Quite the opposite, I have removed the incentive to work to improve my station in life.  It is a very simple economic principle.  It is called a subsidy.  If you subsidize anything you get "more of it"  You provide extra money to unwed mothers, you get more unwed mothers. If you provide more generous food stamp benefits, you get more people who apply  Worst of all, you disincentify those to enter the job market to become self sufficient because they see very little if any benefit from earning a wage and paying taxes versus living off public assistance. 

The answer does not lie with making housing cheaper.  It lies with assisting those to "earn more" to allow them to afford the more expensive housing. 


https://www.heritage.org/poverty-and-inequality/report/the-war-poverty-after-50-years

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1086836/china-poverty-ratio/



 

[Jingthing]

Thanks for the right wing COPY AND PASTE propaganda dump.

Do you feel better now?

Heritage Foundation huh.

Figures.

 

[LarrySR]

45 minutes ago, Longwood50 said:

And as I have said before, the fact that those who can not afford the housing are in many cases the same people who do absolutely nothing to improve their lot in life by getting skills that provide for a better job. 

If by doing nothing a person recognizes that somehow society will provide them with food, shelter, clothing, medical assistance then why try to provide those things for oneself. 

Since 1964 when LBJ declared the war on poverty the USA has spent an estimated 22 Trillion dollars on poverty programs excluding Medicare and Social Security.  There are 122.8 million families in the USA.  That means over the course of 58 years the USA has spent $179,158 per family.  In 2020 there were an estimated 7.3 million American Families living below the poverty line.  That same 22 trillion equates to $3.136 million per poor family.  Now that is over 54 years so on average each and every year for 54 years the USA has spent $55,809 per poverty family  to "help" those in need.  How has that worked out?  In 2020 there were 11.4% of the USA defined as being in poverty.  In 1964.  That means that the rate is approximately the same if not slightly higher than in the early 1970's despite spending trillions of dollars.  

By contrast a mere 20 years ago almost 50% of the Chinese population lived in poverty.  Today that percentage is approaching zero.  They have no "welfare" programs.  How did they accomplish that in a shorter period of time with a much larger population.  Easy.  They got jobs for their people. 

Liberals don't understand there is a difference between "helping" and "enabling"  If I train a person and allow them to be employable at a living wage I am helping them.  If I hand out money including subsidized "affordable housing" I am enabling them.  The problem does not go away.  Quite the opposite, I have removed the incentive to work to improve my station in life.  It is a very simple economic principle.  It is called a subsidy.  If you subsidize anything you get "more of it"  You provide extra money to unwed mothers, you get more unwed mothers. If you provide more generous food stamp benefits, you get more people who apply  Worst of all, you disincentify those to enter the job market to become self sufficient because they see very little if any benefit from earning a wage and paying taxes versus living off public assistance. 

The answer does not lie with making housing cheaper.  It lies with assisting those to "earn more" to allow them to afford the more expensive housing. 


https://www.heritage.org/poverty-and-inequality/report/the-war-poverty-after-50-years

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1086836/china-poverty-ratio/



 

Maybe someone should go into impoverished neighborhoods and put together a program of job training and college prep courses. 
 Oh wait a second… didn’t Obama do that and get endlessly mocked as a “community organizer” by right wing nitwits?

[Jingthing]

19 minutes ago, LarrySR said:

Maybe someone should go into impoverished neighborhoods and put together a program of job training and college prep courses. 
 Oh wait a second… didn’t Obama do that and get endlessly mocked as a “community organizer” by right wing nitwits?

Don't say critical race theory to those types or they break out in hives.

[EVENKEEL]

Just now, Jingthing said:

Don't say critical race theory to those types or they break out in hives.

Teaching CRT will certainly help folks get trained for a better paying job.

[Jingthing]

7 minutes ago, EVENKEEL said:

Teaching CRT will certainly help folks get trained for a better paying job.

Its only taught in graduate schools.

[Yellowtail]

Can we at least try to address the issues rather than just attack each other? 

 

Why not point out what is untrue in an argument, rather than just pretending the source makes somethin true untrue? 

 

[Yellowtail]

1 hour ago, LarrySR said:

Maybe someone should go into impoverished neighborhoods and put together a program of job training and college prep courses. 
 Oh wait a second… didn’t Obama do that and get endlessly mocked as a “community organizer” by right wing nitwits?

You're not going to get people in impoverished to vote for you by pushing job training or college prep courses, even President Obama figured that out. 

 

I'm all for trade schools, but unfortunately our culture has progressed such that anyone working in trades is looked down on by half the country. 

 

We have far too many un/underemployed non-STEM collage graduates in the US now. 

 

[Jingthing]

The only issue that is on topic here is the critical shortage of affordable housing in the US in the context of that fact making it extremely problematic for non owner lower wealth expats to repatriate.

 

Cheers

[LarrySR]

33 minutes ago, Yellowtail said:

 

 

I'm all for trade schools, but unfortunately our culture has progressed such that anyone working in trades is looked down on by half the country. 

 

 

It’s sad there is a segment of society that looks down on the working class, like CEOs that earn 500x the workers salary, or those that  oppose a higher minimum wage, health care, education, higher taxes on the rich, equal rights, unions and environmental protection.
Ya know, Republicans. 

[EVENKEEL]

1 hour ago, Jingthing said:

The only issue that is on topic here is the critical shortage of affordable housing in the US in the context of that fact making it extremely problematic for non owner lower wealth expats to repatriate.

 

Cheers

You've already established if you're a poor expat, you're better off not coming back to the USA. That about wraps it up then, ehh.

[Jingthing]

16 minutes ago, EVENKEEL said:

You've already established if you're a poor expat, you're better off not coming back to the USA. That about wraps it up then, ehh.

But some may NEED  to come back.

[Yellowtail]

25 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

But some may NEED  to come back.

Unless I'm missing something, if someone needs to go back, they need to go back, so what difference does the price of housing make? They're going to have to bite the bullet and go regardless. 

[Jingthing]

"The affordability period is over."

Now that's a classic quote.

 

 

[Yellowtail]

It is worth noting, that rents pretty much have to go up as property values rise and the cost of goods, services and labor increase. 

 

Also, if you're in a ten-unit building and one tenant is not paying their rent and cannot be evicted, your rent is going up 11%.

 

But not to worry, the kind and caring Democrats will have a great program to subsidize rent for the poor just in time for the next election. That the middle class will have to pay for it, and that ultimately it will  only benefit rich landlords matters not. 

 

Help is on the way!

 

 

[LarrySR]

30 minutes ago, Yellowtail said:

It is worth noting, that rents pretty much have to go up as property values rise and the cost of goods, services and labor increase. 

 

Also, if you're in a ten-unit building and one tenant is not paying their rent and cannot be evicted, your rent is going up 11%.

 

But not to worry, the kind and caring Democrats will have a great program to subsidize rent for the poor just in time for the next election. That the middle class will have to pay for it, and that ultimately it will  only benefit rich landlords matters not. 

 

Help is on the way!

 

 

Silly. 

[Jingthing]

23 minutes ago, LarrySR said:

Silly. 

That free markets are pure and perfect and result in the best of all possible worlds is kind of like a religion. More about blind faith than reality.

 

[Longwood50]

22 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

That free markets are pure and perfect and result in the best of all possible worlds is kind of like a religion. More about blind faith than reality.

First off there is no such thing as a "perfect free market"  Capitalism is not perfect but given all the other alternatives are significantly worse. 

Liberals like to point out the inequities as somehow validating the evils of capitalism.  However they ignore that even greater inequities occur in those countries that practice "socialism" and that the standard of living in those countries is significantly worse. 

There is this preoccupation with "fair" that sticks with liberals.  Life is not fair, some are born in Burundi while another child is born in Luxemburg.  While capitalism does not guarantee equal outcomes, it is still the best possible way for the average person to become self sufficient and even wealthy. 

The OP was about housing prices making repatriation less possible.  A large portion of this inflation was created by exactly the government whose policies poured trillions of borrowed dollars into the economy and enacted policies that produced product shortages, contributed to oil price skyrocketing, and bottlenecked delivery of products causing shortages. 

And the liberals answer always is " more government"  The same people who created the mess.  If you want a real mess try having the government make homes "affordable"  Seems like they tried that approach and it resulted in the worst financial crisis since the great depresssion as housing prices plummeted and the financial system went into free fall 

You want to make housing more affordable.  First stop bringing in millions of illegal aliens who snap up the lowest price homes and apartments resulting in shortages which drives up the price.  The real answer is elevating the skills of the lowest income workers allowing them to earn more and pay for the more expensive housing.  This notion that the lowest rung on the economic ladder expecting the government to provide for food, clothing, medical, education, transportation, and housing only leads to more people willing to sit on the lowest rung of the ladder. 

[Yellowtail]

1 hour ago, Jingthing said:

 That free markets are pure and perfect and result in the best of all possible worlds is kind of like a religion. More about blind faith than reality. 

 

That free markets  government programs are pure and perfect and result in the best of all possible worlds is kind of like a religion. More about blind faith than reality.

[Jingthing]

Nobody expects perfect fairness or flat classes. But the other extreme of massive economic inequalities is obscene. A somewhat rich country like the US shouldn't have even one homeless person unless they're camping. 

[Scott]

A post violating Fair Use Policy has been reported and removed. 

 

I suggest members stop using this thread as an excuse to discuss politics.   Continue and face a suspension. 

 

[impulse]

On 8/22/2021 at 9:29 PM, Berkshire said:

The increase in price is partially to do with people stampeding to get in before the interest rates start to climb.  And if home prices rise, so will the rental price.  I do wonder if this is another real estate bubble destined to burst in the not-so-distant future. 

As I recall, the last time home and gas prices exploded and people couldn't pay both their McMansion's mortgage and to fill up the car to commute the hour to get between their office and their home was 2008.  And we all know how that went.

 

The saving grace may be the vast number of people working from home due to Covid...

 

[GinBoy2]

4 hours ago, Jingthing said:

Nobody expects perfect fairness or flat classes. But the other extreme of massive economic inequalities is obscene. A somewhat rich country like the US shouldn't have even one homeless person unless they're camping. 

Is there any country in the world that doesn't have homeless people?

Take a look in Bangkok, plenty of folks hunkered down under freeway overpasses.

 

Homelessness in the West especially is tricky, with a lot of it related to drugs, mental issues and runaways.

 

Funnily enough I was watching a BBC documentary the other day about homelessness in London in the 1970's. You could literally have scrubbed London and 1975 and put in any Western city and 2022 and same would be true

[impulse]

On 3/6/2022 at 7:28 AM, Yellowtail said:

The house I grew up in was $10K in 1954, with  30-year, 4% loan. So about $47 a month payment. The house sold for $535K in 2007. Zillow puts the value at ~$702K and the rent at ~3,050.

 

So on the face of it, that's about from 1954 to 2022 that's about an 8.5% return, which is pretty good.

2 comments... 

 

1) If that house happened to be in Flint or Detroit MI, it would be worth about what they paid for it.  (That's an exaggeration, of course.  But you get the point)  Luck of the draw in terms of what sector your parents found employment in.  If it was at Pontiac or Chrysler, too bad...

 

2) Your ROI comparison assumes constant costs.  You left out insurance, taxes and maintenance which have been skyrocketing along with the values.  Here where I live, taxes alone would be about $15,000 a year and flood insurance would be about the same (we get socked here at the beach).  Add those numbers into the comparison, and putting that money into some other investment vehicle looks pretty good. 

 

[Jingthing]

It's not rocket science. 

It's basic math. 

If a tenant is initially qualified with the rent at 33 percent of their income or in some markets like the Bay Area, 50 percent, when the rents start going up 10, 15, 25, 30, or even 50 percent per year, assuming the vast majority of people aren't getting pay raises at nearly that level, then the tenant must:

 

Get roommates (if allowed by lease, difficult in tiny apartments)

Burn through all their savings

Find a cheaper place in the area (but wait that might not exist and move in costs are very high)

Apply for Section 8 (doesn't mean there will be a unit for them)

Move to a cheaper area (but then what, leave their job? Also similar increases are happening across the nation)

Couch surf / move in with friends and family / (how long will that welcome last?)

Move into car (then deal with police harassing them)

Fix up a van, etc. (then deal with police harassing them)

FULL BLOWN HOMELESSNESS (and likely premature death)

 

OR

 

If they can qualify for a visa and if they have a moveable income like social security or online remote work or perhaps a large amount of savings:

 

MOVE ABROAD to a country where they can afford a nice shelter and pretty much everything else, rather than live in utter misery in the U.S. 

 

We've been talking about expats trying to not go home.

It works the other way too.

 

American economic refugees choosing a better quality of life abroad.

 

Of course expats are at the mercy of these foreign countries. They very well might not want American financial refugees. The overall international trend seems to reflect an awareness of an increase in western economic refugees and trying to repel them by raising the financial requirements. Americans abroad are certainly not legally entitled to live there without conditions (and if they act like they are entitled just because they are Americans they will quickly get a dose of hard core reality as many Americans are now rotting in horrific Mexican prisons for overstaying). 

 

However, at this point, there are still some options.

 

[cmarshall]

8 hours ago, Yellowtail said:

That free markets  government programs are pure and perfect and result in the best of all possible worlds is kind of like a religion. More about blind faith than reality.

It's always impressive to me to hear the conservatives decry government programs at the same time that they extol home ownership.  Well, here's some news for you: the US has a socialized system of home ownership from which your family has benefitted.  The banks make the mortgages, but then upstream the loans to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac while the FHA standardized loan terms.  The 30-year mortgage was created during WWII and is pretty much an American phenomenon along with the absence of prepayment penalties, which is unknown outside the US.  Your childhood home benefitted from the GI bill with its federal mortgage guarantee even if your father was not himself a veteran since it assisted in creating the buildout of the postwar suburbs.  

 

So, let's keep the government's hands off our Medicare, eh?