On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't

On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
residentcontrarian.substack.com

E.g.

> That’s the drop-off you experience at the lower price levels - there’s nothing between “This is a tiny but acceptable apartment” and “Slum apartments in stab-ville”.

I don't think this is true, and why would it be? Unless you're in an area where the housing market is cliffed for some legislative or regulatory reason. But most places, no, I've not seen this. You might have to put effort in to find nicer places on a budget, research areas, etc. but isn't that true of any purchase?

It's true that when you're poor you never get close to those naive 'this is how much of your income to spend on rent' suggestions, but there are places that cover the whole spectrum.

> Whichever you choose, a person of less-than-intermediate income has to be prepared to stick with the rental long-term, should things not go well. This is because apartments at both of these levels quite accurately assume that you can’t afford a lawyer - while it’s normal to put down a month or two worth of rent as a security deposit, it’s much less normal to get it back; the apartment complex has no reason to give back thousands of dollars they can simply keep. This means every time you move, you pay something like a third to a month’s wages for the privilege. Since breaking a lease often means you lose your privilege to live anywhere non-hellish, this means if you don’t have cash reserves (more on these later*) at the exact right time of year, you might end up in the same place for another full year whether you like it or not.

You stick with a rental longer term because of overheads, yeah, but I wouldn't go into a rental contract expecting with certainty to lose 100% of my deposit.

Rather what happens is you get good at doing minor legal research and writing terse emails about it. Maybe many are scummy by default, but most roll when they see you've got even a little knowledge about what you're entitled to. That's a valuable skill for life in general, so it's something you should be learning to do regardless.

> a person’s pay is determined by how rare their skills are and how much demand there is for those skills. The value of their work doesn’t factor in as much

What's the value of a person's work that isn't just determined by the first part? What does the author think drives demand, if not the prospective value you provide to the various companies in the labor market?

This looks insane to an Australian. I have moved house 4 times in the past 5 years and I have never not got all of my bond back. Some states here have a rule that the bond money is held by the state so that the landowner doesn't just take that money for themselves. How can the poor ever break the cycle if no one is willing to help protect them from shitty rent-seekers?

As someone from a former socialist country, I can confirm.

Situation has got a lot better in the last ~30 years, people have alot more, but since a few people got even more than that, some complain a lot. Average worker family has gone from bicicyles and maybe one yugo (or a "fico" - even smaller/cheaper) to two, maybe three european-mid-range cars + all the modern extras, but are not happy, because their neighbor has as 100k€ mercedes.