Envy Apartment

Rents in the Vallejo area, while the lowest in the Bay Area, are rising faster than in most other places, even as the number of renters increase, driving some people out of the area, a new study found. A firm called Apartment List conducted the study to try and get a handle on the challenges renters face , spokeswoman Sydney Bennet said. “In the Vallejo metro, the number of renter households has increased by 30 percent since 2005,” she said. “However, there was insufficient data and research into the challenges renters face . To address this, Apartment List set up its data science program in 2014.” That research leverages proprietary rental unit and survey data, she said. “We also invest significant resources into gathering and analyzing Census and other publicly available data,” she said. The resulting study found that the Vallejo area’s 5 percent year-over- year rent increases , leads the national and state averages. The median monthly rent for a two-bedroom unit in Vallejo t...

Last year, the Miami- Dade County Commission shot down a plan that would have forced local developers to include some affordable apartments in every new project. Commissioner Javier Souto claimed the idea was "social engineering," one of the most profoundly stupid things said in South Florida politics this decade. According to the study, almost two-thirds of Miami's poor are stuck spending more than half of their income on rent or living in roach-infested hellholes. "These households are defined as very low-income renters who do not receive government housing assistance and who paid more than one-half of their income for rent, lived in severely inadequate conditions , or both," HUD's researchers write. "High rents in proportion to renter incomes remain dominant among households with worst-case needs, leaving these renters with substantial, unmet need for affordable housing." Larger cities, including New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago, techn...

September 27, 2005 | By Joe Newman, Sentinel Staff Writer When Lesley Brown got her first job out of college, she figured it was time to move out of the cramped house she shared with three other people. But finding something Brown, 22, could afford near the Lockheed Martin facility on Sand Lake Road was another matter. At $950 a month, even a small one-bedroom apartment was out of reach for the University of Central Florida graduate . At that price, she would have been spending much more than a third of her salary on rent. "I was definitely surprised by the prices," Brown said. "The market soared out of my reach." Finding an affordable rental in Central Florida is becoming a Herculean challenge. Two of every five renters in Orange, Seminole, Polk and Volusia counties spent 35 percent or more of their monthly income on housing in 2004, according to a recent U.S. census report. The bureau did not track Osceola County . More than half of all renters in Orange, Semi...

At the ribbon cutting this month for the Wesley Village affordable housing complex in Garden Grove, Laura Archuleta couldn ’t resist referencing Joni Mitchell ’s 1970 environmental protest “Big Yellow Taxi.” Built on underused land that’s part of the Garden Grove United Methodist Church campus on Main Street, Wesley Village offered Archuleta , president of the nonprofit community organization Jamboree Housing Corp ., a chance to riff on one of Mitchell’s most famous lyrics. Where Mitchell sang “They paved paradise/And put up a parking lot,” Archuleta told about 300 people packed into the steamy church sanctuary on a hot afternoon that “Today we are going to learn how a group of dedicated organizations and individuals re-purposed a parking lot and put up a paradise.” Then she and others who spoke, including a single mom with six children who now reside at Wesley Village , told how the project became reality through a unique collaboration that involved the church, Jamboree and other...

Developer Jerry Epstein will replace his 202-unit Del Rey Shores apartment community built in the 1960s with a 544-unit complex in fewer, taller buildings. Marina Del Rey . The development will feature 12 four- and five-story buildings. The project is expected to be completed in two years." alt="An artist's rendering shows the Shores project to be built in Marina Del Rey . The development will feature 12 four- and five-story buildings. The project is expected to be completed in two years." /> An artist's rendering shows the Shores project to be built in Marina… (Shores ) The last surviving original developer of Marina del Rey will start work Monday on a $165- million apartment complex there that will replace one he built in the 1960s. The project is part of a push by Los Angeles County officials to spruce up the aging publicly owned marina , the largest pleasure boat harbor community in the United States. Leaseholders of land there have been urged to u...

Flagship Inn, Petersburg Two Sundays ago the Richmond Times-Dispatch ran a disturbing special report on poverty and housing insecurity along the Jefferson Davis Highway in Chesterfield County. Hundreds of people live in shabby motels, paying $200 or more per week to live in conditions almost as deplorable as Richmond’s public housing projects . These hotels, the housing equivalent of pawn shops and payday lenders, serve the poor and the desperate who have nowhere else to turn. It is depressing to think that people live this way. People pay huge sums — $200 per week translates into more than $800 per month, enough to rent a nice, two- room apartment in a decent neighborhood — to dwell amidst deplorable conditions . Many hotel rooms have roaches, bedbugs and other insect infestations. The article cites leaking sewage , mold, mice droppings, and inoperable door locks . Conditions sound similar to those of the public housing projects — without the same level of crime. The plight of ...

You, too, can live with these beautiful people in the clouds ( additional fees apply ) Rents are going nowhere but up and wages aren't really going anywhere at all, so obviously this is as good a time as ever to play the housing lottery. Yes, even though I've argued many times that they should really call it the jack squattery since that's all I've ever won from it, I'd recommend you try to snag one of affordable apartments now available at 555Ten at Hudson Yards. The city's latest batch of affordable apartments come in two flavors of income bands. For people making 40% of the city's Area Median Income , there are 60 apartments ranging from $613/month to $875/month. To qualify, household incomes will have to come in somewhere between $22,903 and $44,280, depending on the size of your household. There are also a handful of affordable apartments available for people making 120 percent of AMI, or households making $68,709 and $132,840. Those 30 apartments ran...

Cincinnati—2013 was a good year for the Cincinnati apartment market , as the city experienced an increase in demand thanks to improving employment , income growth and a swelling millennial population . According to Marcus & Millichap, 600 apartments were delivered last year, vacancies dropped to 4.5 percent—the lowest year-end level in years—and average rents were fast approaching $800 per month. And the commercial real estate brokerage firm expects Cincinnati ’s apartment market to perform the same this year. Forbes recently reported that Cincinnati is the third most affordable city in the United States. Although the median price for a new home in the area was set at around $133,000, the rental market was still the top performer last year. And apartment rents are expected to continue to increase in 2014, for the fifth consecutive year. All of this is thanks to the growing population of young professionals. Cincinnati’s 20- to 34-year-old population, with its live-work-play lifes...

Duval Mobile Home Park in southeast Houston has 182 lots." />EXPAND The Duval Mobile Home Park in southeast Houston has 182 lots. Stephen Paulsen Elizabeth Perez loves her trailer park . But if she's ever forced to move, at least she has a back-up plan. A chatty 45-year-old with a wide smile, Perez has lived at and managed the Trinity Duval Mobile Home Park in southeast Houston since 2008. Used mobile homes here typically sell for $12,000 to $38,000, depending on their size and condition, she says. She remembers one woman buying a home for just $2,000, using her IRS refund. The Duval Mobile Home Park first opened in the 1950s. It was purchased last year by Trinity Community Group , a trailer park management company — and Perez worried about the future of the park. “I kept thinking, ‘Shoot, they're going to want to tear it down,’” Perez said. “I was kind of scared.” The company promised it would keep the park operational , according to Perez. Still, Perez accepts...

DETROIT (CNNMoney) - This is Detroit, not Hobbiton. Just like the tiny homes of the hobbits in the "Lord of The Rings" series, the Cass Community Center Tiny Homes Project looks cute. But its small buildings house big hopes . Four years ago, Detroit became the biggest American city in history to file for bankruptcy, brought down by a snowballing financial crisis that followed huge layoffs at the city's major employers General Motors and Chrysler. Today, Detroit is in a period of economic recovery, yet many of its hardest hit residents still don't have adequate housing . The homeless population is around 2,000 and dwindling, according to city authorities. But uncertainty hangs over low-income earners, who struggle to keep up with the rising cost of living. "Purchase prices and rents are increasing faster than people's incomes," says Earl Poleski, executive director of the Michigan State Housing Development Authority . "That's a manifestatio...

Developers plan to build a community of new homes in the midst of an established neighborhood at the edge of downtown. The new houses will replace a cluster of small rental homes known as Tiny Town near the Oakwood and Mordecai neighborhoods . The rental community , called the Brookview Apartments, is under contract by residential developer Community Properties in a joint venture with builder Robuck Homes . The property was originally listed for $5.3 million. A final purchase price has not been disclosed. Jack Morisey, president of Community Properties , said the area is ripe for development, especially with the revitalization of North Person Street , which includes new restaurants, shops and bars. “We want to do something that’s really attractive, that really fits in. We certainly understand that the Mordecai and Oakwood neighborhoods are treasures,” he said. The move toward infill development is one example of the new ways developers are looking to build in Raleigh’s dense down...

The Oasis Terraces housing complex in Singapore and the original cast of “Rent” How to tell if one has made it in America? See if they own a home. For decades, homeownership has been one of the cornerstones of the American dream, and the U.S. housing market was the envy of the world. But that’s changed. The federal mortgage subsidy complex , which turned (white) America into a nation of homeowners in the postwar decades and helped build the world’s largest middle class , is no longer doing what it’s supposed to. Faced with stagnating wages and ballooning property prices , fewer Americans can afford to buy their own homes. The mortgage interest deduction and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are turning into regressive subsidies, channeling taxpayer money to rich homeowners and driving up housing costs while a growing group of middle-income renters must fend for themselves. Rent-stabilization laws have become weaker over time. And New York is dealing with a crumbling public housing infrast...