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Old 08-18-2017, 07:12 PM   #61
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To be fair my generation ( WW2 baby Boomers 1946 to 1960) are not as good with money as we pretend to be . The average person in our age group has approx $70K saved for retirement and we don't have Starbucks for an excuse.
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Old 08-19-2017, 02:05 AM   #62
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The smallest of starter homes, and my daughter just got into one a year ago, is all over $300k here.
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Old 02-15-2019, 01:08 AM   #63
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Looks like RV scams have moved into the Tiny Homes sector.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/tiny-h...rces-1.4293137
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Old 02-15-2019, 03:30 AM   #64
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Just harvest an RVIA plaque from a junker. That is what I did. It is not as if anyone is going to look it up on the internet if they were to go out and do a walk around of your RV.
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Old 02-15-2019, 04:29 AM   #65
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The Tiny Home debate in Washington State is at the moment working on legislation to open the way for more legal tiny homes on private land as in backyards but also in RV parks and in communities made up of tiny houses.
This is a link to a hearing that took place this month on February 6th 2019 in the review committee for proposed legislation. There was an overwhelming positive presentation. Hopefully there will be action to allow more of these dwelling units in the near future.


I have met a number of the people giving testimony. A few years ago some Tiny Homes and platforms for tents were being setup on a city owned lot in my neighborhood. I was able to tap into the Tiny Home Meetup support group I belong to for volunteer labor to create the structures needed to keep the tent dwellers elevated above the ground. We spent 3 days at the site. I had also provided to this site a large, commercial grade 12x12 popup structure which they used at the site for more than 3 years as their internal community gathering space. The Tiny Houses were created by various organizations in the area including a program of high school students learning the building trades.



To watch the hearing slide the bar to 1:10 that is 1 hour and 10 minutes time on the recording. https://www.tvw.org/watch/?clientID=...artStream=true
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Old 02-15-2019, 11:23 AM   #66
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Arkansas is a whole different deal...

I don't really have a horse in the race, but heard a recent study on Millennials. The reason they can't afford homes isn't because they throw away all their money on avocado toast. It's that they're coming out of college absolutely drowning in student loan debt, into a market where they're making less money than even generation X did, all in a skyrocketing housing market (depending on where you live).

Many people who can pay high rent can afford a mortgage, sure, but not the down payment to get to that mortgage.

Everyone has to deal with the particular circumstances of their time. The current generation isn't just a bunch of complaining idiots, though obviously there are plenty of those in every generation. They're just working with the hand they were dealt.

The ingenuity, resourcefulness and anti-consumerism at the heart of the tiny house movement (though obviously exploited for $ gains for some and just undertaken to be "cool" by others) is pretty inspiration for me.

The American middle class has truly been gutted in a lot of the county.
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Old 02-15-2019, 12:08 PM   #67
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Think of it like this: You can go to Home Depot anywhere in the US and buy a house, then take it to your lot and assemble it. The Home Depot prices will be the same except for some variations in sales tax rates. The labor to assemble it will vary a little more depending on region. But it should be about the same $ as the materials.



So if you go to Home Depot and buy a house for say $100,000 and you spend $100,000 putting it together you are up to $200,000 plus the cost of the lot or land you put it on. There you find the rub. In the mid-west you will be enjoying a fine house for say $225,000 with probably a $3,000 annual property tax rate. In San Francisco or Los Angeles (or the upper east coast) your $225,000 house will cost you $1.75 million with a 3% annual property tax. Thats $52,500. Same luxurious house, just a different location.



You can live an upper middle class standard of living in many locations on a $100,000 annual income. In other locations you will exist in poverty on a $100,000 annual income.



Tiny houses in more expensive locations will be seen as the next thing above a homeless camp, and they will be outlawed if they are not already.
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Old 02-15-2019, 12:21 PM   #68
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ZachO View Post
I don't really have a horse in the race, but heard a recent study on Millennials. The reason they can't afford homes isn't because they throw away all their money on avocado toast. It's that they're coming out of college absolutely drowning in student loan debt, into a market where they're making less money than even generation X did, all in a skyrocketing housing market (depending on where you live).
Well put.

In the Bay Area, a starter home can be $2,000,000. And it will likely be bulldozed to build something else. You can probably get in for $600,000. if you're willing to fight the commute of 1.5 hours each way and leave at 5AM. Apartments are going for $5,500. per month. Rental homes around $7,500./ month. And companies like Google, Apple and Facebook are giving rent allowances of $2,000.per mont to help their employees cope. So anyone not working for those guys has an additional burden of $2,000./month just to keep up. Meanwhile, my daughter, at 46, is still paying her student loans.

That area isn't just a location in the US, it's a location in the world. People are coming from all over the world to start businesses, invent and invest. It has geographic limitations with the ocean, the Bay and the mountains, so space is limited. It's growing so fast that builders can't keep up.

When someone simply declares people should "just buy a home", they are out of touch with reality.

When I hear that "you can buy a really nice home on 2 acres for $100,000" somewhere, I have to wonder. What's the catch? Minimum wage jobs? High unemployment? Terrible weather? Crime ridden area? No industry? Or a tax incentive system to industry that allow companies to pay little or no taxes to support infrastructure, as in Louisiana. In Nevada, when Tesla announced it was going to build it's battery plant there, corporations began buying up all of the available houses in the nearby towns. Suddenly, just as more housing was needed for workers, the price jumped up and the available units fell sharply. That's capitalism and free enterprise, but, do we blame the workers for not managing their money? Are we surprised when people can't get ahead? Should we tell them that they have to have a large home, instead of a tiny home?
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Old 02-15-2019, 12:27 PM   #69
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A lot of tiny houses are on a lot owned by friends or family. In the backyard of a house, out on the back 40, etc. There's obviously truth to any side you want to look at on this, and examples that run the whole spectrum.

Until everyone can telecommute for work, I'd enjoy seeing all the people who can't afford to live in San Francisco and other expensive places all head to rural America and try to find jobs paying $100,000.

And once they can telecommute, all the inexpensive places to live in the US and elsewhere will see prices skyrocket as tech industry employees gentrify every last corner of the globe.
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Old 02-15-2019, 02:01 PM   #70
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There is a lot more to life than simply getting by. That is what dreaming is all about. It's unrealistic to tell a young family to go find a cheap place to live, dashing hopes of a bright future and possibly wasting the hard work of getting a degree. In the end, it's a dog-eat-dog world. People either keep up or fall behind. Those with a built in advantage, have the chance to excel.

Developing new products, networking and riding the bucking horse of a new startup requires being in attendance. And so much of the money sloshing around is from speculation and investments. The people in the service industries, the construction workers, etc are seriously struggling unless they received a home in a will. I moved out because I was tired of the rat race and didn't need to play that game any longer, but it was tricky to stay ahead of the curve.

It's funny to wonder if tiny houses should be allowed, when it costs $1,500-$2,000, to park a trailer in a lot and live there. And meanwhile, in front of Stanford University, in Palo Alto, along the main drag through town, El Camino Real, there is a long line of junk motorhomes parked along the street. Some leveled with blocks, generators sitting there. And unused parking lots, like at Kmart fill up with them too, until they get evicted. If you park your own Casita in your own driveway, for more than 72 hours, you'll get a ticket. So the must be parked hidden in the back yard.

Bottom line: the whole system is out of balance and not being regulated in a way that addresses current realities.
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Old 02-15-2019, 03:08 PM   #71
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I agree.

There was a time when there was a strong middle class. One person works a job and supports a family. Not some crazy multi-million/billion dollar startup or tech job or corporate job. Just a typical old job.

What I see now is jobs which used to support whole families; one person working, supporting an entire family, are now jobs that won't even buy a house for a single person just supporting themselves, unless you want to spend every last dime you have on a "starter house" that more or less needs be gutted which means that in addition to spending all your money, it also requires all your time.

Not worth it for me.

Now it takes two incomes to comfortably buy a house for a "middle class" family. Add the "second mortgage" of childcare (people I know with two kids are paying somewhere around $1,200/month) and two people in a medium size town in Montana are just scraping by, each making around $50,000/year. Which is actually pretty good money around here. Or used to be.

Things have changed. Income gap is widening, becoming extreme. Lot's of extremely rich people, and everyone else. Trouble coming...You can't apply the old middle class logic to the modern world. It used to be true, and it's still true in some cases, in some places. But it's going away.
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Old 02-15-2019, 03:20 PM   #72
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I occurs to me, from the responses, that nobody actually clicked on the link I posted and read the story. It's about tiny house believers being scammed out of their money and getting little or nothing i return.
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Old 02-15-2019, 04:14 PM   #73
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Originally Posted by Glenn Baglo View Post
I occurs to me, from the responses, that nobody actually clicked on the link I posted and read the story. It's about tiny house believers being scammed out of their money and getting little or nothing i return.
I can only speak for myself, but I rarely follow video links. I might if there is a really good teaser that piques my interest

In this case, scams are everywhere and one more is ho hum, especially since it involves a product I have no intention of purchasing in the foreseeable future. If there were a scam involving a maker of molded fiberglass trailers, we'd be all over it, I'm sure.

Sorry to disappoint, Glenn. If it's any consolation, I didn't follow KC's link, either.

Really, I think the topic is simply slipping back into a well-worn rut that has little reference to any particular post.
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Old 02-15-2019, 04:21 PM   #74
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Here's the teaser: the contractor was subbing cheaper unsuitable metal framing for what was promised, building the homes on used RV frames and recycling RV appliances. Took deposits for months and then went bankrupt. Last known location is US.
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Old 02-15-2019, 05:58 PM   #75
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Very Abridged Version of My Story

Aside from my gripe of the new fiberglassrv.com log-in protocol and my 4X attempt to post this...remember to keep it simple my friends!



Purchased/owned 3 acres of land in AK that I built a home on. Paid cash for undeveloped land out-of-hard-earned-pocket money upon graduating college. After few years, freaked out by being locked into property, so quit-claimed property/house to ex-bo.

Ex-bo has been a great friend. He sold property about 8 years later and kicked me enough profit that allowed me to buy a used tow vehicle and 13’ fiberglass travel trailer. Since 5 years after purchase, still full-time in the trailer today (with same tow vehicle & lovin' it!).

I'm living the gypsy life I was genuinely meant to live and embracing it for the most part. Miss having an occasional camp Base with a workshop, but I’m establishing that now.

We naturally fill our needs.
I have so much more to my story, but bottom line is we know that tiny trailers or houses are generally a more healthy choice than living in mansions, yachts or going to a fraudulent Fyre Festival. (Oh, the maintenance!)
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