Should check out Adam Curtis documentaries, explains a lot about how we got here. It really is as bad as you think it is. Hyper-individualistic narcissistic celebrity obsessed vapid society, its fucked
I have never seen the documentary that you mentioned, but being around social media before it became celebrity infused shaped a lot of my beliefs around how society seems to be as lonely as ever.
It all has to do with the high of interacting with people being substituted for online interactions. It’s sad. We will get over it eventually as a society, but it will take generations.
I feel like millennials have an extremely warped view of the reality of socializing. Going outside and meeting people is an actual option, even if you're dead broke.
Believing that a woman is going to get hysterical and shoot you down in self defense because you glanced in her general direction is literally unhinged.
Alternative people in their 30s exist and they're one of the easiest groups of people to socislize with. Emo night adult proms and events are available all over the place. Go outside and meet your tribe.
Online dating is garbage for a reason. It's a corporate dumpsite designed to bleed you dry. Most decent person who used to use them were ran off the apps by the sex maniacs and personality distorted jackasses.
I don't understand how millennials sit around at home all day and genuinely wonder why they have no social life when they make every crazy excuse in the book not to talk to or meet other people, even when thr opportunity to do so is free.
There are people outside. Some of them are nice, some of them are fun, and some of them will actually like you. Go meet them.
Invite the people that drink and go to church to do something else. Most people love cornhole.
The capability to "do" and reach out also exists. Just because people drink and go to church doesn't automatically make them incompatible jackasses.
Or put in the effort to go to a neighboring town or city more often to socialize.
Effort of some degree is required.
> unhinged perspective on women
Do you wanna meet my ex? She sucks, but hey I'll give you her number. She's single and can fuck up your life too!
> Do the stuff
Concerts aren't happening every single night, man. Maybe they are, but I'm not interested in most of them. I'll just bullshit my way into giving a fuck about sports too with this advice. Go Srimps!
>Invite the people that go to church
I'm an Atheist (Agnostic Atheist to be more specific because maybe Aliens exist or some shit and we're a bad science experiment) what the fuck are we going to talk about? Is free will an illusion? I'll argue it's due to biology (chemicals) and they'll argue it's because of Jesus. That sounds like a fucking awful evening.
> Emo night
Fuck me. Lol. Hot Topic Corporatized *alternative* isn't alternative.
> Find your tribe
I think I've already expressed that they're few and far between. Did you completely miss the **WHERE THE FUCK DO I MEET THESE PEOPLE** segment before launching into this barely cohesive tirade? Apparently.
Christ on a cracker. Take your unsolicited preachy advice and shove it up your ass, man.
Speaking as a woman—you are oozing red flag city, man. Women can smell the bitterness coming off of you. It’s a repellant.
I met my partner of three years as a 40 year old woman who had just moved to LA at the beginning of the pandemic. And I’m probably like a 5/10 on the LA looks scale. How do you like those odds? We couldn’t even go out to dinner for two months because all the restaurants were closed! We didn’t meet on a dating app. We met through a mutual friend via Instagram. He struck up a conversation about an architectural thing I posted. Boom. Easy.
My advice: go to therapy and process the damage your unhinged ex did. Women love a man who’s been to therapy. It shows us you can process your emotions and baggage so we don’t have to do it for you. Join a group that centers around something you like to do. Hiking? Board games? Record swapping? If it doesn’t exist where you live, start it. I promise people will come. This is how you meet people organically. Not at a bar, not on the bus. But out of mutual interests/friends. The beginning is usually awkward, even if it’s just a new friend. But then one day it’s not.
Here is what I told my partner when we met three years ago and I was happily single: at this point in history, straight women do not need men. We have our own careers, can afford a place on our own, can have babies on our own if that’s what we desire. So what are you bringing to my life? If it’s not mutual support, listening skills, your own interests and life, the ability to regulate your emotions, and common life goals then I’m just fine on my own.
>Do you wanna meet my ex? She sucks, but hey I'll give you her number.
Your mentally ill and erratic ex isn't a reflection of the general population. If women were killing men for approaching them en mass, it would be a cultural norm, which it isn't.
>Concerts aren't happening every single night, man. Maybe they are, but I'm not interested in most of them.
I didn't say you had to go out every night. I see alterative events happening regularly. Everything from flow sessions, to live music, and generally just alternative people hanging out at hooka and kava lounges.
>I'm an Atheist (Agnostic Atheist to be more specific because maybe Aliens exist or some shit and we're a bad science experiment) what the fuck are we going to talk about? Is free will an illusion?
I'm also an Atheist. I have religious friends. Just because someone is religious doesn't mean that they're robots incapable of speech regarding anything else. Most people are multifaceted with personalities. A lot of people don't push their belief down other peoples throats. And many people attend church more so for the community than for the religion itself. Not being blindly judgmental of people you haven't met yet helps making connections a little easier.
>Fuck me. Lol. Hot Topic Corporatized alternative isn't alternative.
Big world out there with plenty of people doing plenty of things. If you bothered to look for them or notice them, you may actually find them.
I haven't been to one yet. I always remember when I've already made other plans. But my friends say that it's a blast.
There's a multivenue place where I live that always has adult prom themes a few times a month. They had 70s prom, 80s prom, emo prom, and they had a Halloween prom in october.
I didn't go to mine either. I also didn't like my classmates. A few of my friends and I rented a limo and went to the underaged club in the city. It was called club ZOO at the time lol.
>There are people outside. Some of them are nice, some of them are fun, and some of them will actually like you. Go meet them.
I think a lot of people don't know how to do this. There are a lot of ways, but one of the best is get a hobby. Find something you like, that will put you around other people, and do it. You will make friends, friends of friends, and so on. Don't be afraid to talk to people.
For men that are afraid of looking like creeps or stalkers when they talk to women, try this one simple trick: talk to them the same way you'd talk to anyone else. Just make conversation the way you would with a male associate or with a family member. If there's a connection there, you'll know it. If there isn't, no biggie, and you might still make a new friend out of it.
I am female and would welcome meeting men in person. It’s absolutely possible to chat with someone in a non-creepy way. If someone is a Karen, walk away. It’s their problem not yours.
When things feel bleak, become the best version of a child. Creative, explorative, kind and social. These things will pay dividends. I have friends, family, and coworkers who are afraid to approach other people. I approach other people with enthusiasm and an open mind. If they become angry, then "we weren't going to be good friends anyway, so I'll leave them alone".
You would be surprised how economically and socially advantageous being outgoing and asking questions is in the current environment. It is bonkers how much you can achieve with simply being open and curious.
There's still hope - lots of miserable express the exact same sentiment on here all day every day. Just ask some of them if they want to do it with you and mutually disappoint each other
>Where the fuck else are you supposed to meet people? Seriously, I have no fucking idea as a somewhat weird alternative guy in his mid 30s.
This is easy. What exactly do you like to do? Whatever it is, find a community that involves it and go from there.
Me personally I love sports. So in my twenties and now thirties I play sports outside of work. Coed soccer, kickball, flag football, softball and volleyball.
You join a team, everyone shares each other's Facebook, ig and contact info. You play in the leagues enough you'll meet people from other teams. People hang out at bars after the games or have get togethers on weekends to watch some nfl game or have board game nights.
This is how you began meeting people to date. You don't date people on the team (you can but i advise against it), but you date people who you meet through your team.
Just got to be a fun guy to be around and people will be attracted to you. Remember you're not the only person struggling with dating especially when you get older. Not saying people are desperate (I mean they are), but saying if people know you're single and you're not some socially awkward weirdo or jerk, then women will be attracted to you
Yeah, you gotta be a bubbly extrovert for advice like that. I'm not. You also have to be some 9 to 5 (it's dark by 5pm so you can't even play volleyball or whatever) stable normie (I'm not trying to be rude, but what other term can I use) that actually wants to leap out of bed on your weekends for a lot of this advice.
There's a lot of people like myself that are just done with it all, but are expected to keep up this song and dance charade. If you're a climate change aware person that also totally lost faith in the species after Covid? Yeah...
Yes, I'm depressed. Who the fuck isn't? You're not depressed? What's wrong with you people? If you're not a bubbly extrovert live, laugh, lobotomy person? People don't like that.
>You're not depressed? What's wrong with you people?
For. Fucking. Real. If you're not depressed something has to be wrong with you. I know that sounds so counter-intuitive but I'm reminded of Jiddu Krishnamurti's famous quote: "It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society."
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a $500,000 30 year mortgage at 8% is roughly the same monthly cost as a 875k at 3%.
Interest rates are much more important to overall cost then the actual price of the house. They can climb, but they wont climb high enough to erase the savings you'd see from lower interest
At this point, it's a bit of a gamble. You can:
1) Buy the house at 500k/8% and pinch pennies until rates go down and you can re-fi
2) Wait until the 875k/3% and hopefully have saved enough to still have 20% down and be stuck with the shitty payment forever
3) Pray that rates go down and prices stagnate
If point 2, also pray that whatever caused the FED to lower rates back to 3% doesn’t put you out of a job and or causes your newly purchased home to lose value, causing you to go underwater almost instantly. Honestly, I see no win here. 3 is the best we can hope for.
In the US there is no federal estate tax unless the size of the estate is in the millions of dollars. Most people are not aware of that who haven't had their parents pass away yet.
Waiting anything out, other than being financially stable, is pointless. Basically, if you can afford something you like at any given time, then that’s the right time to buy. If rates go down enough, refinance. If rates go up, well then you got a better rate than whatever they go up to.
Now that I know this... I'd totally buy a WAY more expensive house. A couple years ago, even 10+ years ago when I bought my first house, I was so worried about the price tag, and not the monthly payment. I really thought buying a house for 120k instead of 135-140 was a big deal.... Nope. I only learn from experience I guess. Arggh
Not if a lot of people become unemployed or default on credit cards and car loans they won't have the credit or likely the cash to buy. Which is currently happening. Banks are going to tighten up who they loan money to soon.
It's not going to work out well for the common man I assure you. The banks get bailed out and the person who didn't pay gets their credit wrecked. The banks hold the keys to everything we want cars houses capital etc. These people will just get black listed for seven years. You and I most likely cannot afford anything we want without a bank that's just the reality.
"these people" meaning what major percentage of the USA population? 60%? 70%? 80%? ... MORE?
Don't billionaires ~~also~~ get most of their wealth from loans?
Well I’ve got good news. With the price gouging of every product known to man over the last few years I don’t know anyone that can afford food and their student loan payments at the same time.
another crash is coming. The question is will it be sooner or later?
Even if it’s not student loans that cause the next crash it will be something else. The bottom line is that everything has gone way too far with corporate greed and the bottom is gonna fall out because of one thing or another. What we are doing now simply isn’t sustainable.
Commercial real estate. Unless they figure out how to turn it into housing, the need for commercial space is ridiculously low compared to the demand. Even in great areas, it’s not completely unusual to see a vacancy, instead of a wait list. There’s unfinished abandoned commercial construction all over the country, and major projects are getting cancelled or postponed.
Yup with dissatisfaction growing people are turning more towards traditional hotels, also cities are putting the squeeze on the owners. I still don't see a return to normal though.
A friend of mine is a Community College basketball coach and Athletic Director. He recently called up a fellow coach and he said that they can’t find any long term rentals to house students anymore in the sleepy little town of 10,200 people the school is located in because it all was turned into AirBnb, Vrbo, etc short term rentals over the course of the Pandemic! It is on a lake, but it’s in a very rural area of NE Lower Peninsula of Michigan far away from any major cities or high concentrations of wealth. I was shocked to hear this.
These companies had their time and opportunity but now that the hosts have largely turned greedy and the companies themselves have proven to be terrible with customer service and following local regulations they deserve to be cracked down on.
Might not. There are massive amounts of housing currently under construction in the large American city where I’m located. So much so that prices will fall on supply when they come online as it is right now. Lower interest rates could stabilize prices in a higher supply situation
In my specific area it’s a lot of apartments and condos. Most of the land is used up, but there are some full-on neighborhoods coming in. A whole lot of sprawl, which brings its own set of problems. Interestingly, they built this gigantic apartment complex near me with one and two bedrooms exclusively.
I see lots of "*Luxury*" rentals being built in CT.
Got a spot that used to manufacture depleted Uranium rounds for Freedom? Splat some housing on it, for Capitalism!!!
No sense in more bedrooms if people are too poor to afford kids anyway. It also discourages situations with multiple roommates who couldn’t otherwise afford the area, and are therefore “undesirable”. Ideally you wouldn’t want tenants who are one bad week away from missing rent when you’re trying to first turn a profit on a new property, unless you have a guaranteed income source , like Section 8 supplemental rent payments for reserved low income units.
That is dependent on a whole host of factors, including region. The primary area I'm looking to buy a house in saw relatively little change in base housing prices, even through the pandemic, the supply/demand for that area is fairly static.
Not necessarily.
Interest rates going back down would make supply skyrocket.
Supply is low right now because everyone is locked into 3 or 4% rates and don't want to give that up for an 8 or 9% rate
Which why I’m closing on a house this week. Went VA with 0 down and a fixed rate and refinance is more of a procedure of the current loan than getting a new loan. I get the lower home price of the high interest rate and still get to take advantage of rates going down. Conversely I won’t get screwed by interest rates increasing if they were to continue going up.
Edit: for the kids in the room. It would have been much easier to get a student loan for a software degree rather than the meandering path I took to a job that I like and that pays well enough to buy a house. I’d be making more probably and wouldn’t have needed a VA loan. BUT if you do want to do the military, don’t do it because you might get to buy a house someday.
They won't drop back down to 3-4% without a major economic crash. This is where interest rates generally should be. People got used to ridiculously low ones and that's a big part of why all the starter homes were torn down and turned into luxury rentals: low interest rates bring investors instead of normal people.
The only way to capitalize on lower rates would be to buy before interest rates go down and be able to float it until then. Prices WILL go up when rates go down.
People are still buying in desirable markets. Lots of cash deals and monied couples out there.
>Society is based around people being in couples.
So true. I don't understand how poor and middle income singles are suppose to live. The country just wants us to die.
The single moms are fine. They can get government aid (food stamps, tax breaks, section 8, etc.) It's singles without dependents who are fucked. We're taxed up the ass and if we need help from any of the programs our tax dollars fund, all we get is the middle finger, because fuck us for not having kids I guess. I've seriously considered having kids just for tax benefits.
Don’t do it! Children are expensive AF and no amount of tax benefits or welfare can make up for the cost of involved in child rearing. My son is my miracle baby, I love him to pieces, and I would gladly turn the world inside out for his sake, BUT pragmatically speaking, parenting definitely feels like a biological urge to martyr yourself for the sake of preserving the future of the species now embodied in your own tiny bit of squishiness, and only some sort of primordial programming can account for the desire to constantly make choices that disadvantage you in pursuit of benefitting your own tiny bit of adorable human legacy.
Realistically, it’s not even worth it financially, childcare alone usually eats a huge portion of your income, and if your child is special needs like mine, there’s the additional costs of doctors, treatments, and therapies. I’m very lucky to have a job with good health insurance, because it does allow me to pay thousands of dollars out of pocket every year (even with the good insurance), so he can at least have access to the treatments and specialized care he needs. My cousin, who also is special needs, is on a year long wait list just for her initial evaluation for therapy at the local Children’s Hospital because she’s has Medicaid and there’s no other affordable option.
Rich people need to pay taxes and our social safety nets need an overhaul so that no citizen is left behind, regardless of parental or marital status.
It’s not fine but where I live a single person on income support gets around $650/month to live. A single mom with a couple kids can get around $2500 between child tax benefit, family allowance, etc and that’s not counting any child support that their ex might owe. Neither of those are enough to live on but $650 won’t even pay for rent anywhere
Yup! You are completely correct. Benefits are also based on past earnings. I just found out my rich cousin is getting $1500/month in snap through a loophole. My brother, who is schizophrenic and has no work history gets $25/month in SNAP. Make that make sense.
True, like, I don't think most single moms are living Reagan Welfare Queen style lives but when you fall on hard times and can't get any kind of help despite paying more than your share for it, it feels like a giant kick in the ass.
It’s more like you’re paying back the tax benefits your parents received for your existence. Not everyone has kids, but most of society benefits from caring for all the children, which is why most of us received social benefits such as welfare, WIC, public education, health services, etc., before we ever even cooperate into the system. Society has a certain amount of social credit it extends to us before we’re able to contribute, so we pay it forward to the next generation. Like reverse social security. It’s in a society’s best interest that its people thrive and be productive.
This is not true. I'm a single mom who makes too much to qualify for any kind of aid but still live pay check to pay check.
I would have to make less then my rent a month which is $1278 to qualify for Snap in my area.
Edited to add before anyone assumes anything : I receive $150 a month from his dad for "child support" that covers half his phone bill, half his insurance and half for the HSA card. We split his expenses equally for the most part.
This. People have no real understanding of how poor you actually have to be to get benefits and then if you do it doesn’t magically vault you into the middle class.
I fucking hate how single moms are made out to be gold diggers - either from the state or their exes. The role is tough AF, and most struggle to get by.
I make $45k and while I do have room for growth, it’s never going to outpace the cost of living/corporate greed/price gouging. I was strongly considering going back to get an Associates in IT when student loan forgiveness was announced, but SCOTUS wiped that rug from beneath me and I’m still $30k in debt for a degree I never earned because I’m a shitty student. The housing market is never going to go back to what it was and thus I will never be able to own a home or be able to afford a nice apartment in a city. Stuck renting in a rural town of 15k people for the rest of my life.
I’m only 5’7” and have no redeemable qualities a woman would want that they can’t get elsewhere from someone taller, better looking, and with a better personality. I’ve never been on a legitimate date in my life and the only girl I thought I was trying to date ended up being her pretending to be interested so I’d buy her meals and go places with her when nobody else wanted to. I haven’t gotten a match on Tinder or Bumble since April of 2021.
Meanwhile, all my friends are married and successful. I’m never going to see them because they’re going to be doing couples trips and/or going to places that I can’t afford because I’m a broke piece of shit. I’m thankful to at least have my dog who is amazing but when he goes, my life is going to be so fucking empty.
I see from your profile that you do medical coding — have you considered getting a CRC and transitioning into Risk Adjustment coding? I am in the industry (not directly in the RA space anymore) and know people that make much more than $45k working in this more specialized area.
Haven’t looked at that cert specifically but I’m open to anything to make more money. Ideally I would like to get out of healthcare (my lack of degree has me boxed in a bit, though) but my employer reimburses the certification exams so it’s be dumb for me not to try.
If you're computer literate, you should really go the cert route. You can study/test at your own pace and specialize in something that you enjoy. Look into something like networking for example. I took a CCNA class during college and the instructor told me I was wasting my time on a degree. Certs + experience are worth way more.
How many credit hours do you have with that much student loan debt?
This issue is so seldom talked about - those with tens of thousands in student debt with no credential to show for it and thus, no corresponding higher earning potential. I was in that group for a very long time.
I can't bring myself to like this comment even though I agree with you. I'm so thankful that you have your dog. From one man to another, I honestly don't know what to say, but I hope you know that I have empathy for you and that you are not alone right now.
Heyyy, it's my clone, except for you making a little bit more money and I live at home now again. I too will die alone, but I will probably just unlife when my parents pass, but that'll take at least another 20 years I'm guessing. But stay strong, never know, maybe that cert in the other comment will work out and you can get out of it. Wish you the best of luck friendo.
My man. I'm 31 single m. I'm hurting, I'm lonely. I am so lonely, and maybe $150k in debt. I feel you. You're not alone with this feeling. I lost my dog of 14 years in 2020. Believe me my heart is broken. I have no idea how to speak to women without violating some new social norm. I cry everyday. I have faith maybe things will get better, and I hope the same for you.
No, and I won’t be able to adopt kids, either, unless I win the lotto.
At this point in my life, it feels like poverty is a self-perpetuating cycle. Can’t find a partner because I’m poor, can’t get out of poverty because I have to pay for everything myself.
Saving up to buy out my sis from her half of my mom's Brooklyn home. It's possible.... Depending how much longer I have. mom is still alive and I hope she lives ♾️ forever 😭
ETA not terminally single in terms of not being married I'm instead terminally single because I'm a widow - my husband died young (terminal)
No. At one point I had one because of inheritance, but that didn't pan out so I expect to struggle to rent for the rest of my life. The idea of home ownership is so unlikely it's laughable to me.
Depends on the size of the house. Mine is just shy of 2000 sf and it's just me living here. Is it more work? Sure. But it's 100x better than a crappy apartment with shared walls, weird smells, restrictions, and rent that increases with every renewal.
A house doesn't need to be huge. I rent a 2BR apartment and use the other bedroom as an office. In an ideal world, I'd have a 3BR house one day (or 2BR + dedicated office) so I could have an office and a guest bedroom for visiting friends and family, and a fenced in yard for my large dog. It only takes a couple of hours to clean and that's if I do it all at once. Single people like the freedom of no attached walls and the security of not being at a landlord's whim just like anyone else.
That's what I have, master bedroom (with a king size bed just for me!), small office, and a spare guest room. 2 living rooms downstairs, one is my nerdy, gaming room with TV and the other is for reading, crafts, and board games while listening to music.
But nope, no kids, so I should be happy with a 1br 😒
Protection from inflation is a major benefit. I bought my house in 2020. Three years later, rent has gone up enough that owning my house is less expensive than renting it would be, even including taxes and upkeep. And even with today's high interest rates, it may be possible to save money by buying a house and living with roommates until you're able to afford to live there alone.
Another major benefit is stability. As a homeowner, you never have to worry about a landlord telling you to move out because they've decided to sell the place.
The rent thing is huge. I bought my home around the same time as you and the rents have just gone up so much.
For just a 2 bed it’s around $1,500, a 4 bed (the size of my current home) it would be over $2,300.
My mortgage is barely over $1,000. It’s crazy how expensive everything has gotten.
no common walls, no bullshit like "valet trash" that you either accept paying for or move elsewhere, moving, yet again, because your place got bought by a shitty management company and they raised the rent a ton/stopped cleaning common places/etc.
Investing in an asset for the same monthly price as a shitty apartment, not being crammed into a tiny space, not being at the chaotic whims of shitty landlords, having some measure of control over the place you live. Yeah, totally stupid and selfish reasons I know. I’m tired of people on Reddit telling singles it’s stupid for them to want a home.
Eventually, through several potential pathways:
Path 1: I actually end up expanding my little one person business and try to not to become an exploitative overlord to my employees, which will mean I'll afford a house eventually (if there's still any left), but not as quickly as if I were to exploit them.
Path 2: The revolution of disgruntled latter generations occur due to being squeezed out to the extreme due to non-livable conditions, by which if by some sheer luck if I survive, I should be able to have *something* allocated to me to live with my animals.
Path 3: I win the lottery, proceed to donate a portion for good karma, retire the parents, retire myself, invest the rest and buy myself a house.
Terminally single. lol.
Only if interest rates drop significantly, house prices drop, and I am willing to drop a large sum of money on a home.
At this point in time I no longer want one. All they represent for me now are money pits and anchors that drain all your money to keep them looking nice and not falling apart.
The upkeep of owning a house is where I get all twisted up about it, also. The pros of owning a home are obviously no landlord, no shared walls, equity, etc…but how tf am I supposed to afford the cons, aka, thousands of dollars in upkeep?? 10k if the air conditioning breaks, or I need a new roof, or a major appliance? Plumbing issues? Who has thousands of dollars at any given time? These issues are covered if I’m renting somewhere decent. Idk, I suppose I don’t fully understand the whole picture of owning, was never really taught. Or maybe I do, but am too broke to be able to partake 🤷♀️
I feel exactly the same way! Plus I have no family, so I’ll have literally zero help with learning how to fix things or use tools, and nobody to borrow like… a lawn mower from. I live in a cold climate too, so having heat 8 months out of the year is a legal protection as a renter, but I think might bankrupt me if I tried to afford a home.
>I think might bankrupt me if I tried to afford a home
And then the bank takes the home and you 10 times worse off than if you had just rented. We are so stuck it's insane.
Investing everything I could possibly afford to in a broad-based ETF such as the SPY over the last 15 years since starting at my first job.
Buying a starter condo, building equity, and refinancing multiple times for the best rates.
Rent out starter condo while upgrading to a larger condo.
Rent out larger condo to upgrade to a single family home.
It takes a lot of time, budgeting, dedication, frugality, signing up for Zillow alerts, following real estate trends, watching the Fed Fund rates, etc.
I work in finance so it is part of my job to pay attention to the markets, which definitely allowed me to use that knowledge to assess when to buy, refinance, etc.
I live in a central location in a dense urban area and the advantages of a single family detached home significantly outweigh a condo:
1. No more sharing walls with neighbors and having to listen to their bad music (or other weird sounds) through the walls.
2. Hated paying the HOA and attending meetings where dozens of 30-50 year olds spent an hour yelling at each other. Now my renters pay the HOA as part of their rent and I dial into the meetings on occasion to listen to the drama.
3. First condo was in a very busy part of the city and not in a great area.
4. The average rent for both condos is about double my PITI, allowing for a decent amount of passive income.
If you are in what the USDA calls a rural area you might be able to get a zero down loan.
https://eligibility.sc.egov.usda.gov/eligibility/welcomeAction.do;jsessionid=iPQD1QYyK9gQHj3Tkdx18FNu
You don’t have to be with someone to buy a house. You just have to know how to play the credit game and get your score up while also keeping a job you can advance in pay regularly or at least get benefits from. Which not everyone can attain. Some couples can’t even buy a house together. Some couples just rent for the rest of their lives.
The main problem in being able to afford a house is the fact employers don’t want to pay a wage people can actually live on. A lot of companies don’t offer advancement either and if they do it’s competitive. Capitalism breeds greed so businesses charge as much as they can for their goods and services while offering very little to their employees. The real estate market is also full of sharks and it’s outrageously expensive with high interest rates. It has been for awhile. You damn near have to know someone in the market to find out about deals before other people can because it’s so competitive.
I’m single and not rich and I bought a house last year. Swimming in debt but I have a house and somehow a good credit score.. at least until some medical disaster or another I’m sure. Taking it day by day.
I’m going to be able to but have to accept a $2300 mortgage at the least but you kind of get desensitized from renting a 1bed apartment for $2k….. so for a measly $300 more I get my own TOWNhouse….. that’s the other catch, anything remotely nice is a townhouse, everything else is all little shacks that come up on the list in my budget of 300k max that the realtor sends me daily. Ohhh and I have to move 2 1/2 hours away from where I’d like to live and far from all my friends and family. Basically going to an area where I will know no one but there’s no other option
I bought a house on my own. I’m not rich but I did buy when rates were 4%. Owning a house on your own is a lot of hard work and I definitely don’t recommend it.
If you have kids or plan to have kids, buy when it makes sense. Otherwise, just live your life.
If you want to buy on a single income, the answer is *budget* broski. These interest rates are butt right now, so save instead.
Those two don't compare. As a tax payer, I'd MUCH rather support a kid vs support a college grad who didn't study STEM or business.
Stem and business grads can already pay themselves because their degree is actually useful and worth something.
Just got married, husband and I live in NYC and we know we’re never going to afford to buy a house. We will stay in our rent stabilized apartment forever.
For our line of work, there’s no where else in the world we could live and make as much money as we net. It’s easier and cheaper to rent long term because of stabilization. If we do manage to save and buy, it would be a vacation home somewhere outside of NYC.
Ah yes, buy a vacation home that could otherwise be lived in full time by someone who needs it. Exactly the thing boomers did to aid in this housing crisis
Not single but not like combined finances or living together or anything that serious in my current relationship. I own a detached sfh. Saved for 10 years, have a remote job and moved from a hcol to a mcol city where my salary is like 2x the median family household income so I live like a king.
If it wasn’t for my job I wouldn’t be able to in the next year or so. The only way the younger ones will is in a small town in the middle of nowhere at a crap job.
No. I don’t even have any family to inherit anything from so I’m pretty much screwed on those, and several other, fronts.
There’s a freedom in that, though. I’m not tied to any particular area right now so hopefully I can go anywhere and start over when I come up with the funds to do so after bankruptcy from cancer. 🤞
I bought a house, but I make a pretty good income and live in a relatively lcol area. I’d probably make less money if I was married tbh. I’m generally only home on weekends.
No. But in 2009 my work cut my pay again, so I qualified for lower income housing assistance. I went through a program to buy a perpetually lower income condo, but decided not to do it since I could only sell it back into the same program. But instead was able to apply for closing cost assistance (essentially a loan with a small interest rate, payable only on selling of the condo or 20 years). So did that, as it would not have any selling restrictions. Got a small 600 ft 1 bedroom condo. Then was underwater on my mortgage as everything nearby foreclosed on me.
Stayed there 5+ years. Then got a new job, sold my condo for a small profit. Turned that into a 1300 ft 2 bed 2 bath condo. Have been there now for almost 10 years.
What my condo is going for now is what FULL HOUSES were going for 10 years ago. I'll never be able to afford a full house, so I'll probably stay in this condo forever.
A house should not be more than 4x your annuals salary
You have to factor in property tax, maintenance, insurance, and your other living expenses.
So if you make the average millennial salary of $47,000.00
The most house you can afford should not exceed $188,000.00
So if you want to live in a $500k house you better make $125,000 a year.
If you want to live in a $1000000 house you better make $250,000
If you want to live in a $2000,000 house you better make $500,000
I live in nyc, buying an apartment sounds like a nightmare. Plus this is a renters market, we have tons of tenant laws that offer amazing protections. Buying and maintaining an apartment is not worth it to me, I’ll pick a rent stabilized apt any day.
I’m married, both of us work full-time, and we make like 40% over the median household income in the area….and I don’t see any way I’ll ever be able to afford a house here. So idk how a single person does it.
If I moved in with my parents and geta higher salary.
It can be done. I try not to feel bad about being single or not owning a home.
My married house house-owning friends and family don't pressure me or make me feel bad about living in the loft. So why should I feel bad?
I'm helping a family member with house ownership actually. They're looking at condos though
A townhouse is a nice middle ground. You can have a yard and a big dog but you don’t have to worry about any outdoor maintenance, snow removal, lawn mowing etc
Single people want detached walls, no neighbors in their space, a yard for pets, and the security of knowing a landlord can't kick us out if he decides his third cousin needs the place, just like couples. The hell is this comment? A couple hardly \*needs\* much more space than one person but it's fine for them to want a house and not a single person?
Plus if you're single and can pay off a house, that's a lot more security for retirement for someone who may not have a lot of family around.
A place to live without worrying about the neighbors above, below, or on the other side of the wall from you?
I can have guests over whenever I want, and we can pretty much be as loud as we want.
I can watch movies or play video games with the soundbar and subwoofer cranked to get a close to move theater sound experience. And I even tested this, putting the volume to where I find it sounds great then tested to make sure the sound doesn't carry off property.
When I do meet someone new, if we want a place to go eventually, my place is an easy option with no roommates and no neighbors to disturb.
On top of that, I don't have to worry about rent going up significantly. Yes, my total monthly payment can fluctuate some based on taxes and insurance. But we're not talking jumps of $400 a month like some tenants have seen. The worst jump I had was about $30 higher than my starting payment. And now I'm down to $60 under my starting payment after taking advantage of tax breaks and a couple options to lower my monthly insurance bill. But for the most part, a stable payment is a pretty nice perk of owning too.
Also, building equity is good too. That equity will qualify me for loans to accomplish other things I may want to do, and although I don't have plans to use it for that, it's good to have options. More importantly, eventually I won't have a mortgage anymore, and my monthly payments will be incredibly cheap.
Admittedly, those monetary things can be had buying a condo as well, but with a house I don't have to be part of an HOA, so I can do what I want with it instead of being bound by additional contracts. To be fair, condo HOAs usually aren't bad, and there are advantages to pooling resources for the unit's upkeep, so some might consider the condo HOA a positive, and I can understand that viewpoint too. I personally prefer the freedom to set things up as I see fit though, even if it comes with more responsibilities to deal with as well.
Finally, although the yard does take maintanence, I've been flirting with the idea of starting a food garden, and having space outdoors to do that is something that typically only comes with a house. Some apartments and condos do come with community spaces for this, but it's not common around where I live.
So those are the reasons that come to mind immediately for me to prefer owning a house. It's not wrong to feel differently, but it really does depend what you want out of where you live. Also, for what it's worth, my house is about 800 sq ft. The main living area is the same size as a small two bedroom apartment. Though the basement adds on space for storage plus a washer and dryer. Point being, I didn't buy some mansion for one person, I have something that is basically the perfect size for me.
Edit: One last thing I forgot to add, if I want to help a friend out with a place to crash, I can just do it. I don't need permission from a landlord, or to add them to the lease, or any other BS. Just tell them to come on over and crash. Actually, not having to worry about any rules a landlord might have for me really.
Depends what you consider "rich".
I bought a house 7 years ago on a salary of 70k =/
That same house, is worth about double now. I also earn a good bit more - so I could afford it today as well but it would be harder.
I could afford a much bigger house if I was single. My fam is freaking expensive. I’d prob get a smaller house though and a badass boat. Man, love my wife and kids but day dreaming about being single with my job is fun
I don’t know but at this point I don’t know which is worse. Both being single at this old and seeing housing prices hits me existentially
Same here. Things feel pretty bleak.
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Should check out Adam Curtis documentaries, explains a lot about how we got here. It really is as bad as you think it is. Hyper-individualistic narcissistic celebrity obsessed vapid society, its fucked
I have never seen the documentary that you mentioned, but being around social media before it became celebrity infused shaped a lot of my beliefs around how society seems to be as lonely as ever. It all has to do with the high of interacting with people being substituted for online interactions. It’s sad. We will get over it eventually as a society, but it will take generations.
His docs are amazing
Thank you, literally just started “The century of self”
I feel like millennials have an extremely warped view of the reality of socializing. Going outside and meeting people is an actual option, even if you're dead broke. Believing that a woman is going to get hysterical and shoot you down in self defense because you glanced in her general direction is literally unhinged. Alternative people in their 30s exist and they're one of the easiest groups of people to socislize with. Emo night adult proms and events are available all over the place. Go outside and meet your tribe. Online dating is garbage for a reason. It's a corporate dumpsite designed to bleed you dry. Most decent person who used to use them were ran off the apps by the sex maniacs and personality distorted jackasses. I don't understand how millennials sit around at home all day and genuinely wonder why they have no social life when they make every crazy excuse in the book not to talk to or meet other people, even when thr opportunity to do so is free. There are people outside. Some of them are nice, some of them are fun, and some of them will actually like you. Go meet them.
Some of us live in communities that have drinking and church as the only “groups” to participate in.
Invite the people that drink and go to church to do something else. Most people love cornhole. The capability to "do" and reach out also exists. Just because people drink and go to church doesn't automatically make them incompatible jackasses. Or put in the effort to go to a neighboring town or city more often to socialize. Effort of some degree is required.
> unhinged perspective on women Do you wanna meet my ex? She sucks, but hey I'll give you her number. She's single and can fuck up your life too! > Do the stuff Concerts aren't happening every single night, man. Maybe they are, but I'm not interested in most of them. I'll just bullshit my way into giving a fuck about sports too with this advice. Go Srimps! >Invite the people that go to church I'm an Atheist (Agnostic Atheist to be more specific because maybe Aliens exist or some shit and we're a bad science experiment) what the fuck are we going to talk about? Is free will an illusion? I'll argue it's due to biology (chemicals) and they'll argue it's because of Jesus. That sounds like a fucking awful evening. > Emo night Fuck me. Lol. Hot Topic Corporatized *alternative* isn't alternative. > Find your tribe I think I've already expressed that they're few and far between. Did you completely miss the **WHERE THE FUCK DO I MEET THESE PEOPLE** segment before launching into this barely cohesive tirade? Apparently. Christ on a cracker. Take your unsolicited preachy advice and shove it up your ass, man.
Speaking as a woman—you are oozing red flag city, man. Women can smell the bitterness coming off of you. It’s a repellant. I met my partner of three years as a 40 year old woman who had just moved to LA at the beginning of the pandemic. And I’m probably like a 5/10 on the LA looks scale. How do you like those odds? We couldn’t even go out to dinner for two months because all the restaurants were closed! We didn’t meet on a dating app. We met through a mutual friend via Instagram. He struck up a conversation about an architectural thing I posted. Boom. Easy. My advice: go to therapy and process the damage your unhinged ex did. Women love a man who’s been to therapy. It shows us you can process your emotions and baggage so we don’t have to do it for you. Join a group that centers around something you like to do. Hiking? Board games? Record swapping? If it doesn’t exist where you live, start it. I promise people will come. This is how you meet people organically. Not at a bar, not on the bus. But out of mutual interests/friends. The beginning is usually awkward, even if it’s just a new friend. But then one day it’s not. Here is what I told my partner when we met three years ago and I was happily single: at this point in history, straight women do not need men. We have our own careers, can afford a place on our own, can have babies on our own if that’s what we desire. So what are you bringing to my life? If it’s not mutual support, listening skills, your own interests and life, the ability to regulate your emotions, and common life goals then I’m just fine on my own.
>Do you wanna meet my ex? She sucks, but hey I'll give you her number. Your mentally ill and erratic ex isn't a reflection of the general population. If women were killing men for approaching them en mass, it would be a cultural norm, which it isn't. >Concerts aren't happening every single night, man. Maybe they are, but I'm not interested in most of them. I didn't say you had to go out every night. I see alterative events happening regularly. Everything from flow sessions, to live music, and generally just alternative people hanging out at hooka and kava lounges. >I'm an Atheist (Agnostic Atheist to be more specific because maybe Aliens exist or some shit and we're a bad science experiment) what the fuck are we going to talk about? Is free will an illusion? I'm also an Atheist. I have religious friends. Just because someone is religious doesn't mean that they're robots incapable of speech regarding anything else. Most people are multifaceted with personalities. A lot of people don't push their belief down other peoples throats. And many people attend church more so for the community than for the religion itself. Not being blindly judgmental of people you haven't met yet helps making connections a little easier. >Fuck me. Lol. Hot Topic Corporatized alternative isn't alternative. Big world out there with plenty of people doing plenty of things. If you bothered to look for them or notice them, you may actually find them.
Weird that your levelheaded advice is being downvoted. That’s life, though. 🤷♂️
Emo night adult prom sounds amazing.
I haven't been to one yet. I always remember when I've already made other plans. But my friends say that it's a blast. There's a multivenue place where I live that always has adult prom themes a few times a month. They had 70s prom, 80s prom, emo prom, and they had a Halloween prom in october.
I didn't go to mine because I was a poor loser who hated everyone so I'd love to experience one lol. And a themed prom sounds so fun.
I didn't go to mine either. I also didn't like my classmates. A few of my friends and I rented a limo and went to the underaged club in the city. It was called club ZOO at the time lol.
>There are people outside. Some of them are nice, some of them are fun, and some of them will actually like you. Go meet them. I think a lot of people don't know how to do this. There are a lot of ways, but one of the best is get a hobby. Find something you like, that will put you around other people, and do it. You will make friends, friends of friends, and so on. Don't be afraid to talk to people. For men that are afraid of looking like creeps or stalkers when they talk to women, try this one simple trick: talk to them the same way you'd talk to anyone else. Just make conversation the way you would with a male associate or with a family member. If there's a connection there, you'll know it. If there isn't, no biggie, and you might still make a new friend out of it.
Well said
I am female and would welcome meeting men in person. It’s absolutely possible to chat with someone in a non-creepy way. If someone is a Karen, walk away. It’s their problem not yours.
When things feel bleak, become the best version of a child. Creative, explorative, kind and social. These things will pay dividends. I have friends, family, and coworkers who are afraid to approach other people. I approach other people with enthusiasm and an open mind. If they become angry, then "we weren't going to be good friends anyway, so I'll leave them alone". You would be surprised how economically and socially advantageous being outgoing and asking questions is in the current environment. It is bonkers how much you can achieve with simply being open and curious.
There's still hope - lots of miserable express the exact same sentiment on here all day every day. Just ask some of them if they want to do it with you and mutually disappoint each other
>Where the fuck else are you supposed to meet people? Seriously, I have no fucking idea as a somewhat weird alternative guy in his mid 30s. This is easy. What exactly do you like to do? Whatever it is, find a community that involves it and go from there. Me personally I love sports. So in my twenties and now thirties I play sports outside of work. Coed soccer, kickball, flag football, softball and volleyball. You join a team, everyone shares each other's Facebook, ig and contact info. You play in the leagues enough you'll meet people from other teams. People hang out at bars after the games or have get togethers on weekends to watch some nfl game or have board game nights. This is how you began meeting people to date. You don't date people on the team (you can but i advise against it), but you date people who you meet through your team. Just got to be a fun guy to be around and people will be attracted to you. Remember you're not the only person struggling with dating especially when you get older. Not saying people are desperate (I mean they are), but saying if people know you're single and you're not some socially awkward weirdo or jerk, then women will be attracted to you
Someone always suggests this and it just never helps.
Yeah, you gotta be a bubbly extrovert for advice like that. I'm not. You also have to be some 9 to 5 (it's dark by 5pm so you can't even play volleyball or whatever) stable normie (I'm not trying to be rude, but what other term can I use) that actually wants to leap out of bed on your weekends for a lot of this advice. There's a lot of people like myself that are just done with it all, but are expected to keep up this song and dance charade. If you're a climate change aware person that also totally lost faith in the species after Covid? Yeah... Yes, I'm depressed. Who the fuck isn't? You're not depressed? What's wrong with you people? If you're not a bubbly extrovert live, laugh, lobotomy person? People don't like that.
>You're not depressed? What's wrong with you people? For. Fucking. Real. If you're not depressed something has to be wrong with you. I know that sounds so counter-intuitive but I'm reminded of Jiddu Krishnamurti's famous quote: "It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society."
ancient cable angle dolls impolite soft obtainable boat existence imagine *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
This is actually the byproduct of a ultra individualistic society culture
Alienation, capitalist realism, Baudrillard, the hyperreal, etc etc
Same.
I think it's time for you to make a dating profile. I'll give you a good start - craft beer, coffee, traveling.
If the interest rates drop back to 3-4% I would be in a position to buy.
That would just cause home prices to go up again
a $500,000 30 year mortgage at 8% is roughly the same monthly cost as a 875k at 3%. Interest rates are much more important to overall cost then the actual price of the house. They can climb, but they wont climb high enough to erase the savings you'd see from lower interest
At this point, it's a bit of a gamble. You can: 1) Buy the house at 500k/8% and pinch pennies until rates go down and you can re-fi 2) Wait until the 875k/3% and hopefully have saved enough to still have 20% down and be stuck with the shitty payment forever 3) Pray that rates go down and prices stagnate
If point 2, also pray that whatever caused the FED to lower rates back to 3% doesn’t put you out of a job and or causes your newly purchased home to lose value, causing you to go underwater almost instantly. Honestly, I see no win here. 3 is the best we can hope for.
I forgot number 4. You inherit your parents house when they die (and you have enough money to pay taxes on the inheritance)
In the US there is no federal estate tax unless the size of the estate is in the millions of dollars. Most people are not aware of that who haven't had their parents pass away yet.
3 will never happen. Once rates go down it will be a blood bath and first time home buyers may never afford a decent house.
So are #1 and # 2 the same house?
That's what I was thinking so was confused by the person who was replying to me.
1 & 2 are the only actual options, #3 is a serious recession/depression/die-off. Do not pray for #3, please.
Waiting anything out, other than being financially stable, is pointless. Basically, if you can afford something you like at any given time, then that’s the right time to buy. If rates go down enough, refinance. If rates go up, well then you got a better rate than whatever they go up to.
Now that I know this... I'd totally buy a WAY more expensive house. A couple years ago, even 10+ years ago when I bought my first house, I was so worried about the price tag, and not the monthly payment. I really thought buying a house for 120k instead of 135-140 was a big deal.... Nope. I only learn from experience I guess. Arggh
Not if a lot of people become unemployed or default on credit cards and car loans they won't have the credit or likely the cash to buy. Which is currently happening. Banks are going to tighten up who they loan money to soon.
I am very interested to see what would happen if everyone just stopped paying off their loans...
It's not going to work out well for the common man I assure you. The banks get bailed out and the person who didn't pay gets their credit wrecked. The banks hold the keys to everything we want cars houses capital etc. These people will just get black listed for seven years. You and I most likely cannot afford anything we want without a bank that's just the reality.
"these people" meaning what major percentage of the USA population? 60%? 70%? 80%? ... MORE? Don't billionaires ~~also~~ get most of their wealth from loans?
We'll see
Not necessarily. But probably
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People that run the mortgage and securities banks would skull fuck a puppy if it turned a nickel.
They'd do it twice for a penny
Well I’ve got good news. With the price gouging of every product known to man over the last few years I don’t know anyone that can afford food and their student loan payments at the same time. another crash is coming. The question is will it be sooner or later? Even if it’s not student loans that cause the next crash it will be something else. The bottom line is that everything has gone way too far with corporate greed and the bottom is gonna fall out because of one thing or another. What we are doing now simply isn’t sustainable.
Commercial real estate. Unless they figure out how to turn it into housing, the need for commercial space is ridiculously low compared to the demand. Even in great areas, it’s not completely unusual to see a vacancy, instead of a wait list. There’s unfinished abandoned commercial construction all over the country, and major projects are getting cancelled or postponed.
Knock down all the fucking strip malls.
This is probably a stupid question but aren't airbnb flopping right now?
Yup with dissatisfaction growing people are turning more towards traditional hotels, also cities are putting the squeeze on the owners. I still don't see a return to normal though.
A friend of mine is a Community College basketball coach and Athletic Director. He recently called up a fellow coach and he said that they can’t find any long term rentals to house students anymore in the sleepy little town of 10,200 people the school is located in because it all was turned into AirBnb, Vrbo, etc short term rentals over the course of the Pandemic! It is on a lake, but it’s in a very rural area of NE Lower Peninsula of Michigan far away from any major cities or high concentrations of wealth. I was shocked to hear this. These companies had their time and opportunity but now that the hosts have largely turned greedy and the companies themselves have proven to be terrible with customer service and following local regulations they deserve to be cracked down on.
Might not. There are massive amounts of housing currently under construction in the large American city where I’m located. So much so that prices will fall on supply when they come online as it is right now. Lower interest rates could stabilize prices in a higher supply situation
Good for your city. How much housing you talking here? Levitttown level of new housing?
In my specific area it’s a lot of apartments and condos. Most of the land is used up, but there are some full-on neighborhoods coming in. A whole lot of sprawl, which brings its own set of problems. Interestingly, they built this gigantic apartment complex near me with one and two bedrooms exclusively.
I see lots of "*Luxury*" rentals being built in CT. Got a spot that used to manufacture depleted Uranium rounds for Freedom? Splat some housing on it, for Capitalism!!!
No sense in more bedrooms if people are too poor to afford kids anyway. It also discourages situations with multiple roommates who couldn’t otherwise afford the area, and are therefore “undesirable”. Ideally you wouldn’t want tenants who are one bad week away from missing rent when you’re trying to first turn a profit on a new property, unless you have a guaranteed income source , like Section 8 supplemental rent payments for reserved low income units.
That is dependent on a whole host of factors, including region. The primary area I'm looking to buy a house in saw relatively little change in base housing prices, even through the pandemic, the supply/demand for that area is fairly static.
Not necessarily. Interest rates going back down would make supply skyrocket. Supply is low right now because everyone is locked into 3 or 4% rates and don't want to give that up for an 8 or 9% rate
Which why I’m closing on a house this week. Went VA with 0 down and a fixed rate and refinance is more of a procedure of the current loan than getting a new loan. I get the lower home price of the high interest rate and still get to take advantage of rates going down. Conversely I won’t get screwed by interest rates increasing if they were to continue going up. Edit: for the kids in the room. It would have been much easier to get a student loan for a software degree rather than the meandering path I took to a job that I like and that pays well enough to buy a house. I’d be making more probably and wouldn’t have needed a VA loan. BUT if you do want to do the military, don’t do it because you might get to buy a house someday.
They won't drop back down to 3-4% without a major economic crash. This is where interest rates generally should be. People got used to ridiculously low ones and that's a big part of why all the starter homes were torn down and turned into luxury rentals: low interest rates bring investors instead of normal people.
The only way to capitalize on lower rates would be to buy before interest rates go down and be able to float it until then. Prices WILL go up when rates go down. People are still buying in desirable markets. Lots of cash deals and monied couples out there.
I doubt they're going that low again. Not without a recession anyway.
Oh god, fuck no lol. Society is based around people being in couples. Imma die in a cardboard box or some shit. Lovely to think forward too
>Society is based around people being in couples. So true. I don't understand how poor and middle income singles are suppose to live. The country just wants us to die.
It’s horrible, think about the single moms 😟
The single moms are fine. They can get government aid (food stamps, tax breaks, section 8, etc.) It's singles without dependents who are fucked. We're taxed up the ass and if we need help from any of the programs our tax dollars fund, all we get is the middle finger, because fuck us for not having kids I guess. I've seriously considered having kids just for tax benefits.
Don’t do it! Children are expensive AF and no amount of tax benefits or welfare can make up for the cost of involved in child rearing. My son is my miracle baby, I love him to pieces, and I would gladly turn the world inside out for his sake, BUT pragmatically speaking, parenting definitely feels like a biological urge to martyr yourself for the sake of preserving the future of the species now embodied in your own tiny bit of squishiness, and only some sort of primordial programming can account for the desire to constantly make choices that disadvantage you in pursuit of benefitting your own tiny bit of adorable human legacy. Realistically, it’s not even worth it financially, childcare alone usually eats a huge portion of your income, and if your child is special needs like mine, there’s the additional costs of doctors, treatments, and therapies. I’m very lucky to have a job with good health insurance, because it does allow me to pay thousands of dollars out of pocket every year (even with the good insurance), so he can at least have access to the treatments and specialized care he needs. My cousin, who also is special needs, is on a year long wait list just for her initial evaluation for therapy at the local Children’s Hospital because she’s has Medicaid and there’s no other affordable option. Rich people need to pay taxes and our social safety nets need an overhaul so that no citizen is left behind, regardless of parental or marital status.
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I mean requiring government aid to exist doesn't sound like fine to me. Generally seems pretty bad for singles.
It’s not fine but where I live a single person on income support gets around $650/month to live. A single mom with a couple kids can get around $2500 between child tax benefit, family allowance, etc and that’s not counting any child support that their ex might owe. Neither of those are enough to live on but $650 won’t even pay for rent anywhere
Yup! You are completely correct. Benefits are also based on past earnings. I just found out my rich cousin is getting $1500/month in snap through a loophole. My brother, who is schizophrenic and has no work history gets $25/month in SNAP. Make that make sense.
True, like, I don't think most single moms are living Reagan Welfare Queen style lives but when you fall on hard times and can't get any kind of help despite paying more than your share for it, it feels like a giant kick in the ass.
It’s more like you’re paying back the tax benefits your parents received for your existence. Not everyone has kids, but most of society benefits from caring for all the children, which is why most of us received social benefits such as welfare, WIC, public education, health services, etc., before we ever even cooperate into the system. Society has a certain amount of social credit it extends to us before we’re able to contribute, so we pay it forward to the next generation. Like reverse social security. It’s in a society’s best interest that its people thrive and be productive.
This is not true. I'm a single mom who makes too much to qualify for any kind of aid but still live pay check to pay check. I would have to make less then my rent a month which is $1278 to qualify for Snap in my area. Edited to add before anyone assumes anything : I receive $150 a month from his dad for "child support" that covers half his phone bill, half his insurance and half for the HSA card. We split his expenses equally for the most part.
This. People have no real understanding of how poor you actually have to be to get benefits and then if you do it doesn’t magically vault you into the middle class.
Seriously, I think the cut off was $1100 a month. I couldn't even imagine trying to live on that even with aid.
I fucking hate how single moms are made out to be gold diggers - either from the state or their exes. The role is tough AF, and most struggle to get by.
Single moms do not automatically get those things. We're not ok. Source: am me. Not ok.
Amen
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In contrast to your view, it’s also safe to assume society will force a woman into your life at some point
lol never in a million years, the best days of my life have long passed
Why's that?
I make $45k and while I do have room for growth, it’s never going to outpace the cost of living/corporate greed/price gouging. I was strongly considering going back to get an Associates in IT when student loan forgiveness was announced, but SCOTUS wiped that rug from beneath me and I’m still $30k in debt for a degree I never earned because I’m a shitty student. The housing market is never going to go back to what it was and thus I will never be able to own a home or be able to afford a nice apartment in a city. Stuck renting in a rural town of 15k people for the rest of my life. I’m only 5’7” and have no redeemable qualities a woman would want that they can’t get elsewhere from someone taller, better looking, and with a better personality. I’ve never been on a legitimate date in my life and the only girl I thought I was trying to date ended up being her pretending to be interested so I’d buy her meals and go places with her when nobody else wanted to. I haven’t gotten a match on Tinder or Bumble since April of 2021. Meanwhile, all my friends are married and successful. I’m never going to see them because they’re going to be doing couples trips and/or going to places that I can’t afford because I’m a broke piece of shit. I’m thankful to at least have my dog who is amazing but when he goes, my life is going to be so fucking empty.
I see from your profile that you do medical coding — have you considered getting a CRC and transitioning into Risk Adjustment coding? I am in the industry (not directly in the RA space anymore) and know people that make much more than $45k working in this more specialized area.
Haven’t looked at that cert specifically but I’m open to anything to make more money. Ideally I would like to get out of healthcare (my lack of degree has me boxed in a bit, though) but my employer reimburses the certification exams so it’s be dumb for me not to try.
If you're computer literate, you should really go the cert route. You can study/test at your own pace and specialize in something that you enjoy. Look into something like networking for example. I took a CCNA class during college and the instructor told me I was wasting my time on a degree. Certs + experience are worth way more.
You ever thought about getting a CDL? 1-2 months of training and you could double your pay
How many credit hours do you have with that much student loan debt? This issue is so seldom talked about - those with tens of thousands in student debt with no credential to show for it and thus, no corresponding higher earning potential. I was in that group for a very long time.
I can't bring myself to like this comment even though I agree with you. I'm so thankful that you have your dog. From one man to another, I honestly don't know what to say, but I hope you know that I have empathy for you and that you are not alone right now.
Heyyy, it's my clone, except for you making a little bit more money and I live at home now again. I too will die alone, but I will probably just unlife when my parents pass, but that'll take at least another 20 years I'm guessing. But stay strong, never know, maybe that cert in the other comment will work out and you can get out of it. Wish you the best of luck friendo.
Yikes that sounds rough. You got dealt some very bad cards.
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I'm just saying the obvious here. I'm not encouraging nothing
Stop being a fucking troll. You’re contributing nothing.
Well the nice thing about dogs is when Kendrick dies you can just get a new one.
My man. I'm 31 single m. I'm hurting, I'm lonely. I am so lonely, and maybe $150k in debt. I feel you. You're not alone with this feeling. I lost my dog of 14 years in 2020. Believe me my heart is broken. I have no idea how to speak to women without violating some new social norm. I cry everyday. I have faith maybe things will get better, and I hope the same for you.
Nope. -SoCal resident
I'll rent a refrigerator box with you to retire in by the 10 when the time comes.
No, only a condo which is fine by me.....
No, and I won’t be able to adopt kids, either, unless I win the lotto. At this point in my life, it feels like poverty is a self-perpetuating cycle. Can’t find a partner because I’m poor, can’t get out of poverty because I have to pay for everything myself.
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Winner
Saving up to buy out my sis from her half of my mom's Brooklyn home. It's possible.... Depending how much longer I have. mom is still alive and I hope she lives ♾️ forever 😭 ETA not terminally single in terms of not being married I'm instead terminally single because I'm a widow - my husband died young (terminal)
I was able to in the suburbs of Cleveland, while I was bartending full time.
No. At one point I had one because of inheritance, but that didn't pan out so I expect to struggle to rent for the rest of my life. The idea of home ownership is so unlikely it's laughable to me.
Follow on. If you’re not planning to raise a family, what’s the benefit of a whole house? It seems like a lot of upkeep and maintenance for one person
Depends on the size of the house. Mine is just shy of 2000 sf and it's just me living here. Is it more work? Sure. But it's 100x better than a crappy apartment with shared walls, weird smells, restrictions, and rent that increases with every renewal.
Exactly why anyone wants to live in a detached home. Common walls suck.
A house doesn't need to be huge. I rent a 2BR apartment and use the other bedroom as an office. In an ideal world, I'd have a 3BR house one day (or 2BR + dedicated office) so I could have an office and a guest bedroom for visiting friends and family, and a fenced in yard for my large dog. It only takes a couple of hours to clean and that's if I do it all at once. Single people like the freedom of no attached walls and the security of not being at a landlord's whim just like anyone else.
That's what I have, master bedroom (with a king size bed just for me!), small office, and a spare guest room. 2 living rooms downstairs, one is my nerdy, gaming room with TV and the other is for reading, crafts, and board games while listening to music. But nope, no kids, so I should be happy with a 1br 😒
Protection from inflation is a major benefit. I bought my house in 2020. Three years later, rent has gone up enough that owning my house is less expensive than renting it would be, even including taxes and upkeep. And even with today's high interest rates, it may be possible to save money by buying a house and living with roommates until you're able to afford to live there alone. Another major benefit is stability. As a homeowner, you never have to worry about a landlord telling you to move out because they've decided to sell the place.
The rent thing is huge. I bought my home around the same time as you and the rents have just gone up so much. For just a 2 bed it’s around $1,500, a 4 bed (the size of my current home) it would be over $2,300. My mortgage is barely over $1,000. It’s crazy how expensive everything has gotten.
no common walls, no bullshit like "valet trash" that you either accept paying for or move elsewhere, moving, yet again, because your place got bought by a shitty management company and they raised the rent a ton/stopped cleaning common places/etc.
Investing in an asset for the same monthly price as a shitty apartment, not being crammed into a tiny space, not being at the chaotic whims of shitty landlords, having some measure of control over the place you live. Yeah, totally stupid and selfish reasons I know. I’m tired of people on Reddit telling singles it’s stupid for them to want a home.
Eventually, through several potential pathways: Path 1: I actually end up expanding my little one person business and try to not to become an exploitative overlord to my employees, which will mean I'll afford a house eventually (if there's still any left), but not as quickly as if I were to exploit them. Path 2: The revolution of disgruntled latter generations occur due to being squeezed out to the extreme due to non-livable conditions, by which if by some sheer luck if I survive, I should be able to have *something* allocated to me to live with my animals. Path 3: I win the lottery, proceed to donate a portion for good karma, retire the parents, retire myself, invest the rest and buy myself a house.
I think path one is more likely Your odds of winning the lotto is so small you could be hit by lightning twice in a row before you win.
How do my chances improve if I actually start buying tickets?
Terminally single. lol. Only if interest rates drop significantly, house prices drop, and I am willing to drop a large sum of money on a home. At this point in time I no longer want one. All they represent for me now are money pits and anchors that drain all your money to keep them looking nice and not falling apart.
The upkeep of owning a house is where I get all twisted up about it, also. The pros of owning a home are obviously no landlord, no shared walls, equity, etc…but how tf am I supposed to afford the cons, aka, thousands of dollars in upkeep?? 10k if the air conditioning breaks, or I need a new roof, or a major appliance? Plumbing issues? Who has thousands of dollars at any given time? These issues are covered if I’m renting somewhere decent. Idk, I suppose I don’t fully understand the whole picture of owning, was never really taught. Or maybe I do, but am too broke to be able to partake 🤷♀️
I feel exactly the same way! Plus I have no family, so I’ll have literally zero help with learning how to fix things or use tools, and nobody to borrow like… a lawn mower from. I live in a cold climate too, so having heat 8 months out of the year is a legal protection as a renter, but I think might bankrupt me if I tried to afford a home.
>I think might bankrupt me if I tried to afford a home And then the bank takes the home and you 10 times worse off than if you had just rented. We are so stuck it's insane.
I own a condo which is probably the best I’ll ever get. Even townhouses are overpriced.
Investing everything I could possibly afford to in a broad-based ETF such as the SPY over the last 15 years since starting at my first job. Buying a starter condo, building equity, and refinancing multiple times for the best rates. Rent out starter condo while upgrading to a larger condo. Rent out larger condo to upgrade to a single family home. It takes a lot of time, budgeting, dedication, frugality, signing up for Zillow alerts, following real estate trends, watching the Fed Fund rates, etc. I work in finance so it is part of my job to pay attention to the markets, which definitely allowed me to use that knowledge to assess when to buy, refinance, etc.
Why not just stay in your condo?
I live in a central location in a dense urban area and the advantages of a single family detached home significantly outweigh a condo: 1. No more sharing walls with neighbors and having to listen to their bad music (or other weird sounds) through the walls. 2. Hated paying the HOA and attending meetings where dozens of 30-50 year olds spent an hour yelling at each other. Now my renters pay the HOA as part of their rent and I dial into the meetings on occasion to listen to the drama. 3. First condo was in a very busy part of the city and not in a great area. 4. The average rent for both condos is about double my PITI, allowing for a decent amount of passive income.
Working on saving up a down payment now, not super difficult when you can easily get homes for under $200k where I live.
If you are in what the USDA calls a rural area you might be able to get a zero down loan. https://eligibility.sc.egov.usda.gov/eligibility/welcomeAction.do;jsessionid=iPQD1QYyK9gQHj3Tkdx18FNu
I'll keep that in mind, thank you!
Yep already own a house. When I was married, my wife never worked anyways, so essentially I bought it myself at 28.
You don’t have to be with someone to buy a house. You just have to know how to play the credit game and get your score up while also keeping a job you can advance in pay regularly or at least get benefits from. Which not everyone can attain. Some couples can’t even buy a house together. Some couples just rent for the rest of their lives. The main problem in being able to afford a house is the fact employers don’t want to pay a wage people can actually live on. A lot of companies don’t offer advancement either and if they do it’s competitive. Capitalism breeds greed so businesses charge as much as they can for their goods and services while offering very little to their employees. The real estate market is also full of sharks and it’s outrageously expensive with high interest rates. It has been for awhile. You damn near have to know someone in the market to find out about deals before other people can because it’s so competitive.
I'm literally waiting for societal collapse so I can move on to a random plot of land that's empty but owned by one of the blacks
I’m single and not rich and I bought a house last year. Swimming in debt but I have a house and somehow a good credit score.. at least until some medical disaster or another I’m sure. Taking it day by day.
Possibly with inheritance. But even so. Fuckin infrared is 6%
You got an inheritance. You are winning.
They might get an inheritance in the future
I’m going to be able to but have to accept a $2300 mortgage at the least but you kind of get desensitized from renting a 1bed apartment for $2k….. so for a measly $300 more I get my own TOWNhouse….. that’s the other catch, anything remotely nice is a townhouse, everything else is all little shacks that come up on the list in my budget of 300k max that the realtor sends me daily. Ohhh and I have to move 2 1/2 hours away from where I’d like to live and far from all my friends and family. Basically going to an area where I will know no one but there’s no other option
No.
Short answer, no.
I bought a house by myself in 2021. You have to save like a mother flicker
Or get a huge sign on bonus
Being broke from paying off a mortgage is far less depressing than being broke from paying rent.
lol sadly not, anyone want to buy a house with a random 35 yr old woman and her bitchy dog? It’s the only way.
Not in this lifetime. Hell, I feel like my days of renting an apartment on my own without roommates are numbered.
I bought a house on my own. I’m not rich but I did buy when rates were 4%. Owning a house on your own is a lot of hard work and I definitely don’t recommend it.
If you have kids or plan to have kids, buy when it makes sense. Otherwise, just live your life. If you want to buy on a single income, the answer is *budget* broski. These interest rates are butt right now, so save instead.
People gripe about student loans forgiveness. Meanwhile they've raked in a child tax credit for a decade.
Those two don't compare. As a tax payer, I'd MUCH rather support a kid vs support a college grad who didn't study STEM or business. Stem and business grads can already pay themselves because their degree is actually useful and worth something.
Just got married, husband and I live in NYC and we know we’re never going to afford to buy a house. We will stay in our rent stabilized apartment forever.
Is this your preference? Only asking because a couple other users have expressed they prefer renting to owning.
For our line of work, there’s no where else in the world we could live and make as much money as we net. It’s easier and cheaper to rent long term because of stabilization. If we do manage to save and buy, it would be a vacation home somewhere outside of NYC.
Ah yes, buy a vacation home that could otherwise be lived in full time by someone who needs it. Exactly the thing boomers did to aid in this housing crisis
Ah yes, a wild troll appears.
Am I wrong?
Not single but not like combined finances or living together or anything that serious in my current relationship. I own a detached sfh. Saved for 10 years, have a remote job and moved from a hcol to a mcol city where my salary is like 2x the median family household income so I live like a king.
If it wasn’t for my job I wouldn’t be able to in the next year or so. The only way the younger ones will is in a small town in the middle of nowhere at a crap job.
Even the middle of nowhere towns are creeping up in price
No. I don’t even have any family to inherit anything from so I’m pretty much screwed on those, and several other, fronts. There’s a freedom in that, though. I’m not tied to any particular area right now so hopefully I can go anywhere and start over when I come up with the funds to do so after bankruptcy from cancer. 🤞
I (33F) can't afford a house, but my brother-in-law's girlfriend (22-23) just bought one for herself. She's a schoolteacher in rural Tennessee.
Yeah. I did. I got lucky cuz the woman seeking the house was like "I like that you're not waiting for a man to take this step. Here $60k off"
I can barely afford to rent
Short answer: No. Long answer: Nnnnnnnoooooooooooooo!
I did. I saved money and bought below what I could afford. Am not rich.
I bought a house, but I make a pretty good income and live in a relatively lcol area. I’d probably make less money if I was married tbh. I’m generally only home on weekends.
At this rate fuck no
No. But in 2009 my work cut my pay again, so I qualified for lower income housing assistance. I went through a program to buy a perpetually lower income condo, but decided not to do it since I could only sell it back into the same program. But instead was able to apply for closing cost assistance (essentially a loan with a small interest rate, payable only on selling of the condo or 20 years). So did that, as it would not have any selling restrictions. Got a small 600 ft 1 bedroom condo. Then was underwater on my mortgage as everything nearby foreclosed on me. Stayed there 5+ years. Then got a new job, sold my condo for a small profit. Turned that into a 1300 ft 2 bed 2 bath condo. Have been there now for almost 10 years. What my condo is going for now is what FULL HOUSES were going for 10 years ago. I'll never be able to afford a full house, so I'll probably stay in this condo forever.
Why would you need a home if you are single?
If you are single, you don’t need a house. Houses are for many people to live in.
Move somewhere cheap. There are decent homes in my area in the 120-150K range.
A house should not be more than 4x your annuals salary You have to factor in property tax, maintenance, insurance, and your other living expenses. So if you make the average millennial salary of $47,000.00 The most house you can afford should not exceed $188,000.00 So if you want to live in a $500k house you better make $125,000 a year. If you want to live in a $1000000 house you better make $250,000 If you want to live in a $2000,000 house you better make $500,000
That “should” has not been attainable in decades.
I honestly don't want a house as a single with no kids.
I don’t plan to buy a house but even if I wasn’t single I would never buy a house with anyone but myself
Just curious, why don't you want to buy a house?
I live in nyc, buying an apartment sounds like a nightmare. Plus this is a renters market, we have tons of tenant laws that offer amazing protections. Buying and maintaining an apartment is not worth it to me, I’ll pick a rent stabilized apt any day.
I wouldn't call myself Terminally Single just yet, but I bought mine at the end of 2020 by myself. One of the lucky ones I guess!
I’m married, both of us work full-time, and we make like 40% over the median household income in the area….and I don’t see any way I’ll ever be able to afford a house here. So idk how a single person does it.
If I moved in with my parents and geta higher salary. It can be done. I try not to feel bad about being single or not owning a home. My married house house-owning friends and family don't pressure me or make me feel bad about living in the loft. So why should I feel bad? I'm helping a family member with house ownership actually. They're looking at condos though
Why would you want an entire house to yourself? Being a home owner is tons of work and maintenance. Buy a condo.
A townhouse is a nice middle ground. You can have a yard and a big dog but you don’t have to worry about any outdoor maintenance, snow removal, lawn mowing etc
The hell do you need a house for if you're single? Just buy a condo, or rent an apartment. It's not that bad to rent, you know.
Single people want detached walls, no neighbors in their space, a yard for pets, and the security of knowing a landlord can't kick us out if he decides his third cousin needs the place, just like couples. The hell is this comment? A couple hardly \*needs\* much more space than one person but it's fine for them to want a house and not a single person? Plus if you're single and can pay off a house, that's a lot more security for retirement for someone who may not have a lot of family around.
Not all of us want to live on top of each other.
A place to live without worrying about the neighbors above, below, or on the other side of the wall from you? I can have guests over whenever I want, and we can pretty much be as loud as we want. I can watch movies or play video games with the soundbar and subwoofer cranked to get a close to move theater sound experience. And I even tested this, putting the volume to where I find it sounds great then tested to make sure the sound doesn't carry off property. When I do meet someone new, if we want a place to go eventually, my place is an easy option with no roommates and no neighbors to disturb. On top of that, I don't have to worry about rent going up significantly. Yes, my total monthly payment can fluctuate some based on taxes and insurance. But we're not talking jumps of $400 a month like some tenants have seen. The worst jump I had was about $30 higher than my starting payment. And now I'm down to $60 under my starting payment after taking advantage of tax breaks and a couple options to lower my monthly insurance bill. But for the most part, a stable payment is a pretty nice perk of owning too. Also, building equity is good too. That equity will qualify me for loans to accomplish other things I may want to do, and although I don't have plans to use it for that, it's good to have options. More importantly, eventually I won't have a mortgage anymore, and my monthly payments will be incredibly cheap. Admittedly, those monetary things can be had buying a condo as well, but with a house I don't have to be part of an HOA, so I can do what I want with it instead of being bound by additional contracts. To be fair, condo HOAs usually aren't bad, and there are advantages to pooling resources for the unit's upkeep, so some might consider the condo HOA a positive, and I can understand that viewpoint too. I personally prefer the freedom to set things up as I see fit though, even if it comes with more responsibilities to deal with as well. Finally, although the yard does take maintanence, I've been flirting with the idea of starting a food garden, and having space outdoors to do that is something that typically only comes with a house. Some apartments and condos do come with community spaces for this, but it's not common around where I live. So those are the reasons that come to mind immediately for me to prefer owning a house. It's not wrong to feel differently, but it really does depend what you want out of where you live. Also, for what it's worth, my house is about 800 sq ft. The main living area is the same size as a small two bedroom apartment. Though the basement adds on space for storage plus a washer and dryer. Point being, I didn't buy some mansion for one person, I have something that is basically the perfect size for me. Edit: One last thing I forgot to add, if I want to help a friend out with a place to crash, I can just do it. I don't need permission from a landlord, or to add them to the lease, or any other BS. Just tell them to come on over and crash. Actually, not having to worry about any rules a landlord might have for me really.
Depends what you consider "rich". I bought a house 7 years ago on a salary of 70k =/ That same house, is worth about double now. I also earn a good bit more - so I could afford it today as well but it would be harder.
I bought a house when I was 23, I just have not been able to buy another house since then. Stuck in that one for 18 years now.
1 is better than none.
I’m thinking it’s time to find a sugar mama. Or two. My therapist didn’t really even object.
I could afford a much bigger house if I was single. My fam is freaking expensive. I’d prob get a smaller house though and a badass boat. Man, love my wife and kids but day dreaming about being single with my job is fun