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The article doesn't really touch on two very key facts. 1 - When I grew up in the 90's all I heard from my rich business owners were to buy real estate. The va

The article doesn't really touch on two very key facts. 1 - When I grew up in the 90's all I heard from my rich business owners were to buy real estate. The value always goes up and its a good investment. This isn't true anymore with the crash and younger people don't see real estate as a worthwhile, long term investment. As such, they're not looking at paying for something for so long and not getting anything out of it. Same thing for the "equity" part of this argument. Those same business owners pounded into my head the idea that my money when I was paying rent wasn't going towards anything and I would never have any value in a rental like I would a house or town home that I owned. 2 - The transient nature of the younger generations. When I was growing up, your life arc was pretty well established. Go to college, get a nice job in your career field, get married, buy a house, have some kids. This just isn't the same plan most younger kids have. My nephew is 21 and has been "couch surfing" for years. He has no aspiration to get married, or buy a house. He pretty much lives day-to-day and gets by with help from his friends. His friends are the same way. They change apartments about every 6 months. Different parts of the city, in order to get closer to where the "action" is they say. With a far more transient, younger population, it makes sense their not going to buy houses and settle down. We've spent decades talking about how we want to have everything available wherever we are, we WANT to be a mobile society and culture. This younger generation has simply taken it to its logical conclusion. No need for a house when I can just crash with my homies. No need for a tv, house, car since we've developed an entire culture to handle that and give it you on your phone, tablet, laptop wherever you are. Car? We have Uber and Lyft. No house? We have AirBNB, This makes sense on a bunch of different levels tbh.

2muchcoffeeman 11y ago
Are leases so short there that they can just move every few months?
- at-fates-hands 11y ago
  Closer to 6 months, but yes. They put an ad on craigslist or some of the other smaller publications like the kind you see at bars. They pool their money, get a small ad that talks about taking over a lease near some hip part of town. My nephew said within a week or so they're flooded with responses, They work out the paperwork with the landlord and they're on to the next place.
matwood 11y ago
>1 - When I grew up in the 90's all I heard from my rich business owners were to buy real estate. The value always goes up and its a good investment. This isn't true anymore with the crash and younger people don't see real estate as a worthwhile, long term investment. As such, they're not looking at paying for something for so long and not getting anything out of it. If you had listened and done it smartly you would be a rich person. I have multiple friends who followed that advice and are now landlords doing quite well. When the real estate crash happened they were ecstatic and bought more homes to rent either from distressed sellers or tax sales. Of course doing it smartly means not over extending, buying smartly (buy a duplex or quadplex and live in one while saving for buying the next place), etc...

2muchcoffeeman 11y ago

Are leases so short there that they can just move every few months?

at-fates-hands 11y ago
Closer to 6 months, but yes. They put an ad on craigslist or some of the other smaller publications like the kind you see at bars. They pool their money, get a small ad that talks about taking over a lease near some hip part of town. My nephew said within a week or so they're flooded with responses, They work out the paperwork with the landlord and they're on to the next place.

matwood 11y ago

>1 - When I grew up in the 90's all I heard from my rich business owners were to buy real estate. The value always goes up and its a good investment. This isn't true anymore with the crash and younger people don't see real estate as a worthwhile, long term investment. As such, they're not looking at paying for something for so long and not getting anything out of it. If you had listened and done it smartly you would be a rich person. I have multiple friends who followed that advice and are now landlords doing quite well. When the real estate crash happened they were ecstatic and bought more homes to rent either from distressed sellers or tax sales. Of course doing it smartly means not over extending, buying smartly (buy a duplex or quadplex and live in one while saving for buying the next place), etc...