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Promote yourself and your town. I'm looking for a new home in the same way as the OP, and my best hope is that a few dozen like-minded nerds will gentrify a sma

Promote yourself and your town. I'm looking for a new home in the same way as the OP, and my best hope is that a few dozen like-minded nerds will gentrify a small town, because they have been so undercut by cities of late.

neilv 4y ago
> a few dozen like-minded nerds will gentrify a small town How does one do this in such a way that it's welcomed by people who already make their home there? (I can imagine a lot of ways this could go work out badly, but don't immediately know a good approach.)
- solar-ice 4y ago
  You don't. Gentrifying a place pretty inherently means removing at least some of the people who live there. Why would the people of a small town go for that? Unless you're planning on subsidising the existing residents' lives forever as rent goes up. If you have the money and influence to "gentrify" somewhere... just build a new planned community in the middle of nowhere. The US has plenty of nowhere.
  - ternaryoperator 4y ago
    > Gentrifying a place pretty inherently means removing at least some of the people who live there. Not necessarily. You could buy a house that's empty.
    - solar-ice 4y ago
      And when the rent for the neighbour gets raised double because you started attracting people willing to pay double to move there...?
      - yebyen 4y ago
        > attracting people willing to pay double to move there What active behavior are we actually talking about? Making the place nicer? I feel like there's got to be actual some breathing room between "savior of the murder capital Pine Bluff" and "big bad real estate investor gentrifying people out of their homes."
      - pc86 4y ago
        I don't know if you've ever lived in a place like Pine Bluff, but most people own. It's 52% in the city[0] and I imagine quite a bit higher (70-80% wouldn't surprise me) in the more rural areas. And keep in mind the way these statistics are calculated, all the vacant buildings count as part of that 48%, so the number of renters is likely ~1/3 or less the number of owners. So unlike places with very high rents but also where it seems like 3/4 of all buildings are rented out, most people in Pine Bluff would be objectively better off if rents doubled overnight with corresponding increases to the economy and local services. To be blunt, if you're renting you have no claim to the property or lodging beyond the term of the lease. That's the entire point. I do believe human beings have a right to housing, but you do not have the right to live in someone else's house if they don't want you there. [0] https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/pinebluffcityarkansas https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/pinebluffcityarkansas
  - juve1996 4y ago
    > Why would the people of a small town go for that? Because people are leaving in droves, only old people there are dying off, kids moved to better places, and the economy is dead? > If you have the money and influence to "gentrify" somewhere... just build a new planned community in the middle of nowhere. The US has plenty of nowhere. Seems like a waste of resources. The US has had countless migrations within its borders during its existence. Why should we force people not to settle in places with dire economic circumstances and almost no future without outside influx?
    - staticautomatic 4y ago
      Yeah but the ones who remain are (voluntarily or involuntarily) the most committed.
  - ltbarcly3 4y ago
    Lol, what? Here is how gentrification works: Nobody gets removed, they just have to leave. It's a subtle distinction but that's how it happens. Poor people don't own anything. Their furniture is mostly stacks of junk that is so bad that it would be hard or impossible to get someone to accept it for free (this is very nearly a tautology, since the poor person got this furniture for free to begin with, and it's was so bad when they got it that nobody else would give anything for it). They rent. At some point property values are high enough the landlord (or his heir) decides to sell. At the end of the lease, the property is no longer for rent. That's the end of it. However, keep in mind that poor people tend to move every few years regardless. They are right on the edge of falling out of the population of working people who are self sufficient, so it is very common that they end up being evicted, abusing drugs or alcohol (even if just for awhile), or just having too many kids to be able to afford childcare so they can keep working to support themselves. Properties no longer being for rent in some neighborhood has almost no effect on any given poor person who lived in that neighborhood as they are one step above transient anyway. This isn't an apology, it's just a more accurate description of what happens, I've seen it first hand from the low prestige side of things when I was young.
    - solar-ice 4y ago
      Ehh. Being kicked out of your home is being removed, even if it's perfectly legal. Fixed-term rental contracts are nearly entirely immoral imo. And while an accurate depiction of how this affects the people who were barely hanging on in the first place, there is a later step, where people who /have/ been renting all their lives in one area find themselves unable to continue to pay rent. You're not necessarily a homeowner if you're not at constant risk of homelessness. I've seen this while squatting; our neighbours were people who had lived in the same community for 70 years, and their option once the landlord had decided to tear the building down and replace it with "luxury apartments" was far away from everyone they had known all their lives. There were several similar stories in the area.
      - ltbarcly3 4y ago
        I think it's an interesting moral question: How much are you responsible for someone else's failure to plan ahead or foresee consequences? What are the consequences if we make you responsible for other people for their entire life just because you have some economic interaction with them? I think if you make renting someone an apartment a lifelong obligation to provide them with housing at approximately that cost then only a fool would ever rent out an apartment. The supply of apartments to rent would go to approximately 0. One strange consequence of this would be that the price of housing would plummet as a result as all the landlords left the market. When you went to buy a condo, instead of competing with landlords and money launderers you would only be bidding against other people who want to live in the apartment. I saw this first hand at the GHI housing co-op in Maryland, buying a unit there was dramatically below market cost because they did not allow anyone to live in units apart from owners.
- notatoad 4y ago
  Give them money. Directly or not. If you're a rich person moving into a poor town, the only way to not piss off the locals is to make them richer. If you can make the whole town richer, you'll be welcomed. Whatever portion of the locals that you don't make richer will hate you. If you don't want to piss off the locals, and you don't want to employ the locals, this is a very expensive plan.
  - Eupraxias 4y ago
    Why do you think they won't take your money and still hate you out of town? That's what I have seen.
    - pc86 4y ago
      Where have you seen that?
      - Eupraxias 4y ago
        Rural Vermont. The story is worthy of a screenplay. Small town starts to tax a family for the commercial water line in a general store that closed in the 60's, that happens to be on the property, because, small town. Family has visions of a B&B, vineyard, wedding venue. Everything down the drain in the end, because lawyers are expensive. Still there to this day: worn out stencil on the window of the 'general store'. "Sorry, we closed in 1968".
        notatoad 4y ago
        giving the town tax money isn't going to do it. you need to make the people in the town richer, and most of the people aren't going to see a dollar of that tax money. at least, not directly or in the short term.
        Eupraxias 4y ago
        The family in this situation had business plans that would have done just that, (B&B and a wedding venue), in a town of 300 where there is only a restaurant (catering) and a general store (everything else). The family sourced and bought everything not just locally, but from the town and surrounding farms (all dairy, meat, and produce) The tax was imposed to get the family out of the town, and it worked - the family is not rich. In the end, they had to sell their family home (which had been in the family since the 1930's) and leave (which they did). They were taxed out because the family is notoriously progressive, and the town is very much the opposite. There was cultural friction. Keep in mind that this was 20 years ago. These were very polite 60's era hippies, all college-edumacated and everything - and the (very small, very tight) town didn't want them in it. The town hall imposed a (crazy) tax, and they had to leave. Depending on where you are, some value preserving a local culture over 'getting richer'.
- AussieWog93 4y ago
  I mean, simplest way would be to build a plant that creates hundreds of well-paying jobs. Companies do this all the time.
tacitusarc 4y ago
I’m sure you didn’t intend it this way, but this comment comes across as incredibly arrogant and unfeeling.
- newshorts 4y ago
  Was going to say something similar. Having grown up in a small idyllic town, there was beauty in the slow struggle to live there. OP would do well to try and learn the culture before seeking to change it. There’s value beyond “cheaper houses” and “craft beer” in these places.
  - symlinkk 4y ago
    By “the culture” are you referring to the high murder rate?
  - le-mark 4y ago
    As someone from a small town in a rural area, can you expand on what values you have in mind? What I saw was grinding poverty, bad schools, bottom tier education, and rampant drug abuse. Coincidentally the novel/film Winter’s Bone author portrayed this area, north Arkansas and southern Missouri.
    - telesilla 4y ago
      The excellent serial podcast S*Town did a great job too, on exploring these themes. https://stownpodcast.org/ https://stownpodcast.org/
  - pc86 4y ago
    I grew up in a small town, too. Some are better than others. There doesn't seem to be any redeeming quality to Pine Bluff.
- 55555 4y ago
  To you (and others), but not to everyone.
aaaaaaaaaaab 4y ago
>a few dozen like-minded nerds will gentrify a small town Sounds like a sure plan to get your tires slashed, if not your head bashed.

neilv 4y ago

> a few dozen like-minded nerds will gentrify a small town How does one do this in such a way that it's welcomed by people who already make their home there? (I can imagine a lot of ways this could go work out badly, but don't immediately know a good approach.)

solar-ice 4y ago
You don't. Gentrifying a place pretty inherently means removing at least some of the people who live there. Why would the people of a small town go for that? Unless you're planning on subsidising the existing residents' lives forever as rent goes up. If you have the money and influence to "gentrify" somewhere... just build a new planned community in the middle of nowhere. The US has plenty of nowhere.
- ternaryoperator 4y ago
  > Gentrifying a place pretty inherently means removing at least some of the people who live there. Not necessarily. You could buy a house that's empty.
  - solar-ice 4y ago
    And when the rent for the neighbour gets raised double because you started attracting people willing to pay double to move there...?
    - yebyen 4y ago
      > attracting people willing to pay double to move there What active behavior are we actually talking about? Making the place nicer? I feel like there's got to be actual some breathing room between "savior of the murder capital Pine Bluff" and "big bad real estate investor gentrifying people out of their homes."
    - pc86 4y ago
      I don't know if you've ever lived in a place like Pine Bluff, but most people own. It's 52% in the city[0] and I imagine quite a bit higher (70-80% wouldn't surprise me) in the more rural areas. And keep in mind the way these statistics are calculated, all the vacant buildings count as part of that 48%, so the number of renters is likely ~1/3 or less the number of owners. So unlike places with very high rents but also where it seems like 3/4 of all buildings are rented out, most people in Pine Bluff would be objectively better off if rents doubled overnight with corresponding increases to the economy and local services. To be blunt, if you're renting you have no claim to the property or lodging beyond the term of the lease. That's the entire point. I do believe human beings have a right to housing, but you do not have the right to live in someone else's house if they don't want you there. [0] https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/pinebluffcityarkansas https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/pinebluffcityarkansas
- juve1996 4y ago
  > Why would the people of a small town go for that? Because people are leaving in droves, only old people there are dying off, kids moved to better places, and the economy is dead? > If you have the money and influence to "gentrify" somewhere... just build a new planned community in the middle of nowhere. The US has plenty of nowhere. Seems like a waste of resources. The US has had countless migrations within its borders during its existence. Why should we force people not to settle in places with dire economic circumstances and almost no future without outside influx?
  - staticautomatic 4y ago
    Yeah but the ones who remain are (voluntarily or involuntarily) the most committed.
- ltbarcly3 4y ago
  Lol, what? Here is how gentrification works: Nobody gets removed, they just have to leave. It's a subtle distinction but that's how it happens. Poor people don't own anything. Their furniture is mostly stacks of junk that is so bad that it would be hard or impossible to get someone to accept it for free (this is very nearly a tautology, since the poor person got this furniture for free to begin with, and it's was so bad when they got it that nobody else would give anything for it). They rent. At some point property values are high enough the landlord (or his heir) decides to sell. At the end of the lease, the property is no longer for rent. That's the end of it. However, keep in mind that poor people tend to move every few years regardless. They are right on the edge of falling out of the population of working people who are self sufficient, so it is very common that they end up being evicted, abusing drugs or alcohol (even if just for awhile), or just having too many kids to be able to afford childcare so they can keep working to support themselves. Properties no longer being for rent in some neighborhood has almost no effect on any given poor person who lived in that neighborhood as they are one step above transient anyway. This isn't an apology, it's just a more accurate description of what happens, I've seen it first hand from the low prestige side of things when I was young.
  - solar-ice 4y ago
    Ehh. Being kicked out of your home is being removed, even if it's perfectly legal. Fixed-term rental contracts are nearly entirely immoral imo. And while an accurate depiction of how this affects the people who were barely hanging on in the first place, there is a later step, where people who /have/ been renting all their lives in one area find themselves unable to continue to pay rent. You're not necessarily a homeowner if you're not at constant risk of homelessness. I've seen this while squatting; our neighbours were people who had lived in the same community for 70 years, and their option once the landlord had decided to tear the building down and replace it with "luxury apartments" was far away from everyone they had known all their lives. There were several similar stories in the area.
    - ltbarcly3 4y ago
      I think it's an interesting moral question: How much are you responsible for someone else's failure to plan ahead or foresee consequences? What are the consequences if we make you responsible for other people for their entire life just because you have some economic interaction with them? I think if you make renting someone an apartment a lifelong obligation to provide them with housing at approximately that cost then only a fool would ever rent out an apartment. The supply of apartments to rent would go to approximately 0. One strange consequence of this would be that the price of housing would plummet as a result as all the landlords left the market. When you went to buy a condo, instead of competing with landlords and money launderers you would only be bidding against other people who want to live in the apartment. I saw this first hand at the GHI housing co-op in Maryland, buying a unit there was dramatically below market cost because they did not allow anyone to live in units apart from owners.
notatoad 4y ago
Give them money. Directly or not. If you're a rich person moving into a poor town, the only way to not piss off the locals is to make them richer. If you can make the whole town richer, you'll be welcomed. Whatever portion of the locals that you don't make richer will hate you. If you don't want to piss off the locals, and you don't want to employ the locals, this is a very expensive plan.
- Eupraxias 4y ago
  Why do you think they won't take your money and still hate you out of town? That's what I have seen.
  - pc86 4y ago
    Where have you seen that?
    - Eupraxias 4y ago
      Rural Vermont. The story is worthy of a screenplay. Small town starts to tax a family for the commercial water line in a general store that closed in the 60's, that happens to be on the property, because, small town. Family has visions of a B&B, vineyard, wedding venue. Everything down the drain in the end, because lawyers are expensive. Still there to this day: worn out stencil on the window of the 'general store'. "Sorry, we closed in 1968".
      - notatoad 4y ago
        giving the town tax money isn't going to do it. you need to make the people in the town richer, and most of the people aren't going to see a dollar of that tax money. at least, not directly or in the short term.
        Eupraxias 4y ago
        The family in this situation had business plans that would have done just that, (B&B and a wedding venue), in a town of 300 where there is only a restaurant (catering) and a general store (everything else). The family sourced and bought everything not just locally, but from the town and surrounding farms (all dairy, meat, and produce) The tax was imposed to get the family out of the town, and it worked - the family is not rich. In the end, they had to sell their family home (which had been in the family since the 1930's) and leave (which they did). They were taxed out because the family is notoriously progressive, and the town is very much the opposite. There was cultural friction. Keep in mind that this was 20 years ago. These were very polite 60's era hippies, all college-edumacated and everything - and the (very small, very tight) town didn't want them in it. The town hall imposed a (crazy) tax, and they had to leave. Depending on where you are, some value preserving a local culture over 'getting richer'.
AussieWog93 4y ago
I mean, simplest way would be to build a plant that creates hundreds of well-paying jobs. Companies do this all the time.

tacitusarc 4y ago

I’m sure you didn’t intend it this way, but this comment comes across as incredibly arrogant and unfeeling.

newshorts 4y ago
Was going to say something similar. Having grown up in a small idyllic town, there was beauty in the slow struggle to live there. OP would do well to try and learn the culture before seeking to change it. There’s value beyond “cheaper houses” and “craft beer” in these places.
- symlinkk 4y ago
  By “the culture” are you referring to the high murder rate?
- le-mark 4y ago
  As someone from a small town in a rural area, can you expand on what values you have in mind? What I saw was grinding poverty, bad schools, bottom tier education, and rampant drug abuse. Coincidentally the novel/film Winter’s Bone author portrayed this area, north Arkansas and southern Missouri.
  - telesilla 4y ago
    The excellent serial podcast S*Town did a great job too, on exploring these themes. https://stownpodcast.org/ https://stownpodcast.org/
- pc86 4y ago
  I grew up in a small town, too. Some are better than others. There doesn't seem to be any redeeming quality to Pine Bluff.
55555 4y ago
To you (and others), but not to everyone.

aaaaaaaaaaab 4y ago

>a few dozen like-minded nerds will gentrify a small town Sounds like a sure plan to get your tires slashed, if not your head bashed.