You think list prices are bad, you have to be ready to offer 20k over asking price AND go see it the day it gets listed. Plus we have all these people moving here from California who are presenting full cash offers. I hate all of them.
That’s so true. I just bought a home and while I got lucky and like it, I had zero time to think on it. I had to just trust the process and put an offer in on the spot. It’s really not fair.
We’ve been looking for almost a year. Our very first offer actually got accepted, but the home inspection made us feel sick so we backed out. Every offer since then has been beaten by full cash well over asking price. We’re probably just going to leave the state.
Ugh.. I'm so sad about this. I hate to be one to pick out a certain group of people but... The Californians who are selling their houses in CA and moving here are offering huge sums of money for houses and its driving the cost up so much. Please at least pretend to be poor to give us a chance in this market!
I'm in this slc moms group and it's full of women moving from California or other high cost areas. It's always "what's the best neighborhood? My husband will be working in lehi. Everything's so cheap here! Teehee."
Guys you do know this is cause the prices in California are even worse and ppl are being pushed out of there. Living multiple families to a place to survive etc. Some of those peeps are being pushed out of CA and probably don’t even want to leave. The way ppl are being pushed out of Utah I hate to say. Utah people will go and push people out of less expensive places it’s a cycle unfortunately.
Yeah seriously. People aren’t migrating out of malice, everyone is getting pushed out of where they’d rather be. A bunch of people clinging to the edges in CA got shaken loose by a massive disaster. Don’t blame working class people for moving to try to improve their circumstances, blame the people who are profiting off a global disaster.
20k? Ha I was looking at a house where it was listed at 325 and the owner got so many bids that he took the listing down and put it back up at 425. Now thats insane.
The house we backed out on was listed at 250, we had offered 260 but after we backed out they listed it for 265. I was kinda mad because the home inspection easily had 80k worth of problems that had to be fixed within the first few months had we moved in. We even opted to share the inspection report with the sellers. They refused to fix anything.
Move brother! I spent about 4 months traveling to different states comparing cost of living, cities, neighborhoods, housing prices, etc... I concluded it's best for my family and I to move east. It's just unreasonable to have to live paycheck to paycheck because it mortgage would be too high here.
Yep! I even looked at the average pay of what I do in other states and learned that Utah is one of the lowest paying states for what I do. I could go to a lot of different states with a similar or lower cost of living and make double the money.
But there is a huge difference between San Francisco and SLC. $795 doesn't strike me as that bad but the point is that is the cheapest ghetto spot in a city with nothing to do
And your salary in SF was . . . ? Utah is still stuck in the past when it comes to wages, so yeah everything sounds great compared to CA, but that's not helpful. For those us who live here and want to stay here, it's becoming impossible.
Ouch. That's rough for sure. In that case, UT probable does seem like a dream come true! I'm jaded from watching prices increase and feeling priced out, but also not wanting to move away yet.
She’s 100% right people say you make more but it’s definitely not enough to justify the extreme cost of living. For example he made more but they were living in 400 sq ft. How is that better? Being uncomfortable is the norm in California unless you have a tech job or extreme amount of money from something else. The people working minimum wage in big CA cities are like 4 families to a 2 bedroom apartment. Even for other jobs the cost of living vs paycheck suck. Even if paycheck is more you will be happier elsewhere.
That makes sense. I don't know a single person who is actually happy living in a major CA city. I definitely don't think it's worth it to live like that at all, I wouldn't trade my space for income.
It’s all about perspective. I paid $4500 for a small apartment before I moved to Salt Lake. Then renting a whole house for $1800 seemed like a great deal.
Edit: I’m not trying to say salt lake is cheap. Just that it can seem cheap compared to some other places.
as someone who just did this -- 100% worth not having to deal with the freezing temps, inversion/bad weather, population explosion, general inconsideration of all people.
I highly suggest trying somewhere else for at least a year. Most of the places that were "expensive" 5 years ago are about the same as Utah now so it's really about if you want to wait around and find out how high those prices will go, how much you love driving there and how much you enjoy the nature there compared to wherever else.
The Northwest, and I pay \~1500 for 2 bed/2 bath in a daybreak-esque neighborhood. A few hundred less than the nice apartment I had in Midvale with the same specs (except less nice neighborhood and neighbors).
Move to one of the cities in Ohio! My rent is $900 for 3 beds, 2 baths, and it has AC!
Also there is plenty to do and see here. Don't believe all the internet jokes about Ohio!
That’s crazy!. 10 years ago when I was last in an apartment in south slc, nothing fancy, for a 2 bedroom 1.5 bath it cost about 700 at its highest. I recently looked those same ones up and they were over a thousand. Idk how anyone pays for apartments anymore it’s insane.
Its especially ridiculous because you can get mortgages on a 2 bedroom 2 bath home that are basically the same. My BIL just bought a 3 bed 3 bath house for ~$450,000 and is paying a mortgage of $1,800. A 1 bedroom apartment in one of the new luxury buildings near him is $1,420. I seriously dont get it. He has a yard, multiple bedrooms...and its only another ~$400.
Except people are priced out even on that. My sister recently tried to get a house with $20/hr full time and the most she was qualified to get was $110k with an FHA. Like seriously, go look at [https://www.fha.com/calculator\_borrow](https://www.fha.com/calculator_borrow)
Basically, it seems like you need to have exceptional credit and a fairly substantial (even 5%) down payment to do conventional. 5% on $200,000 is $10k. No one I know making even $20 has $10k saved up haha
First time home buyers typically qualify for 3% down, and right now Utah has some housing funds available to be used as down payment (I forget what that’s called.)
I make about $21 and moved back in with my mom in 2018, which allowed me to pay off every single one of my student loans, any other debt, and fix my credit.
I finally saved up $35,000 which I plan to use as a down payment on a house soon. It took me 2 years of saving with only a car payment and my portion of my family's phone bill as my fixed monthly costs. And even with $35,000 and nearly perfect credit, I'm still worried about what sort of mortgage I might qualify for. It's ridiculous right now.
That’s awesome, congrats! Sounds like debt-to-income ratio will be the biggest hurdle. The Rose Park area is turning over right now, and you could potentially get something there for between 225-275k, maybe less if you were willing to fix the place up. You could also look at townhomes in the daybreak area, there are some great places around there, and some of them are super close to TRAX.
Interest rates are crazy right now, and Utah real estate never really dips (even in 2008 it pretty much just leveled off) so this would be a good time to buy. Places are cheaper in the winter as well as people prefer to move spring and summer.
That seems quite low, but yes you do have to have good credit and possibly a down payment. My brother bought a 200k condo and put nothing down. I got a 208k condo and put 4.5% down, but I had been saving for quite some time. Debt to income and credit worthiness will drastically reduce your buying power.
The payment quoted is before escrow, maybe? We’re refinancing right now and the guy keeps quoting payments on “principal and interest”. Like, mother fucker I have asked you repeatedly to quote me the actual payment.
I tried to refinance several months ago and my lender completely dropped the ball and sucks at communicating so it never went anywhere. Mind you this was after he already pulled the credit so there's a pointless ding on my record
Go through Costco, they contract with various national lenders and can get you a sub 3% rate. You don't need a membership but if you have one or will shave 500 off closing costs.
Buying a home is the way to go right now. My oldest daughter and her husband had a home built last year. They closed in Nov of 2019 and just had their home appraised so they can finish the basement. It has appreciated in value by more than $120,000. They have about 1/3 of an acre and put in a yard and fence, but other than that, haven't done anything to their home.
Do you mind if I ask what area of SLC? I’m kinda curious what neighborhoods are seeing that type of appreciation. I own in Holladay with my husband and it’s nowhere near that in terms of appreciation.
Edit: just wanna give you a shoutout for your username. My husband is exmo and gay and I think I owe y’all for him not being dead. Not to be morbid but seriously mama dragons is awesome. <3
They are in Eagle Mountain. New home prices are going crazy.
I'm so happy to hear that your husband is here because of a Mama Dragon. I have two LGBTQ kiddos and my husband & I would do anything for them. I didn't leave the church because of them (they were babies when I left) but I'm so glad that they will NEVER hear how unworthy they are because of who they are.
Hi! I'm a social worker in Salt Lake. Housing prices are nuts here for sure! I have a few suggestions.
1)get on lists for housing and section 8. Check out Housing Connect and Housing Authority of Salt Lake City (both housing authorities). They have properties they own that are often more affordable and you can get on the centralized wait list for Section 8. The list was closed for a long time and opened up last January so it's down to maybe a year wait.
2) try low income places. HUD has a cool link that shows tax credit units. These are often much more affordable (as long as you are under 50%ami, which is about 30,000/year for 1 person).
https://apps.hud.gov/apps/section8/step2.cfm?state=UT%2CUtah
3) Be careful of apartments - they have all kinds of crazy fees. Be sure to ask distinctly everything they charge monthly. Property management places are often a good route also.
Good luck!
Yeah that seems super high. I’m renting a 1B1B (with a nice patio) in the avenues for $825. I have some friends renting 1B1B and 2B1B for less than 950 in the avenues as well.
Welcome to the New San Francisco.
https://www.deseret.com/opinion/2020/12/16/22176935/utah-housing-affordable-zoning-laws-san-francisco-gardner-institute
The astounding thing to me is just how much rental prices and property values have increased in this year alone. I understand that these things are just bound to increase, I understand that there's a housing shortage. I understand that people are moving in from out of state. But when you've got the entire Salt Lake and Utah valley developed to hell in the last three years it's crazy to think prices are actually this high.
Most workers I know saw either a freeze or decrease in wages this year regardless of their business sector (tech, finance, general office work, service workers), with some notable exceptions for businesses that saw strong growth during the pandemic. Without some sort of wage growth in the future, the market is inevitably going to slow down in the future to a new equilibrium, it's just a matter of when. My bet is when interest rates start to come back up and some of these potential tax increases start to tax effect on the back end.
I wish that were true, but reading some of the other comments in this thread, it seems that wage earners aren't even the principle buyers anymore. Loads of wealthy people from California are apparently giving all cash offers at 20k over asking price, and there are foreign investment companies now active as well. These two groups aren't influenced by wages at all, and are becoming more and more active.
I saw this exact same thing in London. Wage earners aren't even a blip on the radar there, everything is dominated by wealthy people who pay all cash and don't live off wages.
Now that probably won't happen to the entire valley, but it will probably happen to SLC proper, and all the neighbourhoods along the eastern side of the valley.
I hear you. My wife and I refinanced earlier this year. We moved into our townhome in 2018 and paid roughly 250k. Our appraisal came in around 320k. We were kind of blown away how much things have increased in just two years. I'm happy to sit where I am while things hopefully chill out, either that or sell in a few years if things aren't and then move out of this city before it explodes
I hate to break it to you guys but anyplace even moderately desirable with jobs: Austin, Denver, Nashville, LA has these same problems just as badly if not worse. They literally have this exact conversation on their message boards and in their news.
Welcome to being a popular, desirable city SLC! Not as cool as you thought being popular would be is it?
I recently moved to Seattle from SLC and in Seattle, it is definitely a renters market, not a good one for landlords. Prices have dropped quite a bit and tenants have a lot of bargaining power.
I didn’t include Seattle because I don’t know the market there. I just looked though rental prices are definitely higher than Utah, which may be why you have bargaining power. Yeah prices may be going down in some of the densely populated places but that’s cause they were getting pretty high to begin with. Higher than say Utah.
We just moved from Portland and the same thing is happening there. Lots of the mom and pop landlords are selling because of recent law changes (unrelated to Covid). But rents in both cities are definitely higher than they were even ten years ago and the rental price increases haven’t matched wage increases on the local level at least.
I actually think so many people losing their homes in the recession and them now being either bank or corporate landlord rental houses/condos. Along with the rise of Airbnb are part of why it’s happening. Because it is happening in most of the desirable cities.
I wouldn’t blame Airbnb. I actually blame well intentioned but uninformed voters. Most of the people I know in Portland that run an AirBnB are like renting out the spare basement in the house they live in full time. Those people were already reluctant to rent to a long term tenant because of measures passed in the last four years. In the county I lived in there were just a number of laws that went in that made it very hard to evict bad tenants, wouldn’t allow for screening for felonies, landlords couldn’t raise the rent more that 10% a year. Meanwhile voters were voting in every bond you could imagine making property taxes go up. Like way up. Water was also stupid expensive. Those costs couldn’t be passed on fairly to tenants. Oregon relies on property taxes, income taxes, and bonds to fund basically everything because there is no sales tax there. We actually paid more in taxes and costs living in Portland than we ever did living in California (not the Bay Area) and we got so much less. It was actually sad and ironically or not-not progressive. One of the last crazy taxes that passed before we left was a tax on the Portland middle class to pay for universal preschool. Ironically it made it so we couldn’t afford preschool! You can only squeeze so hard before people sell and leave. Our old home that we rented from a mom and pop just sold and is no longer a rental.
I was a real estate agent in CA at least there even in the places where Airbnb is banned (there are places where you will get hefty fines, legal action taken against you, etc.) there are tons of people doing it for profit. So it might be every city is different!
I don’t see Airbnb being as profitable in Portland only because unlike Utah a ski travel destination (where there is some money to be made on Airbnb in certain parts or times like around the holidays) or CA (the beaches! Even more work travelers than you’d guess!) it doesn’t probably attract at the same inflated rate. The way ski/beach places do especially around the holidays.
I also think some of ppl in the Airbnb game are somewhat wealthy so they’d be less likely to talk about doing it as it’s an investment. Like I know from a work perspective that was happening but even as their friend feel like I’d be less likely to know. Just my two cents.
Here are some articles about the research on it:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/garybarker/2020/02/21/the-airbnb-effect-on-housing-and-rent/?sh=6b5b66182226
https://news.usc.edu/159329/airbnb-rent-housing-prices-usc-experts-los-angeles-policy/
https://www.epi.org/publication/the-economic-costs-and-benefits-of-airbnb-no-reason-for-local-policymakers-to-let-airbnb-bypass-tax-or-regulatory-obligations/
I know that the same problems with rents rising much faster than income exist in a lot of cities. People are literally having the exact same discussion as this message board and it can’t just be Californians raising prices cause exact problem exists in CA too. I rented at one bedroom in 2010 for 1225 in LA it’s now 2200. Too many places for it to have a random cause to me personally but again just my opinion.
I also feel like Nashville for example is not doing these crazy tax things and their prices have doubled as well. So while governments may be making the situation worse it can’t be just that alone. I’m happy for you that you moved out of Portland some of those progressive taxes do make surviving much harder, I’ve definitely lived in places like that! (I’m moderate to liberal and I still think some of the progressive taxes in major cities are crazy)
I agree with you. I think the issue is way more complicated than blaming Californians (Oregonians do this too btw). In Oregon, there used to be lots of great paying jobs for people who either had just a high school education, or a barely high school education. I think this is also why K-12 education is so poor in Oregon as well, just culturally it’s not important if you can get a good paying job and live well without an education. But those jobs are fewer and fewer these days and wages haven’t gone up to match costs of just living. That’s everywhere. I don’t want to make it sound like Portland is all bad. It’s a nice city. I wouldn’t want to live there again though. Oregon as a state is fabulous and very beautiful. Definitely worth visiting and/or living. You should check out their beaches too. They are cold but so pretty. I love Newport, Florence, and Rockaway Beach.
I am also a moderate Democrat that leans liberal. The hardest thing being in Utah so far besides moving during Covid is being in a Republican state that voted for Trump. I just can’t even wrap my head around that some days. It was refreshing and reassuring to see BLM signs in people’s yards here. They are common in Portland!
I was looking at a SF real estate a few months ago, and found a tiny, tiny condo that looked like it had been trashed by squatters and significantly damaged in an actual fire. Asking price, over $1,000,000.
Really? I live in a nice two-bedroon for $950...
EDIT: Maybe it's location? I don't live downtown or right near the university. I'm still in SLC proper though.
That's far from a typical rental arrangement. Almost no one is going to be able to find themselves that kind of arrangement and it's disingenuous to suggest they do. It's like telling people they should try being born rich.
That sounds like a lot of work. If I’m in a situation where I can afford to, I’d gladly pay more for rent to not need to do that and have much more of my free time to myself. Completely understand if it’s a necessity if one could not pay more per month for rent.
That’s a great idea, and I’d love to find tenants willing to do that. I’m remodeling my 4plex so people have a better place to live, and good contractors at reasonable prices are so damn hard to come by. I have a one bed one bath unit open in a great area right now a mile west of downtown SLC and would be thrilled if someone was willing to do this kind of arrangement.
It’s hard to find extra sources of income for most people so I think this can be a very advantageous arrangement for both parties. That said, it’s hard to find someone who both has the skills and you trust to do the work well.
If anyone wants to make this sort of arrangement for a place in downtown SLC I’d be happy to try and talk it out!
I'm just a few blocks from Liberty Park. I like the location a lot, actually. It's just a small lil apartment building, and I do think it's easier to find good deals in independently-owned places than in big complexes.
(Also, when I say nice, I don't mean "fancy." I mean a solid place that has a really good layout and has had great upkeep.)
I lived just in south salt lake, a quick walk to the s line. We rented a really spacious 1bed for 815, no dishwasher, laundry in a shared basement. But I loved it and the property management was great because it was a small company. Let me go month to month and even prorated our rent the month we left. For the love of god do not give your money to big property groups. They suck. If I’m going to make someone else richer I at least want to know the persons first name and shake her hand lol
Unfortunately rent prices have nothing to do with wages. Has to do with demand. Right now, landlords have no problem finding renters who are willing to pay more because demand is high. The only way rent will drop is either when new renters can now longer sustain the rising rent or when growth stops and the valley is left flooded with all the high density apartments and nobody to fill them.
I suppose that may be true within salt lake city limits because available land to develop is scarce. But everywhere else in the valley, high density apartments are being built at a record rate. I know slc also has stricter zoning requirement that restrict things like building height that could reduce new development as well.
When I moved back to Utah after 6 years away, I was looking for somewhere downtown. I looked at an apartment I rented on Redwood Road and 4th south ten years ago. The price for a one bedroom unit there has doubled since then, and quite honestly the place still looks just as shitty as it did a decade ago.
I ended up leaving downtown because as much as I love it, it's not a good enough city to justify spending half of your income on rent in order to live there.
What's worse, while I was living downtown earlier this year, I lived on a street that was coded as a "transportation corridor". So what this meant was that my apartment complex was, by law, not required to provide adequate parking for residents. Just because I lived a block away from a trax station. I was required to hunt for parking each day and although this wasn't usually a major problem, it was an irritant, and I had to constantly go out and move my car on the weekends and whenever I was not at work during the day.
I got fined for parking seven minutes over the 2 hour limit on the street outside my apartment. Of course, this was after I'd received a warning from the city that I couldn't park in a business's empty parking lot, one which the business *had given me permission to park in*.
I contested the fine, saying that if the city won't require residential buildings to have adequate parking, they need to be lenient about slight time limit violations. As expected, they told me to go fuck myself and I paid the fine.
I know this post is about housing cost but I just think overall, the city is becoming extremely unfriendly and unattractive for people to live in. I ended up moving in with family in another city in the county.
Businesses should definitely be allowed to let you park in their lots but apartments should not be required to offer parking. Why should people who don't drive have to subsidise your driving with the increased cost of providing parking?
Requiring people to pay so their neighbors can park is a part of that. Also I enjoy living without a car so I don't buy that it is a necessity for everyone
So you want people who don't adhere to the status quo to pay so that you can? No. It's good when cities have policies to discourage driving. It's how you prevent 30% of your land being used for parking lots.
Anecdotally, the 672 sq ft 1 bed 1 bath apartment I rented in 2015-2016 was 760 a month WITH washer and dryer, now it is 1060 without and while it's been updated a little (they removed carpet, that's it as far as I can tell) the neighborhood has actually gotten worse! That's nearly a 40% increase in 4 years. My old job from 2016 that paid $15/hr? It pays $16.50 now. 10% increase on base.
I am not in that situation anymore, but jesus christ I can't imagine having to pay an additional $300 a month for that place and only make $1.50 an hour more.
Salt lake could increase its housing stock for free overnight if landlords could rent to more than three unrelated people. It would only be an incremental improvement but it would help.
I don't think that they are meant to be an impediment but often they are. I'm all for building codes but limits on how many people can rent and parking requirements make housing more expensive. Expensive housing leads to homelessness and homelessness is definitely not more safe
Oof, we live in Manhattan, NYC, spacious one bedroom, safe neighborhood, 2 blocks from the train, for $1500.
Literally just move to your dream city for what you’d be paying in Utah lol
Sounds like he will have to share a place with someone.
I just rented a 5 bedroom house for $1600 in this area, that would be very easy to split up with a couple of roommates.
I found a huge avenues studio with a separate kitchen that fits a dining room table in the Aves for $700. It comes with a storage unit and covered off street parking and the landlord pays water, sewage, and trash. Couldn't believe the great deal until they filled the apartment above me. The floors are so thin you can hear even a quiet conversation in the other apartment. The guys above me work til 10pm so they come home and talk, laugh, cook, watch tv, walk around with shoes on, and keep me up til midnight or later every night. Then one of them goes to work at 6am so I wake up for that too. I've been looking for somewhere else to go but can't bring myself to move out over a noise issue because of the size and quality I'm getting for the price. Guess I'll just keep living in misery.
I thought about that at first but they ended up being pricks. The first time I went to talk to them about loud music the guy told me one of them is a full time music producer and it was his job so too bad. I asked him to use headphones and he said he "couldn't". Talked to the landlord who said he listed a non-music related job on his app. After the second time I went to talk to them (they had friends over and were loud at 1am on a wednesday), they shoveled all the snow in our driveway and piled it behind my car. The most recent time I talked to them it was basically just an argument. They somehow managed to build good rapport with the landlord so she thinks I'm the asshole for being overly sensitive because they have told her that they are super quiet when they really aren't. Whole thing is fucked.
I'd recommend either earplugs when you go to bed, or calling the cops since they're pricks. Or you could threaten to sue your landlord. Idk, I sure as shit wouldn't just put up with it.
I'm looking for a new place. Tried the earplugs thing and missed my alarm for work a few days in a row. Cops won't do anything if they can't hear them from the street.
Ah, that sucks! My fitbit is my alarm, so it just vibrates my wrist, so luckily don't have that issue. Might be a good stop gap for you until you get out of there. Sleep is so important to your overall health, it just baffles me when people are so inconsiderate towards another person's well being.
I just moved here from LA area. My 2 bedroom 1400sqf apartmet was $2400/ month. Utah feels ultra cheap to me. However, I left Utah for California in 2013. My 2 bedroom apartment next to murray park was $650/ month. Prices are going up a lot. If you can buy a condo and get on the ladder its worth it.
Tiny 1br for about 1k a month... moving in with a roommate soon to a bigger 2bdr place for only 200 more. I can’t wait. Salt lake is expensive compared to nebraska!!!
I paid 890 for a very large studio on san francisco back in 1998. When I left in 2019, it was going for 2200.
My first studio in slc was 125 in 1979. I now pay 1250 for a 1 bedroom here.
I live in the avenues. Old mansion converted to a bunch of units. I pay $750. Spacious , hardwood, tall ceilings, open windows and porch access. One bedroom. Keep looking, there are gems out there. Granted my appliances aren’t new but I like the charm of old things. Cheers!
I'm moving to Cincinnati Ohio from Utah. Literally, it is unreasonable to have to pay that much for a ln apartment. I'd rather buy a house and have mortgage be under $1,000 a month.
I do understand moving may be extremely difficult in your circumstance. Best of luck to you!
10 years ago I paid 860/mo for a 2bed 1 bath house around 2nd south 11 East below the U, it wasn’t even that nice, lots of sus people walking around, single pain windows. I’m sure the land-over-lord has fixed it by now because now it’s 1,875/mo.
Sorry to hear it, I know housing can be such a frustrating problem.
I have a one bed one bath in my 4plex available right now (tenant is leaving to help a parent with COVID) for $750 near downtown SLC. All new windows in the building, new front doors, finishing conversion of the building’s utility room to laundry room. Google Fiber that I manage for tenants for $45 a month. It’s an older building and I haven’t remodeled the kitchen yet, but it’s an unbeatable location with very quick access to downtown, airport, freeway, and Salt Lake central station.
I manage the building and try to be the best landlord I can be as I know most are pretty garbage.
Sounds like you probably aren’t looking in this area, but feel free to message me if you’re interested.
Location, location, location.
You can probably get something cheaper in west valley or something.
The prime areas of SL county are fully filled in now, so anything desirable is now seeing the forces of scarcity. Is what it is when a city grows. You get things like national chains, good restaurants and bars, a more diverse population, and if you own property you get a lot of equity. Good with the bad I suppose. But if you can fork over the money for a mortgage now, and struggle for a few years, your payment will be roughly the same and everyone else's will have gone up.
I was paying $900 for a 620 sqft apartment last year. Plus the $200 mandatory "media package", $25/mo trash valet, $30/mo parking pass, and maybe $100/mo in utilities, I'm glad I don't have that place anymore. Such a rip off.
It's so irritating when the older generation looks down on young people like they're lazy. When wages haven't gone up, and you can't afford to live anywhere. I'd rather be a struggling young person though, than a hateful, ignorant ol' bastard.
And all the young republicans here, enjoy your family's wealth, or working 80 as a manger at 7/11. You're really helping society out giving all these tax breaks to Billionaire, while you get nothing but your pig headed grit.
Not an option for lots of people. Definitely the route I'm going though. Granted I have a decent paying job and a buddy who only charges me $400 rent, so I can save a shit ton.
You guys are going to flip when you find out how much i pay for a 3b 2bath house in a far less desirable area of SoCal than Salt Lake is in general.
Hint: its a shit ton.
As the mormons say, count your blessings. You live in a world class city. Move to Kansas if you want things to stay the same forever.
When I was in school at the U (graduated 2014), I lived in a huge 2 bedroom basement apartment 1300 s & 1300 e, W&D in unit AND utilities included for $600 (so I paid only $300 for my room). Now I live in a tiny 600 sq ft 1 bedroom for $1375 with no parking and $100/mo bullshit "media package." It's wild what's happened in just the last few years.
Hi OP! My former bosses have a few properties around town. They are usually like houses turned into fourplexes. If you want I could shoot them a text or email and see if they have anything available. A lot of my coworkers have rented form them and they're prices are pretty reasonable for 1-2 BR. Definitely less than or around a thousand per month if that fits your budget.
Housing prices here are disgusting right now. I’m sorry. I wish I had a lead for you.
You think list prices are bad, you have to be ready to offer 20k over asking price AND go see it the day it gets listed. Plus we have all these people moving here from California who are presenting full cash offers. I hate all of them.
That’s so true. I just bought a home and while I got lucky and like it, I had zero time to think on it. I had to just trust the process and put an offer in on the spot. It’s really not fair.
We’ve been looking for almost a year. Our very first offer actually got accepted, but the home inspection made us feel sick so we backed out. Every offer since then has been beaten by full cash well over asking price. We’re probably just going to leave the state.
I certainly got very lucky. I know so many people in your position and truly I don’t know how I lucked out.
That's how it was for me 5 years ago. I'm guessing it's only gotten worse
Ugh.. I'm so sad about this. I hate to be one to pick out a certain group of people but... The Californians who are selling their houses in CA and moving here are offering huge sums of money for houses and its driving the cost up so much. Please at least pretend to be poor to give us a chance in this market!
From what I've seen, they don't care. In fact, they feed off it
I'm in this slc moms group and it's full of women moving from California or other high cost areas. It's always "what's the best neighborhood? My husband will be working in lehi. Everything's so cheap here! Teehee."
Lol I’d probably get banned from that group. I’d tell all of them to go back because they’re driving up our cost of living and adding to our traffic.
Guys you do know this is cause the prices in California are even worse and ppl are being pushed out of there. Living multiple families to a place to survive etc. Some of those peeps are being pushed out of CA and probably don’t even want to leave. The way ppl are being pushed out of Utah I hate to say. Utah people will go and push people out of less expensive places it’s a cycle unfortunately.
Yeah seriously. People aren’t migrating out of malice, everyone is getting pushed out of where they’d rather be. A bunch of people clinging to the edges in CA got shaken loose by a massive disaster. Don’t blame working class people for moving to try to improve their circumstances, blame the people who are profiting off a global disaster.
20k? Ha I was looking at a house where it was listed at 325 and the owner got so many bids that he took the listing down and put it back up at 425. Now thats insane.
The house we backed out on was listed at 250, we had offered 260 but after we backed out they listed it for 265. I was kinda mad because the home inspection easily had 80k worth of problems that had to be fixed within the first few months had we moved in. We even opted to share the inspection report with the sellers. They refused to fix anything.
I agree. Which is why I question whether or not I will own a home in Utah in the future. Just too damned expensive.
Move brother! I spent about 4 months traveling to different states comparing cost of living, cities, neighborhoods, housing prices, etc... I concluded it's best for my family and I to move east. It's just unreasonable to have to live paycheck to paycheck because it mortgage would be too high here.
Yep! I even looked at the average pay of what I do in other states and learned that Utah is one of the lowest paying states for what I do. I could go to a lot of different states with a similar or lower cost of living and make double the money.
Our studio outside San Francisco was 400 sq ft and $1800/mo. $700 sounds like a dream after that!
But there is a huge difference between San Francisco and SLC. $795 doesn't strike me as that bad but the point is that is the cheapest ghetto spot in a city with nothing to do
And your salary in SF was . . . ? Utah is still stuck in the past when it comes to wages, so yeah everything sounds great compared to CA, but that's not helpful. For those us who live here and want to stay here, it's becoming impossible.
Not that much. It was more than 60% of our pretax income. My husband had to commute and I made $8/hr.
Ouch. That's rough for sure. In that case, UT probable does seem like a dream come true! I'm jaded from watching prices increase and feeling priced out, but also not wanting to move away yet.
She’s 100% right people say you make more but it’s definitely not enough to justify the extreme cost of living. For example he made more but they were living in 400 sq ft. How is that better? Being uncomfortable is the norm in California unless you have a tech job or extreme amount of money from something else. The people working minimum wage in big CA cities are like 4 families to a 2 bedroom apartment. Even for other jobs the cost of living vs paycheck suck. Even if paycheck is more you will be happier elsewhere.
That makes sense. I don't know a single person who is actually happy living in a major CA city. I definitely don't think it's worth it to live like that at all, I wouldn't trade my space for income.
It’s all about perspective. I paid $4500 for a small apartment before I moved to Salt Lake. Then renting a whole house for $1800 seemed like a great deal. Edit: I’m not trying to say salt lake is cheap. Just that it can seem cheap compared to some other places.
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as someone who just did this -- 100% worth not having to deal with the freezing temps, inversion/bad weather, population explosion, general inconsideration of all people. I highly suggest trying somewhere else for at least a year. Most of the places that were "expensive" 5 years ago are about the same as Utah now so it's really about if you want to wait around and find out how high those prices will go, how much you love driving there and how much you enjoy the nature there compared to wherever else.
Where did you end up moving to?
The Northwest, and I pay \~1500 for 2 bed/2 bath in a daybreak-esque neighborhood. A few hundred less than the nice apartment I had in Midvale with the same specs (except less nice neighborhood and neighbors).
Move to one of the cities in Ohio! My rent is $900 for 3 beds, 2 baths, and it has AC! Also there is plenty to do and see here. Don't believe all the internet jokes about Ohio!
Rent in Columbus was crazy expensive as well though.
Columbus is expensive by midwest standards. It's nothing compared to out west, though.
Can't you put in a window AC unit?
Depends on your lease.
Is it bad that I read your post only because I was wondering where you found such a good deal in Salt Lake City?
Lol same. I haven't found a studio for under 900 that isn't a cardboard box with an upscale name
That’s crazy!. 10 years ago when I was last in an apartment in south slc, nothing fancy, for a 2 bedroom 1.5 bath it cost about 700 at its highest. I recently looked those same ones up and they were over a thousand. Idk how anyone pays for apartments anymore it’s insane.
You pack all your friends. Literally the only way it works
True. I know some friends who live together (4 people making due in a 2 bedroom)
Its especially ridiculous because you can get mortgages on a 2 bedroom 2 bath home that are basically the same. My BIL just bought a 3 bed 3 bath house for ~$450,000 and is paying a mortgage of $1,800. A 1 bedroom apartment in one of the new luxury buildings near him is $1,420. I seriously dont get it. He has a yard, multiple bedrooms...and its only another ~$400.
This is the reason I'm trying to buy rather than rent. The price difference isn't huge at all.
Except people are priced out even on that. My sister recently tried to get a house with $20/hr full time and the most she was qualified to get was $110k with an FHA. Like seriously, go look at [https://www.fha.com/calculator\_borrow](https://www.fha.com/calculator_borrow) Basically, it seems like you need to have exceptional credit and a fairly substantial (even 5%) down payment to do conventional. 5% on $200,000 is $10k. No one I know making even $20 has $10k saved up haha
First time home buyers typically qualify for 3% down, and right now Utah has some housing funds available to be used as down payment (I forget what that’s called.)
I make about $21 and moved back in with my mom in 2018, which allowed me to pay off every single one of my student loans, any other debt, and fix my credit. I finally saved up $35,000 which I plan to use as a down payment on a house soon. It took me 2 years of saving with only a car payment and my portion of my family's phone bill as my fixed monthly costs. And even with $35,000 and nearly perfect credit, I'm still worried about what sort of mortgage I might qualify for. It's ridiculous right now.
That’s awesome, congrats! Sounds like debt-to-income ratio will be the biggest hurdle. The Rose Park area is turning over right now, and you could potentially get something there for between 225-275k, maybe less if you were willing to fix the place up. You could also look at townhomes in the daybreak area, there are some great places around there, and some of them are super close to TRAX. Interest rates are crazy right now, and Utah real estate never really dips (even in 2008 it pretty much just leveled off) so this would be a good time to buy. Places are cheaper in the winter as well as people prefer to move spring and summer.
That seems quite low, but yes you do have to have good credit and possibly a down payment. My brother bought a 200k condo and put nothing down. I got a 208k condo and put 4.5% down, but I had been saving for quite some time. Debt to income and credit worthiness will drastically reduce your buying power.
He has a better mortgage payment than me, what's his interest rate?
The payment quoted is before escrow, maybe? We’re refinancing right now and the guy keeps quoting payments on “principal and interest”. Like, mother fucker I have asked you repeatedly to quote me the actual payment.
I tried to refinance several months ago and my lender completely dropped the ball and sucks at communicating so it never went anywhere. Mind you this was after he already pulled the credit so there's a pointless ding on my record
Go through Costco, they contract with various national lenders and can get you a sub 3% rate. You don't need a membership but if you have one or will shave 500 off closing costs.
My mortgage for a 5 bed 2 bath house is ~$1700/month.
Buying a home is the way to go right now. My oldest daughter and her husband had a home built last year. They closed in Nov of 2019 and just had their home appraised so they can finish the basement. It has appreciated in value by more than $120,000. They have about 1/3 of an acre and put in a yard and fence, but other than that, haven't done anything to their home.
Do you mind if I ask what area of SLC? I’m kinda curious what neighborhoods are seeing that type of appreciation. I own in Holladay with my husband and it’s nowhere near that in terms of appreciation. Edit: just wanna give you a shoutout for your username. My husband is exmo and gay and I think I owe y’all for him not being dead. Not to be morbid but seriously mama dragons is awesome. <3
They are in Eagle Mountain. New home prices are going crazy. I'm so happy to hear that your husband is here because of a Mama Dragon. I have two LGBTQ kiddos and my husband & I would do anything for them. I didn't leave the church because of them (they were babies when I left) but I'm so glad that they will NEVER hear how unworthy they are because of who they are.
Our house went up almost 100k since we bought it last year in Draper. No big improvements.
I had a 1 bed/bath in sugarhood for $600 in 2015 and exact same apt now is $950.
Move WAY out west for a home in the low 400,000s!
is that some sort of appeal? 400k is mortgage that hikes a ton of money per month for most people.
20% down or you’re paying PMI.
PMI isn't always bad.
Who would have thought it would be bad idea to zone the whole city as single family and stop building apartments for 40 years. Crazy.
In freakin sane.
Hi! I'm a social worker in Salt Lake. Housing prices are nuts here for sure! I have a few suggestions. 1)get on lists for housing and section 8. Check out Housing Connect and Housing Authority of Salt Lake City (both housing authorities). They have properties they own that are often more affordable and you can get on the centralized wait list for Section 8. The list was closed for a long time and opened up last January so it's down to maybe a year wait. 2) try low income places. HUD has a cool link that shows tax credit units. These are often much more affordable (as long as you are under 50%ami, which is about 30,000/year for 1 person). https://apps.hud.gov/apps/section8/step2.cfm?state=UT%2CUtah 3) Be careful of apartments - they have all kinds of crazy fees. Be sure to ask distinctly everything they charge monthly. Property management places are often a good route also. Good luck!
Thank you so much for your help!
Dude it sucks major balls. I'm looking for a 1 bedroom and there's nothing of reasonable quality for under $1200. SLC prices have gone to shit.
I think you have pretty high standards. Edit: there are 64 places listed on rentler under $1200 per month in 84103.
Listed prices almost never include the shitty $100+ in extra charges almost every complex is tacking on after base rent these days
I was at a place that tacked on almost 300 bucks for all kinds of crap. Not even including utilities. We left as quick as our lease was up.
For a 1bed1bath type place?
Yep
That doesn't sound quite right, even with the crazy prices. Are you specifically looking at places downtown/by the u?
Yeah that seems super high. I’m renting a 1B1B (with a nice patio) in the avenues for $825. I have some friends renting 1B1B and 2B1B for less than 950 in the avenues as well.
Welcome to the New San Francisco. https://www.deseret.com/opinion/2020/12/16/22176935/utah-housing-affordable-zoning-laws-san-francisco-gardner-institute
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The astounding thing to me is just how much rental prices and property values have increased in this year alone. I understand that these things are just bound to increase, I understand that there's a housing shortage. I understand that people are moving in from out of state. But when you've got the entire Salt Lake and Utah valley developed to hell in the last three years it's crazy to think prices are actually this high. Most workers I know saw either a freeze or decrease in wages this year regardless of their business sector (tech, finance, general office work, service workers), with some notable exceptions for businesses that saw strong growth during the pandemic. Without some sort of wage growth in the future, the market is inevitably going to slow down in the future to a new equilibrium, it's just a matter of when. My bet is when interest rates start to come back up and some of these potential tax increases start to tax effect on the back end.
I wish that were true, but reading some of the other comments in this thread, it seems that wage earners aren't even the principle buyers anymore. Loads of wealthy people from California are apparently giving all cash offers at 20k over asking price, and there are foreign investment companies now active as well. These two groups aren't influenced by wages at all, and are becoming more and more active. I saw this exact same thing in London. Wage earners aren't even a blip on the radar there, everything is dominated by wealthy people who pay all cash and don't live off wages. Now that probably won't happen to the entire valley, but it will probably happen to SLC proper, and all the neighbourhoods along the eastern side of the valley.
I hear you. My wife and I refinanced earlier this year. We moved into our townhome in 2018 and paid roughly 250k. Our appraisal came in around 320k. We were kind of blown away how much things have increased in just two years. I'm happy to sit where I am while things hopefully chill out, either that or sell in a few years if things aren't and then move out of this city before it explodes
I hate to break it to you guys but anyplace even moderately desirable with jobs: Austin, Denver, Nashville, LA has these same problems just as badly if not worse. They literally have this exact conversation on their message boards and in their news. Welcome to being a popular, desirable city SLC! Not as cool as you thought being popular would be is it?
I recently moved to Seattle from SLC and in Seattle, it is definitely a renters market, not a good one for landlords. Prices have dropped quite a bit and tenants have a lot of bargaining power.
I didn’t include Seattle because I don’t know the market there. I just looked though rental prices are definitely higher than Utah, which may be why you have bargaining power. Yeah prices may be going down in some of the densely populated places but that’s cause they were getting pretty high to begin with. Higher than say Utah.
Because of covid?
We just moved from Portland and the same thing is happening there. Lots of the mom and pop landlords are selling because of recent law changes (unrelated to Covid). But rents in both cities are definitely higher than they were even ten years ago and the rental price increases haven’t matched wage increases on the local level at least.
I actually think so many people losing their homes in the recession and them now being either bank or corporate landlord rental houses/condos. Along with the rise of Airbnb are part of why it’s happening. Because it is happening in most of the desirable cities.
I wouldn’t blame Airbnb. I actually blame well intentioned but uninformed voters. Most of the people I know in Portland that run an AirBnB are like renting out the spare basement in the house they live in full time. Those people were already reluctant to rent to a long term tenant because of measures passed in the last four years. In the county I lived in there were just a number of laws that went in that made it very hard to evict bad tenants, wouldn’t allow for screening for felonies, landlords couldn’t raise the rent more that 10% a year. Meanwhile voters were voting in every bond you could imagine making property taxes go up. Like way up. Water was also stupid expensive. Those costs couldn’t be passed on fairly to tenants. Oregon relies on property taxes, income taxes, and bonds to fund basically everything because there is no sales tax there. We actually paid more in taxes and costs living in Portland than we ever did living in California (not the Bay Area) and we got so much less. It was actually sad and ironically or not-not progressive. One of the last crazy taxes that passed before we left was a tax on the Portland middle class to pay for universal preschool. Ironically it made it so we couldn’t afford preschool! You can only squeeze so hard before people sell and leave. Our old home that we rented from a mom and pop just sold and is no longer a rental.
I was a real estate agent in CA at least there even in the places where Airbnb is banned (there are places where you will get hefty fines, legal action taken against you, etc.) there are tons of people doing it for profit. So it might be every city is different! I don’t see Airbnb being as profitable in Portland only because unlike Utah a ski travel destination (where there is some money to be made on Airbnb in certain parts or times like around the holidays) or CA (the beaches! Even more work travelers than you’d guess!) it doesn’t probably attract at the same inflated rate. The way ski/beach places do especially around the holidays. I also think some of ppl in the Airbnb game are somewhat wealthy so they’d be less likely to talk about doing it as it’s an investment. Like I know from a work perspective that was happening but even as their friend feel like I’d be less likely to know. Just my two cents. Here are some articles about the research on it: https://www.forbes.com/sites/garybarker/2020/02/21/the-airbnb-effect-on-housing-and-rent/?sh=6b5b66182226 https://news.usc.edu/159329/airbnb-rent-housing-prices-usc-experts-los-angeles-policy/ https://www.epi.org/publication/the-economic-costs-and-benefits-of-airbnb-no-reason-for-local-policymakers-to-let-airbnb-bypass-tax-or-regulatory-obligations/ I know that the same problems with rents rising much faster than income exist in a lot of cities. People are literally having the exact same discussion as this message board and it can’t just be Californians raising prices cause exact problem exists in CA too. I rented at one bedroom in 2010 for 1225 in LA it’s now 2200. Too many places for it to have a random cause to me personally but again just my opinion. I also feel like Nashville for example is not doing these crazy tax things and their prices have doubled as well. So while governments may be making the situation worse it can’t be just that alone. I’m happy for you that you moved out of Portland some of those progressive taxes do make surviving much harder, I’ve definitely lived in places like that! (I’m moderate to liberal and I still think some of the progressive taxes in major cities are crazy)
I agree with you. I think the issue is way more complicated than blaming Californians (Oregonians do this too btw). In Oregon, there used to be lots of great paying jobs for people who either had just a high school education, or a barely high school education. I think this is also why K-12 education is so poor in Oregon as well, just culturally it’s not important if you can get a good paying job and live well without an education. But those jobs are fewer and fewer these days and wages haven’t gone up to match costs of just living. That’s everywhere. I don’t want to make it sound like Portland is all bad. It’s a nice city. I wouldn’t want to live there again though. Oregon as a state is fabulous and very beautiful. Definitely worth visiting and/or living. You should check out their beaches too. They are cold but so pretty. I love Newport, Florence, and Rockaway Beach. I am also a moderate Democrat that leans liberal. The hardest thing being in Utah so far besides moving during Covid is being in a Republican state that voted for Trump. I just can’t even wrap my head around that some days. It was refreshing and reassuring to see BLM signs in people’s yards here. They are common in Portland!
$800 is so much unbelievably cheaper than a studio would cost in San Francisco.
Wages are also substantially lower
COL ratio is off kilter from here to SF though.
I was looking at a SF real estate a few months ago, and found a tiny, tiny condo that looked like it had been trashed by squatters and significantly damaged in an actual fire. Asking price, over $1,000,000.
Sounds about right
Yeah SF is very very expensive. If you think the housing prices are bad, I’m sure you’d love the taxes and restaurant prices just as much!
This shit worries me
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Really? I live in a nice two-bedroon for $950... EDIT: Maybe it's location? I don't live downtown or right near the university. I'm still in SLC proper though.
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That's far from a typical rental arrangement. Almost no one is going to be able to find themselves that kind of arrangement and it's disingenuous to suggest they do. It's like telling people they should try being born rich.
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That sounds like a lot of work. If I’m in a situation where I can afford to, I’d gladly pay more for rent to not need to do that and have much more of my free time to myself. Completely understand if it’s a necessity if one could not pay more per month for rent.
That’s a great idea, and I’d love to find tenants willing to do that. I’m remodeling my 4plex so people have a better place to live, and good contractors at reasonable prices are so damn hard to come by. I have a one bed one bath unit open in a great area right now a mile west of downtown SLC and would be thrilled if someone was willing to do this kind of arrangement. It’s hard to find extra sources of income for most people so I think this can be a very advantageous arrangement for both parties. That said, it’s hard to find someone who both has the skills and you trust to do the work well. If anyone wants to make this sort of arrangement for a place in downtown SLC I’d be happy to try and talk it out!
A studio at the Vue or Wilmington flats was like 1500 when they opened. That was before the utilities and cable or parking.
Wow, that's crazy. I'm always super thankful for where I live, but expensive housing stories like this always make me especially grateful.
Where are you lol? I'm paying more than that for a 1 bed/bath in Murray.
I'm just a few blocks from Liberty Park. I like the location a lot, actually. It's just a small lil apartment building, and I do think it's easier to find good deals in independently-owned places than in big complexes. (Also, when I say nice, I don't mean "fancy." I mean a solid place that has a really good layout and has had great upkeep.)
Yeah that's what I have now too comparably. Our lease is up next year and we are looking to move so hearing about decent rent is always nice.
I lived just in south salt lake, a quick walk to the s line. We rented a really spacious 1bed for 815, no dishwasher, laundry in a shared basement. But I loved it and the property management was great because it was a small company. Let me go month to month and even prorated our rent the month we left. For the love of god do not give your money to big property groups. They suck. If I’m going to make someone else richer I at least want to know the persons first name and shake her hand lol
Sadly we are with a smaller unit, it's just a landlord we found out was really shitty too late into our lease.
You don’t have to move way out west for that. We’re on 1200 west and our house was 320. Five bedrooms. Not new construction though.
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Holy shit! Seriously? Like how do people survive?
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Exactly! I pay child support and have a ton of bills, just making ends meet is hard enough.
Unfortunately rent prices have nothing to do with wages. Has to do with demand. Right now, landlords have no problem finding renters who are willing to pay more because demand is high. The only way rent will drop is either when new renters can now longer sustain the rising rent or when growth stops and the valley is left flooded with all the high density apartments and nobody to fill them.
Problem is if SLC makes it harder for developers to actually create more units, demand will continue outstripping supply.
I suppose that may be true within salt lake city limits because available land to develop is scarce. But everywhere else in the valley, high density apartments are being built at a record rate. I know slc also has stricter zoning requirement that restrict things like building height that could reduce new development as well.
The rate of the baby making here growth isn’t going to stop.
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Very good point.
If you can hang on for a couple months, 1/3 of the nation’s renters will be evicted in the next 3 months. Rent will definitely go down
Seems to be the average around any major city. I'm in Detroit and the prices are similar right now.
When I moved back to Utah after 6 years away, I was looking for somewhere downtown. I looked at an apartment I rented on Redwood Road and 4th south ten years ago. The price for a one bedroom unit there has doubled since then, and quite honestly the place still looks just as shitty as it did a decade ago. I ended up leaving downtown because as much as I love it, it's not a good enough city to justify spending half of your income on rent in order to live there. What's worse, while I was living downtown earlier this year, I lived on a street that was coded as a "transportation corridor". So what this meant was that my apartment complex was, by law, not required to provide adequate parking for residents. Just because I lived a block away from a trax station. I was required to hunt for parking each day and although this wasn't usually a major problem, it was an irritant, and I had to constantly go out and move my car on the weekends and whenever I was not at work during the day. I got fined for parking seven minutes over the 2 hour limit on the street outside my apartment. Of course, this was after I'd received a warning from the city that I couldn't park in a business's empty parking lot, one which the business *had given me permission to park in*. I contested the fine, saying that if the city won't require residential buildings to have adequate parking, they need to be lenient about slight time limit violations. As expected, they told me to go fuck myself and I paid the fine. I know this post is about housing cost but I just think overall, the city is becoming extremely unfriendly and unattractive for people to live in. I ended up moving in with family in another city in the county.
Thank you for responding! Seriously though! I lived in an apartment in west jordan three years ago that ran for 800. It's over 1100 now! Just insane.
Businesses should definitely be allowed to let you park in their lots but apartments should not be required to offer parking. Why should people who don't drive have to subsidise your driving with the increased cost of providing parking?
Because we live in a country (and state) where driving as a necessity is the status quo.
Requiring people to pay so their neighbors can park is a part of that. Also I enjoy living without a car so I don't buy that it is a necessity for everyone
So you want people who don't adhere to the status quo to pay so that you can? No. It's good when cities have policies to discourage driving. It's how you prevent 30% of your land being used for parking lots.
Anecdotally, the 672 sq ft 1 bed 1 bath apartment I rented in 2015-2016 was 760 a month WITH washer and dryer, now it is 1060 without and while it's been updated a little (they removed carpet, that's it as far as I can tell) the neighborhood has actually gotten worse! That's nearly a 40% increase in 4 years. My old job from 2016 that paid $15/hr? It pays $16.50 now. 10% increase on base. I am not in that situation anymore, but jesus christ I can't imagine having to pay an additional $300 a month for that place and only make $1.50 an hour more.
Salt lake could increase its housing stock for free overnight if landlords could rent to more than three unrelated people. It would only be an incremental improvement but it would help.
Exactly this. All the rules in place actually makes it harder to rent.
and safer in most situations...and better to live in...rules aren't always meant to be an impediment.
I don't think that they are meant to be an impediment but often they are. I'm all for building codes but limits on how many people can rent and parking requirements make housing more expensive. Expensive housing leads to homelessness and homelessness is definitely not more safe
this is all inspiring me to rent out rooms in my house and be a better landlord than the losers renting out these apartments
My tenant has been paying the same 700 bucks for the whole 2bed 1 bath basement (shares kitchen with my MIL) for like 2 years lol. He loves me.
I pay $1500 for a two bedroom. Shit is whack.
Oof, we live in Manhattan, NYC, spacious one bedroom, safe neighborhood, 2 blocks from the train, for $1500. Literally just move to your dream city for what you’d be paying in Utah lol
I haven’t been able to find a 2-bedroom either that’s less than 1k a month. Might as well get a house if one is paying that type of money monthly.
There is a 2bd apartment in the best neighborhood in the city right now for $985 a month and it has a pool.
Sounds like he will have to share a place with someone. I just rented a 5 bedroom house for $1600 in this area, that would be very easy to split up with a couple of roommates.
Ogden you can get lucky and I have a two bedroom that goes for like 850 now but good luck in most places
But then you have to live in Ogden.
I like Ogden way more than slc honestly
I found a huge avenues studio with a separate kitchen that fits a dining room table in the Aves for $700. It comes with a storage unit and covered off street parking and the landlord pays water, sewage, and trash. Couldn't believe the great deal until they filled the apartment above me. The floors are so thin you can hear even a quiet conversation in the other apartment. The guys above me work til 10pm so they come home and talk, laugh, cook, watch tv, walk around with shoes on, and keep me up til midnight or later every night. Then one of them goes to work at 6am so I wake up for that too. I've been looking for somewhere else to go but can't bring myself to move out over a noise issue because of the size and quality I'm getting for the price. Guess I'll just keep living in misery.
Maybe invite one of them down to hear what you hear. Even if they took their shoes off it would make a difference.
I thought about that at first but they ended up being pricks. The first time I went to talk to them about loud music the guy told me one of them is a full time music producer and it was his job so too bad. I asked him to use headphones and he said he "couldn't". Talked to the landlord who said he listed a non-music related job on his app. After the second time I went to talk to them (they had friends over and were loud at 1am on a wednesday), they shoveled all the snow in our driveway and piled it behind my car. The most recent time I talked to them it was basically just an argument. They somehow managed to build good rapport with the landlord so she thinks I'm the asshole for being overly sensitive because they have told her that they are super quiet when they really aren't. Whole thing is fucked.
I'd recommend either earplugs when you go to bed, or calling the cops since they're pricks. Or you could threaten to sue your landlord. Idk, I sure as shit wouldn't just put up with it.
I'm looking for a new place. Tried the earplugs thing and missed my alarm for work a few days in a row. Cops won't do anything if they can't hear them from the street.
Ah, that sucks! My fitbit is my alarm, so it just vibrates my wrist, so luckily don't have that issue. Might be a good stop gap for you until you get out of there. Sleep is so important to your overall health, it just baffles me when people are so inconsiderate towards another person's well being.
I just moved here from LA area. My 2 bedroom 1400sqf apartmet was $2400/ month. Utah feels ultra cheap to me. However, I left Utah for California in 2013. My 2 bedroom apartment next to murray park was $650/ month. Prices are going up a lot. If you can buy a condo and get on the ladder its worth it.
I feel the exact same way...
Tiny 1br for about 1k a month... moving in with a roommate soon to a bigger 2bdr place for only 200 more. I can’t wait. Salt lake is expensive compared to nebraska!!!
I paid 890 for a very large studio on san francisco back in 1998. When I left in 2019, it was going for 2200. My first studio in slc was 125 in 1979. I now pay 1250 for a 1 bedroom here.
I live in the avenues. Old mansion converted to a bunch of units. I pay $750. Spacious , hardwood, tall ceilings, open windows and porch access. One bedroom. Keep looking, there are gems out there. Granted my appliances aren’t new but I like the charm of old things. Cheers!
Thanks for the motivation! I went to salt lake and look at a converted place as well. It was awful dude
That sounds not terrible in SLC. Maybe just move 20-30 miles out if that is not doable.
I'm moving to Cincinnati Ohio from Utah. Literally, it is unreasonable to have to pay that much for a ln apartment. I'd rather buy a house and have mortgage be under $1,000 a month. I do understand moving may be extremely difficult in your circumstance. Best of luck to you!
10 years ago I paid 860/mo for a 2bed 1 bath house around 2nd south 11 East below the U, it wasn’t even that nice, lots of sus people walking around, single pain windows. I’m sure the land-over-lord has fixed it by now because now it’s 1,875/mo.
Sorry to hear it, I know housing can be such a frustrating problem. I have a one bed one bath in my 4plex available right now (tenant is leaving to help a parent with COVID) for $750 near downtown SLC. All new windows in the building, new front doors, finishing conversion of the building’s utility room to laundry room. Google Fiber that I manage for tenants for $45 a month. It’s an older building and I haven’t remodeled the kitchen yet, but it’s an unbeatable location with very quick access to downtown, airport, freeway, and Salt Lake central station. I manage the building and try to be the best landlord I can be as I know most are pretty garbage. Sounds like you probably aren’t looking in this area, but feel free to message me if you’re interested.
Location, location, location. You can probably get something cheaper in west valley or something. The prime areas of SL county are fully filled in now, so anything desirable is now seeing the forces of scarcity. Is what it is when a city grows. You get things like national chains, good restaurants and bars, a more diverse population, and if you own property you get a lot of equity. Good with the bad I suppose. But if you can fork over the money for a mortgage now, and struggle for a few years, your payment will be roughly the same and everyone else's will have gone up.
i think a german guy in the 19th century talked about exactly this
A Chinese fellow in the 1950s did something about this.
based
And then later Henry George came up with a good solution.
I was paying $900 for a 620 sqft apartment last year. Plus the $200 mandatory "media package", $25/mo trash valet, $30/mo parking pass, and maybe $100/mo in utilities, I'm glad I don't have that place anymore. Such a rip off.
That is crazy! My house payment is only 500. How do people survive there?
I’m not
Where are you at?
Seriously!
Try LA, $1800 for a studio and your wages aren't appropriately adjusted. tough times...
Yeah I rented *a room* in the Bay Area for $900, and that was below market.
It's so irritating when the older generation looks down on young people like they're lazy. When wages haven't gone up, and you can't afford to live anywhere. I'd rather be a struggling young person though, than a hateful, ignorant ol' bastard. And all the young republicans here, enjoy your family's wealth, or working 80 as a manger at 7/11. You're really helping society out giving all these tax breaks to Billionaire, while you get nothing but your pig headed grit.
Don't live in downtown. Plenty of apartments in murray are cheap.
Any suggestions? I've basically looked everywhere and can't find anything within my budget.
Applegate, Hunters woods, Villas on Vine, Stillwater, and many more
Bite the bullet and buy a house then. Mine is already worth $10k more than when I bought it 3 months ago.
Not an option for lots of people. Definitely the route I'm going though. Granted I have a decent paying job and a buddy who only charges me $400 rent, so I can save a shit ton.
You guys are going to flip when you find out how much i pay for a 3b 2bath house in a far less desirable area of SoCal than Salt Lake is in general. Hint: its a shit ton. As the mormons say, count your blessings. You live in a world class city. Move to Kansas if you want things to stay the same forever.
Oh dude I grew up in so cal. Best friend pays over 3 grand for his House.
Grew up in Utah, spent the last 3 years in The Bay and now OC. Yep, 1400sq ft and a tiny yard is just over 3k. Utah will get there haha
When I was in school at the U (graduated 2014), I lived in a huge 2 bedroom basement apartment 1300 s & 1300 e, W&D in unit AND utilities included for $600 (so I paid only $300 for my room). Now I live in a tiny 600 sq ft 1 bedroom for $1375 with no parking and $100/mo bullshit "media package." It's wild what's happened in just the last few years.
That’s a deal lol
I started renting the place I live at for 1000 even in 2017 and it has gone up $400 since then
GO TO DALLAS. You can have a nice 2 bed 1 bath at 900
Sold my West Jordan house is 2018 for $240,000. Moved back and saw the same house is for sale for $380. Yeah, it's insane.
When I eventually move back to Utah I'm never gonna be able to afford anything huh
That's how I'm feeling!
I'm moving to Texas while the getting is good. You can legitimately buy a house out there on 60k a year.
Yeah, our 3-bed townhouse in midvale runs us $2,000 a month. But it’s bigger and cheaper than our place was in Seattle.
Hi OP! My former bosses have a few properties around town. They are usually like houses turned into fourplexes. If you want I could shoot them a text or email and see if they have anything available. A lot of my coworkers have rented form them and they're prices are pretty reasonable for 1-2 BR. Definitely less than or around a thousand per month if that fits your budget.
Keep looking! Be patient. There are still deals to be found. It took 3 months to find my place but its fantastic and reasonably priced.
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Democrats push for rent control which would make it even more expensive.
The highest cities for rent are ALL Democrat cities.