Jim Mork wrote: > The definition I've heard of "affordable housing' is 30 percent of income. A $600 apartment, if ALL utilities are included, costs $7200 a year. $7200/.3 is $24,000 a year. $24,000/2080 = $11.50 an hour. Retail employees don't MAKE $11.50 an hour. And that is what the modal employee does. > > If you make $7.50 an hour and IF you have 40 hour/week job, you make $15,600. Doing the rest of the math, it means an "affordable" domicile is $390 a month INCLUDING utilities. > > So, now which of you geniuses is renting for $390/month? > Mark Anderson reply: Jim -- the point you missed is that we were discussing full-time single people, and so the apartment needs to be shared with another person. Then each person only need make $6.75/hour, even based on your dubious maximum of 30% for housing. Back when I was poor, I never even considered renting an apartment by myself, because I knew I couldn't afford it.
Concerning the first places I rented as an adult: As I recall, when I was a student in the mid '70's, I usually found a place that cost a bit less than $100/month. Counting work and my social security payments (because my father died), I was probably making about $5000/year. So I was paying less than 30% on housing. Of course I was paying tuition too, and saving money when I wasn't between jobs. On rooming houses: I sure think the prohibition against more than 3 unrelated persons in a residence should be repealed. I think it's basically an anti-poor person law pushed by neighbors who figured that such houses would be party houses. One of the down sides of neighborhood empowerment. Mark Anderson Bancroft TEMPORARY REMINDER: 1. Send all posts in plain-text format. 2. Cut as much of the post you're responding to as possible. ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
