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I've rented from pretty strange people to very nice people. Have a lock on your door helps. Limit the food you have, or get a fridge door lock.
My last time was with a guy who stunned his friends by saying "Oh, my roommate? I got him off Craigslist, he doesn't eat my food, pays rent on time and doesn't bother my daughter" (She was 2.5 and 4 when I left) yeah, they were surprised....I just wasn't raised to screw people over.
While it's a risk, in some cases you really find new friends, or know the signs to look out for the next time. :P
I started my new job on Monday. Planned on commuting first week to two weeks at an hour and fifteen minutes.
No one is willing to rent to me at $900 at the lowest price. I don’t feel comfortable sharing a room with a stranger.
I told my employer I had these issues before my job started. Now I told them it’s been three weeks and no luck. I’ve applied to two other jobs closer to my current home and have interviews. My boss likes me and asked finances if I could get a dollar boost in my wage to 16 an hour. Rooms cost about 950 dollars. I make 15 an hour. My boss had a second option but didn’t like me working remotely but said he’d be open or he said maybe fast track into the higher position with some work in another department.
I don’t know what to do.
I also got a parking ticket my first day because I had no clue where to park and on third day was hit by a truck on the freeway in traffic. Thankfully it was minor and I didn’t die in my small Prius.
Thanks,
Cityguy
You can make more money, get a new job or deal with roommates. But you do not make enough to be super picky at this point.
Buy a nice van that you can live in in the parking lot, set up solar panels and use the company gym/showers or find a cheap fitness club VERY close. Also you can get paid to protest as a second job too.
My sister lives an hour and 15 away. I pay a little. The idea it was transitional housing. I lived in the same city where I work 2 years ago and I got a room for $850 and I had a back up option too. That took me 2 weeks. It's been a month and I cant even get one $900 place to live without having to deal with pot smokers and with my allergies I cant live with pot. I was tempted to negotiate my wage before starting, but I thought well I can see if I can do without. I can't do without now that I realize.
so what's your rough budget on all of your expenses?
Housing
utilities (electric, gas, water, etc)
food
loans
credit cards
gas
phone
internet
tv
clothing
etc..
if you could share some info maybe we could help you figure out where things could be cut..
i don't know what line of work you are in and how much experience you have to know if $16/hr is a good wage; but if you're paying $950 for a room you're in a pretty expensive metro.. I would think unless this is a low-skill job, you'd be better off finding a more affordable metro where you can get your own apartment for around 1k.
Buy a nice van that you can live in in the parking lot, set up solar panels and use the company gym/showers or find a cheap fitness club VERY close. Also you can get paid to protest as a second job too.
I think it's pretty damned sad that someone working a regular 40 hour a week job in America would have to resort out of living out of cars/vans. It's like a race to the bottom anymore. The cost of housing is quickly outpacing wages. I remember back in the late 80s/90s if you had a job, any job you could have a basic place to live. Now even that basic place to live is out of reach unless you're a high earner.
I think it's pretty damned sad that someone working a regular 40 hour a week job in America would have to resort out of living out of cars/vans. It's like a race to the bottom anymore. The cost of housing is quickly outpacing wages. I remember back in the late 80s/90s if you had a job, any job you could have a basic place to live. Now even that basic place to live is out of reach unless you're a high earner.
The race is over, we have arrived at the bottom. The baby boomers (unless they frittered their boom time money away) are lagging behind and wont see the bottom due to the fact that they had easy to get federal jobs, tier 1 pensions, union pension, etc etc. The only way we can sink further is when the critical infrastructure starts to fail and we dont have clean water or a power grid anymore.
Unless you have already set yourself up or your family has in the past this is where we are. I would not recommend sleeping in a car or truck because most peoples body length will not allow you to comfortably lay down nor can you really attach solar panels and batteries in a car. But a well set up van you can, the key is having a place to get showers, restrooms, etc without having to duck in awkwardly somewhere.
Alot of people are trying to go to the tiny home model but municipalies are quickly responding and making life hell for these people, also if you dont have a plot of land that you own its hard to find a place to set up. the nice thing about a well set up van is it just looks like a van in the parking lot, I would not be surprised if some companies are going to draconian survalence and prohibiting over night parking so you may need to require it as a term of employment if they are not paying enough to cover rent in a decent place for 15-20% of your net income (33% is way too high, just becasue we are being socially conditioned to accept 33% does not mean that its a good deal, rent is not the only bill).
Communities hate it because you dont pay real estate tax, you are not enriching a retiring boomer who bought in at 20k and it selling for 300k, you are not hooked up to any utilities (using work or full service laundry mats for showers and cleaning etc), you might have a cellular bill and thats it.
The only sucky thing would be you cant cook so your food bill would go up, may be worth seeing by how much ... eating out is considerably more expensive than cooking at home, considerably. You could get a propane camp stove or portable grill. The other issue is if you are a professional your going to want a home office that is completely divorced from your employer so you can still conduct business have all your references etc even if the employer decides to deal treterously with you. I would probably deck out one of those low profile 20' trailers, then you could put in an office, a small bathroom etc and tow it with a truck like in the accountant. Those trailers are about 10k and you could do the interiour set up yourself. That way they dont look like "tiny homes" they just look like a utility trailer, its all about what you can obscure from others who seek to fleece you. People abore people living for free/cheap, if they have to pay for the school districts teir 1 pensions then so do you lol.
The only way this gets better is to hit the boomers where it counts in the pocket book, dont buy the over priced home, dont pay the inflated rents, dont pay. Its not your job to fund a boomers retirement with the sale of their home to more to florida or pad the bank account of an appartment building owner.
The biggest thing is you do not want to be leveraged, you want to be able to just walk away from an out of control supervisor, if he fires you so what you drive away to the next job, your only bills are gas and car insurance, maybe a cell phone bill and tools of your trade.
Last edited by pittsflyer; 10-12-2017 at 03:24 AM..
I think it's pretty damned sad that someone working a regular 40 hour a week job in America would have to resort out of living out of cars/vans. It's like a race to the bottom anymore. The cost of housing is quickly outpacing wages. I remember back in the late 80s/90s if you had a job, any job you could have a basic place to live. Now even that basic place to live is out of reach unless you're a high earner.
Uh... I've been living in a minivan for 2 years now... I got money, but it sucks that a 1 bdr in Chicago costs typically $1200 or more nowadays... That is STUPID!
So I sink my money into lots of others stuff besides RENT, because RENT SUCKS.
And I've survived 12F degree blizzards sleeping in my minivan. Plus, I CAN LIVE ANYWHERE.
I will publish an ebook on how I live in a minivan! And how you can make one livable, too!
Location: RI, MA, VT, WI, IL, CA, IN (that one sucked), KY
41,936 posts, read 37,280,632 times
Reputation: 40641
Quote:
Originally Posted by JTE1969
Uh... I've been living in a minivan for 2 years now... I got money, but it sucks that a 1 bdr in Chicago costs typically $1200 or more nowadays... That is STUPID!
!
$1200 is super affordable for a city the quality of Chicago, really. I had roommates when living there, and lots of people have roommates in their 30s and even 40s in pricey areas.
$1200 is super affordable for a city the quality of Chicago, really. I had roommates when living there, and lots of people have roommates in their 30s and even 40s in pricey areas.
My Mom, on her Deathbed, - warned me not to live in an Apt with roommates. I tried that twice and it was extremely bad luck. The last Roomie was in fact maybe the Head Coven Witch of Berwyn, so after that, it's the VAN rather than sharing a room!
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