Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha. I'm welcome to stuff
Speaker 1: I've never told your protection.
Speaker 2: I heart radio, and welcome to another edition of Monday
Speaker 2: MANI where I'm confused about the day and just saying
Speaker 2: random things because I'm offer a good start anyway, today
Speaker 2: I kind of had some interesting thoughts and I guess
Speaker 2: advice because as it's been almost two years, so I'm
Speaker 2: coming up on my second anniversary for house hunting and
Speaker 2: being a homeowner. I'll be second year in May, so
Speaker 2: I'm sure we'll do something. I'll do something then too.
Speaker 2: But I found some really interesting tidbits and conversations that
Speaker 2: have been going around on TikTok and just in the
Speaker 2: news in general, which I think is very important for
Speaker 2: us to have a conversation about when comes to owning homes.
Speaker 2: Of course, there's this back and forth that everybody and
Speaker 2: all the generations are having essentially, and essentially it's pretty
Speaker 2: much millennials, gen Zers and half of Gen xers against
Speaker 2: the older gen xers and boomers talking about the fact
Speaker 2: that buying a home is almost impossible, especially today as
Speaker 2: we look at the interest rates and what was what
Speaker 2: has been happening, What's happening, and who owns the homes
Speaker 2: and why this conversation of if you just didn't go
Speaker 2: to Starbucks, which don't go to Starbucks, but if you
Speaker 2: didn't go to Starbucks into for ten years you could
Speaker 2: get a house, and that is absolutely not true. This
Speaker 2: conversation of being able to be a millionaire if you
Speaker 2: just save safe, safe, still not true. I think our
Speaker 2: retirement in itself, when it comes to our retirement plans
Speaker 2: and the investments that we have to do because we
Speaker 2: don't have a choice, are showing this is not how
Speaker 2: this works. This saving that an investing bit is not
Speaker 2: working for us because the powers powers that be have
Speaker 2: already made their money and are going to keep their
Speaker 2: money and don't care about anybody else. That's a very
Speaker 2: cynical take. I apologize, but that's what it looks like.
Speaker 2: And I say this as a person who was able
Speaker 2: to finally buy a home and get a decent interest
Speaker 2: rate and is looking at what I could or can
Speaker 2: do different or if there is any other differences that
Speaker 2: can be done in location. I'm also seeing a lot
Speaker 2: of videos and we've already talked about it this once
Speaker 2: about that it is more single women who are owning
Speaker 2: homes than not, and how that has like grown and
Speaker 2: leaps and mounds and we love it, and in general
Speaker 2: it is women who are owning homes. And one of
Speaker 2: the big things in this debate that there was a
Speaker 2: woman who came on and all she did was statistics.
Speaker 2: All she said was, these are the people who own it.
Speaker 2: It looks like the holmes are being owned mainly by women,
Speaker 2: and it's amazing, we love to see it.
Speaker 3: Blah blah blah.
Speaker 2: And the comments, the comments were surprising, and it all
Speaker 2: pretty much it was like, there's got to be a
Speaker 2: Reddit thread that, of course I'm not into Reddit, but
Speaker 2: where they have figured out a conspiracy theory about how
Speaker 2: these women or people in general who are succeeding that
Speaker 2: is not them or their demographic and that it is
Speaker 2: something that they didn't do. Essentially that they were like
Speaker 2: all these men and they were men accusing these women
Speaker 2: of getting the.
Speaker 3: Houses through divorce. Like there were so.
Speaker 2: Many comments, how did she get it, did she win
Speaker 2: it in divorce? Did she do this because they've got
Speaker 2: a divorce because she took the house? Like they every
Speaker 2: single comment, and I was kind of shocked that that
Speaker 2: was the conclusion of how a woman could own a
Speaker 2: home now, which I'm like, oh, are you divorced and sad?
Speaker 2: Is that why you're saying this? Are you projecting because
Speaker 2: you're sadly divorced now because you're an idiot? Like I
Speaker 2: don't understand that this comment because I was kind of
Speaker 2: like it was we all know and we've all been
Speaker 2: aware that the comments and the sexist comments when it
Speaker 2: comes to women who succeed in anything, it's going to
Speaker 2: be annoyingly trollish. But the fact that they were jumping
Speaker 2: to divorce and like, of course, to my satisfaction, there
Speaker 2: were so many women who like, I've never been married,
Speaker 2: this is my house, as in fact, I owned it
Speaker 2: before I got married. He moved in with me and
Speaker 2: I kicked him out like that. This is some different
Speaker 2: different talks and the fact that they had to even
Speaker 2: like provide that information to get any kind of justification.
Speaker 3: And the woman who.
Speaker 2: Did this, I believe he was a real estate person,
Speaker 2: was talking about the fact that women were owning and
Speaker 2: then had to flip with a different video of like, wow,
Speaker 2: these men are sincerely insecure, like beyond insecure, and are
Speaker 2: going through some things that really show This is why
Speaker 2: she doesn't want to be with you, whoever left you.
Speaker 2: This is the reason why your projection here is the
Speaker 2: reason why. And I'm sorry if she took your house
Speaker 2: and I'm putting that in quotes, but you're going to
Speaker 2: need to calm down.
Speaker 3: And also what did you do wrong? Can we talk
Speaker 3: about that?
Speaker 2: So I thought that was interesting as a conversation and
Speaker 2: this stuff, but women just can't have things without men
Speaker 2: jumping in. And then also this is something that I
Speaker 2: wanted to advise people. So a few things that I'm learning,
Speaker 2: and the real estate and a homeowner world that of
Speaker 2: course I was kind of prepared for already jumping in
Speaker 2: because the reason, the whole reason I went to buy
Speaker 2: house is my partner and I were together the rent
Speaker 2: for our home who was owned by an individual, private person.
Speaker 2: So it's not like a company was exceeding like my
Speaker 2: original It was doubling within two years in an area
Speaker 2: that was okay, and in the house that did not
Speaker 2: have its own washing machine. I just finally got a
Speaker 2: dishwasher after living there for four years.
Speaker 3: Like all these.
Speaker 2: Amenities that does not exist that you think, well, at
Speaker 2: least you would with that price. You should have no, no,
Speaker 2: there's none of these things. And so it got to
Speaker 2: the point where we're like, no, the interest rates were
Speaker 2: kind of low, slowly going up then, but like it
Speaker 2: may make more sense. I have saved up money. I
Speaker 2: have saved up enough money that I'll have extra money
Speaker 2: if something goes wrong and then go from there. And Melody,
Speaker 2: who is a friend of the show, which we should
Speaker 2: have her back on real soon. Anyway, she was the
Speaker 2: person who was helping me go through this process because
Speaker 2: of course, you know, we talked about responsibly buying, so
Speaker 2: making sure you're not buying from a company, making sure
Speaker 2: you're not going into an area that you're part of
Speaker 2: the problem of the gentrification problem, being very cautious and
Speaker 2: aware of what in who you're going in with all
Speaker 2: those things. So I went in with Okay, sat down,
Speaker 2: gave her my I had to give her my finances,
Speaker 2: and like these are the things I can do and
Speaker 2: can't do. I went in knowing that I wanted to
Speaker 2: be owner.
Speaker 3: Of the house.
Speaker 2: I didn't want any messy ties or non t you
Speaker 2: know things that that was like, Okay, this is my responsibility.
Speaker 2: If something goes wrong, it's going to fall back on
Speaker 2: me solely and That's how I wanted to keep that
Speaker 2: like my parents didn't help me at all, like that
Speaker 2: we didn't have any of that. I followed my melodies
Speaker 2: advice for anything and trusted the process with her, which
Speaker 2: that's the first thing. Find a real estate agent that
Speaker 2: you can trust. There's a lot of things flipping right now.
Speaker 2: There was a big lawsuit that just happened in which
Speaker 2: once upon a time, the buyers were not responsible for
Speaker 2: your real estate agent's fee that came out of the
Speaker 2: sellers when they sold the house. That is switching has changed.
Speaker 2: A lawsuit has come out and that they believe they
Speaker 2: have one. I don't know who is they, because it
Speaker 2: wasn't the real estate agents have one in which now
Speaker 2: that responsibly will fall back onto the buyers, which seems
Speaker 2: kind of good for the seller, not great for the
Speaker 2: buyer who is already the one that's paying down or
Speaker 2: buying the three hundred four hundred, five hundred thousand dollars
Speaker 2: home to have to add another twenty thousand and thirty
Speaker 2: thousand on the on the bill. So a lot of
Speaker 2: conversations about you know, who is this protecting? Who isn't
Speaker 2: it protecting?
Speaker 3: Is this right? Is this wrong?
Speaker 2: It's definitely going to shift things. There's a lot to
Speaker 2: have this conversation and like understand who you're using and
Speaker 2: who's going to help you. Because I also like came
Speaker 2: out when I bought this home it was a good
Speaker 2: deal for what it was at the time that it
Speaker 2: was the person sell the people selling it made double
Speaker 2: essentially like what they've paid because they jumped so quickly
Speaker 2: for them and then having understand that they're a real agent,
Speaker 2: they could have done more. Like they were really like, huh,
Speaker 2: why didn't you do?
Speaker 3: Like we were.
Speaker 2: We had questions about who they were using, but in
Speaker 2: the end, like it turned out, well, they got their money,
Speaker 2: we got what we needed, and Melanie did an amazing
Speaker 2: job and making sure I knew what was going because
Speaker 2: I was freaking out the entire time. The amount of stress,
Speaker 2: the amount of panic attacks, the amount of like heart palpitations,
Speaker 2: of understanding I was putting this type of commitment into
Speaker 2: something was like huge. So we were having that conversation
Speaker 2: and like knowing that I had other friends who were
Speaker 2: buying homes and they didn't know their real estate A
Speaker 2: did as well. I'm like, eow, that's a huge, huge,
Speaker 2: important thing, And I know that seems like an obvious
Speaker 2: but you have to understand who you're going in with
Speaker 2: because this is a lot of money.
Speaker 3: Second is that taxes.
Speaker 2: Taxes change and they can significant, Like I've heard stories
Speaker 2: of people saying it doubled their payment because of taxes alone.
Speaker 2: And by the way, state and county taxes are ugly
Speaker 2: and they will take advantage of you. You have to
Speaker 2: go through and check your records, so expect a jump.
Speaker 2: Mine went from what it was originally, and this is
Speaker 2: how I'm like, oh, yeah, I could have done that.
Speaker 2: I can definitely do this to oh it went up
Speaker 2: two one hundred and fifty dollars a month because of taxes,
Speaker 2: and they're like, oh, we didn't do this properly. This
Speaker 2: wasn't done properly. And this is with all the tax
Speaker 2: simptions that I went through the Home Seat Act, all
Speaker 2: of that. I did those because I was like, I
Speaker 2: gotta figure out what's going on.
Speaker 3: But that changes every year.
Speaker 2: Now we've seen conversations about how that has ousted a
Speaker 2: lot of people who've owned their home for very long time,
Speaker 2: but the taxes has gone crazy and almost is unaffordable
Speaker 2: for them. And that is something that you have to
Speaker 2: think about in the future as well. Hopefully you can
Speaker 2: fight things because there are such injustices in this that
Speaker 2: I was like, what is going on, but being prepared
Speaker 2: for that, of course, being prepared for the extras like
Speaker 2: oh did a.
Speaker 3: Rat eat my dishwasher?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah I did.
Speaker 2: Did it cost me like eight hundred dollars more?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Still very mad about this rat raoul did me dirty,
Speaker 2: But having that understanding of that cost as well. And
Speaker 2: then also when it comes to like rental properties, we
Speaker 2: need to be on the lookout of who And I
Speaker 2: know that's one of those things you can't be choosy.
Speaker 2: Sometimes you can't be choosy at all, and people are lost.
Speaker 2: So many scammers, so many scammers. I have seen so
Speaker 2: many people just taking a house and be like this
Speaker 2: is up for rent, give me this, and looking official,
Speaker 2: and it turns out it's not up for rent at all,
Speaker 2: and you just gave a deposit away and you signed
Speaker 2: something and you moved out thinking you were moving into
Speaker 2: a home and it's not at all. As in fact,
Speaker 2: in Atlanta it came out recently and we've kind of
Speaker 2: all known this. You can go back and see behind
Speaker 2: the bastards. I did with Robert where we talked about
Speaker 2: rent in general and who owns all these things, But
Speaker 2: the actual thing is three corporations and this was us
Speaker 2: the beginning of March actually own nineteen thousand metro Atlanta
Speaker 2: homes and they're holding it, holding it. So there's just
Speaker 2: contriput Like Zell had been called out at one point
Speaker 2: about their games and this and trying to drive prices
Speaker 2: up to gain money, also holding onto it to rent
Speaker 2: to people for an absorbent amount of money because they're
Speaker 2: taking advantage of people.
Speaker 3: It is really, really, really gross. I know.
Speaker 2: I want to say one of the company black Rock
Speaker 2: has been around, has been around and been buying this
Speaker 2: stuff up, and it sounds like a conspiracy theory, which
Speaker 2: is why I think Robert did that episode that he did.
Speaker 2: But the fact that they are power behind so many things,
Speaker 2: and housing is just one of those things, and they
Speaker 2: are part of the responsible parties in driving up these
Speaker 2: housing prices and driving up this rates and driving.
Speaker 3: Up so much.
Speaker 2: So there's this conversation that needs to be had that
Speaker 2: it is not good. I know, any I've been trying
Speaker 2: to convince you to buy a house, but then I
Speaker 2: was like, stops up. Stop, don't don't do it right now,
Speaker 2: everything is gross. It is not a buyer's market, and
Speaker 2: the gun government is only helping in assisting large companies
Speaker 2: to keep driving up these prices. Supposedly there's an investigation
Speaker 2: about it, and they did like knock down some of
Speaker 2: the companies like Zell, a Peg or two, But it
Speaker 2: was after outcries of realizing who was making this market
Speaker 2: so unaffordable And with that, I was trying to see
Speaker 2: who may have some of the better affordability, And sadly,
Speaker 2: these are the same places that you may also if
Speaker 2: you're a woman, do not have many rights.
Speaker 3: So take that for what you will.
Speaker 2: Because the number one for cost of living and number
Speaker 2: one for housing of affordability is Mississippi. The number two
Speaker 2: cost of living is Alabama, but the number two affordability
Speaker 2: housing afford ability is West Virginia, so a lot of
Speaker 2: them are in the Southern states. So like for I've seen,
Speaker 2: Alabama is number four for cost of housing affordability, number
Speaker 2: forty four in the best stays to live in overall.
Speaker 2: Mississippi was number forty eight in the best state to
Speaker 2: live in overall. So there's a lot that you're like,
Speaker 2: do I want to live there. Okay, maybe I could
Speaker 2: afford it there, but do I want to actually live there.
Speaker 2: Iowa actually stands at number six as affordability, number five
Speaker 2: are the cost of living, number eight for housing affordability,
Speaker 2: and number seven in the best States overall. So hey, listeners, Iowa,
Speaker 2: tell us what's going on over there, because I'm kind
Speaker 2: of shocked. I don't know anyone that lives in Iowa.
Speaker 2: No offense, I just don't see you.
Speaker 3: Yeah you do.
Speaker 2: I don't know anybody who's from Iowa. I need to
Speaker 2: I need to expand my friend group, I guess countrywide,
Speaker 2: So shout out to Iowa.
Speaker 3: Let me know what's going on there.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it's definitely some conversations about what's affordable, why
Speaker 2: is it safe, and even know some of the states
Speaker 2: that we called out not safe for women at all.
Speaker 2: Georgia ended up being number twenty seven. So like we
Speaker 2: are for cost of living, like we are in the
Speaker 2: middle with twenty six, number twenty six for housing affordability,
Speaker 2: twenty one in best states overall. So we're middling. We
Speaker 2: are an.
Speaker 3: Average crew which we're mid. We're mid. We're gonna stay mid.
Speaker 2: I guess Idaho, which I have heard of people wanting
Speaker 2: to move to Idaho. I heard they have a really
Speaker 2: like bustling art district and art area, so someone needs
Speaker 2: to tell me about that. But they are number three
Speaker 2: in the Best States overall housing affordabilities at twenty five
Speaker 2: and cost of living is at seventeen, so you know,
Speaker 2: there are some things to consider. I would not move
Speaker 2: at any point at this point at this time because
Speaker 2: obviously I'm very established. Thought about Ireland, keep thinking about it,
Speaker 2: but like I just bought this house. I don't think
Speaker 2: I can do this. And it's not a buyer's market. Oh,
Speaker 2: it is a buyer's market, but no one's buying. That's
Speaker 2: part of the problem. It's interesting to see with these
Speaker 2: conversations in these lists about who and what this is
Speaker 2: going to affect. Again, women are now gaining access to
Speaker 2: it more. I'm wondering, like, is there any causality into
Speaker 2: why it's getting more difficult now? Hmm, I don't know,
Speaker 2: you know, like that must be another conspiracy theory. Apologies,
Speaker 2: but like in my head, I'm like, Eh, we just
Speaker 2: can't thrive.
Speaker 3: Y'all just won't let us.
Speaker 1: This is interesting because I have an episode coming up
Speaker 1: because I do have a lot of friends who are
Speaker 1: renting in apartments and are like, have had these conversations
Speaker 1: allowed to me of like this, it's expensive, but I
Speaker 1: feel safer. But I would like to save money, but
Speaker 1: it means moving to somewhere I won't feel so safe.
Speaker 1: I've been looking at moving and I was just curious,
Speaker 1: and I was researching, like I want to know who
Speaker 1: like the landlord breakdown like gender wise, yes, it's mostly men,
Speaker 1: but it was more close than I thought it would be.
Speaker 1: But one interesting thing that I found was the landlord's
Speaker 1: kind of openly said that they have gender stereotypes that
Speaker 1: effect when they're going to who they'll rent to, and
Speaker 1: of course race also plays into it, which we've talked
Speaker 1: about before, but that they were being so stereotypical, I
Speaker 1: was kind of shocked you said that out loud. But
Speaker 1: one of their things was basically perception that women won't
Speaker 1: be able to fix stuff, so the house do more
Speaker 1: work if it's a woman who's renting.
Speaker 3: So really I assumed it would be that women will
Speaker 3: be cleaner and quiet.
Speaker 1: They said that too, but they prefer the man who
Speaker 1: they believe will be able to fix stuff, whereas the
Speaker 1: one like literally one person said they don't know how
Speaker 1: to screw in light bulbs, Like they said, yeah, women
Speaker 1: don't know how to screw in light bulbs. So I'll
Speaker 1: have to be coming in like really.
Speaker 2: Wow to be fair, maybe just like it's not my responsibility,
Speaker 2: so I don't want to.
Speaker 1: I know.
Speaker 3: That's the part of it.
Speaker 1: That's the other part of it. Because then is it like,
Speaker 1: because we have that perception of women being high maintenance,
Speaker 1: is it just anytime she complains about something, you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: she's being high maintenance.
Speaker 2: Yeah, on actuality, you're just noticing she's complaining as versus
Speaker 2: like they have just complaining just as much but you
Speaker 2: don't notice it. Also, just by the way, if you
Speaker 2: want to know, the number one best overall state was Utah. Really,
Speaker 2: but the fact is like housing affordability is at number
Speaker 2: thirty three for them, the cost of living is twenty five,
Speaker 2: they're twenty five, and then affordability was like twenty eight.
Speaker 2: They're number twenty eight for that, and then they're number
Speaker 2: twenty four opportunities. So I'm trying to be like, how
Speaker 2: does those numbers mesh then?
Speaker 3: Because I'm not telling you how this is qualified.
Speaker 2: It's just like the titles I've been given and this
Speaker 2: is according to the Usnews dot Com, so you know,
Speaker 2: like take it with a grain of salt and where
Speaker 2: it's from. But like, I found it interesting that all
Speaker 2: the other numbers are like mid, but there are still
Speaker 2: number one.
Speaker 3: I'm like, it's because they got the good parks. Is
Speaker 3: because they they do have really good parks. It's quite bad.
Speaker 3: I do love your parks.
Speaker 2: Cheers of that, but yeah, like that's interesting. I'm excited
Speaker 2: to hear your take on that because I think we
Speaker 2: haven't really talked about landlords in rent renters, and it's
Speaker 2: getting to be a really heated subject right now.
Speaker 1: It is because, like you said, there's been a lot
Speaker 1: of backlash discussion about rents going up, prices going interest
Speaker 1: going up, and it's it's frustrating because I feel like
Speaker 1: so many things in this conversation are out of your control,
Speaker 1: and so for me, I'm very much in a holding
Speaker 1: pattern where I know one day the rent will go
Speaker 1: up and I will have to go, and I don't
Speaker 1: know when that will be. It's just annoying when it's
Speaker 1: like because I've pretty much been told if you like it,
Speaker 1: that's a good price, stay there.
Speaker 3: Until it goes up.
Speaker 1: But that's such a strange place to be in where
Speaker 1: you're essentially waiting for someone else to give you maybe
Speaker 1: sixty days maybe to do make this huge decision where
Speaker 1: do I go next?
Speaker 2: But nothing, and you can't get ahead either because you
Speaker 2: can't plan. People want to rent immediately. Oh it's such
Speaker 2: a crisis that I hate. I hated this whole thing,
Speaker 2: which is why I would like refusing Tom and honestly,
Speaker 2: had he kept the prices as was or at least
Speaker 2: an in reasonable intent instead of doing it like he
Speaker 2: did a twenty five increase for like three years or
Speaker 2: like wait what twenty five percent increase instead of like
Speaker 2: five percent every now and like every year that I
Speaker 2: was like, wait, what is this for? And it didn't
Speaker 2: make sense, like he's his reasoning made no sense rather
Speaker 2: than like taxes, And I was like, okay, I kind
Speaker 2: of get that, but you were already making like he
Speaker 2: had bought this place for so like little and done
Speaker 2: so little and renovations that it was like, did you
Speaker 2: do you? Are you because you know you've already paid
Speaker 2: it off by this point, I don't know, Like I
Speaker 2: don't know, and not that you can't you're not allowed
Speaker 2: to make money. Sure, sure, sure, but to really like
Speaker 2: go over the top with lies and like no, it's
Speaker 2: absolutely not this, this and this, and then like getting
Speaker 2: and knowing that I rarely got things fixed on time,
Speaker 2: like I had to beg at. He was like, because
Speaker 2: that whole idea of like I don't have to be
Speaker 2: responsible for employ like appliances, and like you like things
Speaker 2: that happened in the background, like that was lovely. I
Speaker 2: did not want to deal with that. I loved my
Speaker 2: neighbors at the time, my partner there, but like there's
Speaker 2: so many things that's just like, m it doesn't make sense.
Speaker 2: But because it finally got to that point, it's like this,
Speaker 2: I hate to do the I don't want to be responsible,
Speaker 2: but I guess I'm gonna be responsible in this manner
Speaker 2: and buy a whole home, right.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, I mean that's kind of the reason that
Speaker 1: I was looking into this because I've had such a
Speaker 1: honestly part of it is me, but I've had troubles
Speaker 1: with my landlord, and now that I've read this study,
Speaker 1: I'm like there was a reason I.
Speaker 3: Felt uncomfortable like complaining or.
Speaker 1: Like raising an issue, and it's it's gotten kind of
Speaker 1: like there are things that I need to get fixed,
Speaker 1: and I keep putting it off because I'm like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: you don't want to deal with yeah, M Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: I am looking forward to our celebration, your two year
Speaker 1: yeah anniversary.
Speaker 3: We'll do another check.
Speaker 1: In, but yeah, there's a lot of issues to talk
Speaker 1: about for conversations. Yes, indeed, Well listeners, if you have
Speaker 1: thoughts about this, If you have any questions you would
Speaker 1: like us to address to look in to, please let
Speaker 1: us know. You can email U at Stephanie and mom
Speaker 1: Stuff at iHeartMedia dot com. You can find us on
Speaker 1: Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast, or on Instagram and TikTok
Speaker 1: at stuff one ever told you if we have a
Speaker 1: tea public store and we have a book you can
Speaker 1: get wherever you get your books. Thanks as always too,
Speaker 1: our super producer Christina, our executive producer and our contributor Joey.
Speaker 1: Thank you and thanks to you for listening. Stephone ever
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