After all the years of rents going up, in many areas they are actually dropping, due to the lack of demand for all the condos that had been built. There are exceptions, of course, as some cities still have a high demand for housing, but it is becoming more and more possible to find cheaper rents.

That condo demand has gone belly up does not surprise me. I just have to look at how many of the apartment complexes my husband and I looked at the last time we moved, and see how many of them are now condos. It’s quite a number of them. The trend to turn apartments into condos was huge, and paid off well for a time.

But now that the housing market is down, all these condos are going unsold, and so the building owners need to rent them to get some money coming in. That works to bring the prices down.

Technorati Tags: rents, rent, renting, apartments, condos, housing

People living in Jackson County, OR, are going to be learning the true value of public libraries very soon. You see, due to lack of funding, theirs are about to close.

This is truly horrendous so far as I’m concerned. Libraries are vital to many people. Children use them to research class projects - and don’t assume school libraries are always sufficient. Toddlers and preschoolers enjoy story times. It’s internet access for those who can’t afford it at home. It’s a way for people to learn without having to buy books they may not be able to afford. And in small towns libraries can be community meeting places. Read the rest of this entry »

Here we go again. Coin collectors, both casual and serious, will no doubt be getting into the new Presidential dollar coins.

It should be interesting to see how these do compared to the Sacajawa dollars. They’re the same size, but have some different features. Only question is, will people tolerate them or just collect them? Read the rest of this entry »

Some people have just way too much money. It just amazes me that there are people who would pay $50 for a bottle of mineral water.

Yes, really.

I’ll admit some places have lousy water. I live in San Diego, so I know what I’m talking about, and my sister tells me the water in Los Angeles tastes even worse. But paying that much for water is just insane. I don’t care how pretty the bottle is.  Read the rest of this entry »

There’s an interesting report on Newsweek about how poverty has come to the suburbs. Sad, yet really not surprising.

Poverty happens, even to people who were previously doing well. Medical problems are a major cause, along with job loss. It’s just that now things are coming to light about how much of a problem it’s becoming in suburban areas where there’s less support for the poor.

A part of the problem has more to do with the nature of how neighborhoods age. Used to be that moving to the suburbs was a way to get out of the city. So you had more prosperous people moving out there. But as time goes on the homes age, lives change and poor people appear. Suddenly you have poor people just scraping by living next to families who are still quite well off. Read the rest of this entry »

I love shopping at Amazon.com. However, lately I’ve been seeing some insane prices over there, and not in a good way.

I have two kids, so I’ve been noticing it as I do bits of Christmas shopping over there. Some toys have ridiculously HIGH prices. I’m talking double and more other places. Read the rest of this entry »