My husband and I rent an apartment from a local complex. It is ridiculous how much a corporation charges the hard working person. How is a person to make ends meet? To put it bluntly, it stinks.

We heard about the maintenance breaking a toilet in one of the tenants apartments. The tenants had to pay for the toilet, that was broken by the maintenance man. If this happens to us or something similar, we are going to the authorities and complain. This is dirty and not right.

Market is out of control and over priced. people are a being taken advantage of due to the limited housing market.

Tell me, is a house of 800 square feet really worth $125000? Absurd.

As for renters rights. I think it would all depend upon what is in your contract. I know someone who has to pay for all minor repairs (minor plumbing), but the landlord picks up the rest. As for the tenant who paid for the maintenance man's blunder, not sure why they would unless they maintenance man denied it adamantly.

I checked on the zillow.com website and it shows that Casper real estate values are declining. Supply is increasing and demand is dropping, due to unrealistic listing prices. It is just a matter of time, before sellers capitulate, cut prices, and sell while they still have a chance.

When I sold my house, I quickly discovered that the buying pool consisted of unqualified buyers who hoped to use 103% mortgages to be able to buy the house, but ended up getting rejected due to credit quality issues.

The market is turning. Do not be the family that buys a hungry alligator that needs fed every month. If you are renting, at least you can get rid of the alligator after a month. If you buy it, the alligator is yours until you can find someone else that will take it.

Bah, the market is awful. I can't find a house! Good for CS-T on this series.

When I lived in Maryland (primarily in the suburbs around DC.), they had a program through many of their apartment complexes where a portion of their rent went towards a state sponsored down payment plan. I don't remember all of the details on it, as people had to do a few things to qualify for it, but in any case, should this be something that Wyoming cities look at?

Basically it went something like this. Your rent was say $1,000 per month. Each month about $100 of it was put into an account of sorts that could eventually be used as part of a down payment on a home.

Meanwhile, the apartment complex had to follow regulations on rent increases to participate, they were re-imbursed for the money diverted to the renters' downpayment account. And they may have also received other perks that I'm not really all that aware of.

Anyways, this may be something worth checking into as a potential option for Wyoming. It's not like the state can't afford it!

Paul

Everyone who is concerned about the high cost of housing should write or call their congressional delegates and insist that they oppose any bailouts for irreponsible borrowers and lenders, including and especially the Wall Street investment banks (like Bear Stearns).

Most members of Congress are trying to keep house prices from declining, and they're getting a lot of money from real estate and financial services interests to do so. It will take a lot of pressure from many, many citizens to overcome these well-financed influences.

Let your U.S. Senators and Representatives know that you want free market forces to determine house prices. Tell them that borrowers who can't or won't pay their mortgages should lose their homes, irresponsible lenders should lose their investments, and all who committed fraud -- borrowers, sellers who provided down payments, mortgage brokers, appraisers, investment bankers, bond rating agencies, etc. -- should lose their freedom. The only legitimate role for the government is prosecution of fraud, of which there has been an abundance in connection with the housing bubble.


Following are links to some petitions you can sign:

http://www.petitiononline.com/bailout/petition.html

http://www.angryrenter.com/

http://www.stopthehousingbailout.com/

I think that it is important to note that at least 1/3 of the population is better off renting than buying.

Any governmental efforts to make housing more affordable generally ends up making it less affordable since the government subsidies quickly work their way into the price.

Let the market forces work and force lenders to be responsible for making bad loans and the housing bubble will deflate enough to let responsible owners into the market.

Up until about a week ago, I had a house on the market between the price of $150,000-160,000, in a great neighborhood, newer appliances, new paint, 2-car garage, 3 bedrooms, and almost 2,000 square feet. That house sat on the market for three months. If there truly was such a shortage and a high demand, why wasn't that home scooped up right away?
Buyers right now want the moon. They want brand new flooring, paint, appliances, huge master bedrooms, a jet tub, sprinkler system, and everything else HGTV real estate shows tell them they need in their first home. Oh, and they also want the seller to foot the bill for their closing costs and prepaids (around $5,000 for a house that price) because their 100 percent mortgage doesn't cover that, and even though they've been approved for a loan, they don't have money in a savings account.
Buyers need to be responsible. If you're not ready to take on the maintenance and responsibility of a home in that price range, and not able to foot at least part of those closing costs, you're not ready to buy. Keep renting.

"Seller" makes very good points and echoes my experiences. There is a shortage of truly qualified buyers. I had two "buyers" fall out of the contract due to their inability to secure financing and the six percenter's inability to prequalify their clients. If a "buyer" needs to borrow money for the closing costs, they are not ready or prepared to be a property owner.

What we really have is a shortage of apartment rentals and an oversupply of homes that are not priced to meet the budgets of our typical homebuyers.

Seller & Former Casper Homeowner-
I agree somewhat with both of you. I do think that some buyers are expecting way too much. I do think we are short on rentals- my problem is, how can I justify paying a rent that would be more than or equal to a mortgage? This is a hard pill for me to swallow. I could be paying to own not just to live for one month!
As a college grad I came out of college with the world at my finger tips. I worked hard and graduated and expected to get a decent paying job. By decent I mean no less than 32,000 a year. Of course that is what the professors said I deserve. I am 5 years out and have not met that number yet. Nor have I broke 30. I am responsible. I pay all my bills. I have student loans out my butt and I am going back to school- in hopes to break 30. Hopefully this all pays off. My credit is excellent- but I have student loans coming out my butt.
The way I see it, there is a problem if the average house in Casper is 275,000. The demand is coming from a group of people that need homes more in the range of 90,000 - 130,000.
One more question- everyone wants to know why the young people of Casper leave and don't come back. I will tell you! They leave because they go to college. They come back with a great education and can't find jobs that pay them what they are worth. They deal with the low paying job, but now they can't find housing. What in the heck are they supposed to do? They leave. They leave because the pay sucks and there is no where to live. At some point, living with your parents is just plain embarassing.
Contractors need to start building homes that fill the demand that is out there.

My wife and I moved back here a year ago after finishing college and when looking at renting vs buying we decided to buy. We have lived shared walls and floors with people for too long and we were not going to do that but to rent a house is just as much as buying one. We decided to buy and found a lovely 3000 sq ft 4 bed 2 bath house in great condition and under $190,000. The home inspector said that we got a great deal and was impressed. We jumped on it put an offer in before having walked through it, and closed with in two weeks. There are great realtors and mortgage agents in this town and if you work with the right people you can have a great experience I feel blessed and lucky to have such a great home for my family and just wish others as much luck as we had.

When I bought my first house (in 1974), in order to qualify for an FHA loan I had to sign a statement that none of the down-payment had been borrowed. You couldn't even borrow from relatives. If this were still the case, you wouldn't see the problems we have now. I rented for years until I had the money to buy and so did all our friends. We might have been broke, but we sure had fun.

David H. -- my experience matches yours, but we're living in a new age. Nowadays some borrowers are able to get mortgages with no down payments. Moreover, because many mortgages are sold into the secondary market, brokers and primary lenders don't even care if the borrowers are going to be able to pay their mortgages (thus the appearance of "no doc" and "liar" loans).

There also are programs whereby home buyers can obtain "gifts" to cover down payments and closing costs. For example, under the auspices of the American Dream Down Payment Initiative, which President Bush signed into law about 4 years ago, the federal government provides down payment grants of up $10,000 to qualified buyers:

http://www.hud.gov/offices/cpd/affordablehousing/programs/home/addi/

Besides federal government assistance and various state government subsidies, there are private "charities" such as Nehemiah and Ameridream which launder down payments funded by home sellers (including home builders). For example, suppose a seller wants to sell his home for $200,000. The seller "contributes" $25,000 to one of these phony charities and raises his price to $225,000. The charity gives this $25,000 contribution to the buyer. At closing, the buyer makes his $25,000 down payment with the gift, ending up with a $200,000 mortgage; and the seller receives $225,000, thereby recovering his $25,000 contribution and netting $200,000.

http://www.ameridream.org/

http://www.getdownpayment.com/)

With down payment schemes like the foregoing, combined with fraudulent appraisals, fraudulent credit ratings, and fraudulent AAA ratings of risky collateralized mortgage obligations, we shouldn't be surprised that house prices have skyrocketed. Ponzi would have been impressed. But now that the entire "house of cards" appears to be collapsing, the biggest crime of all is that Congress intends to force honest, prudent taxpayers like you and me to bail out many of the irresponsible borrowers and lenders in order to prevent house prices from falling and to protect the lenders' investments. The Bear Stearns fiasco is just the tip of the iceberg.

Most surprising and discouraging is that, given the facts about all the shady dealing in the housing and mortgage markets -- which has been not merely sanctioned but actively promoted by our federal and state governments -- there seems to be very little public outrage. I hope the lack of outrage is mainly due to ignorance and not widespread complacency, else I fear for America's future.

Lets just take another look at Mr & Mrs Typical--To start with many younger folks have a brand new truck and a near new car and every big toy possible--such as boat, snow mobile, 4-wheelers etc. Now take a look at what they might afford or not afford. Also we do not absoultly need a new home at this young age -- an apartment would really work just fine, so we probsbly need more apartments and this mignt also help--RENT CONTROL!!

here is another concern of mine. I notice that most of the positive house buying stories that are on this blog are of couples buying homes. Sad to say, not everyone is a couple. I am single, one income. One income can not afford a $1000 rent payment. Which seems to be the going rate. I can see why women move in with the men they are dating. It is a hell of a lot easier to take the scrutiny of living with a guy before marrying him than it is to find an affordable apartment on one income. Of course the scrutiny of living with a guy before being married is a-whole-nother issue, however, it is one to ponder.
I am an independent woman and who knows how long I have to wait till I find mister right. I'll be damned if I am going to wait for him till I move out on my own and rent/buy a house. I should be able to take care of myself. Thank you.

I think the housing cost in casper is plainoutright terrible. looking around town seeing all these new construction of all these $300,000+plus homes is ridiculous. who are moving into these homes? who can afford them? i don't see any big name jobs coming in paying people alot of money to be able to afford this home sin east gate or in wolf creek, then you have 1200 sq foot home 3 bed one bath on the market for 160,000-220,000 which are really just crap and requires more money to fix them up. apartments are 800>1000 amonth?! no wonder the service business in town here sucks! and people complain about waiting an hour to get food and service at applebee's. theres your reason, ther aren't enough people willing to work minimum wage or whatever and be able to afford housing here espicially with the rising cost of everything else. people are leaving town to go somewhere cheaper. I didn't know housing cost and aprtment rents were going to be big city rates like denver or on the east coast. 6 years ago an apartment at foxhill was 375 month for two bedrooms, you can find a 2000sq foot home w/4 bedrooms 2 bath for under 200,000, not its just not worth it. casper is just going to ruin itself eventually unless people do something about it. remember 10 years ago how housing wasn't an issue and things were simpler, RAISE the cost of housing they say but don't raise people's salary yeah that'll get people to move to casper, people aren't idiots at least i hope so

Another major thing buyers need to be aware of his the escalting property taxes. When I bought my house 5 years ago, the property taxes were $522 for the year. I just got my assessment from the county and they are $1047 for 2008, which is a 37% increase over just last year. That is an increase of 100% in just 5 years. It also means my payment is going up about $30 more per month. Now that $30 might not sound like a lot, but with gas prices, grocery prices and everything else skyrocketing it does make a difference. House payments don't stay the same amount just because you have a mortgage with a fixed interest loan. The thing that really ticks me off, is the county is supposed to have so much surplus, why are they sticking it to the middle income families on property taxes?

My question is, why on earth would anyone on earth move to Casper. That city was built on oil and uranium and there isn't that much activity in either of those around there at this time. The center of activity seems to have shifted significantly SW. Why live in a dump like Casper when you can live cheaper in a dump closer to the money?

Dave T~
That is all you have to say about the housing situation in Casper? That is not even worth posting.

Hear, hear, Michael. I am absolutely stunned that the government feels they can bail out the banks secondary to their greediness loaning people money they know they can't afford to pay back. And for the people being suckered in to sub prime mortgages with variable rates....shame. The old adage still holds true, if it sounds to good to be true, it is.

Dave....for those of us who love Casper, we thank you for not wanting to live here. Enjoy the SW...with income tax, higher housing in some areas, also uranium mining, and nuclear testing sites.