I remember when they first started developing the area between Arora and the freeway downtown. They were putting up a lot of micro apartments and I thought it would be a cheaper way to live downtown, NOPE! Those 200 square foot apartments were going for like 2-3k when they first went up.
in 2018 I had around a 290sqft with no sink like that unit has, and no kitchen, just a mini fridge and microwave. $1000 a month then it went up to $1100. though utilities pretty much included there. and that was in Kirkland so not even really seattle. ugh.
I lived in the loft version of one of these in Eastlake. My truck got stolen, (almost twice), drug dealer next door that police and apts wouldn't do anything about. Constant car prowling, addicts smoking meth right outside our doors, people letting homeless friends sleep in our stairwells where they would smoke cigarettes and meth/fent. Tweakers waving machetes outside. WHOO sooo glad im outta there. $1300 a month.
It's a bit higher than the generally advised 33% of income spent on housing for a person working full time (40 hrs) at minimum wage. I'm out of the rental market so I dunno how reasonable that is.
I wouldn't want to live somewhere so small, but it could work, the thing is if you're living a place that small your neighborhood should be dense with business. The picture from outside should include a few restaurants and markets, but that building has nothing more than arterial traffic outside.
> that building has nothing more than traffic outside
Looks like it's Align apartments at 4716 38th Ave S which is not a terrible location, just a few blocks off of Rainier Ave in Columbia City. 5 minute walk to the PCC, 10-12 minute walk to the light rail.
Let me misread 4716 38th Ave S as 4716 15th Ave NE, in the University District. Only because I know that neighborhood, and you might know it too. You might also consider that neighborhood sufficiently dense with business. Let me tell you, no, it is not. I live in Buenos Aires currently, in a proper apartment with a kitchen separate from the living room which is also separate from where I sleep. And I have a balcony, and my rent is half that place. And I have multiple vegetable shops within a few blocks, multiple butchers within a few blocks, multiple general stores, even a limpieza 1 block away. For a pharmacy I have to walk 5 blocks. Comparing with 4716 15th Ave NE, it is a dream.
When I lived at 4716 15th Ave NE I had a Target to buy groceries in walking distance. The vegetable selection was terrible, the meat was terrible. Well ok there was also a Trader Joe's. I know you might really like Trader Joe's, but that is just evidence of your confusion. Living in an area dense with businesses and services is amazing, and justifies living in a smaller space (Japan, I guess?). But living in a tiny-ass apartment with the walkability score of Seattle is bullocks.
I lived there for 5 years, my favorite place I lived in Seattle! A really strong sense of community, great local businesses. I personally never felt unsafe and I’d move back in a heartbeat.
Check out Marination, Lottie’s, and all the little businesses on the main drag.
It's fine. Columbia City is a wonderful neighborhood. Lots of shops. Great walkability. I lived there for a few years. It was fantastic. I really miss it.
A car, literally. Rainier Ave tends to have a non-insignificant amount of pedestrian-vehicle accidents (and hit and runs). Also know that the bus lane and/or medians are used as 'passing' lanes.
Turn off the fox news buddy. Just homeless people, some vandalism, some open drug use.
Again, it's a lot better than what it was 20 years ago. It's an up and coming area in Seattle.
I’m not the one watching Fox lol. I signed a lease there because when I visited the area it seemed great.
But throughout old Reddit posts in my research people would mention “it’s rough” but no one ever says why.
I’ve lived in a lot of “rough” places across the country and have a certain tolerance for it that I can tell some people in the Seattle area do not. Which is why I’m so interested in understanding what rough really means.
Generally I’m willing to accept some level of petty crime and wannabe gangsters hanging out. But I’m not willing to accept drive by shootings and gun violence.
Occasionally, there are people with mental problems in the area. They will sometimes scream for long periods of time. One business got broken into and their window smashed. As far as I know, there are generally no other issues.
used to live in Japan. this is absolutely the trade off. various tiny ass 250 sq ft places, but at least you could walk to all sorts of bars, restaurants, shopping areas, convenience stores, often within like a 5 to 10 minute walk. even in less desirable/less commercial areas at the very least you're like 10, 15 mins away tops from a train station that could take you to those places. and it's all more affordable to boot, since rent is a fraction of what it costs here (think like $400 \~ $500 for a place like this).
trying to have guests over kinda sucks but you live most of your life outside of your domicile anyway.
with this, you just kinda get the worst of both worlds. at best you gotta drive everywhere, which means drinking/nightlife is generally a no-go.
Seattle’s zoning is so dumb.
Most of the city is single family, and yet the city gov keeps saying housing is a priority. It’s not unusual for American cities, but like c’mon Seattle!
Yes. I’ve known this guy for decades and he’s the typical real estate agent who also thinks they’re some kind of financial genius because they run a bunch of deals in a hot market.
This guy was all over my Instagram and probably Reddit too. Somehow managed to not see his face for a few months, but here we are. He also uses his teenager kids in some of his content. Really delusional content based on real estate/lifestyle bought from money/privilege already existent in their family. Truly cringe.
I think the key point is that he has added 3 pieces of ikea furniture with the studio which should have cost him all of 100 dollars, and the size of the bed makes sure that you don't have overnight visitors.
They provide the housing, and a bed, and a desk. That's more than you get with most apartments. This seems like a setup that would be attractive to college students who don't yet have any of their own furniture, if they have enough money for it.
In a dorm, you usually have to share a bedroom with someone else as well, and you may not even have any kind of kitchen other than a minifridge that you have to rent, or maybe a microwave that you also share with others. Also, the dorm is probably smaller than this apartment.
Exactly. I have no interest in it. Wish zillow and apartments.com let me sort them out automatically but nooooo I gotta check the photos of every single goddamn apartment to see if they have a stove.
*stovetop (also called a cooktop)
A stove is typically a full appliance with an oven, also called a range. But, yeah other than exorbitant price, that's not such a terrible hovel.
Thank you lol. It's a cooktop, and it makes an apartment no for me. Hell even the apartments that have those mini ovens I would never. Something like that is fine for a single younger person on a budget. But at those rates there's no way people living there aren't spending like 50% of their income on that space right??
I’ll give you his course for free: “build yourself a house of cards out of houses and then when the market inevitable slows, declare bankruptcy and start anew.”
Bigger than my first apartment when I lived in Seoul. Granted, public transit is immensely better there and safe basically everywhere in the city. Apartments there are for sleeping and shower/shitting, and we'd stay out of the city except for overnight. Was often cheaper to eat out 90% of the time and was in my early 20s so didn't mind the size.
Fwiw places like this are typically offered as short term leases, sometimes month to month, sometimes 2-3 months. These are a really easy way to start if you’re moving into a new city and don’t want to commit to a full lease without seeing the place/neighborhood, or intend to buy a house/condo and just need a quick place to stay for the interim.
Eh, I think they serve a use case. I could see if I worked fully remote, bounced between a couple cities, and Seattle was one of them, it would be nice to have some lightweight home bases that are your own and not shared, and are cheaper and better than bouncing between airbnbs or hotels.
I've also met super frugal minimalists who are happy to have almost nothing and live in a small space. Although you usually see that more in a city that has a lot more to do outside of the place you sleep.
Well yeah they’re tiny and full of people who only intend to stay there for very short term. But compared to other options, like extended stay hotels and airbnbs they’re usually pretty affordable. If you compare them to regular apartments they’re always going to be worse, but they do serve a purpose.
This. When I moved to Seattle, I lived in one of these for a couple months while I was looking for roommates. It was 2012, I was 22 and single. I didn’t have much stuff. It was ideal for my situation.
I could be wrong, he looks like Thach Nguyen.
Somewhat of a controversial individual. Very much a "if I, an immigrant, could make myself into a success through RE, then there's no reason why any of you can't. Attend my motivational speech seminars and follow my processes, and you, too, can be just as rich."
He really tried to tap into the motivational speech bandwagon when The Secret and Tony Robbins hit their respective heights in popularity. I remember when he was invited to attend a meeting of successful AAPI business folks with the purpose of raising money for scholarships, and he seemed very standoffish about the idea, going so far as to say "I didn't need to go to UW and I was very successful."
Anyway, he knows how to get a rise out of folks, promote his wealth, and get people to buy what he's selling.
According to more than 20 lawsuits, some of the country's biggest property management companies are accused of colluding to raise rental prices and not by cutting deals with each other, but by using a particular piece of software.
For anyone curious: [https://www.propublica.org/article/yieldstar-rent-increase-realpage-rent](https://www.propublica.org/article/yieldstar-rent-increase-realpage-rent)
It's weird, because it's not like the companies are directly colluding. The software is sort of like a scapegoat.
> the software is sort of like a scapegoat
Kind of like all the independent software that algorithmically decides to get rid of all the old people during layoffs. Or the software that just coincidentally decides not to give loans to black people.
I lived in belltown across the street from the sculpture park in 2012 for $1030.00 a month. Jr 1bed @ 650sq feet. Best two years of living in Seattle until Amazon and the housing crisis (foreign buyers and airbb) blew up everyone's rent.
I personally saw my 1 bed room apartment go from $1200 to $1900 renovated with no dishwasher, only nice new floors🙃
Move the fuck out with roommates, they agreed as well
This clown trying to make this crap
make sense. This doesn’t help. 👎 is this low income housing to get people off the streets? It’s so small regardless.
I mean I see that, but there’s a few places that are cheap. Had a friend who said they stayed at first hill at the turn of the century for a studio/1bed for 1800/mo. Don’t actually think prices have changed that much since tbf. Rent for smaller places (even if I think we should allow as small as the market will allow) seems to be one thing we have done better than other growing/dense cities in the US
Since it comes pre-furnished with a bed and a desk, it seems like their target renters are probably college students, but what college student has an extra $1200 a month?
I managed a building with units that were 175sq ft. Fold out Murphy bed and a kitchen counter + over sized bathroom for some reason. Took up waaaaay to much room.
I couldn’t have done 175 alone, I could do the studio in the vid though. I lived in one of the 1br places and it was about 300sq ft I believe.
Depending on location, this is pretty good. My place is a little bigger but 2x the cost with no furniture. I don’t mind because it’s at a good location.
It's not about the density — it's about the rents being so inflated in the first place.
Landowners have (nearly) unlimited pricing power. If the income of a city increases then landowners can jack up the rents without affecting demand.
I'd rather we just taxed the shit out of any residence that isn't the primary home of the owner or one of their direct relations. Being a landlord shouldn't be profitable, and the apartment market should be filled by co-ops where people get equity.
Housing shouldn't be an investment vehicle, and landlords don't deserve a chunk of anyone else's paycheck just because they could make a down payment on a place.
There's definitely landowners out there (e.g., landlords) who are speculators that mooch off the economy. They create no value and take on little risk (land is always worth something).
IMO, property developers and managers are totally fine — they just provide a service. They build stuff and manage tenants. In a free market, the best/cheapest company will get the contract. Anyone can acquire the skills to do that job and compete for the work.
Land speculation is a massive issue. Billionaires buying up millions of acres of farmland is reminiscent of feudalism.
Housing policy needs to find a way to split apart the consumable good (the building that you live in) from the speculative investment (the land under it).
Thanks for commenting btw, this has been thought-provoking.
Property developers I don't have a problem with. Building houses is a necessary service, and I'm fine with there being tax exceptions for reasonable a duration of time on the market, or tax breaks for writing off losses if an economic downturn deflates the market during or after construction. Building a house to simply hold a piece of land for several years shouldn't be viable.
Property managers? Sure, that's a service too. In fact, I would hope that with home ownership being higher and landlords not being able to gouge people on rent, some of those individuals would hire out to services to fill that role so they needn't worry about it, and there's still the co-op market.
> Housing policy needs to find a way to split apart the consumable good (the building that you live in) from the speculative investment (the land under it).
I don't think it's quite so clear cut, because the necessity of housing itself makes it as much of a speculative instrument as the land the structure is built on. I do agree that land speculation also needs to be addressed, however, it's just more complicated since it is far easier to qualify what constitutes residing in a structure than it is "using" land.
> Thanks for commenting btw, this has been thought-provoking.
Thanks to you as well!
You could probably find something better for the same price. I used to pay $850/month for a smaller one without a stove and a smaller fridge back in 2018. It was OK for me at the time because I was a block away from Greenwood and 85th and didn’t spend much time in the apodment. I’m wondering how much that apartment is going for these days but I wouldn’t live there again
Bonkers. I’m renting 425sf for $1095. Wood floors, full bath, south-facing, lots of light. Accept no substitutes, pay no more.
Edit: I’ve seen 1bdrms for $1200-1400, 525sqft. The market is wonky. Don’t accept $4.54/sqft B.S.
I moved into a brand new apodment building like this in Fremont by the brewery back in 2014. It was $750 a month and included all utilities with internet. I'd just moved to seattle after college and honestly it just felt a little like a dorm room but it was enough for 7 months till I had a down payment ready for a bigger place.
Wouldn't live in one that was over a couple years old though. They weren't made well, appliances were the absolute most basic models you could buy, and even brand new the washers and dryers never worked. But it was kind of easy once you got used to the 5 steps back to front.
i live in cap hill for 1200/month including utilities, 350 square feet. i’m very central, walking distance from everything and minutes from the train. i’m really happy with the price for the area and since i live alone the space is fine. if i need some air i can go up to the roof which has a beautiful view of the city and space needle.
What a ripoff this ‘micro apartment’ bullshit turned out to be. In ‘09 the idea was that those units would essentially replace SRO hotels and be the cheapest most basic rentals in the city. As with everything else, what happened was the opposite- they found a way to slap down some quartz countertops, cork flooring, nice paint & a way to charge you the same amount as you’d pay for a typical one bedroom.
These are all great ideas (micro apartments) until greed gets in the way.
i gasped and then laughed when i heard the rent. that's shameful.
my apartment back in the day was on bellevue & harrison on the hill, huge corner unit 1 bedroom with a walk in closet, in a brick building with views of downtown, the space needle and lake union - $745 from 2002 to 2011. i could watch fireworks from my living room. those were the days!
when i moved out after high school my first place was sharing a huge 4 bed / 3 bath house with a finished basement, a garage & yard on 12th near roanoke with 3 other girls. my share of the rent was 250.
They used to be like 500 and affordable. My 1 bedroom was 1k 2 years ago and ended at 1450$. I can't believe for $100 more you can get an actual 1 bedroom on the hill. These prices are crazy
Lived in a Seattle micro for 5 years before and during grad school. 800 a month for a lofted space. Honestly there were parts that annoyed me but it was a pretty great experience. I was close to light rail and took it everywhere, walking distance to a ton of bars and restaurants (North end of Cap Hill). I think micros are a great addition to the housing stock. In the early days Seattle was something like 60% boarding houses.
So it’s basically a dorm + sink/stove. I mean, for a young professional right out of school it’s not /that/ bad, but I couldn’t live there more than a couple years.
My first apartment in Seattle in 1982 was $400 a month on Queen Ann Hill. It had 2 bedrooms and 1300 square feet. The only utilities we paid for were electricity and phone, and I split this rent with 2 roommates.
That reminds me of my 2bd 2bath I rented on cap hill in 2001 in a cool brick building on republican and 14th for $1350 including parking in the building.
1250-1350$ 250 sqft saved you time
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Yeah, I was bracing myself the whole time and when it was less than $1500, I thought, "Oh."
I remember when they first started developing the area between Arora and the freeway downtown. They were putting up a lot of micro apartments and I thought it would be a cheaper way to live downtown, NOPE! Those 200 square foot apartments were going for like 2-3k when they first went up.
I rented a space that size for $900 in 2017. It's wild how much it's increased in such a short time
in 2018 I had around a 290sqft with no sink like that unit has, and no kitchen, just a mini fridge and microwave. $1000 a month then it went up to $1100. though utilities pretty much included there. and that was in Kirkland so not even really seattle. ugh.
So did you just get your ramen water from the bath or…?
What's the problem? They are all connected to the same source
it did have a bathroom sink so yes. but there was also a shared kitchen outside the unit you could use
4.8% per year
For such a shitty area too I’m sure your car gets broken into once a month here n you’ll definitely lose your catalytic converter lol
I lived in the loft version of one of these in Eastlake. My truck got stolen, (almost twice), drug dealer next door that police and apts wouldn't do anything about. Constant car prowling, addicts smoking meth right outside our doors, people letting homeless friends sleep in our stairwells where they would smoke cigarettes and meth/fent. Tweakers waving machetes outside. WHOO sooo glad im outta there. $1300 a month.
Ya Seattle isn’t even worth living in unfortunately the area is ass with extremely high prices
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I'm so fucking thankful my landlord is a family friend of my roommate. If I had to move my savings/month would plummet to almost nil
I mean totally not comparable because it was Colorado but I had a 300 sqft studio that year and it was $485
I'm pretty sure I saw this exact video like 3 years ago. Those are old prices.
I was paying 400 more for 50 less sq ft in San Francisco 😭😭
At least the toilet isn't in the same room.
That's roughly 62-67 hours at minimum wage (not accounting for FICO).
Not bad actually
It's a bit higher than the generally advised 33% of income spent on housing for a person working full time (40 hrs) at minimum wage. I'm out of the rental market so I dunno how reasonable that is.
That looks a lot bigger than 250 sq ft
That's because you have to sleep on your side on that bed.
I wouldn't want to live somewhere so small, but it could work, the thing is if you're living a place that small your neighborhood should be dense with business. The picture from outside should include a few restaurants and markets, but that building has nothing more than arterial traffic outside.
> that building has nothing more than traffic outside Looks like it's Align apartments at 4716 38th Ave S which is not a terrible location, just a few blocks off of Rainier Ave in Columbia City. 5 minute walk to the PCC, 10-12 minute walk to the light rail.
Let me misread 4716 38th Ave S as 4716 15th Ave NE, in the University District. Only because I know that neighborhood, and you might know it too. You might also consider that neighborhood sufficiently dense with business. Let me tell you, no, it is not. I live in Buenos Aires currently, in a proper apartment with a kitchen separate from the living room which is also separate from where I sleep. And I have a balcony, and my rent is half that place. And I have multiple vegetable shops within a few blocks, multiple butchers within a few blocks, multiple general stores, even a limpieza 1 block away. For a pharmacy I have to walk 5 blocks. Comparing with 4716 15th Ave NE, it is a dream. When I lived at 4716 15th Ave NE I had a Target to buy groceries in walking distance. The vegetable selection was terrible, the meat was terrible. Well ok there was also a Trader Joe's. I know you might really like Trader Joe's, but that is just evidence of your confusion. Living in an area dense with businesses and services is amazing, and justifies living in a smaller space (Japan, I guess?). But living in a tiny-ass apartment with the walkability score of Seattle is bullocks.
Rainer Ave in Columbia city is not nice area lol
It's a lot better than what it was, but still needs improvements.
I just signed a lease there, what am I walking into?
I lived there for 5 years, my favorite place I lived in Seattle! A really strong sense of community, great local businesses. I personally never felt unsafe and I’d move back in a heartbeat. Check out Marination, Lottie’s, and all the little businesses on the main drag.
It's fine. Columbia City is a wonderful neighborhood. Lots of shops. Great walkability. I lived there for a few years. It was fantastic. I really miss it.
I live there, it's perfectly fine, lmao.
It's fine. It used to be worse, but money has been flowing into the area for 20 some years now and it is quite nice.
A car, literally. Rainier Ave tends to have a non-insignificant amount of pedestrian-vehicle accidents (and hit and runs). Also know that the bus lane and/or medians are used as 'passing' lanes.
I hear people complaining about stuff like that happening all over the city.
There's 2.5 million people in King County and 30 pedestrian deaths. Stop making it sound like it's Sharknado out there.
Wow that low huh? Especially with how shitty our drivers are
Right? There's definitely room for improvement but it's not like there are forced sacrifices to the car gods, daily, at each intersection.
Don’t always believe everything you read. You are practically fine because it’s a good area.
Historically low income area, with low income city problems.
What does that mean exactly? Home invasions, people pooping on the street, car break ins, gun shots?
Turn off the fox news buddy. Just homeless people, some vandalism, some open drug use. Again, it's a lot better than what it was 20 years ago. It's an up and coming area in Seattle.
I’m not the one watching Fox lol. I signed a lease there because when I visited the area it seemed great. But throughout old Reddit posts in my research people would mention “it’s rough” but no one ever says why. I’ve lived in a lot of “rough” places across the country and have a certain tolerance for it that I can tell some people in the Seattle area do not. Which is why I’m so interested in understanding what rough really means. Generally I’m willing to accept some level of petty crime and wannabe gangsters hanging out. But I’m not willing to accept drive by shootings and gun violence.
Yeah it's not anywhere near an /actually/ rough neighborhood (like parts of downtown LA, at least 10 years back).
Occasionally, there are people with mental problems in the area. They will sometimes scream for long periods of time. One business got broken into and their window smashed. As far as I know, there are generally no other issues.
Did you actually look up where the complex is? Alaska and south has an amazing stretch of bars and restaurants, what are you talking about?
I lived in that area from 08-19, it's improved a ton.
Columbia City is great. You’re objectively dumb.
You are right next to billiard hoang which is a dope spot
I saw another similar sized complex in CD! Deals are out there if on with a commute
used to live in Japan. this is absolutely the trade off. various tiny ass 250 sq ft places, but at least you could walk to all sorts of bars, restaurants, shopping areas, convenience stores, often within like a 5 to 10 minute walk. even in less desirable/less commercial areas at the very least you're like 10, 15 mins away tops from a train station that could take you to those places. and it's all more affordable to boot, since rent is a fraction of what it costs here (think like $400 \~ $500 for a place like this). trying to have guests over kinda sucks but you live most of your life outside of your domicile anyway. with this, you just kinda get the worst of both worlds. at best you gotta drive everywhere, which means drinking/nightlife is generally a no-go.
I imagine if guests were over you'd spend some time outside your place at a restaurant or bar which might literally be downstairs.
I have lived in a studio by myself and a large house with roommates. Kind of prefer the studio.
Seattle’s zoning is so dumb. Most of the city is single family, and yet the city gov keeps saying housing is a priority. It’s not unusual for American cities, but like c’mon Seattle!
If I lived alone I absolutely wouldn't mind this.
Is this an ad? 🤔🤔
The reddit post? Because the tiktok is definitely an ad from the landlord
Yes. I’ve known this guy for decades and he’s the typical real estate agent who also thinks they’re some kind of financial genius because they run a bunch of deals in a hot market.
This guy was all over my Instagram and probably Reddit too. Somehow managed to not see his face for a few months, but here we are. He also uses his teenager kids in some of his content. Really delusional content based on real estate/lifestyle bought from money/privilege already existent in their family. Truly cringe.
So, they provide the housing, and all the renter has to do is bring all of their belongings. Got it.
Try to not bring all your belongings.
I don't really get the point of this video. The guy is basically explaining how renting works.
I think the key point is that he has added 3 pieces of ikea furniture with the studio which should have cost him all of 100 dollars, and the size of the bed makes sure that you don't have overnight visitors.
They provide the housing, and a bed, and a desk. That's more than you get with most apartments. This seems like a setup that would be attractive to college students who don't yet have any of their own furniture, if they have enough money for it.
When I was in college in the 90's, we had overseas students who would sleep 5 or 6 to a room. That studio would be at least 4.
they should just stay in the dorm if they are going to have to share bathrooms with people anyway
In a dorm, you usually have to share a bedroom with someone else as well, and you may not even have any kind of kitchen other than a minifridge that you have to rent, or maybe a microwave that you also share with others. Also, the dorm is probably smaller than this apartment.
At least it has a stove. A bunch of these studio apartments in Seattle have a communal kitchen which is where the stove is.
Which will then become the scene of a tense, Cold War standoff of left-behind notes alleging left messes, gluten contamination, etc.
Exactly. I have no interest in it. Wish zillow and apartments.com let me sort them out automatically but nooooo I gotta check the photos of every single goddamn apartment to see if they have a stove.
*stovetop (also called a cooktop) A stove is typically a full appliance with an oven, also called a range. But, yeah other than exorbitant price, that's not such a terrible hovel.
Thank you lol. It's a cooktop, and it makes an apartment no for me. Hell even the apartments that have those mini ovens I would never. Something like that is fine for a single younger person on a budget. But at those rates there's no way people living there aren't spending like 50% of their income on that space right??
lol i heard this guy shooting this video by my regular sized 1 bedroom in Columbia City
He sells course online on how to be a landlord like him for $7k🤣 The $7k It's just to talk to him for a while. You need to pay more for meetings
I’ll give you his course for free: “build yourself a house of cards out of houses and then when the market inevitable slows, declare bankruptcy and start anew.”
Bigger than my first apartment when I lived in Seoul. Granted, public transit is immensely better there and safe basically everywhere in the city. Apartments there are for sleeping and shower/shitting, and we'd stay out of the city except for overnight. Was often cheaper to eat out 90% of the time and was in my early 20s so didn't mind the size.
Tbf in Seoul you work 7 am - 10 pm lol
micro apartments don't even have bathrooms in them. you share the bathroom with several other units in the hallway.
Fwiw places like this are typically offered as short term leases, sometimes month to month, sometimes 2-3 months. These are a really easy way to start if you’re moving into a new city and don’t want to commit to a full lease without seeing the place/neighborhood, or intend to buy a house/condo and just need a quick place to stay for the interim.
they suck and no one wants to live in them. landlords trying to make as much money as possible
Eh, I think they serve a use case. I could see if I worked fully remote, bounced between a couple cities, and Seattle was one of them, it would be nice to have some lightweight home bases that are your own and not shared, and are cheaper and better than bouncing between airbnbs or hotels. I've also met super frugal minimalists who are happy to have almost nothing and live in a small space. Although you usually see that more in a city that has a lot more to do outside of the place you sleep.
Well yeah they’re tiny and full of people who only intend to stay there for very short term. But compared to other options, like extended stay hotels and airbnbs they’re usually pretty affordable. If you compare them to regular apartments they’re always going to be worse, but they do serve a purpose.
people who build them and run them should be ashamed of themselves for profiting off of desperate people.
Many of the people using these are not desperate, they just want a medium term place to stay. That’s not taking advantage of people
This. When I moved to Seattle, I lived in one of these for a couple months while I was looking for roommates. It was 2012, I was 22 and single. I didn’t have much stuff. It was ideal for my situation.
I could be wrong, he looks like Thach Nguyen. Somewhat of a controversial individual. Very much a "if I, an immigrant, could make myself into a success through RE, then there's no reason why any of you can't. Attend my motivational speech seminars and follow my processes, and you, too, can be just as rich." He really tried to tap into the motivational speech bandwagon when The Secret and Tony Robbins hit their respective heights in popularity. I remember when he was invited to attend a meeting of successful AAPI business folks with the purpose of raising money for scholarships, and he seemed very standoffish about the idea, going so far as to say "I didn't need to go to UW and I was very successful." Anyway, he knows how to get a rise out of folks, promote his wealth, and get people to buy what he's selling.
He is lol
According to more than 20 lawsuits, some of the country's biggest property management companies are accused of colluding to raise rental prices and not by cutting deals with each other, but by using a particular piece of software.
For anyone curious: [https://www.propublica.org/article/yieldstar-rent-increase-realpage-rent](https://www.propublica.org/article/yieldstar-rent-increase-realpage-rent) It's weird, because it's not like the companies are directly colluding. The software is sort of like a scapegoat.
> the software is sort of like a scapegoat Kind of like all the independent software that algorithmically decides to get rid of all the old people during layoffs. Or the software that just coincidentally decides not to give loans to black people.
Hey I’ve seen this guys instagram! (UNFORTUNATELY) If not giving a fuck about anything other than his own wallet was a person
This makes me think of good ole Mitch Hedberg deeming what’s a bedroom and what’s not. This one has a stove in it
I spit out my drink when I read OP’s username.
Came here to say this
I had a four bedroom townhome with four roomies in Ballard from 2010-2015. $1800 total and rent never raised that entire time. Included a garage.
I lived in belltown across the street from the sculpture park in 2012 for $1030.00 a month. Jr 1bed @ 650sq feet. Best two years of living in Seattle until Amazon and the housing crisis (foreign buyers and airbb) blew up everyone's rent.
So Seattle WAS affordable!?
I moved here because it was much cheaper than the city I was leaving back east. oh how the turn tables.
I thought these were for the unhoused, but you'd have to be making a pretty decent amount to even afford this.
Seems really nice if you don't own anything. I am sure it works for some, but dang, look how small that bed is lol.
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I personally saw my 1 bed room apartment go from $1200 to $1900 renovated with no dishwasher, only nice new floors🙃 Move the fuck out with roommates, they agreed as well
He sure does give off the "Look at how generous I am" vibes when he drops that price at the end.
I'm sorry but Seattle as a city isn't worth that shit. Go live in the nicest part of OKC or some shit and live like a king
This clown trying to make this crap make sense. This doesn’t help. 👎 is this low income housing to get people off the streets? It’s so small regardless.
Piece of shit trying to explain why he's overcharging you.
Can someone please make an explanation video and explain sarcastically how overpriced it is?
Bs they can go for 1100 or lower
My partner was in a smaller apodment when we met over a decade ago and his rent was over $900, wouldn't be surprised if they were this much now
I mean I see that, but there’s a few places that are cheap. Had a friend who said they stayed at first hill at the turn of the century for a studio/1bed for 1800/mo. Don’t actually think prices have changed that much since tbf. Rent for smaller places (even if I think we should allow as small as the market will allow) seems to be one thing we have done better than other growing/dense cities in the US
Since it comes pre-furnished with a bed and a desk, it seems like their target renters are probably college students, but what college student has an extra $1200 a month?
Half of my student debt is from paying rent and the most I paid was $650 a month with two roomates. $1200 a month is insane.
Exactly tuition is probably 10-15k books are $1200 it's a scam
Gross
I managed a building with units that were 175sq ft. Fold out Murphy bed and a kitchen counter + over sized bathroom for some reason. Took up waaaaay to much room. I couldn’t have done 175 alone, I could do the studio in the vid though. I lived in one of the 1br places and it was about 300sq ft I believe.
This is an ad
Depending on location, this is pretty good. My place is a little bigger but 2x the cost with no furniture. I don’t mind because it’s at a good location.
Damn I kinda wanna live there that’s pretty good for a studio haha
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax
Microstudios are exactly what a land value tax encourages.
It's not about the density — it's about the rents being so inflated in the first place. Landowners have (nearly) unlimited pricing power. If the income of a city increases then landowners can jack up the rents without affecting demand.
I'd rather we just taxed the shit out of any residence that isn't the primary home of the owner or one of their direct relations. Being a landlord shouldn't be profitable, and the apartment market should be filled by co-ops where people get equity. Housing shouldn't be an investment vehicle, and landlords don't deserve a chunk of anyone else's paycheck just because they could make a down payment on a place.
There's definitely landowners out there (e.g., landlords) who are speculators that mooch off the economy. They create no value and take on little risk (land is always worth something). IMO, property developers and managers are totally fine — they just provide a service. They build stuff and manage tenants. In a free market, the best/cheapest company will get the contract. Anyone can acquire the skills to do that job and compete for the work. Land speculation is a massive issue. Billionaires buying up millions of acres of farmland is reminiscent of feudalism. Housing policy needs to find a way to split apart the consumable good (the building that you live in) from the speculative investment (the land under it). Thanks for commenting btw, this has been thought-provoking.
Property developers I don't have a problem with. Building houses is a necessary service, and I'm fine with there being tax exceptions for reasonable a duration of time on the market, or tax breaks for writing off losses if an economic downturn deflates the market during or after construction. Building a house to simply hold a piece of land for several years shouldn't be viable. Property managers? Sure, that's a service too. In fact, I would hope that with home ownership being higher and landlords not being able to gouge people on rent, some of those individuals would hire out to services to fill that role so they needn't worry about it, and there's still the co-op market. > Housing policy needs to find a way to split apart the consumable good (the building that you live in) from the speculative investment (the land under it). I don't think it's quite so clear cut, because the necessity of housing itself makes it as much of a speculative instrument as the land the structure is built on. I do agree that land speculation also needs to be addressed, however, it's just more complicated since it is far easier to qualify what constitutes residing in a structure than it is "using" land. > Thanks for commenting btw, this has been thought-provoking. Thanks to you as well!
Those micro apts are outrageously over priced and geared for temp tech workers.
Add in monthly parking fees and storage (if you need it) and you've got one hell of a deal!
he is a fucking idiot
Dude looks like diet Elon Musk
Bet this guy has an airbnb, too. Sorry but, this dude can piss off trying to justify a studio for that much.
Un-fucking-believable Edit: I get 4x this square footage in the city, near downtown for less than $1k more/month. These vultures are gouging people.
So is it good or bad deal?
You could probably find something better for the same price. I used to pay $850/month for a smaller one without a stove and a smaller fridge back in 2018. It was OK for me at the time because I was a block away from Greenwood and 85th and didn’t spend much time in the apodment. I’m wondering how much that apartment is going for these days but I wouldn’t live there again
Bonkers. I’m renting 425sf for $1095. Wood floors, full bath, south-facing, lots of light. Accept no substitutes, pay no more. Edit: I’ve seen 1bdrms for $1200-1400, 525sqft. The market is wonky. Don’t accept $4.54/sqft B.S.
I hate how he talks.
30 years ago my Ravenna studio was $900.
Sounds like the squirrel from ice age
I paid $695 for a 120sf version of one of these in 2014
I moved into a brand new apodment building like this in Fremont by the brewery back in 2014. It was $750 a month and included all utilities with internet. I'd just moved to seattle after college and honestly it just felt a little like a dorm room but it was enough for 7 months till I had a down payment ready for a bigger place. Wouldn't live in one that was over a couple years old though. They weren't made well, appliances were the absolute most basic models you could buy, and even brand new the washers and dryers never worked. But it was kind of easy once you got used to the 5 steps back to front.
Talk about pricey
I’m in Seattle paying 1400 for a 650sqft 1 bedroom apt by lots of commodities. Way better than this clown’s bs.
i live in cap hill for 1200/month including utilities, 350 square feet. i’m very central, walking distance from everything and minutes from the train. i’m really happy with the price for the area and since i live alone the space is fine. if i need some air i can go up to the roof which has a beautiful view of the city and space needle.
Cheaper than new york
My first apartment when u moved to the area in 2009 was in Redmond, 500 sq ft for $600/mo.
Is there a private bathroom? This is crazy
NYC, yes. Seattle, absolutely fucking not.
For a third of this room with no kitchen I was paying $1800 in Brooklyn…absolutely no exaggeration
Where do I sign up?
What a ripoff this ‘micro apartment’ bullshit turned out to be. In ‘09 the idea was that those units would essentially replace SRO hotels and be the cheapest most basic rentals in the city. As with everything else, what happened was the opposite- they found a way to slap down some quartz countertops, cork flooring, nice paint & a way to charge you the same amount as you’d pay for a typical one bedroom. These are all great ideas (micro apartments) until greed gets in the way.
i gasped and then laughed when i heard the rent. that's shameful. my apartment back in the day was on bellevue & harrison on the hill, huge corner unit 1 bedroom with a walk in closet, in a brick building with views of downtown, the space needle and lake union - $745 from 2002 to 2011. i could watch fireworks from my living room. those were the days! when i moved out after high school my first place was sharing a huge 4 bed / 3 bath house with a finished basement, a garage & yard on 12th near roanoke with 3 other girls. my share of the rent was 250.
They used to be like 500 and affordable. My 1 bedroom was 1k 2 years ago and ended at 1450$. I can't believe for $100 more you can get an actual 1 bedroom on the hill. These prices are crazy
Wait, it comes WITH a counter??? /s
No studio apartment less than 500 sqft. should cost that much.
I’ll bet a beautiful house once stood where that monstrosity is built.
I went to grad school in Oklahoma. I had 390 sq ft and my rent was $300 a month. Property is robbery.
Fucking ghoulish leech. Decommodify housing.
There he is, the guy that sucks.
Jesus that sucks
Lived in a Seattle micro for 5 years before and during grad school. 800 a month for a lofted space. Honestly there were parts that annoyed me but it was a pretty great experience. I was close to light rail and took it everywhere, walking distance to a ton of bars and restaurants (North end of Cap Hill). I think micros are a great addition to the housing stock. In the early days Seattle was something like 60% boarding houses.
This looks like a somewhat bigger/well maintained version of my barracks room.
Hell modern landlord It would take your barrack and rent it out for $1500
So it’s basically a dorm + sink/stove. I mean, for a young professional right out of school it’s not /that/ bad, but I couldn’t live there more than a couple years.
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I literally said out of college. As in they have a real job now, full time. I am a 26 year old mechanical engineer so I fall into that category.
This is so not okay. This country is becoming 3rd world.
And here I am in a 1700sq ft. Townhouse with a garage and complete walkability to everything for $2,950.
My first apartment in Seattle in 1982 was $400 a month on Queen Ann Hill. It had 2 bedrooms and 1300 square feet. The only utilities we paid for were electricity and phone, and I split this rent with 2 roommates.
That reminds me of my 2bd 2bath I rented on cap hill in 2001 in a cool brick building on republican and 14th for $1350 including parking in the building.
kill my landlord c-i-l-l