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"[The rent] has gone from $850 in March 2015 to $1,295 now."
Walter G.
Talent
Walter moved to Talent from Virginia in order to be closer to family. Since then, he’s been priced out of one home and foresees a difficult move again in the next year given the rent increases and shrinking availability of affordable housing.
I moved from Virginia in September 2013 to be near my sister who lives in Ashland. She found an apartment for me through CPM, which is one of the big property management companies. It was $850 for a townhouse in Ashland.
Then my landlord went from CPM to Pacific Properties. That was around March or April of 2015. The rent went from $850 to $995 when it went to Pacific Properties. So, I left that location, and I moved to a place called Talent Parkside which is on Rapp Road in Talent, OR. I moved there in May of 2015, and the rent was $900 for an end of the row townhouse.
The next year, my anniversary year, it went to $1,000. And then this May it will go up to $1,090. My monthly income is $2800 so over a third goes to housing. I know that a new person coming in to where I am now is being charged $1,180.
CPM pretty much took over all of Pacific Properties rentals in 2016, and the place I rented in Ashland now rents for $1,295. So, it has gone from $850 in March 2015 to $1,295 now.
I was doing subsidized rentals in Virginia. The income threshold for a subsidized rental is
different from state to state; there you can make as much as $34,000 a year, whereas with most subsidized housing in Oregon you can’t make more than $11,000 or maybe $19,000. So that is not an option for me particularly.
Where I am living now, when I moved in the security deposit was $600; now it is not uncommon to pay $1,200. Looking at other rentals on Craigslist shows some landlords asking as much as $1,500 for a security deposit.
I figure if I can live where I am one more year, even though the rent is increasing $90 a month, then I am saving on the security deposit. I am not having that money tied up. I do plan to stay where I am likely for another year. They just sent me a letter saying that the rent will go up to $1,090 in May, and it will be good for 12 months.
I – and many of my neighbors – have a lot of stress about housing. Rent costs too much. We need some form of rent stabilization in Oregon, or eventually I will have to move away because I wouldn’t be able to afford it here.